 
# Blue Crystal Oracle

# By

# K. G. Lawrence

# Book 4 of the Proteus Group Series

Copyright 2016 K.G. Lawrence

Cover Design: SelfPubBookCovers.com/Shardel

All rights reserved.

**ISBN:** 9781370991358

Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.

Discover other titles in the Proteus Group Series by K.G. Lawrence:

Book 1 Wear Something Red

Book 2 Rembrandt be Damned

Book 3 Jellyfish

Book 5 A Vague Recollection of Something Blue

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 10

Chapter 20

Chapter 30

Chapter 40

Chapter 50

Other Books by K.G. Lawrence

Wear Something Red

Rembrandt Be Damned

Jellyfish

A Vague Recollection of Something Blue

Shadow Caste

#  Chapter 1

The blue gun was made of plastic, but it wasn't a toy. It fit her hand perfectly and felt light in her grasp. The trigger had a smooth, precise action when she squeezed it.

"Mrs. Lomax . . . Savannah," the older of the two men said, "think about what you're doing."

It had dual-laser sighting. She couldn't miss, just point the two red dots at either of the two men on their knees before her and shoot.

"There is no need for this."

The clip contained thirty rounds of small-caliber bullets fired at twice the velocity of the next fastest handgun made. A semi-automatic, it was a short-range weapon designed to be used in tight places to take down as many people as possible as quickly as possible.

"Where is my daughter?"

Four more clips of thirty rounds each were stuffed into her pockets.

"We can still work this out," the older man said.

"Where is she?"

She didn't understand the significance of making the gun out of plastic, and she didn't care. She had used one clip to get here and it had been effective. That was all that mattered.

She stepped closer to the two men. "You're stalling."

"No, Savannah, that's not it."

As she took a moment to look through the laboratory windows at the catwalk outside, she touched the bloody wound on her forehead and then the one near her right temple. Her shirt was torn at the left shoulder and stained with her husband's blood.

Ryan laid on the laboratory floor three paces to her left. The blood had finally stopped pooling around his waist.

She checked for a pulse one last time.

"Savannah, we've come so far together. You have no idea what Sage can do. She could be the end of all of us or she could be a new beginning. Just let us—"

"Shut-up!"

Four men, security guards, lay dead and strewn about the laboratory. Two other men were dead in the laboratory one floor below them.

"Do you expect me to count to three?" She put the gun to the older man's temple. "I should just kill you now for all you've done to us, for all you were going to do to us." She patted her stomach and squeezed the trigger back.

The younger man, a surgeon, had a bloody wound on his forehead similar to hers.

"Fine. One." She grabbed a handful of messy salt-and-pepper hair and dragged the older man over to the console that controlled the locks on all the laboratory doors. "Two." A tug back and hard push forward propelled his face into the metallic corner of the console.

The man grunted one sharp, painful gasp before crumpling to the floor.

Savannah didn't give him a chance to catch his breath. She kicked at him to force him back beside his partner.

"Three." She squeezed off a shot near their knees. It sounded muted compared to the noises the rifles those four dead men never got the chance to fire would make.

They had conceived and instigated their plan shortly after Sage's final procedure. They had manipulated everything in order to get her and her daughter back to this medical research facility in east San Francisco.

Another look over at Ryan brought tears again. She wiped her eyes and aimed the gun at the older man. Her trembling subsided the moment she pulled back the hammer.

Through clenched teeth, she said, "I won't ask again."

The two men glanced at each other, but neither of them said anything.

"Fuck you!"

Each man held up a hand as if that would actually stop a high-velocity bullet; a purely reflexive response.

These two had thought they knew everything. They believed they had controlled every phase of her daughter's experimental treatments. They were going to deliver their greatest achievement to the ones holding their leashes. They had been bigger fools than she had.

The older man said, "Think about what you're doing. Think about how we all got here. Don't do something you will regret. Don't do anything that will harm Sage."

Her hands began trembling again. "I trusted you." She squeezed on the trigger.

"Remember what it's been like for you, Mrs. Lomax."

She glanced at Ryan. "Don't call me that."

He nodded. "It's been an episodic life with Sage, has it not? Remember the promise of your first child, the shock, the setbacks, the unexpected threats and challenges? Remember how we helped both you and Sage through all that?"

"She's in here somewhere. Where did you put her? What are you doing to her?" She pressed the gun hard against the older man's forehead, forcing his head back, tilting his face up so she could look straight into his eyes.

"All right, you want to be angry, be angry. You have every right to feel that way, but don't be foolish. Just take a moment and remember, Savannah. We've been with you the whole way. Think about all you went through twelve years ago to finally give birth to the child you thought you would never have."

# Chapter 2

She took another deep breath, grunted and pushed again. The stabbing pain shot up from her uterus to her heart.

Ryan supported her shoulders. "One more, sweetheart, you're almost there. She wants to come into this world. One more push, that's it."

Ann Devonshire wiped Savannah's brow. "You're doing great. You both are. Just remember your lessons. She's almost here, almost here."

"Hold on," she said to Ryan.

"I've got you." He squeezed her shoulders.

Savannah strained and pushed and yelled. Shards of pain seemed to be trying to shred her to pieces.

Dr. Felix Humboldt said, "I see the head." He looked over at Drs. Tammy Darrow and Robert Visser. His eyes opened wide. "It looks normal." The tone of surprise in his voice matched his eyes.

"Again, sweetheart. That's it. You're doing great." Ryan kissed the back of her neck.

She would insist forever that the shiver his kiss sent through her provided the power behind her last push to bring their child into the world.

"She's beautiful," Ann Devonshire declared, "a beautiful, beautiful baby girl."

Darrow and Visser rushed over to the surgery table to take a quick look at the new arrival. Visser bumped the cart containing all the medical instruments needed for a C-section if that had been necessary.

She leaned back against Ryan but continued to take deep breaths. Though the contractions were subsiding, each one still felt like a knife slashing at her insides.

"I love you." He kissed her cheek.

With assistance from Ann Devonshire, Dr. Humboldt took care of the umbilical cord. Darrow and Visser backed up to their previous position to just observe.

Devonshire and senior nurse, Elizabeth Bergeron, quickly cleaned and wrapped the baby before handing her over.

Devonshire cooed, "Your angel is a bit early. We need to keep her extra clean and warm."

Bergeron said, "Congratulations." Her voice carried no joy, no conviction.

Her daughter was six weeks premature. Blue eyes starred up at Savannah but with no focus to them. She didn't move. She didn't cry. Savannah could barely feel her breath.

"I love you," she whispered and took hold of Ryan's hand. "Mommy and daddy love you so much." Their tiny daughter just lay there in her arms. "She's so light."

"She's wonderful," Ryan said. His voice failed when he touched his daughter's cheek. "I have the two best girls in the world."

Nurse Devonshire said, "She's your very own great big miracle."

Their daughter didn't move or cry. To Savannah, it felt like she had just stopped breathing.

Dr. Humboldt took off his white surgery cap to reveal a mess of long, greying hair and backed up to stand with Darrow and Visser. They whispered together, but their whispering soon became a hushed and animated debate. When they broke their huddle, Humboldt came back to them.

Nurse Bergeron took the still baby from Savannah.

Humboldt said, "We need to do those tests we talked about. And you need to get some rest. Let us take care of your new treasure for the next while and let you get your strength back."

"It's okay," Ryan said and gently squeezed her hand. "We knew this was going to happen. Everything is ready for her. She will be all right."

His voice had no more conviction behind it than Bergeron's had.

Elizabeth Bergeron placed Sage into the incubator and followed the three doctors out of surgery on their way to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.

Nurse Devonshire smiled and brought over the wheelchair for her. "Let's get you rested up so you can hold your baby girl again as soon as possible."

Pain sliced through her abdomen when she called after the others through the closing door, "Her name is Sage." She looked up at Ryan's glistening eyes with tears welling up in hers. "They should know her name."

# Chapter 3

Dr. Felix Humboldt fixed the x-rays to the backlit screen. "How did we miss this until just a few weeks ago?"

Dr. Visser just repeated what he'd always said before, "That opaque extracellular matrix in her head must have clouded the image. It looked like there should be something there. It looked like normal development."

"You had problems from the start. At one point, you thought she was going to have triplets."

"That's what the 2D ultrasound showed at first. Ten days later, the 3D corrected the image. They were only cysts on the inside wall of her uterus."

Darrow counted off on her fingers as she listed the encouraging but incorrect results from all the ultrasounds they had taken. "At six weeks, we saw what appeared to be normal development in the telencephalon, mesencephalon and rhombencephalon. She had a forebrain, a midbrain and a hindbrain. We saw normal development in movement coordination. Her mouth would open, her thumb would go in. At twenty-eight weeks, she opened her eyes. Blood flow was good in the middle cerebral artery. There are no lesions."

Visser added, "The mother tested free of any viruses or genetic anomalies. The amniotic fluid tests were fine. Nothing in the images suggested anything other than—"

"Then we get this." Humboldt put up the most recent x-rays. "That's all this poor girl has."

Visser said, "It's a wonder she isn't exhibiting symptoms of anencephaly. With no functioning cerebrum, she should never have been able to gain consciousness."

Darrow countered with, "But the neural tube did close."

He tapped one of the x-rays of Sage's head. "So, something inside that opaque mystery must be working, then, wouldn't you say?"

"But for how long?" Darrow scanned the pre-natal reports. "She's alive . . . for now. There is some stem cell development. But we may be looking at little more than autonomic functions and who knows how long they will last?"

He said, "Others have survived."

Darrow asked, "What about the array?"

Visser shook his head. "It's too early for both the girl and the array to consider that option. The array is still in the research stage and she may never develop sufficiently for it to be of any use to her."

"It's designed to help people with Parkinson's and those who suffer severe seizures. It could possibly help her with basic functions like breathing and rudimentary movement."

Darrow said, "Felix, we don't even know if she's going to survive the night. She looked half-dead to me. Even you have to admit she didn't look good. If she could make it through the next three or four years, and that would be pushing our luck because she would still be too young, we might be able to consider that option. Right now, however, she's just too small and fragile for that kind of surgery."

Visser said, "Who knows how much better it will be in three or four years? If she's still here, we would have a better idea of what her special needs are. They could design the array to specifically deal with those needs." He shook his head again. "But not right now."

"Contact Novus Somnia, tell them they have an obligation here. It was their Ovagamex she took. It was their revolutionary new in vitro technique that delivered this problem to Savannah and Ryan Lomax."

Dr. Visser stopped at the door. "Ramona really likes Savannah. She will make sure Novus Somnia steps up for them." He left.

Dr. Darrow took down the x-rays and then took hold of his hands. "It's all very well, Felix, to make plans for her future, but what do we do for her until then?"

"Every damn thing we can. And then we pray."

# *****

"Shit," Bergeron said for the fourth time. "It's impossible. They're too small. I can't find a vein big enough."

Devonshire blew a kiss to Sage. "She's breathing on her own pretty good. She's a fighter, Liz. She's going to make it. I just know she is."

"Not if I don't get this PICC line into her. She'll starve to death before she ever gets the chance."

Ann took hold of the tiny girl's arm and gently slapped her skin. She squeezed and massaged and stroked. "Come on, pretty girl. Give me a vein and we'll take good care of you, I promise, sweetie."

The fifth attempt was successful. The needle looked like a harpoon going into her arm.

Sage didn't cry or fuss when it went in. She just looked up at them from her incubator with wonderful blue eyes.

"You can do it, sweetheart. I know you can."

Bergeron checked all the pads attached to Sage's chest, her legs and arms. Three of the pads were specifically designed to stimulate her muscles. Recent research had indicated a modest stimulation could go a long way to encouraging development of muscle tissue, bone growth and even organs.

It was no substitute for contact with her mother, though. If this preemie was going to make it, she needed her mother's touch, as much of it as she could get. Even that might not be enough, though.

Ann wiped her eyes and whispered, "You're too precious. You just have to live."

"It might be better if she didn't."

"Don't say that. God didn't bring her this far just to let her die."

"God had nothing to do with _this_. It was those damned drugs. They should have adopted instead of risking _this_ trying to have one of their own. Now look at what they've got: only heartache, guilt and regret."

Ann Devonshire continued to coo at Sage as she positioned the Bili lights and turned them on. "We're going to get some proper color into you, my little miracle." She said to Bergeron, "They have much more than that, Liz. They have the sweetest baby girl in the world. That's all that matters." She cooed at Sage, "Isn't that right, princess? You have your whole life ahead of you."

"What kind of life is she going to have with no brain?

# Chapter 4

Ryan brought her into the NICU's Isolation room still in the wheelchair. The pain in her stomach had barely eased off since giving birth to Sage three hours ago. Moans and groans preceded almost every word she said. Pain circling around her ribcage made breathing without gasping more difficult as they approached Sage's incubator.

Ann Devonshire patted her shoulder. "Try not to worry about all the equipment. All this wonderful beeping and humming stuff is doing all it can to help your little girl."

Elizabeth Bergeron stepped away from Sage once they were close enough. "She's quite the tiny celebrity. All the girls just had to come have a look at her."

"Those patches," Ann said of the white ones, "let us monitor everything about her. She's breathing quite well on her own for having underdeveloped lungs. Dr. Humboldt thinks we only need to keep the oxygen supply turned up at bit."

"See those there." Bergeron pointed to pale-blue patches. "They are from Novus Somnia. It's a new stimulator for preemies. It's just been approved for use and we're the first hospital in San Francisco to get one. Your Sage is the first baby here to use it."

Ryan put her right next to the incubator.

Sage's blue eyes were fixed, as if staring at the top of the clear plastic box that was keeping her warm and bathed in oxygen-enriched air. She didn't move.

Bergeron tapped on a beeping monitor. "Her vitals are good, though her body temperature is lower than we would like. I'm sure that will right itself soon enough."

"Of course it will." Ryan rubbed her back. "Hello, princess, mommy and daddy have come to see you."

Savannah buckled a bit when she bent forward. A stab of pain like a ball of spikes rolling around poked against her lower abdomen. "It's mommy, baby. Sage, can you look at me, sweetheart? Give mommy a smile, okay?"

Sage's eyes didn't move from staring up. She was wrapped tight to keep her warm and looked like a caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland.

Ann said, "Dr. Humboldt thinks we can risk some kangaroo care for the both of you as early as tomorrow. You can hold her all you want then."

She reached for Sage. "What are those on her head?"

Three smooth ridges about one centimeter apart ran side by side from the top of Sage's forehead to halfway to the back of the top of her skull before flattening again. They resembled a design highlight sometimes seen on the hood of older model cars.

"We don't know," Bergeron said. "I've never seen that before on a preemie." Bergeron clucked her tongue and sighed. "I've never seen that on any baby."

"It could be some overlap or distortion of those sections of her skull because she has no. . . ." Ann gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze.

Dr. Humboldt entered the room running his fingers back through his thick, unkempt hair. "How is our mighty mite doing?"

Bergeron said, "Vitals are good but for her body temperature. We were finally able to get the PICC line in. The Bili lights will get rid of the jaundice."

He stood beside her and Ryan. "This must look a bit confusing, and maybe somewhat scary, but it is routine for a preemie to be hooked up to all this equipment. Remember, this is exactly what we discussed last week."

Ryan asked, "How much does she weigh?"

Bergeron said, "She's just over a kilogram, two pounds eight ounces. She's fifteen and a quarter inches long. Her abdominal circumference is nine inches. Her head is also nine inches."

"She is a bit on the small side, but that is a good weight for a six week preemie her size." Humboldt smiled at them. "If she'd gone full term, you would have delivered a very big package, Mrs. Lomax."

"And that other matter?" Ann stroked her hair. "What are we looking at, Doctor?"

She took hold of Ann's hand. "Thank you."

More sharp, stabbing pain tore through her lower abdomen.

"We found a small lump of brain tissue about the size of an acorn at the top of the spinal cord just inside the foramen magnum. It appears Sage has a medulla, so her autonomic functions are good: breathing, heart rate and blood pressure. There also appears to be some development of the pons and the midbrain, albeit very small at this stage."

Ryan asked, "What does that mean for Sage?"

"Breathing, heart rate and blood pressure are stable, though her heart is beating a bit faster than it should at the moment. Her vitals should remain stable as she develops and gets stronger. Preemies usually develop quite quickly." He shrugged. "Frankly, I am guessing here because the pons is so small, but if it functions properly, Sage should be capable of regular sleep, and we should expect to see her be able to swallow, which is good for feeding without a tube. Her eyes will become less fixed. She will be able to taste and hear and see." He crossed his fingers. "It will assist in regulating her breathing and you should soon be able to see all those wonderful facial expressions babies make. The midbrain plays a part in all that, too, plus motor control and temperature regulation."

"But it is really small right now," Ryan said.

"About the size of an acorn, yes," Humboldt said and held his finger and thumb apart to indicate the size.

"That's so—" Savannah heard screaming . . . her screaming. The room began to go dark. Hands were grabbing hold of her, at first trying to stop her fall, then turning her onto her back once she landed on the floor.

Dr. Humboldt was checking her. One of the nurses had run to the intercom and was calling out the emergency code and location.

Ryan's muted voice didn't match the wide and vigorous movement of his mouth. "She's bleeding."

Nurse Bergeron was suddenly beside her with towels. A soft, warm lump was pressed between her legs.

"I want to hold my baby," she heard herself say to the blurry ceiling lights. "Let me hold my little girl." She screamed again as something scraped and burned inside her. "My baby let me have my baby."

Medical staff came running into the room. Other doctors and nurses took over from Humboldt.

Another tearing explosion went off inside her, followed by a warm flow and numbness spreading down along the inside of her stomach, groin and thighs.

"Prep her for surgery," one of the new crew said. "I'll call Dr. Lytle." That person then vanished.

The next moment, she was rising off the floor and landing on a gurney.

She screamed out. "Sorry, baby, sorry. You sleep now, get your strength. That's my—" She screamed again and grabbed something.

Someone tried to take hold of her hand but their fingers only just touched before the bright ceiling lights began to move like a conveyor belt above her.

Had she left her body? Could she will herself back inside of it? Was she dying?

_You must stay with Sage and Ryan_. _Go back to them_. _You can't leave them all alone now_. _You can't do that to them_. _It's just the beginning for all of you_.

"Please, Savannah," Ann Devonshire said, "don't struggle. You have some tearing and bleeding. We need to get you put back together. You will be fine. I'll look after both of them for you, don't you worry."

She felt a soft pat on her shoulder and a brief clasp of her hand before her eyes closed. Numbing coolness was replacing what had felt like magma flowing through her.

The overhead conveyor belt of lights had stopped moving. A door swung open and then quickly closed again.

A doctor was barking out orders.

Someone grabbed her left arm. A moment later a sharp pinch intruded at her elbow.

Bright lights came on directly above her. A sheet covered her head and then drew back.

She tried to bring up a hand to shield her eyes but couldn't raise either arm.

A dark head bent over her and blocked some of the light.

"It's okay, Mrs. Lomax," the doctor said through his surgical mask. "We think you have a couple of tears inside. You've lost some blood and you're going to be sore for a few days, but you will be fine. I'm going to fix you right up. Now just go to sleep and let me do my magic."

Another head came between her and the light. "We're ready."

A number of people began talking at the same time as the anesthetist put the mask over her nose and mouth.

"She could have avoided all this if she'd just had the sense to abort once she found out she was going to give birth to a child with an empty noggin. Now we could lose them both. A pity, too, because she has a nice pair on her."

From Savannah's right, Bergeron wiped her forehead and said, "That comment is inappropriate, Dr. Lytle. And they didn't know their little girl had no brain until it was too late."

"How could you not know . . . ?"

Sage's blue eyes stared down at her.

# Chapter 5

"Is it time already?"

Ann Devonshire nodded and came straight to her bed. She looked down at Sage lying between Savannah's breasts. "She is so happy like that. It is a shame that she can't stay longer, but we all want what's best for her, don't we?"

"You can be a terrible nag, you know."

Ann laughed. "Hand her over, mom, that's an order."

"She won't look at me. I wish I could make her look at me."

"She will," Ryan said.

"Ryan's right. She still has five weeks to go before she even gets to the point where she is a fully developed newborn. But, Savannah, she is making fantastic progress."

"Are you sure she can't suckle yet?"

"No, she just can't right now." She picked Sage off Savannah's bare chest. "I know you're concerned about bonding with your daughter, but believe me, these sessions with mom and dad are doing the trick. And just between you and me and our miracle girl, I know for a fact that she's impatient to get at you, too." She laughed and rubbed Sage's back.

"She doesn't move. She doesn't make a sound."

"She will soon enough. Then you will wish she would just sit quiet for a few moments and let you catch your breath." She turned Sage toward them and lifted her tiny arm. "Wave to mommy and daddy, tell them you will be back promptly at two o'clock. And this time you can stay for two whole hours."

"Really?"

"Dr. Humboldt thinks it will be okay." Ann left.

Dr. Humboldt entered her private room a few minutes after Ann had taken Sage back to NCIU. Ramona Gilbert from Novus Somnia, taller than Humboldt, solid, her straight auburn hair kept short, her green eyes and wide, friendly mouth free of makeup, came in with him.

She had just finished getting from her bed to the wheelchair.

Humboldt asked, "How did this session go?"

"Good." She wiggled a bit to get comfortable in the chair. Some lingering pain persuaded her not to wiggle too much. "She's getting some natural pink to her skin."

Ryan said, "She smiled at us today."

"Wonderful. And how are you doing, my dear?"

"There is little pain now unless Ryan and I are really going at it. But the nurses keep interrupting us so I haven't popped any stitches. I can stand and walk a bit more now."

Gilbert said, "That is good news on all counts."

"You three have come a long way in just one week. Liz and Ann tell me Sage has responded well to being held. She's getting stronger every day . . . really strong."

Ramona shook her hand and then Ryan's. "But we also know it has been a struggle for all of you. We want to be optimistic but realistic and not minimize the challenges you have already faced or the ones ahead of you."

"Still, I think she's getting very close to being ready to go home. The both of you are."

Ryan asked, "Is Sage microcephalic?"

"No," Gilbert said.

"We've run all the tests. She doesn't come out positive for any of the usual causes. She has no chromosomal anomalies like those that cause Down's syndrome. We found no genetic deletions or mutations or defects. She has no mitochondrial disorders. Basically, she has passed the whole gamut of potential causes that we can test for at the moment. And you both passed every test with perfect results. It is a given, though, that we will continue to monitor her closely."

"There have been cases of children born with similar conditions to Sage who have survived and even thrived."

She took hold of Ryan's hand. "Is Sage in danger?"

Humboldt put up his hands as if trying to prevent her from getting up. "It is too early to make assumption about Sage. While she does not have a normally developed brain, her head is only slightly smaller than it should be. It is likely the gel inside it that masked our ultrasound scans played a role in keeping her skull growing to a normal size."

"Is the gel any danger to her?"

"We do not think so. We are monitoring it, but it does not appear to be causing any extra pressure. We do not want to risk draining any of it while her skull is still soft, just in case, and certainly not until we know more about what it is."

Gilbert said, "I'm sorry, Savannah. I wasn't trying to alarm you. I only wanted to point out that there have been a number of cases similar to Sage's condition where the child has done just fine. While each case is unique, a woman in England born with no brain grew up to earn a doctorate degree at Oxford and is now a psychology professor there."

"The next few weeks are crucial to Sage's immediate survival. She is doing just great right now and we should keep in mind that postnatal brain development is very fluid and dynamic. Over the next three years, we will need to be vigilante for any signs of Rett syndrome or other complications, but we can discuss that at another time."

Ryan asked Gilbert, "Why are you here?"

"Before I came to work at Novus Somnia on the Human Genome Project, I studied genetic disorders. I'm here to help in any way I can to understand why Sage is the way she is and what can be done to make her life, and yours, as fulfilling as possible."

"Why?"

"Savannah, I would have thought you'd know why."

With Ryan's assistance, she rose from the wheelchair and hugged Gilbert. "Thank you, Ramona. We like you, too."

Gilbert kissed Savannah' cheek and wiped her eyes when they ended the hug. "She is so beautiful. She has your eyes, Savannah, but I think she is going to have Ryan's dark, curly hair, not your straight, chestnut color."

"I hope she ends up taller than me, too."

Gilbert wiped her eyes again. "I better get back to work before I become a bubbling mess. Just remember, you two, you are not alone in this. We guarantee that."

"We do," Dr. Humboldt said and then escorted Gilbert out of the room.

"Why did she really come to see us today?"

"Stop thinking like a lawyer and help me to the bathroom."

# Chapter 6

They called themselves the Apostles, but he refused to use that exalted label. Unfortunately, the situation had reached the stage where he had no choice but to bring the four men and two women left of the original seven with him.

Though comfortable, clean and centrally located in San Francisco, the hotel wasn't fancy. It certainly wasn't what _they_ had become accustomed to when out in the field. It wasn't up to the standards of the one they had stayed in during last year's mission here, but it had what he needed. He had reserved the whole fourth floor, which included a conference room they could use for their command center.

Timothy Bartholomew Chase sat his 6'6", 350 pound frame onto the chair at the head of the table in the center of the conference room and waited for the two co-leaders of the group to enter.

Joseph Clarke and his people were busy setting up their equipment and monitoring stations at the other end of the room.

He first joined the secret service community as a CIA agent. As part of his indoctrination, he took it upon himself to learn all he could about CIA operations past and present. He had discovered two occurrences of US intelligence becoming involved with paranormal potential in human beings.

The first time was when the CIA and military intelligence gathered all the data they could on USSR experiments with telekinesis and remote viewing. Both departments had come to the same conclusion. There was nothing of significance to it. One contributor to the final CIA report had acerbically summarized the whole business as resulting in a few spoons being bent by dubious means.

Cole Reagan, two inches shorter than him and over a hundred pounds lighter, ten years younger, blond, permanently tanned, and originally from Los Angeles, entered the room and took a seat to his right. "The other members of the Senate Review Committee all arrived at the Omni last night. They dined together."

He checked his watch. "That won't take long. What is our team doing?"

"Tye Rosen just got up. I don't know how, but he managed to get wasted last night."

"If he's not in top form, you have my permission to throw him out a window."

"Gladly. Gwen Hunter is already in position in the other room. Herman Kolisnek is busy with his second helping of breakfast."

"And how is _mom_ doing?"

"She's stomping around her room cursing her daughter for deserting her." Reagan got up and headed for the door. "I'll round up the others and get them situated with Hunter."

The second time the CIA had become interested in anything paranormal had more merit, though only after the fact. A self-proclaimed medium in Newark successfully predicted a surprise attack on allied forces during the Gulf War. No one had acted on her warning, however, and sixteen soldiers were killed in the ambush.

Another flurry of research started with a focus on issues of national security. After seven years, roughly at the turn of the century, and after this Newark medium had failed to predict anything else of use—though she had monetized her brief fame with a short-lived reality television show—it started to peter out and eventually faded away again. The research team was disbanded. The team's leader, Harvey Weinberg, moved on to more fruitful research in human genomics.

They discovered the first real one right after 9/11. Dorothy Cooper was a very unremarkable single mother of three living in a trailer park just outside of Anadarko, Oklahoma. Her first prophecy was a frantic warning of the pending 9/11 attacks. All three of her children had been agitated the night before. None of them could get to sleep. Dorothy Cooper had _divined a sense of impending doom_ for the nation. She had called numerous local and national radio talk shows, had spoken in vague metaphorical and symbolic terms about the coming destruction.

"Those on high will crash into clouds of despair. The innocent will be innocent no longer."

She had, the program directors had admitted later, sounded too hysterical and crazy for anyone to put her on their show. She never got past the screeners on three shows and was quickly cut off on two others.

Then the unimaginable horror happened.

The event that brought her to his attention occurred one year later. Three tornados struck just south of Anadarko one after the other. All three bulldozed their way through her trailer park. The whole place was literally torn from the map. But not her trailer; it was untouched.

That story made headlines. Dorothy Cooper claimed she simply refused to let any of the tornados harm them when they came through. Satellite images revealed one of the tornados had only skirted the trailer park before vanishing, but the paths of destruction of the other two revealed what appeared to be sudden deviations away from the trailer park as first one and then the other twenty minutes later came close to Cooper's trailer.

_Dorothy Misses Her Flight to Oz_ , _TWICE_ , one local paper proclaimed.

Dorothy was the first apostle, but she was also the dumbest of the group. She did have enough sense to capitalize on her moment in the spotlight, though, and officially changed her name to Themis, after the titan who could see the future.

An intense series of tests on her and her three children revealed her oldest daughter, Lucinda, ten at the time, exhibited capabilities significantly above random levels of probability. It really wasn't much to go on, but the pair came cheaply.

Weinberg was brought back—one of the biggest mistakes he ever made—and the research group was reactivated. Using what they learned from Dorothy and Lucinda helped them to refine their parameters for search and assessment. Within a year, they found five more with similar talents.

Douglas, Vitale and Hart in the Psychology Department of the University of Oklahoma soon discovered the seven could influence certain energetic and dynamic systems, though not very much. It was beginning to look like the Apostles could, in concert, blow out a match, but weren't capable of doing much against a bonfire unless they had brought with them a hose attached to a tap.

Their apotheosis finally came in the form of a new turbine recently installed into a dam but not yet operational. Working together, the seven were able to turn the turbine very slowly 2 ½ times before their _influence_ failed. Their reputation was entrenched after that. Scepticism and disbelief became admiration and, in some cases, worship; hence that fucking name for the group.

He and Weinberg had known from the start, though, that their real talent lay in crowd control.

John Atkinson, forty-two, just over six feet tall, thirty pounds overweight, a former accredited accounting technician, entered the room first. Cedric Hutt, thirty-five, exactly halfway between five feet and six feet tall, forty, a former Office Depot manager, shuffled in behind Atkinson. Hutt had kept his head shaved completely bald once he became the group's unofficial lieutenant.

Reagan had remarked, "Maybe he doesn't want anything to interfere with his feeble brainwaves."

Neither of them came to his end of the table or sat down.

Chase checked his watch again. "I have to leave shortly for the Senate Review Committee hearing. Where are we with those two?"

"We've lost them," Atkinson said. "Her signal cut out at the bridge. It's been cutting in and out since then."

Hutt said, "But they're still in the city. We'll get her back."

"It's Dorothy." Atkinson started to come to his end of the table but stopped when Chase glared at him. "She keeps losing her temper. That makes it hard for her to concentrate."

Chase got up from the uncomfortable chair. "You are here only because Lucinda was supposed to lead you right to them. Remind Mrs. Cooper of that and tell her to bring her daughter back under control. I will return in a few hours."

# Chapter 7

The first meeting of the Novus Somnia Incident Senate Review Committee hearing was to be held in a prosaic but useful meeting room of the Omni San Francisco Hotel.

Joan McGowan sat at the lone table facing the two tables placed end to end where the four committee members would sit. The windows were behind her. She wouldn't have to look up from her report into glare coming from behind the people who would be asking her very hard questions.

She removed the sealed manila folders from her briefcase and set one next to the laptops on the committee tables for each of the four members. She opened the one she had for herself and set it beside the laptop that had just finished booting up.

Dr. Cynthia Thorpe, recently of USAMRIID and the San Francisco toxin attack from last year, was the first committee member to enter the room. She brought a cup of steaming green tea in with her. Her straight, brindle hair was fastened in a ponytail that extended down to between her shoulder blades.

"Good morning, Joan, all ready for your presentation?" Thorpe asked this as she walked to the tables ten feet across for hers and elevated on platforms one foot high. She took her seat at one end of them.

Senator Sutton, though having agreed to convene this review in the city where the incident took place, had done her best to make the meeting room resemble an intimidating Washington committee hearing room.

"As ready as I'm going to be."

"No wind, then?"

"Thin air, I'm afraid."

"Claudette isn't going to like that."

"I don't like it. Nyla doesn't like it."

Special Agent-in-Charge, Nyla Rowe, African-American and as beautiful as a Nubian princess, the one who persuaded Cynthia to retire from USAMRIID as a Colonel and join her special task force, the one who brought her back into this mess, came in next.

"Good morning. Did you get in a ride, Joan?" Nyla poured herself a glass of water when she sat down at the elevated table to the right of Cynthia.

"I'll go later if there's time."

"How are Shana and Craig doing?" She had asked the same thing last night.

"Shana's just started her first year at UCLA. Craig's just finishing another addition to his veterinary research farm." She then asked what she had asked last night, "How's Jaxon? His work is certainly popular."

Shana had taken one of his calendars of adorable farm animals with her to UCLA.

"We won't be discussing that topic anytime soon." Last night, she had just ignored the question and changed the subject.

"Again? Which one of you started it this time?"

"He will tell you I did." She took a drink of water as she looked over the setup of the tables in the room. "This is ridiculous."

Senator Claudette Sutton, from Jackson, Mississippi, entered the room. Her aide, Randi Boone, followed her in holding two large cups of Starbuck's coffee.

Sutton stopped the moment she spotted the elevated tables. "Who the hell did that?" She looked around the room, only nodded at Joan, Nyla and Cynthia, and said, "Where is our big and tall table mover?" After another quick look around the room, she exhaled an exaggerated sigh and threw up her hands. "Never mind him. We can do this job ourselves. Randi, honey, put those magic potions on that lonely little table next to the wall over there for now."

Senator Claudette Sutton was fifty-seven. Her blonde hair had become long, wispy silver strands that floated or whipped about her head depending on how vigorously she moved. Her lips were always bright red. She did wear pale-blue eye makeup, though she seemed to be able to apply it more subtly than most who suffered from that affliction. She had a loud, hearty twang to her voice and was thin enough to cause concern about her eating habits.

Randi Boone was still a towhead, mid-twenties, pretty and bright as anything.

Claudette had told her yesterday, "If I can last long enough in Washington before I have to step aside, Randi will succeed me. All those dumbass men are going to constantly underestimate her until she kicks their balls up to their chins. And she will, I hope, when she's president."

She, Nyla and Cynthia were all in their thirties and all of them were fit. She still rode, Nyla ran and taught martial arts at Quantico when she wasn't chairing the Special Task Force investigating the mysterious Proteus Group. Cynthia was just insane about her fitness. The list of things she did was too long to bother even starting. Of them all, Cynthia was the most likely to never sleep, nor need it, probably.

Sutton exhibited her excellent leadership by instructing the rest of them on how to get the tables down from their stupid perch, which they shoved up against the wall, and then how to align them with the presenter's table.

"That is much better," she said. "This is supposed to be a friendly atmosphere. God knows, we're not here to hang anybody, unless Tubby can't get his big, hairy ass in here on time."

She had joined the other women in this room for dinner last night after arriving from Portland. She hadn't met Timothy Bartholomew Chase yet because he did not attend. He had also declined to stay in the same hotel with them.

Nyla had given her two pieces of advice about Chase. "Don't trust him and don't let him catch you calling him Tubby."

Chase had a sense of timing that suited him. He entered the room just as Senator Sutton took her seat and started on her Starbuck's coffee. Two DHS agents entered behind him and took up positions at the locked door.

Randi came to her table to sit with her and provide any assistance she might need with her presentation. Sutton had made that offer and decision on her behalf at their dinner.

Chase brought nothing with him to eat or drink. His chair creaked loudly when he sat down to Sutton's left.

"We can get a . . . 'nother one for you if you want, Tim."

"This is fine," he said. The chair squawked and groaned when he lean back and folded his arms across his chest.

Sutton began looking over the table, then under it. "Where is my gavel?"

Randi bounded to her feet, rushed to a large bag Joan hadn't seen her bring in, pulled one out and handed it to Sutton.

"It's her favorite," she whispered when she sat back down.

"She has more than one?"

"She's on six other committees as well as this one. All of them are adjourned right now or we wouldn't have come here."

Sutton finished her Starbuck's coffee with a loud smack of her bright red lips and then smacked the table with her favorite gavel. "Before we get this shindig going," she said, "just let me get my most recent information update straight. The two people we are here about have disappeared, correct?"

Joan replied, "Yes, Senator, they have."

"We have no idea where they are?"

"We believe they are still in the country, but otherwise, _we have no idea_ would be a correct assessment."

Sutton tapped her gavel. "Joan, I think we are going to be good friends by the time this is all over, but do not get smart with me this early in the proceedings. As a matter of fact," she banged the gavel again, "don't any of you think of even trying to be clever with me or we are all in for a very miserable time in San Francisco. And that would upset me very much because San Francisco is my favorite city on the west coast. Are we all clear on that point?"

"Sorry, Senator, I was unaware of any attempt on my part to sound clever. I was just—"

"I know what you were _just_ . . . but starting our review with the knowledge that our subjects have vanished is troubling. And, Tim, your agent assigned to keep an eye on them is still missing as well."

"That is correct."

"And your three units that tried to apprehend them at Novus Somnia do not remember anything about that night."

"That is also correct."

Sutton checked the notes Randi had deftly placed on the table after they had brought it down to Joan's level. "The records I have before me—I believe they make up part of your report, Joan—show we have spent over thirty million dollars monitoring everything about this remarkable girl's life for the past five years or more," she aimed the 'or more' at Chase, "and now we can't find hide nor hair of her and her mother. Do we have much chance of ever finding them?" She flipped through her notes. "And based on our latest report from Tim and his operatives, there is now reason to believe there might be others like her out there."

Nyla looked straight at Chase. "That's right, Senator."

Chase said, "We are gathering all the data now, but it is scarce and could be apocryphal."

"And that group that is suspected of being behind so many recent attacks on U.S. soil could have had a hand in all this?"

Chase glared back at Nyla. "Yes. We have to date been unable to identify any of the major players yet or disrupt their activities in any significant way."

"All right, then, let's get on with this. I for one want to know how a little girl born with no brain became the most powerful high-tech weapon in the world, singlehandedly destroyed a huge research complex, and how, after years of close surveillance, we managed to lose her." She broke the seal on the manila folder before her, as did the other committee members. "Special Agent Joan McGowan, if you would enlighten us, please." She banged her gavel to officially start the hearing.

# Chapter 8

Before Joan could read the first sentence of her report, Senator Sutton banged her gavel. "Just a moment, please." She lifted up the folder. "This is a thick package, Joan, so I am confident we are going to get a very comprehensive background on the Lomax family. But before we dive deep into this, I'd just like to get to know everyone in this room a bit better. I'm new to all these Proteus Group shenanigans, but I believe every one of you has had some firsthand experience with what they are up to."

Chase said, "This is nothing like national education or energy policy hearings, Senator. This is a whole different bucket-o-chicken than you are used to."

"That will be enough of that, Tim. I am sure you are correct about this change of pace for me, therefore I consider myself fortunate to have all of you as part of my team. I will rely on you four to bring me up to speed." She set the gavel down. "I assure you, however, I do understand what is going on here and the threat it represents to our national security. And if I have trouble with any of the technical information, Randi sure as hell can and will clarify any of the salient points for me." She picked up the gavel and banged the table hard once. "I believe, Joan, you were involved in two acts of domestic terrorism perpetrated by this Proteus Group. Is that correct?"

"Yes, Senator, the Crowley farm incident east of Portland while I was with the FBI and then the Colter Militia conflict in Dominion, Oregon about a year later."

"You were the sheriff in Dominion at the time."

"I was."

"Now you are back with the FBI in Portland."

"Special Agent Rowe persuaded me to assist her with her task force because of my experience. I am responsible for gathering all the intelligence concerning their suspected activities west of the Rockies."

"Morton Colter, a retired marine colonel, was the leader of both attacks. He died at his farm in the second incident."

"That is correct. He was not at the Crowley farm when my team was ambushed, but he had set it up. He was at his farm during the second incident and died when his house exploded."

Sutton flipped through her own report.

Randi called out, "It's page six, Senator."

"Thank you, dear." She read down the page. "A young woman, only seventeen at the time, sent a Trojan horse into his wireless system that triggered the explosion."

"Lily Wiley's virus—she called it Pox—only disrupted Colter's timing program that controlled the detonation of all the explosives he had hidden throughout his farm. Colter accidentally set off the explosions in his house himself when he inputted the code in an attempt to blow everyone else up."

"But that was directly as a result of the Wiley girl's own viral attack, was it not?"

"She is a very intelligent young woman, Senator. Morton Colter's programmer was no match for her, but it was I who goaded him into triggering the explosives in his house."

"And why would you do that?"

"He had taken Shana, Lily and Donny hostage. No one messes with my daughter, Senator, no one."

Chase said, "It is my understanding the Colter militia conflict only escalated after your daughter, only fourteen at the time, this Lily Wiley, whose father, Stanford Wiley, had been working with Colter, and Donny Nguyen, whose father had been working with Stanford Wiley, all decided to play junior park rangers and get evidence that would prove Colter and his men were poaching."

Sutton tapped the gavel three times. "Tim, you make it sound like they were the villains. Stanford Wiley tried to protect his daughter from Colter in the end. And Albert Nguyen worked undercover with DEA to gather evidence against a growing drug operation in Dominion. Both Lily and Donny lost their fathers."

Joan said, "Lily was able to download a great deal of information from Colter's computer before the explosions. Subsequent to that, she found and decrypted a USB flash drive her father had hidden that alerted us to the existence of the Proteus Group and Morton Colter's role in it. FBI and DHS used that baseline information to begin investigating them."

"There have only been a few arrests of minor characters so far, though, hasn't there? Nyla, this is where you get stuck in their web. You were working undercover at Remington Bakersfield Draper in New York City. That undercover work discovered plans by the Proteus Group to develop a network of illegal international trade in weapons and people."

Nyla said, "They were planning to trade in anything whether legal or not."

"They were also setting up a money laundering operation to conceal their activities."

"Yes, they were," Nyla said but offered no further information.

Rowe and Chase could compete for the tightest lips in the US national security community.

"And last year, Nyla and Cynthia worked together with Tim's special branch of DHS on the jellyfish toxin affair right here in San Francisco."

"Yes we did," Nyla said.

"Just to call it a jellyfish toxin, Senator," Cynthia said, "is to grossly understate its sophisticated design and the level of danger it actually represented."

"Yes, I know. People were transformed into mannequins and thousands could have been killed if not for the heroic efforts by law enforcement and national security agencies. And then there was Frank Gillett saving President Carol Trotter from assassination aboard Air Force One." She tapped the gavel against the table. "You see, Tim, I am quite well versed already on this terrible Proteus Group and some of its most recent and most deadly campaigns."

"It would appear so, Senator."

"Are we not supposed to have witnesses to call? Ones that remember what happened, that is."

Joan said, "Ann Devonshire is available, Senator. And the programming technician from Novus Somnia, Pat Pritchett is also here. It could be said that he started the incident we are reviewing. We have him under guard in a room on the floor above us."

Randi was checking her own notes. "Dr. Humboldt died shortly after the incident at the Novus Somnia facility."

"The autopsy report indicates he died of a heart attack. He had retired from his obstetrics practice six years ago and was working as a consultant at Novus Somnia. His role there was primarily to keep contact with Sage and Savannah Lomax and liaise with the other medical personnel working on the project. We do not know what role he played in the capture of Sage or in her escape."

"Did she cause his heart attack?"

"There is no way of knowing. It was a very violent incident."

"It was a bloodbath," Chase said.

"That may be, Tim, but it wasn't our doing," Sutton said, "because _we_ had already lost possession of her to _them_."

Randi rattled a piece of paper she was doodling on. "We are scheduled to visit the Novus Somnia complex tomorrow afternoon. It is currently sealed and under guard. Ryan Lomax died there, too, did he not?"

"He did," she said. "Elizabeth Bergeron, another nurse who had worked closely with Sage and Savannah, has also been missing since that night."

"Do we have any others besides Devonshire and Pritchett?"

"There were some other witnesses, Senator, from Novus Somnia and the external security company hired after the mistake. They played minor roles and we have their statements already in the folder before you. The ones we just discussed were the key witnesses to what happened and its aftermath."

"Then tell me a bit about the Lomax family and their special little girl. We'll start there . . . unless that information is now missing, too."

"Twelve years ago, on February twenty-ninth because it was a leap year, Sage Lomax was born six weeks premature to Ryan and Savannah Lomax. She was conceived via in vitro fertilization after Savannah had used a fertility drug called Ovagamex that was developed by Novus Somnia. Ryan was a lawyer at Brooks and Fellows then."

"Your report cites claims by Drs. Visser and Darrow that the fluid in Sage's head masked ultrasound images and prevented them from discovering she had no brain."

"It would be more accurate to say the fluid filling Sage's head—more like an opaque gel—gave a false positive. That is to say, it somehow made everything appear normal when they scanned Savannah."

"But she didn't really have no brain," Randi said. "It was just very small."

"There appeared to be just enough medulla, pons and midbrain to keep Sage going, though the prognosis for her long-term survival or chances of having a normal life wasn't good."

"Joan," Sutton said and leaned forward, "I wouldn't be surprised if you had difficulty at times with this assignment. You were a single mom with a daughter for a while."

"Every parent would sympathize with what Savannah Lomax went through. But no one could possibly anticipate what they were going to encounter."

Chase said, "One of them could."

Sutton tapped her gavel three times. The third time, it came close to Chase's fingers. "This prognosis of theirs; however, Sage threw it a curve ball soon enough, didn't she?"

"Savannah suffered tears to her uterus during the delivery. She almost died. They both almost died. Then something happened that no one expected or believed was even possible. Sage's brain began to grow."

# Chapter 9

Ann helped get Sage into her embrace and came with them when Ryan brought them to the hospital entrance in the wheelchair.

Dr. Humboldt, Ramona Gilbert and Liz Bergeron were there waiting for them.

"Just remember," Dr. Humboldt said, "even though Sage has made exceptional progress these past three weeks, she still has many challenges ahead of her. She isn't supposed to be born for another three weeks."

Bergeron said, "We normally do not release a baby like Sage this early, but she is remarkably strong for a preemie. If I didn't know better, I would say she was already three months old."

Anne said, "She's a miracle baby."

That declaration seemed to annoy Bergeron and disturb both Humboldt and Gilbert.

"Be that as it may," Bergeron said, "do not miss your appointments and therapy sessions. Miracle or not, Sage needs them, Savannah, and so do you."

That was the first time Bergeron had used her first name while talking to her.

Ryan helped her out of the wheelchair and took Sage from her.

Ann was the first to hug her. "I will see you soon."

Ramona hugged her next. "I will visit as often as I can and am only a phone call away if you need anything."

"Thank you."

Liz Bergeron stepped forward like a sergeant about to bark out marching orders and embraced her. She kissed Savannah's cheek. "I will keep you both in my heart."

She hugged Bergeron tighter. "Thank you."

Humboldt shook Ryan's hand before hugging her. When he stepped back, he ran his fingers through that whitish-grey tangle on the top of his head. "Ann will be the one coming to see you on a regular basis. She's the head nurse of our outreach program."

Ann waved at her and smiled.

"Liz will come occasionally."

"Mostly when I can't make it," Ann said.

"Do not hesitate, either of you, if you think there is any kind of problem. We are all here for you."

"Thank you for everything you've done." Ryan handed Sage back to her and took them to their Honda CRV.

Everyone waved one last time before they headed home to Bernal Heights. She sat in the back with Sage after putting her in her car seat. Ryan drove as smoothly and carefully as he could and kept checking on them in the rear view mirror.

Once they had circled Holly Park to get to Highland Avenue, Savannah put a hand on Sage and looked down at her daughter's blue eyes. "We're going to have a long, warm bath when we get home. You and mommy deserve that."

"You sure do." Ryan turned the CRV into their driveway, took it into the garage once the door was up and then rushed around to her side of the car.

A big paper sign with letters the colors of the rainbow hung from the ceiling to welcome them home.

"Everyone," he said as he guided them through the kitchen and dining room to the living room, "and I mean everyone, wanted to be here for you and Sage, but I told them it would be better if we kept it quiet for the first few days."

"Give us a week and then we'll party."

He held on to her all the way up the stairs to Sage's nursery. Stuffed animals, all of which appeared to be far bigger than Sage, some of which appeared to be bigger than her, stuffed the room. Ryan had to move some of them out of the way to clear a path to Sage's pink crib.

"I know we weren't going to gender profile her, but after I saw her, I just had to paint it pink."

She kissed his cheek. "I love you." A mobile of rockets and cars and unicorns and planets and fairies revolved over the crib. "I guess that brings some balance."

"In here," he said and took her through the door to their master bedroom and the other crib, "this one's yellow; a nice, gender-neutral color."

"You are a complete nutcase." She looked down at Sage's blue eyes staring up at her. "Daddy is a nutcase, isn't he, darling?"

"Lost all control, that's me." He kissed her and then Sage. "I'll run the bath."

She took Sage out of her car seat and set her down on their king size bed next to the bathrobe Ryan had laid out for her. "Our first bath together is going to be so special."

Blue eyes blinked up at her but they did not move. The pupils did not dilate or contract. In three weeks of life, Sage had still made no sounds of any kind.

"She doesn't even fart," Ann had said.

Savannah took off her clothes and put on the robe. She unwrapped and undressed Sage. It was a cool and breezy March morning, but the heat was up in the house. Sage didn't shiver or fuss once she was naked on the bed. She didn't move at all.

From the doorway to the bathroom Ryan said, "I was talking to Ramona and Ann about Small Wonders House."

She picked up Sage. "I thought you didn't trust Ramona."

"Tests on us prove we didn't pass on some genetic defect to Sage. That means we have to consider the possibility the Ovagamex you took could be the cause. Gilbert is just watching us. If we sue Novus Somnia, she's the lead in heading us off."

"Who said we were going to sue them? We could not create a baby on our own. You should remember how often and vigorously we kept trying. It could have just been one of those things. Ovagamex has been approved as safe. There have been no problems associated with it. And Novus Somnia guarantees to cover any and all medical costs incurred if there are any complications."

"Gilbert has already implied Novus Somnia would cover the expenses of Small Wonders House."

"Sage will never go in there."

"No one is suggesting she go in there. It's just that Small Wonders House has people with the expertise to work with the special needs Sage has. They are a skilled resource for Sage _and_ for us." He kissed her forehead. "Ann works with them on several cases. She says they're excellent."

"You're sounding more like a lawyer than a father."

"I know how I sound, sweetheart, but if Novus Somnia is willing to foot the bill, I want to secure that commitment as quickly as possible. Then we have a solid platform to stand on . . . just in case."

"In case of what?"

Ryan was only trying to make sure Sage was properly cared for no matter what challenges she faced in her future. And he was a lawyer, so it was no surprise he tended to think like one. But as he said what he said, it just sounded more and more like he had ulterior motives.

"In case of what?"

"Honey, we don't know. That is the point. I'm just trying to anticipate all the possibilities and have contingencies in place in case something happens."

"You can't just negotiate your way out of your responsibility to Sage."

Ryan jerked back as if she'd just taken a swing at him. He bumped his head against the door jamb.

"I'm sorry." She reached for him. "I don't know why I said that. I'm sorry."

He took her into his arms, careful not to crush Sage. "We're all home now. Have your bath. Take some time for yourself. I have some work to do." He kissed her and took Sage to let her take off her robe. "It's not too hot. I checked." He handed Sage back to her. "God, you are beautiful, both of you are. I love it that she got your blue eyes."

He kissed them both, helped them get into the soaker tub and then left them alone.

Why should his comment about Sage inheriting her blue eyes sound like an accusation? She had been unable to conceive before taking Ovagamex. Was Ryan blaming her for . . . ?

She hugged Sage to her chest. The water was the perfect temperature. "Our first day back home; and your terrified mommy has already gone crazy." She lay back, slid down to put Sage halfway into the water and closed her eyes. "I love you, Sage. Ann is right. You are my great big miracle. You always will be." She stroked Sage's cheek.

Sage moved her right arm.

"That's it, baby, just do little movements. Don't try to do too much the first time. You have your whole life to do that."

Sage's tiny fingers of her right hand opened and closed. They tickled against Savannah's skin.

She started to call for Ryan but held her breath rather than holler. She lifted Sage up to look at her.

Blue eyes blinked back at her. Sage shivered at being lifted out of the warm water.

"Sorry, sweetie." She submerged Sage a bit and placed her cheek against her left breast. "That's mommy's heart. I can feel yours, can you feel mine?"

Sage moved her head slightly and pursed her lips. Her left arm came up. Her left hand settled on Savannah's breast.

"That's it, sweetheart. You are doing fantastic."

Sage took a deep breath. Both arms began to wriggle about. Just as Savannah started to reposition her, Sage started crying and fussing. She pulled up on her left breast. Sage found the nipple and began feeding.

# Chapter 10

Ann Devonshire handed Sage back to her once she returned to the outer office of the MRI imaging room. "She's such a charmer. There was no fuss, even with the noise. And she didn't move at all. She's an angel."

Sage bubbled in her mother's arms. Her blue eyes seemed to follow mommy's smile.

"What a good girl you are." She kissed Sage's forehead.

Dr. Humboldt came in. "Have a look at these." He put up three MRI scans.

Drs. Tammy Darrow and Robert Visser entered the room.

"I'm not quite sure how to explain this properly, but that extracellular matrix in Sage's head—what we've been calling the gel—appears to be getting clearer. Today, we used a new scanning technique being developed at Stanford called compressed sensing. It's designed to make MRIs more accessible to children by shortening the time they need to be inside the machine. The algorithm they use requires fewer data points to be collected and the results are fantastic. These are the best images we have been able to get and they are very encouraging."

Dr. Visser came over to the images and pointed to the first one. "Those bright, stringy filaments you see at the top front appear to be neural tissue."

"It is as though Sage has been generating nerve fibers but hasn't been able to bring them all together to complete her brain."

"She has had some success, however." Visser pointed to the lower rear of Sage's head in the second image. "Her brain has doubled in size in the past three weeks."

Humboldt tapped the dark spot. "It's grown from the size of an acorn to about the size of a walnut. She has a tiny cortex, which, again, we have to concede, may have always been there, but we are only able to see it now."

Sage wriggled in her arms. She still hadn't become used to Sage being able to move. A frisson went through her every time Sage made even the slightest twitch. She kissed Sage's forehead again.

Visser ran his hand along the top back of the second image. "She also appears to have developed this neural bundle. It could be more of her cortex trying to develop. It has extensions attached to her brain." He traced them with his finger.

Savannah stepped closer. The shadow revealed a web-like clump of filaments darker than the bright, stringy ones in the first image.

"It also might have been there all along," Dr. Darrow said, "and just didn't show up in our earlier images, but we do believe it is a recent development."

"And a fortunate one, too," Humboldt said as he smoothed down some of Sage's tangle of black hair. "We think that jumble of nerves at the back is allowing her to see and hear."

"What about speak?"

"We know she can cry and make other baby noises, so there is nothing wrong with her vocal chords."

"Especially at two o'clock in the morning." She pointed to the third image. The three ridges along the top of Sage's head resembled shadowy fingers only slightly larger than Sage's own tiny ones. "Why are they so dark? Are there new bundles of nerves in there, too?"

Visser shook his head. "We don't know what to make of those, either their structure or why they are so unrevealing in the image."

"Could there be denser bundles of nerves than the one at the back of her head?"

"There could be indeed, or they could all just be dark because the gel is still too dense in there, or they are empty. In the future, we may get a better picture of what is or isn't in those compartments. At least we know there is no edema or lesions."

She looked down at Sage. "You are a great big mystery to everyone, but not to me."

Sage began to blow bubbles, her face trembled and turned bright red, her left arm shot straight out and trembled too.

"What's happening to her?"

Ann took Sage from her and set her on the table in the middle of the room. All three doctors gathered around her daughter.

"It's a tonic seizure," Humboldt said. "She's stopped breathing."

Ann grabbed her before she could get to the table.

Darrow picked Sage up and rushed out the door.

"Savannah, it's all right." Ann held on firmly to her shoulders. "Tammy's only gone two doors down to where all the equipment is that will help her. They can get a tube into her if she needs it and hook her up to a ventilator."

"Why is this happening to her?"

"Come on. We'll wait in Dr. Humboldt's office."

Ann took her out into the hall. Liz Bergeron and other staff were rushing into the room two doors down.

"Oh, God, my baby." Her legs buckled.

Ann went down to the floor with her. "We can't give up on our little angel. She's strong. You know that."

Ann waved off another nurse who had come to help. Somehow, Ann then got her back up to her feet and into Humboldt's office with little awareness or assistance from her. Once she was on a chair, Ann said, "I'll get you some water."

She tried to shake her head and speak but only one word came out. "Sage."

She slid off the chair into a heap on the floor.

Ann got down with her and handed her the glass of water. "Drink all of that before you try to say anything."

She started drinking.

Ann pushed up on the glass when she stopped. "All of it, Savannah. Drink it all down."

Coolness cascaded into her stomach and spread out into her hips and thighs, but that new sensation only made her neck and face feel hotter.

Ann wiped her face with a cloth. "It will be all right, I promise you. Many babies like Sage have seizures. It's very disturbing to see, and I was upset, too, but most babies get through it with no problems."

"I don't want to cry. I cry all the time around her."

"I know, but it is okay if you do."

Ramona Gilbert entered the office. Without the slightest hesitation, she dropped to the floor and embraced her. "Are you all right? I came as soon as Felix called me. How is Sage?"

She hung on tight to Ramona.

Ann said, "If you can stay with Savannah, I'll go see how she's doing."

"I'll stay as long as you need me to."

Ann rubbed her back. "I'll return as fast as I can."

As soon as Ann was out the door, Ramona said, "Do you think you can get up?"

She nodded and let Ramona help her back into the chair. She was more able to work with Ramona than she had with Ann, but Ramona clearly had the strength to get her off the floor on her own. She drank a second glass of water on Ramona's orders.

"Just take your time." Ramona checked her for injuries. "You couldn't have been in a better place for this to happen. Where is Ryan?"

"They called him back into work. He was on a difficult case before Sage was born. There have been some complications. It should take only a few days and then he will back on paternity leave. They promised not to suck him back in completely yet."

Ann and Liz came into the office.

Liz said, "The seizure is over. She's stable. We will be keeping her overnight for observation, though. You can go see her now."

Ann took her to the room. Sage was covered in pads again. She was asleep. Her color had returned to a healthy pink tone.

"I'll just leave you two alone." Ann kissed Sage's cheek before leaving as quietly as she could.

She kissed Sage. "Come on, baby, just get through the next few minutes, the next hour, and then the next day. Just take another breath . . . for me, okay, sweetheart?

"Can you do that for me? I love you, Sage. I will look after you. I will change your diapers. I will rub your back. I will walk the floor with you all night when you can't sleep, I promise. I will never stop loving you. I will never leave you."

She wiped her eyes. "If you could speak, I know you would say to me, 'Mommy, you are being silly. I am here to stay. I will make you happy. I will make you sad. I will make you doubt yourself, but I will always love you.'"

Sage yawned and trembled but continued sleeping.

"Don't you give up on yourself and I won't either. Just do that, baby, and everything else will be perfect. Can you do that for mommy?"

She reached for her daughter's hand. Sage remained asleep, but her little fingers closed around mom's thumb.

# Chapter 11

"It was a tough three weeks," Joan said. "Sage suffered twelve more tonic seizures during that period before they abated."

"According to your report, they discovered something else surprising as well as that burst of brain development."

"Drs. Darrow and Visser re-examined the previous images they had as well as the new enhanced MRI scans. Sage had a rudimentary auxiliary nervous system. It wasn't extensive at that point. They suspected it could be the cause of the seizures."

Dr. Thorpe said, "But they also believed it was helping keep Sage alive. It provided some redundancy and reinforcement to her primary nervous system, particularly for autonomic functions. And it played a crucial role in the unique and novel neurological capabilities that Sage would eventually develop."

"Cynthia, you've reviewed all the medical records we have for Sage. You might be the better person to describe this secondary nervous system."

"All of this is in your report," Chase said. "It would be redundant to just read it aloud. We should be focusing on—"

"Tim," Sutton said. "If you don't mind, I will determine what we should focus on. Cynthia, you have the floor."

Thorpe cleared her throat and drank some water as she flipped through both the paper report and the copy on her laptop to find the material she wanted. It was of some comfort to know another professional could also still experience a case of nerves in a setting like this.

Cynthia cleared her throat again. "This could be a bit dry. The secondary nervous system and what they would come to label exocranial neural bundles—or ganglion—along her spine played a crucial role in what Sage has become."

She glanced at Chase, but he just sat back in his complaining chair.

"Darrow at first suggested this secondary network was a failed attempt to develop a complete brain, but her neural tube had closed properly during fetal development exactly when it was supposed to. There was no exposed fetal brain tissue that might have migrated out of her cranium. Subsequent to this first discovery, they soon discovered the network extended along the spine and throughout Sage's body. Sections of it were connected to her vagus nerve and numerous organs."

Randi, already one step ahead of them, said, "Tracing this secondary nervous system led them to the exocranial bundles and the bundles inside her ridges."

"Not initially because both sets of those bundles were too small to find at that time. Sage was still too young. They discovered the bundles along her spine and in her ridges years later."

"She was almost six," Joan said, "before they could get a clear image of what exactly was in those ridges."

"It took years of research before the neurologists could even guess at what the secondary nervous system was doing and what extra abilities it gave Sage."

"Most of the researchers never could fully accept what they saw with their own eyes."

Sutton said, "Just confirm it for me, Joan, please? Though those two networks continued to grow, Sage experienced no further core brain development after that early burst for quite some time."

"There would be two more significant phases of brain development, but not for years."

Chase said, "Senator, the story of Sage Lomax's development is one of the most fascinating tales anyone could ever encounter, but our time here might be more productive if we focused first on what happened at the Novus Somnia facility and then on finding them."

Sutton appeared ready to hit Chase over the head with her gavel. "Tim, do you work at that or is your tone just naturally condescending? And if you will recall, _your_ people were the ones who lost them in the first place and then failed to reacquire them. And now every last one of them has amnesia. That is also a fascinating story. And we will get to that, too, soon enough."

Randi leaned over and whispered to Joan, "In case you are wondering, she has hit exactly seven people with a gavel in her career but none with that one."

"Because it is her favorite."

Sutton almost banged the gavel again, but instead just said, "Please continue, Cynthia."

Chase said, "Senator, we've been here for three hours. This part of our review, if you are determined to proceed with it, will be very complex and involved because of the medical and technical details it contains. Perhaps we could take a brief recess before Dr. Thorpe continues her lecture."

Sutton surprised Chase by agreeing. "We will reconvene in thirty minutes." She banged the gavel. "Randi, honey, come with me, please. We need to make a few calls."

Tim Chase was the first one out the door.

Cynthia chuckled. "I didn't think _he_ would have the smallest bladder here."

Nyla brought Cynthia over to her and waited for Sutton and Boone to exit the room. "Tubby knows more about Sage than he's letting on."

Cynthia said, "That would come as no surprise to me."

"Ever since we crossed swords during the toxin incident last year, I've had this persistent feeling he's known about the Proteus Group longer than anyone."

She said, "How could he? Our timeline with the Proteus Group started with the Colter Militia case."

"For one thing, he's Tubby Chase. He left the CIA to become the head of security for scientific research at government facilities and for government funded research at private facilities. Now look at where he is. But when I try to track his career, I can't get anything more than superficial information about a dedicated bureaucrat."

Cynthia poured herself a glass of water. "Maybe that's all he is."

"Do you really think Timothy Bartholomew Chase is nothing more than a bureaucrat?" Nyla chuckled harshly. "That's what he thinks I am."

Two hotel employees brought in trolleys of snacks and refreshments. The two DHS agents hadn't budged from their positions at the doors.

Nyla waited for them to set up whatever they had to and leave. She then led them over to get what they wanted.

Joan took only a second coffee and a bran muffin.

Cynthia took an orange juice and a banana.

Nyla poured herself a coffee with cream and four sugars, and took three blueberry muffins.

"You usually only take one," Cynthia said.

"Blame Jaxon. And he doesn't need to know about the other two." She bit into a muffin. "Don't misunderstand. I think Tim wants the Proteus Group stopped as much as any of us. I'm just not sure he can play well with others."

"If you two will excuse me," Cynthia said and left the room.

Randi returned without Sutton as Cynthia left.

Nyla asked her, "Does Senator Sutton have the power to compel Chase to reveal all he knows and all he's doing concerning this incident?"

"Wow. Good luck with that." Randi bit into a glazed donut. "Mr. Chase is part of the review committee. He isn't a witness. He hasn't been subpoenaed as one. Claudette could ask him questions, as could all of you, if they are pertinent to the scope of this review, but Mr. Chase is only required to provide the information he sees fit to provide. He has the highest level of security clearance, which, as you both know, includes being permitted to keep his mouth shut whenever he wants."

"By that," Joan said, "you mean he has a higher level of security clearance than any of us."

"He has a higher level of security clearance than this committee. Claudette would have to request a special order from the Senate Intelligence Operations Oversight Committee or from President Trotter herself to reach that level."

"I was afraid of that." Nyla stuffed the third blueberry muffin into her mouth. "I don't think anyone here believes Tim is staying in another hotel just because he's antisocial. Cynthia will tell you Harvey Weinberg worked with both her USAMRIID team and the CDC years ago under another identity and under Chase's supervision."

She said, "I knew it. You can't talk about Chase without including Weinberg."

"That's exactly my point. After the toxin attack last year, during _that_ critical incident review, Tim was forced to reveal a lengthy history with Weinberg. He couldn't keep his mouth completely shut that time because his bosses were the ones conducting the CIR under direct orders from President Trotter. She also saw to it that I got to sit in on the review."

"He must have been happy about that," Randi said while licking icing off her fingers.

"Delighted. We learned the man behind the creation of the toxin, and the attack here last year, had frequently worked undercover with different identities to infiltrate research Chase's department wanted to get more details about. After he gave his report, though it was quite revealing, I still had the feeling there was so much more he could have told us. Weinberg likely knows everything Chase knows. Chase likely knows everything Weinberg's been doing."

"Weinberg is supposed to be at the bottom of a lake in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia."

"And who reported that to everyone? Two months ago, Jacqueline Duquesne came to work as a diplomat at the Canadian Embassy in Washington. Shortly after she arrived, she advised Carol of receiving Dracula's jewelry box and two antique lockets four months earlier."

Randi asked, "Didn't Weinberg steal that box from the San Francisco FBI Field Office?"

"Yes, and he killed Duquesne's former employer, Algernon Devries, to get at least one of those lockets."

Joan groaned and took a sip of her coffee. "You're about to drop another name, aren't you?"

"Frank Gillett had to be the one who got to Weinberg. He recovered the box and lockets and then sent them to Duquesne. What did he send to Chase?"

"Should we be making Mr. Chase a witness here?" Randi started on a second glazed donut. "Should we subpoena Mr. Gillett?"

She answered for Nyla, "Frank Gillett has been missing for over a year."

"I don't doubt the nation's security is foremost in Chase's mind. But how do we hope to stop something as insidious and ubiquitous as the Proteus Group seems to be if one particular department of national security won't share all it knows?"

"Don't start that again. You will only get more upset and all the muffins are gone."

Nyla frowned and then stuck her tongue out at Joan.

Randi finished her donut, licked more icing off her fingers and smiled at them. "Let me see what I can do." She rolled the trolley of food over to the two DHS agents and poured each of them a cup of coffee.

Cynthia and Claudette entered the room together.

Sutton scowled. "And where is our DHS representative?" She sighed again and then said to her aide, "Randi, honey, please find that phone number Tubby so generously provided to us and give him a call. And tell him this is the last time I will wait for him."

Randi went to the table Joan was using to retrieve her phone from her bag.

Chase entered the room before she could make the call.

Sutton's moue hardened. "Tim, do not do that again. When I say thirty minutes, I don't mean thirty-three minutes or even thirty-one. I mean thirty minutes or less."

He continued to his chair. "Senator, this review serves some purpose, I'm sure, but my work does not stop even for that."

"You and I are going to have a rather intense private conversation at lunch, Tubby."

Chase just sat down and scowled back at her. "Please do not call me that. It is demeaning and could be considered harassment."

"I will not use that term in your presence again."

Once everyone had returned to their chairs, Randi whispered to her, "This is perfect. If they keep going at each other like that, Claudette will give me all the support I need."

Senator Sutton raised her favorite gavel, glanced at Chase's hand on the table and brought it down only a few inches away from an easy target.

Chase didn't even flinch.

"Cynthia, I think it would be best if we revisit the medical and technical details of Sage's unique nervous system within the context of the events of Sage's life that they played a role in."

"As you wish, Senator." Cynthia shoved her papers aside.

After first taking another glance at Chase's hand, Sutton said, "For now, Joan, please continue. Sage's development progressed slowly but steadily after the seizures ended, correct?"

She reopened her folder. "There were no further _major_ seizures. Unfortunately, though less severe, both tonic and absence seizures continued to be a regular occurrence for her. Sage was also delayed in hitting many of her age-specific developmental milestones, even taking into account being six weeks premature. But she was doing far better than most of the medical people involved with her had ever expected."

Nyla asked, "How were Ryan and Savannah coping with the stress of Sage's special needs?"

Senator Sutton had been the only one of the committee to get an advanced copy of her report. Nyla and Cynthia only received their copies last night after dinner. Per Sutton's instructions, they were given only ten minutes to skim the two hundred and sixty-two pages before being required to return the folders to her for safekeeping. Chase still hadn't opened his copy of the report to follow along. His laptop was still closed.

"Their marriage took a turn for the worse shortly after Sage's first birthday." She cringed at the cliché way she had just introduced the next major episode in the Lomax family's life, perhaps the pivotal one.

# Chapter 12

"The first decision we had to make," Savannah said to Ryan's parents, "was what date to have the birthday on. Being a Sunday, this year it's February twenty-eighth, though officially it's March First."

Christopher and Deborah Lomax were the only ones in the kitchen with her as she put the last of the chocolate icing on the cake.

"You can stay the night. You won't have to drive back to Los Angeles in the dark."

Deborah said, "We'd love to, dear, but Chris has to work tomorrow."

All the other party guests were crowded into the living room around Sage.

Chris looked through the doorway at the chaos that was passing for play. "How is she doing?"

"Dr. Humboldt is encouraged that she seems to finally be able to follow moving objects. She could stare at me for hours, but she couldn't track a ball or a toy if I moved it."

Deborah asked, "Can I help you with the cake?"

She pointed to the counter behind her. "The candle is right there."

"Good, you got a big one. Sage should have a big one."

She picked up the cake once the candle was in place and lit.

Ryan was holding Sage up at the coffee table waiting for the cake. His sister's children, Taylor, eight, and Micah, six, were trying to take her away from him.

"Careful," Regina said. "She's still a bit unstable. You don't want to make her fall."

Everyone applauded and began singing when she came in with the cake.

Sage caught sight of the cake and lit candle as Savannah set it on the table.

"Happy birthday, sweetheart."

Sage gurgled with pleasure, slapped the table and wriggled in Ryan's grasp to get at the cake. With daddy's help, she braced herself and just stared at the flame. She tried to bounce up and down, but her legs wouldn't cooperate. Ryan had to hold on tight to keep her from falling.

Regina's husband, James Kemp, said to his daughter and son, "Back up a bit and give her a chance to enjoy her first birthday cake."

Her mother and father came to stand beside her.

Mom said, "Taylor and Micah just love your little doll."

"So do I."

Sage still had trouble standing even with the table for support. If Ryan didn't keep supporting her, she would just flop down to the floor.

"We all do," Olivia said.

Sage leaned forward as best as she could to get closer to the flame.

Ryan adjusted her and then lifted her up so she could reach for the cake.

Sage squealed with delight and everyone applauded again. Daddy helped her blow out the candle. She grabbed a handful of icing and cake before he could pull her back, which she then smeared all over his face and the front of her jumper.

Everyone got a piece of cake. Micah and his sister, along with her niece, Gloria, fifteen, then helped Sage unwrap all her presents. After that was complete, they helped her play with all the crinkly wrapping paper. Sage giggled and squealed as she tore and tossed her way through every piece the kids handed to her.

Her dad hugged her. "She's loved and happy. Those are the important things."

Leaving Sage to the care and supervision of three children who adored her, Ryan finally got off the floor and came to her. "Thanks for coming, Dex." He shook her father's hand.

"She does appear to be getting stronger."

"She's small for her age. And she still has problems with tremors and coordination. It's her legs. She is determined, but it is a struggle for her."

The doorbell rang.

"I'll get it." Ryan headed for the front door.

It was a good turnout for Sage's first birthday. Chris and Deborah had come up from Los Angeles. Ryan's older sister, Regina and her husband brought Taylor and Micah from San Mateo. Her mom and dad, dad's twin brother, Lester, his wife, Barbara, and daughter, Gloria lived in San Francisco. They were the most familiar to Sage.

Even her know-it-all-electrical-engineering-grad-student older brother, Jake, took a day off from studies at UC Berkley to drop by. To no one's surprise, sardonic Jake made the most ridiculous faces and noises when he played with Sage.

Neighbors had dropped by to wish them well, say hi to Sage and leave birthday cards.

It was a typical first birthday party, but this event felt like the moment she could finally exhale.

Sage had made it to her first birthday. Technically, she still had six weeks to wait, but she was still here. Her arms, and particularly her legs, didn't do what she clearly wanted them to. But she could sit up mostly on her own and she had mommy and daddy to help her get around. If anything about Sage's personality came out strong and clear throughout her milestone hits and misses, it was her determination and effort. Despite how still she'd been for the first weeks after her birth, Sage was not a passive child. She might be small and not be capable of all the physical things a child her age should be able to do, but that wasn't for lack of trying.

Ryan returned with Ramona Gilbert, Liz Bergeron, Felix Humboldt and Ann Devonshire.

Ann handed her a gift-wrapped box. "It's another knitted blanket. Mom can't stop herself. She asks about Sage all the time. We need to get a video of all this for her."

Liz Bergeron came over to her and handed her a card. "It's from the three of us. This is a special day."

Ramona hugged her.

Dr. Humboldt hugged her. "We can't stay but we wanted to come wish you all a happy birthday."

Ramona nodded to Ryan. He escorted her, Humboldt and Bergeron back to the front door.

Ann took her into the kitchen. "It's okay, Savannah. All of us feel the same mixture of happiness, relief and apprehension, too. Sage has done remarkably well, all three of you have."

"I don't know how we would have got through this past year without you. Dad and mom say we should just adopt you. You are always here. You do so much."

"You say that like it's hard for me." Ann rubbed her back.

"I can see the network clearer every day. It's just below her skin. They're blue, like veins, but thinner and lighter in color. Her earlobes, fingernails and toenails have a similar blue tint to them along their edges." She sighed. "Or am I just seeing things?"

"You are not just seeing things. We all see it, and those freckles, too."

"Yeah, what's with them?"

"It looks like the nerves are coming right to the surface. We'll have to take a closer look, but I can tell you it isn't blue nevus. They are not lesions. Dr. Visser postulates they might be some type of sensory nodes."

"Wonderful. My daughter is going to end up with blue freckles that can smell or—"

"That's enough shop talk for now. Go play with your birthday girl."

She replaced Gloria, Taylor and Micah in the middle of the wrapping paper mess that surrounded Sage.

Sage slapped at the paper and squealed when mommy sat down behind her. She fell backward into her mom's arms and somehow managed to bring along a handful of wrapping paper with her to flap around when mom sat her on her lap.

Everyone just watched Sage enjoying herself. This was one of those synergies people talk about, a collective human response, a community synchronicity. Everyone here would always remember this moment. The only one missing from this group experience was Ryan.

As if Ann sensed her concern, she left the living room. She was back in a matter of seconds and pointed toward the front of the house.

When Gloria returned to them, Sage lifted up her arms to be picked up. Taylor and Micah soon filled the empty spot she'd left when she joined Ann to go to the front door.

Ryan was standing on the sidewalk having a very serious conversation with a man in his fifties. The man was wearing an expensive blue suit.

Ann asked, "Who is he?"

"I don't know."

# Chapter 13

When she stepped out onto the front porch, Ryan waved at her but made no move to come back inside. When she started for the sidewalk, he intercepted her in the front yard.

"I will only be a few more minutes," he said and kissed her cheek.

"Who is he?"

"It's just William from our Los Angeles office. He didn't want to bother me, but something came up on a case. I'll explain it later. Just a little bit longer, I promise."

"Don't be long. You are missing your daughter's first birthday."

There wasn't much left of the party for Ryan to miss. By the time she came back into the living room, Sage was sagging in Gloria's arms. She was then fast asleep in her crib after a quick diaper change. Ann and Gloria volunteered to watch her while she played hostess to the guests.

Gloria did point out, though, "You don't really have to if you don't want to. They are only family."

Ryan was still talking to William in the expensive blue suit when she came back to the living room.

After the star of the show had left the main stage, the party soon became a bunch of small groups of adults breaking off to engage in very boring—according to Taylor and Micah—adult conversations about work, travel, yard maintenance and stuff like that.

Taylor and Micah compensated themselves for being trapped in her living room without a real baby to play with by playing with some of the baby's new birthday presents.

Jake was the first to leave. "Sorry, sis, two papers due tomorrow; I have to get back to work." At the front door, he said, "I've been talking to people at school about some new tech that could help Sage. She's too young now, but one day."

Ryan missed saying goodbye to Jake.

Within ten minutes of Jake's departure, Chris and Deborah Lomax had to go.

Chris hugged her first. "Pass it on to Sage."

Deborah said, "Give her a kiss from us, too, and tell my son to stop neglecting his family or he will answer to me."

Ryan did catch his parents leaving and had to put up with a scolding from his mother. Despite the scolding, however, he remained outside talking to the expensive blue suit from the Brooks and Fellows Los Angeles office.

Mom and dad, uncle Lex and Barb, after fetching Gloria from Sage's bedroom, left next. Regina, James, Taylor and Micah left twenty minutes after that once Regina refused to wait any longer to see if Sage would wake up to play some more.

"Let her sleep." She shoved her own children out the front door and herded them to their van with the same deft and energetic skills as a border collie.

Ryan waved to all of them, but he never stopped his conversation with that party crasher from LA.

Ann came down to help her clean up. "She's sleeping like an angel on a cloud."

"You don't have to do this."

"And you don't have to keep telling me that."

She looked out at Ryan and that guy. Her face flushed. "I'll be right back."

William from the LA office spotted her approaching first. He immediately signaled for Ryan to be quiet.

"Everyone but Ann has gone home. You two might as well continue your conversation inside."

William said, "We're finished, Sage."

"Sage is his daughter. She's the one having the birthday. I'm Savannah."

"I do apologize, Mrs. Lomax, for getting your names mixed up and for intruding on such a special day for your family." He reached up as if to tip a hat at them, turned around and walked away.

"How is Sage?"

"She's sleeping now." She returned to the living room to help Ann.

Most of the cleaning was complete.

Ann was picking up the cake plates. "I helped myself to the last piece." Her smile could melt a glacier in about five seconds. "I hope you don't mind."

"You do know I hate you, right? How do you shovel stuff like that into you and barely weigh a hundred pounds? I still have to get rid of my last ten."

Ann was 5'10" tall, with short, straight, silky black hair inherited from her Japanese mother, along with dark, sultry brown eyes. Her height and lean frame she got from the Devonshire side of the family.

"I'll have you know I am a healthy one hundred and thirty-nine pounds." Ann's broad, warm smile shrank away as she watched Ryan enter the house and go upstairs. She grimaced. "It might be better if I just sneak away right now. Call me if you need to talk."

After carrying the plates into the kitchen, Ann snuck away through the back door.

Ryan entered the kitchen just as she finished loading the dishwasher. "I was checking on Sage."

"Do I need to ask you who that really was?"

"I told you. He's from our Los Angeles office. He's come here to help us with that class action suit I told you about. He just arrived today and I was his contact. He didn't know we were having a birthday party for Sage."

"You should have told him and sent him on his way. Whatever he wanted to talk about could have waited until tomorrow."

"Yes, it could have waited, but it would have been unfair to just send him away. He has important information that could help us settle without going to court. He wanted my opinion."

"You missed most of Sage's birthday party." She immediately stomped her foot. "Sorry. That's not fair or correct."

He embraced her and kissed her. "I think she enjoyed herself."

"She played herself out. I would call that a good birthday."

"I would call it that, too." He let her go.

All the energy inside her seemed to pull away with Ryan when he stepped back. She couldn't stifle the yawn.

"Ramona has talked to Small Wonders House about Sage."

"Why is she doing that? Sage will never go in there." She pushed the button to start the dishwasher and walked back into the living room. She checked for anything she might have missed or Ann had—mostly Ann.

Ryan came in behind her. "Please don't walk away from me every time I bring this up. I'm not saying Sage is going in there. You've been working with them through Ann. They've been very good with Sage. Isn't that right?"

"It's so sad there. Some of those children merely exist. Sage would just wither away there."

"Ramona was only talking to them about providing respite care. They do it with other families all the time. Sage has done well, but she will always have special needs. I can escape to work, but you are here with her all day every day. I don't want you to exhaust yourself." Before she could offer a rebuttal, he took hold of her hands. "I know Ann and Liz and Ramona come around a lot, but I've seen you when they aren't here. You can't relax. You can't take time for yourself. That's not healthy."

"I'm fine."

"We have a right to a good life, too, Savannah."

"I have a good life. I have Sage."

"You just said it for me. Sage is consuming you."

She pulled her hands away and gathered up the last of the wrapping paper.

"What if Sage develops problems we can't do anything about? What if she becomes like some of those children at Small Wonders House? She only has a brain as big as a walnut. That secondary nervous system, as much as it appears to be helping now, could create unforeseen complications in the future. Her seizures could get worse. She might never talk or understand what we are saying to her. How much more do you think she will develop?"

"We'll deal with whatever problems we encounter together."

"But what if we can't?"

She crushed the wrapping paper into a ball.

"Savannah, I'm just trying to talk about the possibility. We need to discuss this. We can't just keep biding our time until the next medical emergency pops up in front of us. What if it is so serious that we can't—"

"Fine." She threw the ball of wrapping paper at him. "If you want to put her into a special care facility, then you better find a room there for me, too, because I will not leave my daughter."

"We need to be aware of what our options are."

"My option is to love and care for my little girl. If you can't man up for that, you're of no use to us. Just go. Ann and I can do a better job without you."

Ryan backed away. "I'm going to give you some time to cool down. I'll be back later." He walked out the front door.

She fetched a garbage bag from the kitchen and pitched what was left of the mess into it. She had to recover Sage's new stuffed tiger when she accidentally pitched it into the bag. She pulled out the chair cushions from the sofa and loveseat and tossed them to the floor to get at the debris that had slipped down between them. After filling the bag and tying it, she left it in the living room, went up to Sage's room and lay down on the floor beside her crib.

Sage woke up twice to eat. The third time she woke up she appeared puzzled about something and started smacking her lips as she continued her search.

"What is it, dear? What are you looking for? Your presents are still downstairs. Do you want me to get Tiger for you?"

Sage checked around the room one more time before looking straight into her mom's eyes again. "Dada?"

# Chapter 14

She woke up late and alone. A quick check of the radio's clock told her she had overslept by more than two hours. Ryan would have left seventy minutes ago after dashing through his coffee and toast.

Nothing hurt when she sat up on the edge of the bed. Her abdomen wasn't providing one of its cramping wake-up calls. Her temples felt cool to the cool tips of her fingers and didn't pound. Her neck wasn't hot either.

So why did she sleep late? Normally, Ryan was the one who got off to a slow start each morning. Then he turned everything into a sprint to make up for lost time.

They hadn't had any wine or hard liquor because last night was Sunday. House rules meant no alcoholic beverages Sunday night. Ryan hated the thought of even the risk of starting the week off with a hangover, but that wasn't much of a risk anymore. They had all but given up drinking anything with alcohol in it once Sage was conceived.

She slapped her cheeks. "Come on, come on, get the lead out of your butt and get going."

A check of the master bathroom revealed nothing of Ryan's usual hasty preparations for a day at work. He hadn't shaved or showered. A check of the closet, however, revealed his side of it had been almost completely cleaned out.

Savannah raced down the stairs and into the kitchen. There were no remnants of Ryan making himself coffee or toast, no cup, no butter knife or plate. Ryan could be quiet to avoid disturbing Sage, but this morning, he'd gone above and beyond.

"And just why would you think that?"

The two clocks in the kitchen were equally stern reminders of having slept late.

Had she complained last night about not feeling well? Ryan would let her sleep on a Monday morning if a weekend had been too draining.

She called Brooks and Fellows and keyed in Ryan's office extension as soon as the prompt requested it.

Felicia Trent, receptionist for that wing of the office, answered on the third ring. "Brooks and Fellows Law Office, how may I direct your call?"

"Good morning, Felicia. Could I speak to Ryan please?"

"Sorry, Mrs. Lomax, he left for the airport twenty minutes ago."

"What airport?"

"San Francisco International; he's taking our jet to Los Angeles."

"Why?"

"Um, didn't he tell you?" Felicia was twenty-two, just a year younger than her, but she left the impression of being only in her teens when she talked. Ryan had told her she was working hard to sound more mature and professional on the phone. At the moment, even over the phone line, she was beginning to sound like a child who had just been caught in a big lie.

"Tell me what?"

"Maybe I should put you through to Mr. Brooks' office. Hold, please?"

Tonya Beltran, Mr. Brooks' Personal Assistant, answered the phone. "Good morning, Savannah. Do I understand correctly that you were unaware Ryan was being seconded to our Los Angeles office?"

Felicia had been able to provide the awkward details to Tonya in the few seconds she had been on hold. The big lie was becoming a big conspiracy.

"Why?"

"The Feldman and Cooper Construction Company class action suit has changed venues. It will now proceed through the courts in Los Angeles. It should take three to six months to settle. Ryan and two of our legal researchers have gone down to assist. I'm sorry, Savannah, I'm not sure why he neglected to tell you. William Caruthers from our Los Angeles office came to your house two weeks ago to tell him of the decision. He was a bit upset for taking Ryan away from Sage's birthday party. How is she doing?"

The conspiracy had some of its origins in LA. "Fine. Thanks." She hung up.

Had Ryan drugged her so he could slip away easier?

"Don't be stupid. How does he usually handle a confrontation with you? He leaves to give you time to cool down. He doesn't spike your Earl Grey with sedatives."

She retrieved her iPhone from her bag and called Ryan's number.

After too many rings to keep track of, a voice came on the line to tell her his number was no longer in service. Three more attempts all ended with a repeat of the same message.

She called Deborah Lomax in Los Angeles next.

"Hello, dear, how are you?"

"Did you know Ryan was coming back to Los Angeles?" She put her hand over her heart. Her temples were pounding now. Her neck was getting hot the way it always did. As she waited for Deborah to answer, her face flushed when the heat spread upward from her neck.

"I'm confused, dear. What are you saying?"

"I thought I was very clear. Did you know Ryan was moving back to Los Angeles?"

Christopher Lomax came on their extension. "Hello, Savannah. We haven't heard from either of you since the party. What's happened?"

Deborah quickly added, "Take your time, dear."

Though sure she wasn't taking her time or sounding very coherent, Savannah told them about waking up alone and calling Ryan's law firm only to find out. . . . "He said nothing to me about going to Los Angeles. Now his phone number is no longer in service."

"Savannah," Christopher said, "we are as confused as you."

"Christopher is wrong," Deborah said, "I did talk to Ryan only three days ago."

"Did he tell you anything?"

"No, but he did seem to be a bit distracted. You know what he's like. He's always in control of his every thought and every detail of what he's talking about. But Friday he was having a difficult time staying engaged in our conversation." Deborah inhaled a big, noisy breath. "Now that I remember it, he suddenly told me he had to go and ended the call. Just like that and he was gone."

"Tonya told me the case would last three to six months. I automatically thought he would stay with you two if he had to go back."

Saying that last sentence didn't do the trick it was supposed to. It was not convincing her all this was just a misunderstanding, one of those breakdowns in spousal communication that happened every now and then. Ryan didn't talk much about work for confidentiality reasons and because he didn't want to bring it home. He fought hard to not bring work home with him, but to not tell her he was leaving for Los Angeles was a big-time breakdown. It wasn't just a misunderstanding that came from the lingering tension between them after the birthday party.

Deborah said, "I just tried his number. I got the same message, dear."

"We don't know what's happening with Ryan, either, Savannah, other than what you've just told us, but try not to worry. We'll do what we can at this end and get back to you as soon as we know something."

"And Savannah, dear, if my son doesn't have a good explanation for this blunder of his, rest assured, I will wring his neck for the both of us."

"Just make sure he calls me."

"Oh, we will definitely do that. Give our love to Sage and take a great big portion of it for yourself, too, dear."

"We'll get back to you soon," Christopher said before hanging up.

The doorbell rang. The stove clock changed to 10:00 a.m. They were on time.

She was still in her pajamas. "Shit."

The doorbell rang again before she could let Dr. Humboldt and Ann Devonshire in.

"Pardon the mess and my appearance. Make yourselves comfortable. I will be right back with Sage."

She held on to the railing and took wobbly steps up the stairs. It sounded like Ann was calling after her something about Ramona Gilbert.

Sage was lying on her back following the movement of Ryan's idea of a gender-neutral mobile above her. She fidgeted and reached with her hands, but her legs didn't move much.

"Sorry I'm late, sweetheart. How's my wonderful girl this morning?"

Sage gurgled and reached up. "Dada?"

Her neck, temples and cheeks became hotter. "Dada is at work." She picked Sage up.

Ann was standing at the door to the room. "What's wrong? You look angry and bewildered at the same time?"

The phone in the master bedroom began ringing.

She handed Sage to Ann and ran to answer. "Hello."

Ryan said, "It's me."

"Why didn't you tell me?" She had to pull the receiver away when the pressure of it began to hurt her ear.

"I knew you would be upset. I have to be here. I'm sorry."

"What on earth would make you think going this way would be better?"

"Honestly, I didn't think any way would be better, but I didn't want us fighting for two weeks, not after the way the party ended for us."

"I called your phone. It's no longer in service."

"I have a company smartphone now. It's encrypted to allow us to send secure messages by text or voice."

Her heart skipped. "Is this case that serious?"

"There are political corruption issues and organized crime interests involved. We will be sequestered for the duration of the trial." He turned away from the phone and cursed. "How was I going to tell you that? I'm not supposed to tell anyone anything. I know it's going to be hard on you and Sage, but what choice do I have? The case didn't start out this way, but then it took a turn. That's all I can tell you."

"I called your parents. I was worried."

"I don't blame you. I'll call them when I get the chance."

"Can you come home on the weekends?"

"I don't know yet. But we have to ask ourselves if we want me bringing this home with me. I would have to have protection with me at all times. You and Sage could be exposed to serious danger."

She put a hand against the wall to support herself when her legs began trembling. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I'm sorry. I have to go. I'll call you when I can, every chance I get. I'll try to set up a schedule so you will know when. I love you both. Don't ever forget that. Bye."

A loud click drowned out her words. "I love you. Bye."

Ann had entered the room still holding Sage in her arms. "She's got a new diaper. We're all ready to go. Do you want to talk about it?"

"He's gone for the next three to six months. There is nothing else to talk about."

"Ramona Gilbert will be here soon. I think she has a proposal to make about treatments and therapies for Sage."

She dressed and then took Sage from Ann. She didn't bother with earrings. Sage would just keep grabbing for them.

Dr. Humboldt was running his fingers through his messy hair and opening the front door for Ramona as they reached the top of the stairs.

"We'll keep Ryan's news between ourselves," she said and started down.

"Good morning," Ramona said with irritating cheeriness in her voice. "It's too bad Ryan's going to be away for so long, but—"

"He told you?"

Sage looked around. "Dada?"

"He asked if I could stay close while he was gone. He was very concerned about you and Sage being on your own. Even after I assured him that wouldn't be the case, he still made me promise. And that is exactly what I'm going to do. Now, if you will come with me." Ramona took hold of her arm and guided her into the nook. "This kind of news is best discussed over a freshly brewed cup of coffee at a cozy table."

# Chapter 15

Turning that silly turbine at the dam had been a small but impressive display of what they could do together, but the event that really solidified their credibility and reputation, and identified their true strength, was stopping the attack at the University of Miami eight years ago.

It had been exhilarating, revealing and terrifying for her at twelve years of age. In the eight years since then the exhilaration had diminished with each assignment until it completely vanished. The terror had gone in the other direction.

Reliable intelligence had alerted them to a pending attack on a political science professor at the University of Miami within the next three day window. They were brought to Coral Gables and deposited in their hotel rooms. The plan was to bring them together every day to _scan_ for the attackers.

They did nothing particularly special to work together. They sat around a table in a room darkened by closed drapes. They did not hold hands or anything ridiculous like that.

Each of them focused his or her gaze on a candle flame set on the table before them. A device that resembled three grey metal drinking bottles taped together was set beside each candle. The round candles were as thick as pie plates, nine inches tall and scented with nutmeg and almonds. Nozzles attached to the canisters were aimed at the candle flames. At regular intervals the round platforms the canisters sat on rotated and the flame was sprayed with more nutmeg and almond scent or spritzed with a blast of pure oxygen to make the flame flare for 1.2 to 1.7 seconds. It was a precisely timed and automated procedure.

This minor theatrical setting was done because EEG scans of each of them while experimenting with various stimuli had proven this aid to be the most effective at charging the areas of their brains that increased each member's focus, concentration and connection to everyone else.

The first time they had encountered the set-up, the scientist in charge of them, Harvey Weinberg, had said to her, "We have biometric readings that tell us this works best."

"Why?"

"That's a very good question, Lucy, but I do not have a complete answer for you. Though we can see the results of what you do together and we can see what areas of your brains are active, we have been unable to detect any transmission of energy from any of you while doing what you do. That failure by science to get a measurable reading of something being generated or passing between you is what makes what you do so difficult to believe."

She hadn't considered that even a partial answer.

The connection between the members of the Apostles that science couldn't measure hadn't been that impressive so far this time, however. That lack of cohesion within the group might have been because a moody, bored and frightened teenage girl starting puberty couldn't appreciate at the time what was happening, what they were all accomplishing.

It wasn't that she suddenly got a sense she was standing, floating or submerged in the darkness with her mom, now known as Themis, Gwen Hunter, John Atchison, Herman Kolisnek, Cedric Hutt, or the gorgeously dark Tye Rosen, only sixteen then. She was aware of all of the others. She was aware of her sensations and reactions to each of them: frustration and embarrassment with mother's pretentions; a strange, muted neutrality toward Gwen no matter how hard she tried to be a big sister to her; apprehension and repulsion higher with John Atchison than with Cedric Hutt, but more suspicion of Hutt—who she had secretly named Jabba; almost nothing from or about Herman Kolisnek; a physical tingle where there were no physical parts when Tye entered her sphere of collective consciousness.

_Sphere of collective consciousness_ was Weinberg's stupid term. And speaking of creepy, Weinberg took the cake, the icing, the ice cream, the whole shebang in that category. Weinberg made even super-duper creepy Chase's indifference to her almost avuncular.

"We're all ready." Weinberg stood at the door to the hotel conference room. "Day two of surveillance commenced at five twenty-two a.m., May seventh; last light off now." Creepy Weinberg then flipped the switch that put the room into complete darkness except for the seven candle flames.

John Atchison, creepy dude number three, took command of the group the moment Weinberg left the room. "Everyone focus on your flame."

"Yeah, like that instruction had to be repeated."

Mom growled, "Mind your tongue, girl."

She had seen little daylight—or much of anything else—since arriving in Coral Gables two nights ago.

The only thing they had _detected_ was a vague cloud—not even that, more like a dissipating vapor—of anticipation and anxiety centered to the south. They could get the direction but not a credible sense of location or movement.

"Lucinda," Atchison said, "let's not horse around today, okay?"

"Yes, daddy."

Mom said, "You mind him, girl. We need to find this bandit now. Don't you be smart-assin' anybody."

"Sorry, momma."

She was the best at detection and location. Tye called her their GPS unit. The other six focused their ritualized stares and were with her in her sphere of collective consciousness. She would look around in the fog. They would support, strengthen and help project her if she needed it, but she did all the work.

Atchison and Hutt had talked to momma last night after their inability—her inability—to clearly find what everyone knew was out there.

Momma came straight from the meeting back to their room. "You have to try harder tomorrow."

"Momma, I am trying. Scolding me won't help. And neither will showing off your cleavage to that big asshole Atchison."

Momma had slapped her twice for her blaspheme. "It's up to you to get us out of being stuck in that dark room day after day. Find him and we can get out into the light again."

"Momma, if I can't find him, I can't. That's all there is to it. We're not the great Apostles that Atchison and Hutt think we are. We're just a bunch of people who can . . . well, I don't know what we can do, but it isn't anything all that special."

Another slap had brought an end to their _discussion_.

"Hallelujah," she said from outside the sphere. "I believe, dear comrades, we might actually see the light of day today."

Momma said, "Keep that sarcasm to yourself, girl, and get busy."

That physical tingle she felt near Tye's presence scampered up her spine, over her shoulder and down between her budding breasts. Momma would slap her senseless if she noticed her erect nipples.

Lucinda reached out to what had been just waiting for them to catch up to it. "They are already on campus," she said. "They have just walked past the bookstore and are approaching University Green."

Over a speaker, Chase asked, "How many are there? Where are they going?"

"How the hell should I—"

"Lucinda," momma growled, "Focus."

"Just a moment."

Tye's physical tingle was racing all over her now, a prickly heat that brought gooseflesh and jolts everywhere it went. _Everywhere_!

"Stop that."

Chase said, "Stop what?"

"Hold, please."

"So help me, girl, I'll knock you into next Sunday if you don't—"

"I got one. I can see the Green."

This one produced a hazy vision of the grassy field ahead. The image from someone wasn't usually very clear. Sometimes they were little more than impressions or sensations, the idea of a thing. Colors, odors, temperature and pressure all added up to a construct.

_Construct_ was another of creepy Weinberg's terms.

They could _know_ what it was because they all shared the same sensations, the same neural pathways and connections were stimulated. But they usually could not actually _see_ what the person was seeing. For some reason that even creepy Weinberg couldn't explain, the Apostles had always had trouble sensing sound. They flat out couldn't hear anything their target could hear.

But today was different.

"He's having trouble breathing," Gwen said. "I can feel it _and_ hear him wheezing. He might hyperventilate before he gets to Professor Abdul-Rafi' Abboud."

Weinberg asked, "Are you sure you're hearing his breathing or just sensing it?"

"If I say I'm hearing it, I'm hearing it."

"I can hear him, too," Themis said. "He's very anxious. The one with him is the one in command of the mission."

"Professor Abboud is lecturing at the university library. His topic is strategies for finding a lasting peace in the Middle East," Chase said. "He's one of the targets on their list."

The Apostles had already helped prevent two other attacks on foreign intellectuals in the United States.

At their initial briefing, Chase had told them, "They are sending a clear message to people coming from other countries, particularly Arab countries, to be educated here: do not give them your intelligence."

The first attacks were thwarted at the planning stage. The would-be attackers were located and caught with the evidence and equipment of their plans stashed in cubbyholes and hidden niches inside their residences. She had found them.

Creepy Weinberg had been the one to show the decency of talking to her about what she was doing though only a child. "I'm sorry you must be a part of this at your age, Lucinda. I don't know if it is of any comfort to you, but you are doing your country a great service."

Professor Abdul-Rafi' Abboud was an Iraqi educated in Britain before coming to the University of Miami. He was seen as a voice of reason on the complex issues in the Middle East and often spoke at the United Nations. For years, he had been a target for every terrorist organization from that region of the world.

"I do not want to sound crude," Weinberg had said at the briefing for this mission, "but Abboud is the World Trade Center of the voices for peace. Killing him would be a huge symbolic triumph for whoever accomplished it."

"He's the bomb," she said.

"Please repeat," Chase said.

"He's the bomb. That's why he's so anxious. He has C4 strapped to his body. The other one has only two handguns with him because they are easier to conceal, or so he believes. His job is to provide only short-term protection for his partner. It _is_ a suicide mission."

"Well done, Lucinda," Chase said, "but our closest team is on the other side of the campus. Can you slow them down?"

"I think I can," Tye said.

"Do what you can. I'm on my way to the school."

The attacker's vision was poor because he hadn't bothered to wear his glasses. He was on his way to Paradise. His vision would be perfect there.

"God," Herman said, "why is this one coming in so clear to us?"

"It's his energy level," Hutt said. "He's so pumped. He's like a bloody lighthouse in the usual fog we encounter."

Gwen said, "He's on something, a stimulant. I'm getting quite a buzz from—"

"Quiet." Tye Rosen knocked on the table top, his unique trick to help him focus.

The attacker's legs were thick. The man was grossly obese. Chase was a huge man, but he carried himself like a healthy young grizzly bear. With Chase, despite his girth, it was hard to imagine his weight as anything other than more leverage for him to use against his enemies. The attacker was in his twenties, but his weight caused him every sort of physical and health problem imaginable. The stimulant was barely keeping him on his feet.

"He is incredibly weak," Tye said. "His legs ache all the time."

Momma, eager to contribute, said, "He's always short of breath. I don't think he would make it up a set of stairs."

"Everyone come to me." Tye tapped the table again.

That tingle became an intense but brief pinch between her thighs before stopping. Was Tye doing that on purpose? Was he even aware of the affect he was having on her? She gasped when she tried to speak.

The collective had just dived deeper inside the obese attacker. Every step he took felt like moving stone pillars up Mount Everest. His feet, knees and lower back ached. Stabbing pains went through his hips. The bomb vest squeezed against his chest, jabbed into his ribs. His heart rate was rising to a level usually only seen in sprints. He had overdosed to get himself into Paradise.

"Do his heart," Hutt said.

Lucinda still couldn't find the exact term to describe what they were exchanging with each other during these sessions. Everyone laughed when _thought transfer_ or _mind reading_ was suggested, but to her those were as accurate as any term she could think of. It was like calling what they were doing within this attacker _remote viewing_ except they were trying to do far more than just that. She didn't receive any words from any of them, only the concentration of each of the group members to reinforce Tye's efforts to slow down the attackers the same way they had reinforced her GPS talents.

Nonetheless, Hutt and Kolisnek were the strongest reinforcements and influences on Tye's efforts. No words being read or transferred were required to understand what they were attempting to do.

Hutt and Kolisnek were using all their energies to urge and help Tye to not just stop the bomber, but to kill him. They wanted to reinforce the effects of the stimulant, boost it to stop his heart, pop a blood vessel in his head, freeze his muscles or even set off the bomb not to just stop him but to see if they could do it. Remote viewing would become remote killing. They wanted to show Chase and Weinberg what they were capable of.

Tye was eagerly absorbing their intentions, motivation and momentum to do just that. The revelation came to her like one of mom's slaps to her face. Tye had always wondered if he could do something like that. He'd always wanted to try it. This was his opportunity, his golden moment.

She felt the pain in the attacker's head inside her own. Clamps were tightening against each temple. His left hand came up to clutch at his chest. Her left hand came up to her chest. A great pressure crushed inward against her heart. Burning pain ran along her left arm and squeezed around her throat. Her mouth and sinuses dried up. The inside of her nose stung and began to bleed. Her legs kicked out.

"Finish him."

She couldn't tell whether it was Weinberg's voice coming from the speaker or Hutt speaking the words.

"Finish him _now_!"

The force pushed her back from the table and tossed her from the chair. Something small and hot and fast penetrated into the back of her skull. There was no Paradise, only oblivion.

"They got them," Weinberg's clear voice said. "The bomber's gone down and so has his partner."

Mom helped her up and back into her chair. The candle flames had been extinguished. The drapes were opened to let the bright sunshine in.

"I'm hungry." Kolisnek patted his stomach. "What's for lunch?"

Numb lips and a desiccated tongue that felt ten times too small barely allowed her to ask, "How long?"

Gwen handed her a tissue. "I know what you mean. It all seemed to happen so fast, but it is past one o'clock. We've been at this for nearly eight hours."

Tye came over and smiled down at her. "A sniper got him before he could set himself off."

She wiped the blood from her nose. "So we didn't . . . ?"

"We only made him believe he was having a heart attack. That fear was already in his mind and amplified because of the stimulant. We just intensified it a bit more. A pretty good trick, don't you think?"

"But it was you who delivered the coup de grace," Hutt said. "When you screamed and fell off your chair, that's when he fell too. He was your puppet at that moment. We just helped you give him the push to send him to the ground. They shot both of them while he was down and his partner was trying to get him back up."

"I screamed?"

Atchison said, "Well done, Lucinda. You get the game ball this time." He applauded her.

Everyone else joined in. Momma flushed with pride.

She had known better, but she had also known she was alone inside the Apostles, isolated within this selfish collective.

"They tried to kill him on their own," she said to momma that night before bed. "Tell Weinberg to do an autopsy. I bet he will find proof of a heart attack or aneurysm or whatever."

"You just keep those foolish ideas to yourself. No one here wants to listen to that kind of nonsense. What we did today was a good thing. Don't try ruining that with any of your stupid notions."

"Momma, we need to know—"

"Just hush up now and go to bed."

After eight more years of momma always siding with the others, it was easy to just give in to the pull when it came and head for San Francisco. Their power would be diminished without her, but they would eventually get a bearing off her and come after them. They had no choice. It was as much a matter of their survival as it was hers.

# Chapter 16

Senator Sutton did indeed take him aside when the review committee broke for lunch, but she used a different tactic than he had anticipated.

"Join us for lunch, Tim. Be a bit more sociable and this whole process will go by a lot quicker. I am sure you could bring some poignant insights to our informal discussions."

He could play that game too. "I'd love to, Claudette, but, unfortunately, I was not just showing off earlier when I said my work refuses to hit the pause button just because I am in a meeting. Maybe next time."

"The invitation remains open and my expectations for solid, helpful intelligence remains high." Sutton turned and proceeded to the elevators.

Boone and Rowe were waiting for her there.

Inside the suite reserved for his use, he opened the laptop and called Reagan on a line as secure as it could be under the circumstances.

"They're struggling," Reagan said. "I think they're falling apart."

"Bring them in."

John Atchison, Cedric Hutt and Dorothy Cooper entered the hotel room and approached the bed where Reagan had placed his laptop. Reagan stopped them at a measured distance from the laptop so they would all be visible on his screen.

"I'm disappointed, John. You told me you'd have them soon."

Hutt said, "I don't believe we need Lucinda to be efficient, Mr. Chase."

"How long have you been working for me, Cedric?"

Reagan stood behind the trio. He prevented Hutt from taking a step back.

"It's been a little over ten years by my count. In all that time, _you_ have never found any more like you. _We_ have never found any more like you. And if the last decade has taught us anything, it is that you work best with seven in the group. You are of no use to me as you are now."

Atchison said, "We have seen a glimmer in the fog."

"I need more than a glimmer, John." He signalled Reagan.

Cole took Atchison and Hutt aside and out of range of the laptop camera. When he came back into view, he brought Dorothy Cooper two steps closer. Her face filled the screen at his end.

"I would have thought you and Lucinda were closer, Dorothy."

"We're very close, Mr. Chase."

"Even so, she walked out on the group a week ago and you haven't been able to find her."

"We tracked her to here."

"That had very little to do with your talents."

"Yes, sir."

Reagan backed her up to her first position and brought Hutt and Atchison back into view.

"You people have had a pretty sweet ride. Laws have been made because of you. Strict protocols are in place to govern how you are to be used. One to those protocols restricts the use of your talents as a group to only government sanctioned missions in the service of national security; in other words, no free-lancing."

"We are aware of that, Mr. Chase," Atchison said.

"You should be because my job has always been to use you as I see fit and enforce those protocols. Now, after all the top secret missions you have all been involved with, after all the top secret information you have all been privy to, one of you just leaves with all that inside her head to join potentially a very powerful adversary."

Dorothy said, "Lucinda is a good girl, Mr. Chase. She won't do anything that would harm us or our country."

"How can I be sure of that? She destroyed her tracker."

"Mr. Chase—"

"Mrs. Cooper, it would be best if you find her before she reaches the point of having to make a decision on that issue."

Reagan came back on the screen once the trio had been returned to their room.

"We've relied on them too much, Cole. We've become lazy and sloppy."

"My units are ready. We just need a vector."

"Keep on them. I have to get back to the review. Let me know the moment they have anything useful."

The strict protocols on the use of the Apostles were clear. They could not be used in any attempt to influence political, judicial, legal, military or executive branches of any level of government in the US or in any other country. They could not be used to insert themselves into or interfere with any law enforcement or national security operation in any way. Every major mission for them must first receive approval from either the Secret Service Operations Oversight Panel, a special section of the SIOOC, or the president.

They were to be used in matters of clearly identified and credible threats to American citizens or national security. The toxin incident here last year was just such a situation. They could not snoop, remote view, eavesdrop or behave in any way that infringed on the individual rights and freedoms or the privacy of US citizens. There were no such limitations for foreign nationals on US soil; however, special SSOOP permission was still required before beginning any such undertakings.

There were specific exceptions in case of emergencies that offered some discretion for him to act without having to first receive permission. The immediate and pending danger presented by the Lomax girl fell within the scope of those exceptions.

Many of the people aware of the Apostles believed them to be a national treasure, the ultimate weapon or super spy. No matter what those easily swayed people thought of them, they were never to be trusted.

Though they had never been able to find more members for the group, Weinberg himself came to believe these were all there were in the nation and possibly the world, he had always been suspicious of that conclusion. In their ten years together, the two most promising candidates for addition to the group had both died in accidents before the vetting process on them could be completed. The status quo of everyone in the group had been carefully and not so coincidentally maintained.

He was again the last one to return to the reconvened meeting.

Sutton only scowled at him and banged the gavel to signal Joan McGowan to continue with her report. "Ryan Lomax did not return to San Francisco after the class action suit was settled."

"He left Brooks and Fellows to become a junior partner at Turcotte, Crane and Poole in San Diego. He did return to Sage and Savannah, but that was years later and it was a very difficult situation for all of them."

"Indeed. His return, as a matter of fact, triggered the events that led to the formation of this committee."

McGowan flipped back and forth between the pages of her report until she found what she wanted. "We will now cover Sage's life from one year old to six years of age. Under the direction of Dr. Humboldt, Dr. Seymour Lanyon, the head of research at Novus Somnia, and Ramona Gilbert, an international scientific, medical and engineering effort was initiated to document Sage's physical, psychological and developmental issues and find ways to help her cope with them."

Randi Boone, again reading a copy of the report on McGowan's laptop, said, "Gilbert got Savannah a job at Small Wonders House."

"Small Wonders House was fully funded by Novus Somnia as part of their community outreach program."

Sutton said, "Please clarify that for me, Joan."

"Novus Somnia research and development was primarily focused on fertility and conception, which is what led to the drug Ovagamex that Savannah took to have Sage. They also researched human genetics and every disease and congenital disability related to the brain. They were the perfect organization to oversee this project. Small Wonders House was used as its center of operations."

"By project," he said, "you mean the synthetic brains they would put inside her."

Thorpe said, "The arrays were too simple to be called synthetic brains. They were little more than electrodes and wires and microchips with simple feedback response programs designed to help Sage with seizures and tremors and balance. The wires inserted into her head were as small as they could make them."

"Nonetheless, by the third update it provided much more than that."

"The arrays were only one aspect of their research. And the researchers had no idea they would get the result they did with the last one."

"It still turned out to be the most significant result or we wouldn't be here."

Sutton said, "Let's not get ahead of ourselves, Tim. Personally, I would like to pretend for the moment that we don't already know how this ends."

"Senator, _this_ is hardly over."

"Nevertheless," She said and tapped her gavel on the table. "Joan, please?"

"The first step was a complete evaluation of Sage and then the development of a comprehensive plan of therapy and treatments to bring her along as far as possible. Small Wonders House staff, under the supervision of Ramona Gilbert and Ann Devonshire, put together an environmental enrichment program for her."

"Why?"

"Structural and functional development of a child's brain is influenced by both the physical and social world. Sage was only one year old when the project began. She was too young and too frail to consider putting her through any kind of experimental surgeries. The evaluation and ethics panel established to oversee the project would not condone the surgeries because Sage was not in imminent danger. They also wanted time to observe both Sage and Savannah. The project was complex. There was a concern about whether Savannah, or anyone else involved, would ever have sufficient understanding of all the details to be able to make an informed decision on the riskier procedures to come."

"Then why even bother in the first place?"

"They asked that question frequently throughout the process. The answer was always the same. Knowledge of the human brain was advancing rapidly, as were numerous therapies and technologies to treat problems and injuries associated with it. Sage was a special opportunity to gain even more knowledge. She presented such an extensive list of disabilities, if they could relieve only a few of them for her, the consensus was, that could be considered a major success."

"The costs were prohibitively high."

Sutton said, "Spoken like someone who is not a parent, Tim."

"These are brilliant people who saw an amazing opportunity to do some good for Sage and, they hoped, maybe develop treatments and aids for others suffering similar problems." McGowan coughed a couple of times. "The researchers agreed both Sage and the technology they were considering needed further development. The plan was to use the first synthetic neural net when Sage was between five and six years of age if she had made enough progress. Oh, excuse me." McGowan coughed again and took a drink of water.

Boone said, "Let me cover the next part for you. I've read the complete report a couple of times already."

McGowan nodded and took another sip of water.

Boone turned the laptop to face her directly. "As Joan just explained, the goal of the enrichment program was to prepare Sage for what was coming. They would focus on physical, intellectual and social activities to promote Sage's development."

"Programs like this," McGowan said, "have been known to promote repairs to the brain's myelin, the protein layer that protects and insulates nerve fibers."

"In Sage's case, they hoped what was good for repair would also be good for development."

He asked, "How effective was it?"

"It is impossible to separate out the effects of the program at that time from Sage's own intermittent spurts of development. If you turn to page forty-two of the report, you will find a description of one such incredible development. As well as further development of her secondary nervous system, Sage also began to grow clusters of ganglia along the outside of her spinal column and similar clusters of nerves inside her three ridges."

Thorpe was checking something on her laptop. "Those bundles connected the secondary nervous system with her primary one. They acted as nodes of communication and control."

"They didn't know very much about what they might be capable of at that time. Some of the team were concerned all that extra neural development outside of her head could possibly cause more problems than benefits."

Boone read directly from the screen. "Physical activity was somewhat limited due to Sage's tremors, seizures, muscle tightness and balance problems, but she loved dancing and jumping. Using specially designed support devices allowed Sage to finally gain some control of her legs."

"That is a needlessly elaborate description of braces. How does this help us with what we are facing right now?"

Sutton tapped her gavel. "Please hold your questions until the end of this part of the report, Tim."

With McGowan and Boone taking turns speaking, they summarized Sage's development as a toddler. Her physical and intellectual development, while not equal to what a normal child her age would go through, was nonetheless remarkable. Her social development surpassed the other two segments of the program.

"She was an infectiously happy and alive toddler. She made friends with everyone. Staff and kids loved her. Her vocabulary lagged, and she did have the occasional episode of glossolalia, but she had no trouble making people understand her."

McGowan concluded this section of her report. "Her balance and coordination was still a problem, as was her seizures and tremors. But at five years, three months and twenty days, she was deemed ready for the first series of injections."

Rowe said, "These injections were her own stem cells to promote further brain growth."

"They failed to do that."

Boone said, "That is not correct, Mr. Chase. They only appeared to fail at first."

McGowan read out loud the summary of her report's chapter on the injections. "Researchers had grown neural bundles using Sage's own stem cells. They used exosomes, sacs of proteins, and Sage's own genetic material, to deliver the packets."

"But they observed no measureable brain growth."

"They did observe growth of those nerve cells along her spine, within her secondary nervous system and particularly inside the three ridges at the top of her skull, but no measurable growth of her tiny brain."

"It definitely helped her new exocranial neural network." Boone tapped the screen. "These new neural bundles appeared to be making no myelin sheaths to protect them, or else they were incomplete. But the injections and, the researchers believed, the enrichment program eventually triggered these immature nerve cells to develop into oligodendrocytes."

"Myelin-making cells," Thorpe said.

"It all sounds impressive, but what is the end result?"

"It set the platform for the nanotechnology that would be placed inside her." McGowan took another drink of water. "At five years, eight months, eleven days, Sage was ready for her first synthetic neural net to be attached."

"We will stop there." Sutton banged the gavel. "Two hours for supper and then we will return for a short session this evening."

Chase quickly returned to his room. Reagan was on the screen when he reactivated his laptop.

"What is it?"

"Rosen wants to talk to you."

Tye Rosen stepped into view. "I will only talk to you."

"Leave us, Cole." Once Rosen turned to face the screen again, he said, "Have you found them?"

"We can't find our asses while sitting on a chair. We're not what you think we are."

"What I think of you is irrelevant. Can you find them or not?"

"I can't because I can barely bend a spoon using my hand."

"Stop trying to be clever and just tell me."

"I'm not the clever one, Dorothy is. She may not be all that smart, but she's the cleverest of us all. You see, Mr. Chase, most of us are frauds. You could correctly call us little more than batteries for the Coopers. Themis and Lucinda are the real powers in the group. I'll bet Lucinda doesn't know it, but her mother is the one controlling everything. She's the one who brought us into the group, not you, because each of us is useful to her."

"Why are you telling me this now?"

"Because I'm scared shitless, that's why. You know that bomber in Miami was killed by a heart attack before the sniper shot him. Kolisnek and Hutt think they helped me do that, but Themis did it. The only special talent I have is detecting it in others. Themis and Lucinda are fucking nuclear power plants compared to the rest of us. Lucy could quite easily surpass Themis, but her development has been hindered by her mother's selfishness and neglect. She could still leave, however, because she is the only one strong enough to break free of Dorothy's hold. Now that she's gone, we're coming apart as a collective and I would rather not be in the line of fire when Themis tries to keep us together. I wouldn't want to be you, either, by the way. She really hates you."

"She's an imbecile."

"She's simple, Mr. Chase, not an imbecile, and simple can sometimes be far more powerful than complex. It's often easier to convince an intelligent person who can see reason and consider other points of view than a simpleminded one who has one all-important goal. Themis may not seem like much on her own, but if she taps into us, she might even be able to stop that girl you're after. Believe me, Themis sees Sage Lomax as an even bigger threat than you do. She will do anything to protect her Apostles. She always has."

# Chapter 17

Sage was in her hospital room waiting to go into surgery.

Dr. Seymour Lanyon and his team were reviewing with Dr. Humboldt the procedure they were about to perform when Ramona brought her and Ann into the room.

Dr. Lanyon turned first to greet them. He held up what looked like a clear rubber swimming cap dotted with electrodes like the ones used in EEG scans.

"What do you think? Not too scary for Sage, I hope."

"I would say getting her head shaved was scarier. She's worn a swimming cap before."

"This has only eighteen sensors." He pointed out the dime-sized discs, each one with a sapphire-blue center. "Each sensor has its own microchip; that's the blue part." He pointed to an array of three microchips at the top of the cap. "That's the main control unit with all the programming on it. Each microchip is a quad-core Pentium."

Dr. Humboldt said, "Each of the eighteen sensors has a tiny wire probe attached. The length of each wire varies depending on how far it has to penetrate into Sage's head."

"Will they stop her seizures? Will they stop her tremors?"

"We are basing our design and programming on data collected from research into epilepsy and Parkinson's, but Sage presents challenges that are all her own."

"In other words, after four years of research, you still don't know what's going on inside her head or if any of this will work."

Lanyon led everyone to a table in the center of the room and waited for all to sit down. He had to gesture an invitation before she would take her seat beside Humboldt.

"I understand your apprehension, Savannah, we all do. Sage is very dear to everyone participating in the program. We want nothing less than a happy and normal life for her. I know we have had a number of setbacks getting to this point, but it would be incorrect to believe we have learned nothing about Sage. We have learned a great deal about her and the truly miraculous capabilities of the human brain. Just these past few days our fMRI scans have revealed another little bit of the miracle."

Dr. Selena Paden said, "There is a very fine network of nerves similar to what we see in her secondary nervous system growing throughout all of the gel. It conducts neural charges along discrete sequential and traceable pathways. We know this because the nerves glow while they're active."

"Bioluminescent proteins," Ann said. "Fantastic."

"Savannah," Dr. Humboldt said. "We have always known Sage's brain architecture was different from a normal human brain, but she will force every scientist studying the brain to re-evaluate how much brain she has. Indeed, we may have to redefine what constitutes a brain and what its limitations really are."

"If there are any," Ann said.

Dr. Lanyon drew a side view of a human head on a white board and then drew a brain inside of the head. "Eighty six billion neurons or so connected at almost one hundred trillion synapses and the fact is we still do not know what exactly is going on in there," he tapped his drawing, "when we think."

Dr. Paden got up from her chair and went to the drawing. "We know a lot about the parts of the brain. The central cortex, the outer layer of the brain, the gray matter, though it isn't really gray, handles thought, memory, perception. The frontal lobes," she put her hand over the drawing's forehead, "are associated with abstract thought, self-control and on and on. But we only have a superficial idea of how it all does what it does. Images from fMRI scans have revealed what parts of our brain are activated for various functions like dreams, reading, even telling lies. The parts consume oxygen when active. They glow, but it's like looking at the sun. It's bright but not detailed enough to pick out what is actually happening. But with Sage's neural network flashing clearly its intentions and functions, we might one day be able to identify the exact neural excitation pathway for the word _dog_."

"I'm happy for all of you at what this new toy might give you, but will it help my daughter?"

"We believe it will," Humboldt said. "Over the past four years, Sage has been studied with increasingly more accurate sensors and scans. Everything we've learned from her we've used to refine our research into what we can do for her."

Paden said, "She's is more famous than Phineas P Gage but without the wild, ignorant speculation."

Humboldt took hold of her hand. "This cap is not a replacement for all the brain cells Sage does not have. We can't possibly do that. The wire sensors we are putting inside her head are based, as Dr. Lanyon said, on what we know of areas of a normal brain that are active during epileptic seizures and uncontrollable tremors. Research has given us a very good map of where these electrodes can do the most good."

Dr. Paden returned to her chair. "But we do know Sage is different from that."

Dr. Lanyon said, "Let's review the procedure again. Eighteen tiny holes will be drilled into Sage's skull." He twitched a smile at her. "I imagine that sounds quite horrifying, but the holes are barely large enough to insert the wires and we have performed this procedure dozens of times with no problems."

Ann put an arm around her.

_She always seems to know exactly when I need one_.

"The cap will be attached at these eighteen points. Eighteen microchips will monitor her brain activities. When a seizure strikes or her tremors become too difficult for her to manage, a very small charge will be sent to the active areas according to what we currently know about the most effective electro-stimulus therapy in cases like this."

" _Normal_ cases like this."

"Yes, normal cases like this. The chips will also collect data and send it to that central array on the top of the cap." He picked up the cap and again pointed out the main array of three microchips to her. "We will analyze that data, which will help us adjust the cap's output and programming to better assist Sage. Keep in mind this is only the first step of the next phase of Sage's treatments. We are not putting wires into her head and then just walking away from both of you."

Liz Bergeron entered the room. "Everything is prepped, Dr. Lanyon. Sage is ready."

"It should take about six hours. Would you like to go home and rest? We will call you when it's over."

"No, I'll stay."

Ann gave her a squeeze when she began to tremble.

"Can I see her first?"

"We'll take her," Bergeron said.

Liz, Ann and Ramona escorted her to the surgery's observation room. Most of the American contingent of researchers working on Sage's case was there to watch the procedure.

Sage lay unconscious on her back covered in a blue cloth. IV was inserted into her left arm. She was attached to enough monitors and machines to make the Frankenstein monster jealous. Her bald head was tilted back. The points of entry for the electrodes had been marked on the pale skin of her head with bright red dots inside red circles.

"They look like bull's-eyes."

Ann and Ramona held her up when her legs buckled.

Ramona said to her, "The surgery is laser-guided, Savannah. Those red bull's-eyes contain a dye that glows when the laser strikes them. It helps the laser make precise alignments at each spot."

"I better get in there." Liz hugged her. "I will watch out for her, Savannah, I promise you."

She put her hand on the window glass. "Be strong, baby. Mommy loves you."

Ann whispered in her ear, "Everyone here loves her."

# Chapter 18

She and Ramona were with Sage when she woke up.

She gently squeezed her daughter's hand. "Hello, sweetie." She kissed Sage's cheek. "How are you feeling?"

Sage looked up at her with fixed blue eyes but said nothing.

"Honey, is something wrong? Are you in pain?"

Sage's left hand trembled, she began to shiver. Her eyes remained fixed.

"Oh, God."

Ramona stepped closer and patted her back. "It could just be side effects from the anesthetic. She's come out of it about an hour earlier than anyone expected. I'll get another blanket."

She held Sage's trembling hand and kept looking into her fixed eyes as Ramona tucked another blanket around her.

Sage's shivering subsided quickly once Ramona added the blanket. She took a deep breath and released a long sigh. "Head itchy, mommy." She stuck out her tongue. "Thick and dry."

Ramona had a drink of water ready for her.

Sage took a long sip through the straw. "All done?"

"All done, honey. You were so brave. I'm so proud of you."

Sage squeezed her hand hard. "Strong little girl."

Ramona wiped her eyes. "The strongest and bravest little girl in the world."

"Super hero."

"You're my super hero."

Drs. Humboldt, Lanyon and Paden entered the room.

"How's our big miracle doing?" Lanyon came to the bed and checked the fit of the cap.

"Super hero," Sage said. Her left hand still trembled a bit.

Lanyon took hold of it. "Okay, super hero, show me how strong you are. Squeeze as hard as you can."

Sage sat up and scrunched her face the way she always did when she was determined to accomplish a task she was having trouble with. She grunted and squeezed.

"That's it, as hard as you can. Marvelous. Fantastic. You have a very strong grip, Sage. Well done, Wonder Woman."

"Wonder _Girl_. Super hero." Sage let go and laid back. She squeezed Savannah's hand as hard as she could.

"Wow, baby, that is strong."

"Wonder Girl," Wonder Girl mumbled and then fell right back into a deep sleep.

# *****

Other than having some difficulty rousing her, Sage's post-op progress was good. Dr. Paden was in charge of testing and evaluation. A week after the procedure, Sage was to undergo her final examination at the hospital before being released.

Dr. Paden and Liz Bergeron were with Sage when Savannah arrived.

Sage was busy on the floor trying to complete a puzzle made up of plastic pieces of various colors, sizes and shapes.

"Mommy." Sage raised her arms.

She took a step closer but stopped when Dr. Paden held up a hand. "Can you get up for mommy, Sage?"

Sage frowned, shook her head and went back to her puzzle.

Bergeron said, "She hasn't quite gained enough confidence to try without her braces. The exosuit will be ready next week."

She went to her daughter. "That's fine for now, Sage. You will stand on your own when you're good and ready."

"Look." Sage pointed to a pyramid made out of blocks. "I did that."

"She is incredible. The Human Connectome Project has been eating up Sage's data like kids in a candy store."

"And how is Sage doing?"

Selena Paden came to her smiling as if she were one of those kids who had just discovered her own treasure trove of sugar. "Our project has mapped genetic activity throughout the whole brain. We have collected data on which genes are active or dormant for hearing, touch, movement, problem solving. The list just keeps getting longer. And though we have seen individual variances, the most remarkable result we found is that the gene activity is very similar in all human brains."

"Dr. Lanyon has explained this to me numerous times. Specific sets of genes are active in the different regions of the brain and contribute to their particular function."

"That is where Sage comes into the picture. Her brain, her whole nervous system, is completely different from the norm."

"Yeah, I get that."

Dr. Paden grimaced. "I'm sorry. I sound like a rabid idiot. I get like that when I'm excited. My only excuse is that Sage is someone very special and beyond what we can comprehend at the moment. She is a whole other universe to study and she is going to be our beacon of knowledge for both universes. Every time I look at those flecks twinkling in her eyes, on her irises as well as the whites, I imagine them as stars from her universe beckoning us to enter. She can teach us so much, especially with those bioluminescent pathways she teases us with, because, despite all the lights that go on and off inside _our_ heads, it's still so dark in there."

"Why is she such a beacon? Is it just that glow of hers? Is she using more of her brain?"

Paden grimaced again. "If you are talking about that mythology of untapped potential because we only use about ten percent of our brain's total capacity, the answer is no. That's a fanciful notion but it is nonsense. I would say that with her exocranial nerve bundles and her secondary nervous system Sage simply has more brain to tap into."

"You must be very excited."

Sage put up her hands. She had finished the puzzle.

"It's not a record time, but I think we can all agree that as little as a month ago, Sage would have had great difficulty with both figuring out the puzzle and putting it together."

She picked Sage up. "You are doing great, sweetie."

"Super hero."

"Humans have a more developed cortex than any other animal. It is what gives us our complexity, our wide variety of personalities. Those six layers in there give us our evolutionary edge. Gene activity in each type of cell in the cortex is homogeneous from front to back."

"Sage doesn't have much of a cortex."

"Wonder Girl."

"It's the wiring of the brain, not where the specific cells are located. People are wired differently than animals, even our primate cousins, but we all share a common set of genetic activity in our brains."

Sage pulled on mommy's dangling earring. "Pretty."

"That is perfect; a very human aesthetic judgment. That is what I'm talking about. Yes, Sage has very little development of the cortex. Yes, her wiring appears to be different. But Sage is finding her own way."

Bergeron said, "Tell her what you've been talking to the others about."

"First, Savannah, you have to understand that not many of my colleagues agree with me. They are being cautious. They believe it is too early to make such a sensational assumption."

"All done." Sage settled in her arms.

She sat down on the bed. Her super hero was getting quite heavy. "And that would be?"

"I think Sage's brain is still growing. Look at the neural bundles along her spine and the ones inside her cranial ridges. We are picking up activity from them. They are flashing all the time. I have to concede the point to my colleagues that we have nothing to compare what we are seeing in those bundles to, but Sage's body, her very own brain, as small as it is, is going about its business of growing and developing the best way it knows how."

Liz said, "We are continuing to see networks of nerves growing and extending all through the gel. They are connecting to her core brain, her exocranial and ridge bundles and her secondary nervous system. Those are the illuminated trails Dr. Paden is talking about. We just need to figure out where we are going. We need to learn how to read her map."

"We are seeing activity in the spinal bundles when she is performing fine motor tasks like that pyramid and the puzzle. The bundles in her ridges fire like crazy when she is watching television or looking at picture books, and particularly when she is looking at people. When you see that unnerving stare of hers, those bundles are a storm of electrical activity, really potent electrical activity, between three and six times what a normal brain would produce just in those ridges alone. She has a very powerful little engine inside her. There is no telling what she might eventually be able to do."

"I don't want to sound like an unimaginative mother when we are looking at a whole new universe inside Sage, but I would be happy if that remarkable, expanding universe of hers meant she didn't have to wear diapers as a precaution anymore when we go out."

"I think that will come soon enough, Savannah. Selena neglected to mention that while Sage still doesn't have the confidence to try to stand on her own fine motor control tasks no longer trigger tremors."

"She's had only a few minor seizures since the operations; only a few absence ones, no tonic episodes."

Sage sagged in her arms and began to slide out of her grasp.

"We're boring her," Liz said. "She's fallen asleep."

She laid Sage on the bed. "She's so cold and limp."

Dr. Paden examined her. "She's gone into a coma."

# Chapter 19

The coma expert arrived from Philadelphia two days after Sage lost consciousness. Dr. Henry Edwards, a white-haired, white-bearded man in his sixties spent almost two hours with Sage before inviting them all back in to her room. Drs. Humboldt, Lanyon and Paden were there to consult. Ann and Ramona came for her.

"She has quite the entourage."

Dr. Humboldt said, "A very concerned and hopeful entourage, Henry. What can you tell us?"

"The child's medical history is full of episodes like this, is it not?"

"Sage has lost consciousness frequently after major seizures," she said. "The longest period was about six hours when she was three years old. The frequency of major seizures has decreased significantly in the past two years."

"She hasn't opened her eyes at all for two days?"

"Not once."

"Savannah, could you come here, please? The rest of you hang back for now."

"Is it a coma?"

"It's hard to tell, but then I'm sure you are getting both used to and fed up with that answer."

"I'm just numb to it now, Doctor."

"The patients I see usually lost consciousness due to illness or injury. I could often compare before and after brain activity. Sage is. . . ." He smiled down at Sage.

"Unique."

"Based on the readings we are getting from that cap on her head, I would say it was the fourth of July in there, but—"

Sage shrugged.

She and Dr. Edwards both stepped back.

Ann may have gasped.

"What do you make of that?"

"I can't make anything of it. Her shrug may have been a response to hearing your voice or it may have just been a random firing of her autonomic system. People in a vegetative state do move from time to time."

"That wasn't vegetative. It was a response, I'm sure of it."

Ann came to her. "I'm sure of it, too. She knows you're in here with her. She wants to wake up for mommy."

"I hope so," Edwards said. "If I had to describe those fireworks as anything, they resemble the activity of a grand mal seizure, though in this case I would call it a super grand mal seizure."

Dr. Lanyon came to the bed. "That can't be."

"I only said the activity resembled a seizure. With a grand mal I would expect to see some exterior manifestation of the seizure. Her eyes might flutter, her jaw might tighten. She might twitch or tremble or convulse. But, as you can see, she is completely still."

"Then what is happening?"

"I don't know."

She turned on Lanyon. "You told me the cap was supposed to help control seizures."

"Savannah, Sage is not having a seizure. She is in a coma."

"Dr. Edwards is an expert and he isn't sure it is a coma. What the hell are you playing at? You all say you care about Sage. You want to help her have a good life, but look at her. She's in a coma, or something, and not one of you knows what to do about it. You made life worse for her."

Ramona said, "Savannah, we didn't try to—"

"And you. You get to feel so fucking generous and humanitarian because Novus Somnia is paying all the bills for this great big bloody experiment. She is not an experiment, she is my daughter. You all promised to help her and all those promises did was paint Sage and I into a corner. How do I say no to any crazy thing you people suggest? My god, I let you drill holes into my baby's head and then stick wires into her like she was a voodoo doll." She wiped away her tears. "When do I get Sage just for me? When do we get our lives back?"

"Savannah," Ann said quietly.

" _What_?"

"Your little girl just opened her eyes."

# *****

"Wow," Selena said.

"You're not going to start babbling again about the Human Connectome Project and other universes inside Sage's head and beacons in the darkness and glowing trails that will lead us somewhere special and tell me over and over how Sage's brain is different, are you?"

Sage, still in her pajamas, sat at a table in the larger playroom of Small Wonders House. She kept her walker close, but had been moving quite well these past few days. The custom-made exosuit hadn't come when promised because those experts at Cal-Berkeley were still 'working out some of the bugs'. It was now due within the next week to ten days.

Sage had her tongue out and was coloring in her favorite Tinkerbell coloring book. She still couldn't come close to staying inside the lines.

Selena, with her notebook ready, asked, "Has she had any major seizures in the past three weeks?"

"No seizures of any kind at all. You already know that."

"I have to ask officially. No tremors?"

"No obvious ones. She struggles with her balance and coordination. She still goes stiff in the legs when she wants to change direction. Sometimes she has trouble standing straight and does topple."

"The suit should help with that."

"If it ever gets here," she muttered.

"Has she made any attempt to walk on her own?"

"Can I get you a cup of coffee, Selena?"

Selena wiped the perspiration from her forehead. "That would be nice, black, please, thank you. It's just that every time I'm with her . . . I still get . . . she's just the most. . . ."

"Yeah . . . _wow_ . . . I know."

Ann came into the lunch room while Savannah was pouring the coffee.

"I thought I saw you come in here." She poured herself some coffee.

Savannah looked around the lunch room. "When I first started working here, I thought this had to be the saddest, bleakest place anywhere. I thought the children here were so miserable. I was such a bonehead." She took a sip of coffee. "Some are profoundly disabled, that is true, but most of them are capable of the important human stuff. They can love and laugh, they can play. They're Sage's friends and they enjoy themselves." She took a larger gulp. "Sorry, I get like this sometimes."

"Why should you be any different?" Ann had to slurp up some coffee when it started to run over the rim of her cup. "You should prepare yourself. Selena just got the report on Sage's blue freckles. They confirmed a link between them and her secondary nervous system. And they do have a sensory function."

"What sense?"

"I just took a quick look. You know how they read." Ann blinked rapidly as she tried to remember. "It went something like this. The small blue scales, each one between one and two millimeters in diameter, circumscribed within the node—they mean the freckle—number between eighteen and twenty-four. Each scale is attached via its own nerve—something like hearing and smell receptors—to a greater nerve of the SNS."

"For over five years, most of the conversations I've had with anyone about Sage seem to become lectures on brain development or all the mysteries her amazing nervous system presents."

Ann chuckled. "She looks pretty in her Tinkerbell pajamas."

"Thank you. You are my treasure."

Her mobile phone rang. "Jake."

"Howya doin', sis?"

"Just another day, you know."

"I thought you could use some good news."

"Always."

"Sage's suit will be there by next week. I guarantee it."

"How do you know?"

"I've insinuated myself into the project. You know, just kickin' some assess, knockin' some heads, met a babe. I'll be coming with to make sure everything goes the way it should. Love ya both. Bye."

On the way back to the playroom, she gave Ann the news.

"Wonderful."

Dr. Milton Lytle was talking to Selena. Sage had stopped coloring in her book and was scowling at the two doctors.

"Of all the _normal_ things a child can do, I could have done without that. Why is Lytle here?"

"He's just following up with a couple of the older children. They had some minor surgeries done."

"He doesn't have much hair left."

Ann slurped some coffee and grunted.

Dr. Lytle shook hands with Selena then came to them. "Hello, Mrs. Lomax. I must tell you I did not anticipate the progress your lovely daughter has made. I am very happy for you both." He continued on his rounds.

She handed the coffee cup to Selena and then went to Sage.

"They will fail and he won't like it," Sage said.

"Who will fail, dear? Who won't like it?"

"No bombs boom, no bombs boom. But everyone can still live happily ever after."

"I'm sorry, Sage, but I don't know what you are talking about."

Ann and Selena joined them at the table.

"They did it before, they can do it again. They had better or they will be sorry. Now get to work, all of you. She won't turn and she won't stay. What's a momma to do?"

Ann and Selena looked at her. She shrugged back.

Dr. Lytle passed the doorway and waved on his way out.

Sage scrunched her face into a severe moue. "Do no harm. Doctors should do no harm."

Selena asked, "Does she know about the surgeries? Does she know either of the children and what they went through?"

Ann asked, "Does she think they are in pain because he's here?"

She asked, "Sage, dear, is there something wrong with Dr. Lytle?"

In a stern tone of impatience and with that moue still on her face, Sage said, "Oh, mother, you can see for yourself. He's the wrong color to be a good doctor."

# Chapter 20

The Apostles and the EMT arrived at the Hyatt Regency in Wichita in three white Ford panel vans. Cole Reagan was in charge of herding them to their rooms to deposit their luggage and then to the Willow room on the Century II second-level Promenade.

According to a plaque by the door, the Willow room was 278 square feet in size and could hold sixteen to twenty people. One end of the room was set up with tables and a buffet for their dinner. The other end was an empty space where the surveillance team would set up their monitoring equipment. They worked in a separate room from the Apostles to avoid distracting them.

As the Apostles, they would get to eat first before going into their performance. The Event Monitoring Team had to set up their equipment in the room and then get their other equipment set up at the INTRUST Bank Arena. They would have to eat on the run if they wanted to get some supper.

"Lucinda, you sit beside me." Momma took hold of her by the arm and led her to the buffet.

The next moment a tray holding a heavy white plate, a glass cup etched from too many times through a dishwasher and dinnerware was in her grasp.

"I'm famished," momma said. "The chicken wings look good."

Reagan was too busy with his team at the other end of the room to bother with them.

She placed on her plate the food momma insisted she take and then followed her to the two tables pushed together and covered with blue cloths.

Momma made sure she got the chair next to John Atchison. "You sit here on my left, girl."

"Can we sit on the other side of the table, momma?"

"This side is fine."

"I don't want to watch them working while I eat."

Tye sat down across from her. Herman sat next to him.

He asked, "How are you feeling now?"

Momma clucked. "Don't you worry about Lucy. She's just got the misery right now." Momma wouldn't call it the curse. "She's all cramps and headaches and complaints. Just ignore her."

"Momma, I—"

"Shush, girl. Eat your supper. We got important work to do this evening."

"Personally," Atchison said through a mouthful of barbeque chicken wing, "I don't care about a bunch of stupid young Republicans trying to back the Democratic presidential candidate into a corner over the Iraq war with a meaningless rally in support of allied troops. I don't care about the war in Iraq. There are more important missions we could be doing."

Cedric Hutt sat across from Atchison. "The forecast is for severe thunderstorms tonight and heavy rain. Probably no one on either side will show up."

Tye smiled at her. "How many are they expecting?"

"What's the point in answering you? You haven't listened to anything you've been told since becoming one of us."

"Now, Jabba, don't be so cranky. Lucy is the one bleeding here, not you."

Momma growled, "Shut your mouth, boy. If my girl's in pain, that's nothing to joke about."

Tye winced and dropped his fork to the floor. He flexed his fingers as he looked down at the fork.

"Stupid little boy," momma said. "My son's got more sense than you and Herman put together."

"Don't drag me into this. I didn't say anything about your daughter."

Cole Reagan brought another one of momma's embarrassing confrontations with just about everybody to an end when he came to the table. "Mr. Chase is here. We're almost ready. You have fifteen minutes." He and his team left the room.

"They are holding us back," Atchison said. "Ever since we proved what we can do in Coral Gables, they've held us back. They've stuck us with minor crowd control assignments like this one tonight. We can do better. We can do more important things. If Harvey were still here, we'd be doing something more important."

Tye said, "Careful there, John, you're beginning to repeat yourself."

Momma said, "Mr. Chase is doing this to help us improve our work. He's told us that. We're still in training right now. And he's been nice to us. He's given us a purpose."

Herman took a big drink of his Coke before speaking. They weren't allowed to have beverages with alcohol in them before going to work. "He's been transporting us from assignment to assignment in windowless vans as if we were cattle. You would think his budget could spring for a limo every now and then."

"We've been in training for over two years," Hutt said. "We have improved, grown stronger as a collective. He knows that. It's time to let us play for real now."

Atchison bit into another chicken wing. "The FBI or NSA or CIA could use our talents. We could stretch out and flex our muscles for them. We could grow with them. We're going nowhere with Chase."

Tye said, "I'm sure one of them has limousine service."

"I agree with Momma. Mr. Chase isn't as nice as momma thinks he is, but he has looked after us."

"Who cares what you think," Hutt said. "You're only sixteen. You barely know what's going on around here."

"Yeah, well what if we do go to one of those other places? Who's to say we don't just end up with another one like Chase bossing us around and holding us back there? They might treat us like cows, too."

"Prize cows, though." Tye smirked at her. "Better the devil we know, I suppose."

Atchison nudged momma. "We would insist we be left to supervise ourselves. They just need to see what we can do, isn't that right, Themis?" Momma loved it when they called her by her new name. "We would have assignments all over the world."

Hutt asked Herman and Tye, "What do you two think of the idea?"

Herman just shrugged. "It doesn't matter to me who we work for or where we go or what we do as long as we travel with some style and I get to see some action."

Tye picked up his fork and inspected it.

"See anything interesting." Atchison held up his fork and imitated Tye. "Or are you just going to bend it for us?"

"You leave him alone."

Momma slapped her hand. "Mind your manners, girl."

Reagan came back into the room and just nodded at Atchison before leaving again.

Momma slapped her hand again as they exited the Willow room. "Behave yourself. Don't you be sassing back to anyone here or they will kick us out."

"I don't care."

Momma took hold of her arm and squeezed as hard as she could. "You better care, girl, or you are going to find yourself standing all alone in the ruins of your life."

Reagan took them into a much bigger meeting room. A partition of dark, padded panels had created a section for them smaller than the Willow room. A table had been set up with the incense candles, the spray canisters and four flat-panel television screens in the center of the table that created a four-sided display.

The lights went off.

"Those screens," Chase said from somewhere in the darkness, "will help you pick out people in the groups to focus on. The group supporting the war is nearer the stadium. We estimate less than eighty of them. The ones milling about in the parking lot are the anti-war group. There are about forty of them." The room became temporarily bright with a flash of light, as did the four monitors. Thunder rumbled in the distance a few seconds later. "There is a strong likelihood they will all just leave rather than get soaked or risk a lightning strike."

Reagan said, "We have twelve of our people in the crowd who can quickly get to anyone you identify. Police presence is light because they don't think anything will happen. They do have units ready as backups for us if required."

"Take your positions." Once they did, Chase came into the dim light of one of the candles. "Just monitor the feel of the group. This might be one of your most boring assignments, but stay sharp. You are authorized to act as you see fit to control the situation."

Her head, neck and shoulders throbbed. Her back was stiff and cramps kept squeezing her lower abdomen as if trying to snap her in half. The smell of nutmeg and almonds only nauseated her all the more. The tips of her fingers started going cold and numb.

They had begun.

The Will-of-the-People rally was taking forever to get any traction. On the screen in front of Lucinda, some man just a bit older than Herman, one of John's stupid young Republicans, was walking around his apathetic group carrying a bullhorn painted metallic cherry-red like a hot rod.

She couldn't hear what he was saying through the televisions because the volume was off, but once their collective effort transported her to the INTRUST Bank Arena parking lot, the volume on the televisions wasn't needed.

Kolisnek said, "There is malice here. It has all the ingredients needed. Some have been drinking. Some are congregating in smaller groups eyeing the others. I didn't know young Republicans could harbor such ill will toward their fellow Americans. Turn the other cheek, fellas. None of it really matters in the end."

Momma said, "Don't you mock the bible, Herman."

"Sorry, momma," he said.

"He's right," Atchison said. "I can't pinpoint it but someone is itching to do something. They are in predator mode. They are looking for their prey and the right moment to pounce."

"More than one someone," Tye said, "but they aren't working together."

Chase's disembodied voice asked, "Agitators?"

"No. There is no common plan or coordination between them to act collectively, but if one of them starts something, look out."

"That could be a problem," Chase said. "If it's random, it could escalate too quickly."

"Not with us here," Hutt said. "Most of the agitation is with the pro-war group."

"Disappointment," Atchison said. "The leaders expected a lot more supporters. They're pissed off. They feel letdown, betrayed. Others have reneged on their pledge to come. The aggravation is growing."

She didn't feel any of that. All she got was a sense of them all being cold and miserable and worried about the approaching storm. No matter what they said publicly about their commitment, most of the people at the INTRUST Bank Arena, including Reagan's team, were preoccupied with how bored and uncomfortable they were. The damp chill was penetrating deep into them.

Some were discovering just how inadequately they had dressed for—

"A dark and stormy night," Tye said. " _Oooh_."

She giggled.

Momma grunted at both of them.

Tye countered with, "Moo."

Because she should say something as a member of the collective to prove she was pulling her weight, and to prevent any angry outburst later from momma, she said, "More concern on both sides about the storm than the troops in Iraq. That is what I get."

Tye laughed. "Some expensive shoes could be ruined tonight."

Somewhere out there in the perimeter shadows of their dark and stormy room—she giggled again—Chase cleared his throat. He did that a lot when he thought they were drifting. "Any glow yet? See any bright spots of light within the haze?"

"It's a fog not a haze."

"Shut-up, girl and concentrate."

"I have a headache."

"Stop whining and do as you're told."

"Yes, momma," Tye and Herman said in unison.

Atchison said, "The mood of the crowd is fragmenting. There is an increasing level of selfish concern. Interest and resolve is waning. Why didn't the organizers cancel with a storm coming in? The rain is washing away any commitment to a social identity. But there is also apprehension and anticipation bouncing between the two groups."

"And don't forget all that boredom," Herman said.

The man with the cherry-red bullhorn was trying to whip up his side. His rhetoric changed from support of the troops in Iraq to attacking his opponents. The Apostles didn't hear or 'read' what he was saying, but his change in motivation was obvious. To whip up that support, he had to identify a closer target. That rent-a-crowd of milquetoast protesters with no stomach for doing what was necessary to protect the country were the closer enemy. They were something he could mount some sort of attack against. He suddenly aimed his bullhorn at his immediate enemy and began hollering about patriotism and loyalty and weakness and—

"The storm is accelerating," momma said, "People are getting very nervous about that."

Flashes of lightning and peels of thunder southwest of Wichita stepped closer along the Little Arkansas River.

"Someone thinks they see a funnel cloud. There is a clear visual impression coming through."

"Work with that," Chase said. "Concentrate on that concern. Magnify that threat, spread that to as many as you can. These are not true believers. They don't have the commitment. Get under their skin and they will all stampede for cover."

Lucinda didn't sense Tye or Herman or Cedric trying to harm anyone or urge on anyone from the two groups to do so. Chase's directions were good. The fringe members of both groups were already watching the approaching storm and backing away in their minds. They were remembering where they parked, deciding where they might go for food and assessing how quickly they could get to shelter.

That room back at the hotel seemed awfully attractive right at the moment. There was a good selection of movies on the pay-per-view list. They could watch the storm from safety. She had brought that sheer harem outfit with her. The next phase would be taking that first step away from their group.

Look around. Don't be obvious, but the moment anyone breaks from the crowd make your move. Was that another funnel cloud descending from the sky? Did someone just say they saw a waterspout coming up from the river? It's getting too dangerous to stay here, and for what?

These impressions still didn't come to her as words. They just _deciphered_ that way. The more intense the impression, the easier it was to decipher it. It wasn't going to take much more individual discomfort to defeat the legitimacy and power that belonging to a group brought and the troops deserted their post.

She shivered. "Christ, it's cold."

"You mind, girl."

"It wasn't me, momma, it was one of them."

Another rapid series of powerful and prolonged lightning strikes kept the clouds lit up for seconds in a bluish-white haze. Thunder didn't clap now; it was a steady rumble charging for the city.

Both sides of the rally scattered. Most of them were relieved to be done with all this useless posturing. The few television news crews there had already shut down and retreated to their vans.

Rain began pelting the city. Big drops of it were being fired at the windows by the gusts of wind at the leading edge of the storm. Another series of discharges struck directly at Wichita. Lightning connected to lightning rods on the roofs of buildings in the center of the city. For a moment, heaven sent down six jagged fingers to touch Wichita, Kansas. Thunder rattled the windows of their conference room.

The rally was over before the man with the cherry-red bullhorn could even go hoarse from yelling. On the televisions, one hardy news reporter was standing under an umbrella interviewing the Republican bullhorn. She was having trouble holding on to the umbrella. He was screaming his answers to her questions over the howl of the wind coming straight into their faces. They were both drenched.

The televisions went off.

The collective had yanked her away from the aborted rally and back to their room. They had focused on Chase and Reagan.

Reagan rubbed his temple, squeezed his eyes shut as if against a sudden glare and shook his head. He groaned and grabbed for a chair to stay on his feet.

Tye and Herman were relishing this tiny victory. They were hoping for more. They were going to go all the way this time.

Reagan went down on one knee and shook his head.

Chase didn't try to help him. He just came straight for the Apostles.

She remembered that silly caveat that such Jedi mind tricks only worked on weak minds, but she couldn't get that caution into Tye and Herman. They kept their focus on Reagan.

Chase was reaching under his jacket to pull out his handgun. They might slow them, but they were not going to stop two men who had been trained to resist them.

The moment Chase withdrew his gun coincided with the moment their efforts just stopped. The same way a tornado could suddenly lift its funnel and dissipate, the Apostles' attack had vanished. Atchison and Hutt hadn't called off the coup. Something had shot through the collective and broke every connection within it.

The back of her neck itched, tingled and prickled all at the same time. Dizziness made Chase appear to be giving off intense heat.

Tye was outraged, as were Herman and Cedric. They tried to bring the group back together and retaliate. The collective suspicion was that Chase had a second group like them whose sole purpose was to counter anything rebellious the Apostles tried to do.

Tye, Herman and Cedric wanted revenge. If they could just make Chase aim is gun at—

Tye grabbed the back of his head, hollered out in pain and fell off his chair. All the lights came on. Chase and Reagan and two of Reagan's men were aiming guns at them.

Herman helped Tye up. His nose was bleeding.

Momma pointed a righteous finger at him and laughed. "Now, boy, my daughter isn't the only one of us bleeding tonight."

Chase was still aiming his gun at them when he arrived at the table. He punched Tye in the face and then he punched Herman in the stomach.

Tye's knees went out sideways as he fell down onto his ass. Herman was knocked backward over the table. He landed on three chairs, which fell away from under him and sent him to the floor on his face.

"Help them," he barked at Atchison and Hutt. "Your little insurrection is over." He tapped his head. "No bomb went boom in here and none ever will."

Momma scowled at him as if she wanted to try again all by herself. "What did you do to us?"

"I didn't do anything."

Lucinda asked, "Didn't you feel it?"

Momma turned her scowl on her daughter. "Feel what?"

She looked around for any of the others to acknowledge they had felt it too.

The men were cowering together against the guns aimed at them. Hutt's bald head was covered with large drops of sweat as he tried to slip behind Herman and Tye.

Gwen was staring at her feet. She had wanted no part of this revolt, or of any of them staying inside her head. She had always been the least present of all of them in either the real world or out in that fog. Now she was in full retreat, erecting every barrier she could. She had felt it, but she wouldn't acknowledge that to anyone.

Lucinda bowed her head. "We're sorry, Mr. Chase." She took hold of momma's hand and then she took hold of Gwen's hand. "We shouldn't have."

Chase put his gun away and spoke directly to her. To the extent that he could, he was showing her respect for being the Apostles' contrite voice of reason. "Tonight was an aberration. I will chock it up to the extra energy provided by that storm. But if you try anything like that again, nothing will save you."

Reagan and his two men herded the quartet they were guarding to the door.

"There will be agents posted outside your rooms tonight. Tomorrow we start over. Behave yourselves from now on and you can—"

"All still live happily ever after," she said.

# Chapter 21

Jake kept his promise. The next Tuesday, he, the team, none of them displaying any obvious bruises, and the exosuit arrived at Small Wonders House exactly on time at 1:00 p.m. Jake came to her and Ann in the staff room while the rest of his team brought in the gear.

"This should really help," he said. "We were given access to the software in her cap. All our tests check out perfectly now."

A man and woman, both in their late twenties, struggled to carry in what resembled an overnight case, except it was bigger than a picnic cooler.

"She can't manage anything heavy."

Jake laughed. "That isn't it. That is the computer monitoring gear, batteries and some spare parts."

A third member of the team, a very thin man, helped the pair lift the box onto the table in the middle of the room. Once it was still, Savannah could make out the drawers in it.

The woman opened the lid of the box and pulled out what at first appeared to be a small, one-piece super hero costume for Sage. The arms and legs were sky-blue. The torso section was black. A red octagon outlined with white, inward-curving sides covered the chest area. Two bright-green capital letters sat in the middle of the octagon: WG.

Ann chirp, "Wonder Girl. Sage is going to love that."

The woman brought it over to them. "I'm Faith Goss. What do you think?"

"It looks tight."

Jake said, "It stretches. It's a blend of Lycra and a proprietary mesh of very flexible, electrically conductive fibers that Dhillon, Alwin and Professor Hartwell just developed. It is soft enough for relatively easy movement without pinching at the joints or sensitive areas. It has good ventilation. The elbows and knees have a bit of padding in case she falls. Feel it."

Ann felt the suit first. "It looks like it should feel harder."

"It's warm."

"See that fine mesh crisscrossing on its surface? Those are wires. Each point where the wires cross is a sensor node so we can monitor the signals going to the muscles as well as the ones produced by them when they are active. We started out with a seventeen pound suit, but we were able to bring it down to the seven pounds this one weighs. I'm sure we can get below that in the near future. We went without an exoskeleton because it would have made the suit too heavy and cumbersome. When she's older, if she needs it, we will revisit that option."

Faith said, "All right, boys, remember what we rehearsed. Each of you takes a turn. And keep it as simple as you can."

The taller male took the suit from Savannah. "I'm Dhillon Sangha. I worked on those two rows of square, interlocking links along the spine area, the front and back of the legs and the inside and outside of the arms. We can send a charge into them all at once or one link at a time. They will lock to keep Sage from falling. Those dimpled gold bands around the cuffs and the thigh section are more sensor nodes. A pair of socks, or booties, attach to the ones on the legs, a pair of gloves attach to ones around the wrist."

Faith took the suit and pushed Dhillon aside. "The whole suit also has other fibers in it that can stiffen or change shape depending on the charge sent through them. Right now, they would only be good for trying to prevent Sage from tilting too far in one direction. Next."

The very pale and very skinny man with long, shaggy blond hair and about three days of stubble on his face took the suit. He smiled and saluted. "Alwin Kusec. I did the mesh with the sensors that Jake described. I also did the belt. That buckle at the front houses the CPU. It contains six microchips as well as a USB and Ethernet connection and wifi."

Jake said, "If Sage tips too far in any direction, the software can tighten or even lock those limbs to stop movement in the tipping direction and loosen the other links as required to allow Sage to regain her balance."

Faith qualified Jake's claim with, "It won't be one hundred percent effective, though. It should prevent eighty to ninety percent of all tipping or loss of balance falls. If she moves too quickly, that is, tips, or if she is toppled by someone or some action, it can't help her. If that happens, the suit does nothing in order to reduce the risk of causing any injury as a result of her being unable to respond naturally or being too rigid. Sorry, that was needlessly wordy."

"We will keep upgrading until we perfect it. Nothing less than one hundred percent responsiveness and preventability is acceptable."

"That is more than life itself can promise anyone, Jake."

"It's Sage, sis."

Faith took the suit back from Alwin. "We can send low voltage signals anywhere throughout the suit to persuade her muscles to work. As Jake just told you, they won't necessarily do exactly what they should every time, but it will definitely help her with tightness and if she seizes up."

Dhillon stroked an arm of the suit. "It's called functional electrical stimulation or just FES. A low voltage can be applied to get the movement desired."

Alwin said, "There will be a learning curve for both Sage and the software, but it should progress quickly once she gets used to the suit."

"Stop!" Faith whistled and made a timeout sign with her hands. "Everyone just stop. Savannah, we're going to be at this today for a few more hours. This fantastic four of nerds you see before you are your typical brilliant, hyper-competitive, obsessive-compulsive, overachieving, addictive personalities. Before we bulldoze you any further with our own self-importance, would it be possible to get some coffee?"

Savannah just looked at Ann and then at her brother.

Jake said, "Sis, no matter what scientific gobbledegook we tell you about all this, don't forget you and Sage are the most important part of the whole project. I won't let anyone else forget that, either. We will need all the feedback you two can give us about how the suit is working or not working. What we need to improve or get rid of."

Faith added, "If there are any doubts or misgivings, just take it off. Sage is an awesome little girl. She is doing very well on her own. This suit should improve her quality of life not hinder it. If it doesn't work, and we all promise we will do everything we can to make it work, throw it out."

Dhillon and Alwin both cringed.

Dhillon said, "Call us first before you do anything like that, please?"

Ann took hold of her hand.

She took a slow, deep breath and nodded.

Ann started her toward the staff kitchen. "We'll get the coffee started."

Once they were in the kitchen, she asked, "Do I seem ungrateful?" She got the pitcher of filtered water out of the refrigerator. "I don't know what to say to them."

Ann got out the filters and the can of coffee. "You are just being a mom who wants the best for her daughter, and you are being surrounded by very enthusiastic scientists and engineers. It can be a bit overwhelming."

"Most of the time I feel like I don't have enough brain cells to keep up."

From the doorway to the staff kitchen, Faith said, "Just remember, Savannah, when we all start bubbling or getting a bit wordy, and we always will, we are here to help. And you know Jake will keep an eye on everything about the suit. And I will make sure he does." She then returned to the staff room.

"I like her," Ann said. "I don't want to sound like I'm bashing anyone who is so dedicated to helping our miracle girl, but I feel better that at least one woman is part of Jake's group."

After the coffee break, the fantastic four of nerds settled in to their work. No one bulldozed her with any more techno-babble.

"Don't worry, sis. I'm going to be over all the time tweaking it. I'm looking forward to all those free meals."

"You are all welcome in our house at any time."

"Be careful about making such an offer to poor grad students," Dhillon said. "I might just move in."

Once it was prepped, she and Ann took the suit to Sage in the playroom and helped her put it on. Once it was zipped up and properly adjusted on her, Sage ran her hands over the WG emblem on her chest and smiled.

"Try taking a few steps."

Sage took one step and then another and then stopped.

"How does it feel?"

"Soft and warm."

She and Ann flanked Sage and escorted her back to the staff room. Along the way, Sage appeared to move easily in the suit. She might have stood more upright in it.

Both Jake and Faith checked the fit of the suit, particularly at the joints.

After plugging the suit into Sage's cap, Jack said, "I'm going to turn it on now." He backed up to the case the suit came in. "You might feel a slight tingle as the current goes through the fibers, but it will subside quickly. Are you ready, Sage?"

Sage ran her hands over the WG emblem, then her cap and nodded.

Jake pushed a button on the laptop.

Sage stood at attention. "Uh-oh, here I go." She fell backward like a toppling toy.

Alwin was closest to her and ran to catch her. As soon as he touched her, his scraggly hair stood straight out from his head. A crackling pop went through the room as he and Sage went to the floor.

Kusec tried to lift Sage up, but the moment she grabbed hold of him, another crackling pop shot through the room again. The lights flickered brighter, then dimmer before returning to their normal output.

"Get her off me!" Those four words came out of Kusec as a trembling stutter. His hair was waving about, rising up before dropping to hug his head only to stick back up. "Get her off—"

"Turn it off." Ann tried to take hold of Sage, but a third crackling pop sent her staggering away.

Savannah caught her just as Faith pressed the button to turn off the suit.

"Maybe we could get by with less power."

Alwin lay on the floor moaning and holding his head. He had pissed his jeans. Sage was lying on top of him squealing with laughter.

"Honey, are you all right?"

"That tickled. When do I get a cape?"

# Chapter 22

"I like sunny days," Sage said.

"I like sunny days, too. Are you sure you aren't too cold?" She adjusted the blanket around Sage's shoulders. "I should have put a hat on you."

Sage reached up and patted the cap on her head. "It's not cold. I'm not cold. I like sunny days." She looked up from her wheelchair and said, "It's been so long."

Those words, the fatigue in Sage's voice, the tiny wrinkles around her eyes as she squinted against the sun behind them, the cap on her nearly bald head, gave Savannah the momentary sensation of pushing an elderly woman through Holly Park not her five-year-old daughter.

"When will Uncle Jake bring back my suit?"

"He and Faith are just updating the program. You have given them a lot of data these past three weeks. They will use that to make the suit work better for you."

"I like data. I like my suit. It tickles. I want a cape. I like sunny days."

Sage's foldable crutches were tucked into their pouch on the back of the wheelchair. She would try to walk, she would insist, but her legs just weren't very responsive. Though Sage's motor control had improved since the procedure, her legs lagged behind her arms and hands.

The suit did help. Despite Jake's optimism, though, it was closer to only about sixty percent successful at preventing falls.

The data Sage loved so much was, Jake insisted, "Going to make a big difference to this third upgrade." He was cautious with his predictions, however, and refused to quantify his optimism this time.

Ann arrived at Holly Park on time and caught up to them at the top of the second flight of stairs ascending from the Highland Avenue entrance.

Ann gave Sage a kiss on the cheek and gave her a hug. "What's on the menu for today?"

Sage smacked her lips. "First, a walk in the park, then home for my favorite crumby plumb crumbly."

"Sounds delicious."

They walked along the path toward the outdoor basketball court.

"Do you remember what Sage said about Dr. Lytle being the wrong color to be a good doctor?"

"How could I forget that embarrassment?"

"She may have been right." Ann checked their surroundings.

"I don't think Dr. Lytle will be joining us today, Ann."

Ann blushed and chewed on her lip. "I checked with the hospital in Sacramento where he interned before coming to SFGH. The head nurse, Alice Bryce, remembered him. There were complaints."

"What kind of complaints?"

"Butterfly, butterfly, butterfly." Sage reached for the flying insect though it was fifty feet away from them.

Savannah changed directions to take Sage to the butterfly.

"She didn't want to gossip, so she wouldn't give any details. But she did tell me all parties involved agreed it would be better if Dr. Lytle completed his residency at another hospital."

"There were no specific allegations or charges, though."

Ann shook her head. "But Bryce told me the chief surgeon and the hospital administrator had to do a lot of public relations work. She hinted there may have been a monetary settlement in return for a nondisclosure and no further action agreement."

"Every doctor, especially when they are in residence and are on those impossible shifts, makes mistakes. Most have complaints lodged against them at one time of another. It's not a comfortable notion to consider for patients, but they are only humans with limited experience in very stressful, high risk situations a lot of the time."

"I've been on those shifts. They are brutal and merciless. I know every doctor makes mistakes, but Bryce made it sound like Lytle made more than his fair share and at least some of them were quite serious."

"But she didn't want to gossip. That's a relief."

"Sage saw something in Lytle that isn't quite right. Bryce just confirmed it."

"You're trying to tell me—"

"Pretty, pretty butterfly," Sage squealed and held up her hand. The butterfly settled on her finger.

"Look at that." Ann's eyes were as wide open as she'd ever seen them around Sage.

Sometimes it was a challenge keeping up with Ann's affection for her daughter. More than once it had led to self-doubts of possibly having someone in Sage's life who loved her more than her own mother did. But that was impossible; end of story.

"It's a Painted Lady," she said. "They are often mistaken for Monarchs."

The orange and brown butterfly stayed on Sage's finger when she brought it closer to her face.

"Don't touch it, dear. It's very delicate."

"Pretty butterfly."

The butterfly flapped its wings but remained on Sage's finger.

"Sage can read people," Ann said. "She can see their true colors, so to speak."

"Ann, she has enough challenges in her life. She doesn't need psychic performance expectations piled on top of them. Next, you will be telling me she's controlling the Painted Lady."

"Time to fly to the next flower, pretty Painted Lady," Sage said and raised her hand. "Butterfly go flutter bye-bye now."

The butterfly flew away.

"Pretty lady butterfly." The butterfly would make this visit to the park special. "Pretty." Sage was sounding more like an excited child her age should. She looked around for others.

Two men on the basketball court started taking shots. Other men entered the court through the chain-link gate. Sage might enjoy watching a Saturday afternoon game. The men were young and fit; serious athletes. She might enjoy watching a Saturday afternoon game.

She ushered them toward the basketball court again.

Ann continued with her theory. "I'm only saying she may have heightened perception when it comes to people. What do those freckles do for her?"

"She's not even six years old yet. She has only a simple and magical view of people and life." Savannah winced. "Damn, I swore I would never use that word around her."

"Damn simple," Sage said.

She and Ann laughed.

Sage laughed, too, then stopped looking for more butterflies and pressed back into her wheelchair. "The complex isn't doing what it's supposed to." She began rubbing her hands together. "Those men will always cheat as long as they think they can get away with it. The people who know don't care."

"Sweetheart, what is it? Are you talking about those men? They are only here to play basketball."

Sage rocked back and forth. "The women, they search for the women and all the children, but they can't find them because they're just gone. Simply gone, that's all there is to that. They vanished. _Poof_! No one knows where they are. Damn simple, if you ask me."

She looked to Ann. "Sage, honey, we're right here."

"I don't see any other women or children nearby."

"I don't think she's panicking, Ann. We're too close to her. No one has blocked her view of us and she's familiar with Holly Park. She's not disoriented."

"Then what is it? When did she last have her medication?"

"She hasn't needed the sedative. She hasn't been anxious about the cap or the sensors. I didn't want to give it to her unless—"

"I wouldn't give it to her either unless I absolutely had to." Ann continued to look for women and children. "Do you have it with you?"

"Just one more day," Sage said. "That's all she needs."

"It's in the bag with her diapers and a change of clothes."

"They are all underground."

"What do you mean, sweetie? Why are they underground? Are they . . . ?"

"They are all running underground. They are way down below."

"Sage, it's all right. We're going home now." She checked the blanket around Sage's shoulders and knelt down to look straight into her eyes. "It's okay, honey. We're going home. There are no children in danger in the park. It's a lovely, sunny day. I like sunny days, don't you?"

"They think they are hidden. They think they will get away and be safe again." Sage's rocking became more energetic. "But they are too late. He knows. He follows them and he knows. They're upstairs, but he's there with them and he knows. They only want to be free."

Ann was having trouble finding the sedative.

"The bottle is in a clear plastic bag."

"Yesterday, they should have gone yesterday. They should have run then. But he knew, he knew. He wouldn't let them go. He'd never let them go. Oh, God, he's coming up the stairs. No! Get out! Leave the bags! It's too late." She screamed, "Get out! Get—"

Sage slumped down in her wheelchair.

Ann quickly checked her. "She's just fainted."

"What was that all about?" She looked around the park.

Three of the men at the basketball court had come to the fence to see what the screaming was about. They soon started to joke with each other about a kid having a temper tantrum over something and returned to their game. One of them paused for a second look and might have considered asking if they needed help before jogging to catch up to the other two.

Was Ann right? Had Sage detected something wrong about one of those men?

"Did you see that?"

"See what?"

"Nothing, it was nothing."

Sage's hysteria must have infected her a bit. For a brief moment, she was sure the freckles on her daughter's face and arms were glowing faint blue around their edges.

"Come on." She turned the wheelchair around and headed for home. When they passed a man who had just entered the park, Sage moaned but remained unconscious.

# Chapter 23

Senator Sutton banged her gavel on the table. "The evening session of the Novus Somnia Incident Senate Review Committee hearing is reconvened at sixty-thirty on the night of May thirty-first. All committee members are in attendance. The report is presented by Special Agent Joan McGowan of the FBI Proteus Group Task Force." She tapped the gavel. "Dr. Lytle and this man were the first occurrences of Sage's abilities, then?"

"That is correct."

"The Dr. Lytle issue was a minor one, though."

"Yes. Ann Devonshire had misinterpreted Alice Bryce's information. Some patients had complained of Dr. Lytle's cold, abrupt and indifferent bedside manner with them. The only serious complaint was made by the senior doctor when he had to correct what he called Dr. Lytle's hasty and incomplete diagnosis of a patient's condition. It was not a life-threatening issue and was quickly fixed. The rumor of a settlement was just that, a rumor. It is true; however, that all parties agreed Dr. Lytle should seek a fresh start at a new hospital. He did eventually leave SFGH as well a few years later. Again, it was a mutual decision between him and the hospital."

"The would-be killer was the big fish; her first substantive display of prescience."

"Julio Santana, forty-two, worked for Santiago Waste Disposal in San Mateo. He was an alcoholic and abusive to his family. His estranged wife, Carmelita, thirty-six, and his daughter, Carlita, fourteen, had left him three months earlier and were staying with her mother in Oakland."

Randi Boone, reading along on the laptop's screen, asked, "This really happened as Sage predicted?"

"Sage was overwrought. Much of what she said was a reflection of her own fear. Nonetheless, it was happening as she was experiencing it. Santana had been stalking them. Carmelita had a restraining order against him, but he had violated it a number of times. He somehow found out she and Carlita were about to flee to Texas and disappear."

"He had a lot of guns," Randi said. "Police found two hunting rifles in his truck, a fully-loaded automatic rifle, two handguns and a large hunting knife, those ones that have a jagged edge on one side."

Rowe scanned that section of the report. "But he never got to use them. The stairs collapsed while he was trying to sneak up on them at her mother's house."

"Ann Devonshire will insist the stairs collapsed at precisely the same time Sage screamed and fainted."

Cynthia asked, "What affect did the incident have on Savannah?"

"They didn't know the details of the Santana case until Ann and Savannah caught the story on the news the next day."

"Both heard it at the same time? Did Sage do that, too?"

"They both routinely tried to catch the local news broadcast every day at noon. Ann was convinced by all of it and has never wavered in what she believes Sage can do."

Chase asked, "Has Devonshire explained why she was so accepting of Sage's apparent capabilities so early in her life?"

"Not to me, she hasn't."

Sutton said, "The others, as it turns out, should have been more like her. Savannah's response to this event was the exact opposite from Ann Devonshire's. She wasn't convinced."

"Sage had no natural GPS at that age. She didn't know where she was in either absolute terms or in relation to landmarks or even her own history of being to a place before. Holly Park and their home were the only places that were established in her mind. If she lost sight of her mother while they were out of the house, she would quickly become disoriented and panic. Savannah suspected Sage had focussed so intently on the men that she temporarily 'lost sight' of both Ann and her mother. She was more concerned about the cap possibly causing a hallucination and triggering another bout of glossolalia."

"Something," Sutton said, "the doctors also believed."

Randi added, "They were also concerned the cap might be causing the nightmares Sage started having after that event."

"Drs. Lanyon and Humboldt definitely believed that. Humboldt had recommended a brief period for Sage without the cap, but he didn't get any support for that idea. Selena Paden, who was more involved with following Sage's developing brain and nervous system, was more open to other possibilities."

"Dr. Humboldt had left his practice by this time and was working for Novus Somnia as the Supervisor of Sage's research team."

"Not yet, but he would take the position at Novus Somnia within the year and subsequently supervise the implantations of both the second and third versions of the array."

"He had nothing to do with the mistake that precipitated this incident."

"That was Pritchett. But Dr. Humboldt did play a role in the fiasco that followed once Novus Somnia management found out about the mistake and tried to fix it."

Randi grabbed her arm. "What's all this?"

"Just a moment, please, Senator."

An animated voluptuous blond woman dressed as a Valkyrie had just appeared on the screen of her laptop. She stood akimbo, her blond hair waving about as if being blown by a strong breeze. Her ample bosom, barely contained by her breast plate, heaved as she scowled out at them.

"What did you—?"

"I didn't do anything," Randi said. "I clicked to the next page of your report and _whoosh_ , there she was."

Claudette Sutton tapped her gavel like a teacher who had just caught them passing notes. "What is going on there?"

"You should see this, all of you. We might have a security breach."

Nyla and Cynthia let Claudette go first. Chase followed them three steps back.

When Sutton saw what was on the screen, she said. "Joan, something like that is inappropriate for this hearing."

"She isn't mine. She just showed up."

Chase frowned at the screen. "Is your camera on?"

"I don't think so."

"Turn it on, please. And turn up your volume to about half way. Not too loud; she has a tendency to scream when she's dressed like that."

She did what Chase requested.

He stepped up so his face appeared in the small window in the lower left corner of the laptop screen. "What do you want?"

The warrior princess drew her glinting sword. "Leave them be or suffer the consequences. I will not warn you again."

Chase asked, "Leave who alone?"

"Don't be coy with me, Tubby. You know very well who they are. You will not get your hands on them, not again."

Joan and every other woman in the room, including the warrior princess, stared at Chase. This animation knew his hated nickname. She was also somehow using the laptop's camera to watch them as much as they were watching her.

Sutton asked, "Who are you, my dear?"

"I am the wrath of gods. I am justice and vengeance. I bring lightning and doom to all those who would harm the one's I have sworn to protect by the Oath of the Creators Almighty."

Sutton again looked at Chase.

"She talks like that all the time. It's the way they made her."

"Tim, you have been holding out on us."

"I didn't think she was relevant to our review. I certainly didn't think she would make an appearance."

"Who is she? And who are the Creators Almighty?"

Joan said, "She's AI, isn't she?"

"She started out as a character in one of those online medieval multi-player games, but she's much more than that now. Her name is Muta. The Creators Almighty, as you might have already guessed, are the ones who created her, gave her that very unimaginative name and have been helping her to evolve. Her AI quotient is constantly being upgraded with updates to her code. The members of the Creators Almighty live in basements and attics all over the world. With their own Virtual Privacy Networks and a dense layer of meaningless data that they call a counter-ping force field, they are untraceable."

Randi said, "That explains why she looks like that. They only wish."

"A remarkable and disturbing achievement to be sure," Sutton said, "but why is she here now?"

"I imagine she is trying to protect Sage Lomax and her mother."

"Why would she do that?"

"She and the girl have been friends in here," he tapped his temple, "and in there," he tapped the laptop screen, "for the past two years."

"Since the final array was installed," Rowe said.

"Since before that."

Sutton held up her favorite gavel and swung it straight at Chase's forehead, stopping about two inches from cracking his skull. "And you thought she was irrelevant?" She banged the gavel on Joan's table.

The laptop moved. Muta staggered but did not fall down. She did take a swipe at them with her sword, though.

Randi said, "I'd love to know how they do that."

"I wouldn't threaten her. She can do some horrible things to your laptop and anything linked to it. Agent McGowan's lengthy report could end up deleted."

Muta swung her sword again. It glinted against a virtual sun. "Hear me, all of you. Leave Sage and Savannah and Lucinda alone or you will rue the—"

Chase shut the laptop.

"Hey." She reopened the lid. Muta was gone.

Sutton tapped the gavel more gently to prevent any movement of the laptop. "As I was about to say, we will end this session and reconvene in the morning promptly at eight o'clock. When we do, Tim, you will provide us with all your intelligence on Muta, who created her and the nature of her relationship with Sage Lomax."

Nyla said, "Bring all the information you have on the one name Lucinda."

Randi asked, "Can we call Muta as a material witness . . . or would that be a digital witness . . . a virtual witness?"

"That is enough of that, my dear girl." Before Chase could protest or deny, Sutton said, "And everything you have about the one name Lucinda, too. Mr. Chase, you may have underestimated my level of access to top secret information. I assure you I will be making some calls to Washington before I retire. We will compare notes tomorrow morning. Good night, y'all."

# Chapter 24

The surprise wasn't Muta and the Creators Almighty crashing the review; it was their brazen attempt to intimidate the members of the committee. Those pasty twerps were all sitting back in their chairs laughing and snorting and wiping the snot from their noses convinced they had thrown the fear of _THEM_ into the SRC.

McGowan probably thought he had closed her laptop to prevent any revelations from Muta that were embarrassing to him. Though the Creators Almighty did have substantial programming skills—Muta being exhibit A of that—and were no doubt incredibly manly hacktivists inside their virtual worlds, their threats to real people, particularly women, always degenerated into the same bluster about malware being placed on computers, phones and such, or stealing the intimate pictures their victims were obviously stupid enough to store on their clouds. It wouldn't dawn on these idiots that not all women did such things, particularly members of a government review committee.

If Muta was working with the girl, the boy was, too, and that could be a problem. It did, however, also present an opportunity to end the threat of all of them simultaneously.

He returned to his suite in the other hotel within twenty minutes of the SRC adjourning for the night. Reagan had Cooper, Atchison and Hutt in the room waiting for him.

"We almost had them," Reagan said. "We had tracked her signal to somewhere north of San Francisco, but then it just scattered."

"Scattered?"

"Like the signal was torn into fragments and scattered to the wind. We couldn't tell where any of the fragmented signals were coming from and they were going everywhere. It became little more than static."

"What about the satellite tracking?"

"Everything was scattered there, too. One second we were close, the next it was gone. Every channel had the same static on it. Clarke's teams were unable to determine the origin of the effect." Reagan glanced at Dorothy. "That little girl is going to be a big obstacle."

"They both are. What about the boy?"

"He isn't anywhere near her level, but he can still help them hinder our efforts."

"How many like that do we have to contend with?"

"Three, plus that bitch program in there; they can jam, scramble and block everything we have."

He looked straight at Cooper. "That is what you are here to prevent."

Atchison said, "We've been trying, but it's hard with Lucinda missing. We keep coming close but she's deflecting us, too. We know they have gone north, but that's as close as we can get before our efforts get scrambled as well."

"I wasn't talking to you. I was talking to the one in charge. We let her out on a leash. I don't know how much of that was your idea, but the leash broke. If you and your puppets want to keep your comfy, privileged lifestyle going, you better find your daughter and make her mind her momma."

Dorothy Cooper glared right back at him.

"Mr. Chase," Atchison said.

"Shut-up, John." Dorothy came closer to him. "She has mixed loyalties right now. She's conflicted. Once we find her, she will listen to me."

"She had better listen or you are going to find yourself back in a trailer with no television, no internet and no indoor plumbing. This is your big moment, _Themis_. You and your precious Apostles can go forward from here or you can go back to where you came from. I will personally see you get an exclusive pad right in the middle of tornado alley. Maybe one day one will come straight at you that is too big for your magic and your luck."

Dorothy took another step closer.

Reagan stepped up behind her and put his gun to her head. He cocked the hammer.

"You may be able to deflect tornados, Dorothy, but can you stop a bullet?"

Atchison and Hutt didn't know what to do. They never really did.

"Bring in the others."

Hutt left the suite and quickly returned with Hunter, Kolisnek and Rosen.

"From now on, the Apostles do as Themis wants, which you always did anyway. She does what I want. John and Cedric are nothing more than batteries for her like the rest of you."

Reagan pressed his gun against Cooper's head to force her to nod.

"Are we all clear on what's expected?"

The others all nodded.

"Good. Now get some results or this is the end for all of you."

Dorothy glared at Tye with the same hatred in her eyes as she had for him. At the door, she let the others leave before her. "I will find them. I will stop her and I will get my daughter back. In answer to your earlier question, Mr. Chase, I do not have to stop a bullet if he cannot pull the trigger."

Reagan grunted, dropped his gun and grabbed his wrist.

Themis slammed the door on the way out.

"How's the hand?"

"It felt like I was being stabbed right through the middle of it." He flexed his fingers. "It's subsiding now."

"That was her last trick. When this is over, there will be no more need for candles and spray cans of oxygen, almond and nutmeg. We will have the new and improved model and they will all be gone."

# Chapter 25

Nyla and Cynthia entered Joan's room shortly after 8:00 p.m.

Nyla said, "Claudette is furious."

"Where's Randi?"

"She's helping Claudette calm down and get her focus back."

"I'll ask the obvious questions," Cynthia said. "Who is Lucinda? And why did Chase close the laptop the moment her name came up?"

Randi entered the room.

"How is she?"

"She's calling everyone she knows in Washington, even President Trotter."

"She is aware of the time difference, isn't she?"

"She doesn't care about that right now. As she put it, she is determined to find out how she got stuck with someone like Chase on her committee and exactly how much pressure she can put on him to reveal what he knows."

Joan opened her laptop. "Do you think we can reach out to Muta?"

Randi sat down at the table. "I can try."

"Wait. I might have someone who can help with that." She brought up her list of contacts. "Lily Wiley is attending Stanford. She's brilliant with computers. She might be able to initiate contact."

"She's the one who helped you stop Morton Colter."

"My daughter calls her our little genius. That is no exaggeration. For all I know, Lily could be one of the original Creators Almighty."

Cynthia sat down by the window and opened it. "Why don't we ask Ann Devonshire about Muta?"

"You can't," Randi said as she worked at the keyboard. "All witnesses are sequestered until it is their turn to testify. No one is allowed to talk to them outside of the review hearing."

"Could Claudette bring her in earlier than scheduled?"

Randi nodded. "That's a possibility. She has that discretion."

She said, "We should bring in Pritchett, too. He might know something about the relationship between Muta and Sage. In his deposition, he stated _they_ ganged up on him when he tried to fix the mistake. Muta could have helped Sage with that."

"Or the Creators Almighty could have."

"Muta would be their agent. She is programming code. Tubby told us they are constantly updating her. It would have been easy for them to give her a virus to deliver to Novus Somnia. Pritchett described the attack on their mainframe as too brutal and too fast to stop."

"One thing I've found out," Randi said as she kept keying. "Chase has brought his own team to San Francisco with him. Other than Cole Reagan and his crew, however, the identity of the others is top secret."

"Is he here after Sage or Lucinda?" Cynthia asked.

"I would say both. Our investigation of what happened at the Novus Somnia research facility indicates Sage escaped from her captivity there and then ran amok, destroying everything and everyone in her path. Perhaps Lucinda played some role in her escape."

"As a hostage?"

"No, as an accomplice; we know someone helped them to disappear."

"Was there a Lucinda working at Novus Somnia?"

"Hello, Muta," Randi said. "Thanks for responding so quickly."

They gathered around the laptop. Muta was dressed in military clothes, the Creators Almighty's idea of military clothes. A lot of buttons on her very tight camouflage shirt were undone.

"Did Lily help you contact her?"

"Lily told me to tell you it would be better if you did not pursue that line of enquiry."

"Understood." She smiled at Muta and blushed a moment later. "We want to help Sage and Savannah and Lucinda. Can you get that message to her?"

"She knows what I know."

Randi said, "At least she isn't scowling at us this time. And she's very fashionable."

"Can we talk to Sage?"

"You are talking to her."

"Go for it," Randi said, "All in or nothing."

"I have investigated your life, Sage, and the events leading up to the incident at Novus Somnia. We are reviewing all the facts and evidence now. We believe you acted in self-defence, but we need to hear your side of the story."

The laptop screen flickered. Muta's face suddenly filled it completely and then just as suddenly she was back to normal size except she now aimed a AK-47 out at them and was scowling again. She also wore a pistol in a holster and had grenades hanging from her unbuttoned shirt, pulling it open to reveal even more of her breasts.

"We only want to help you."

"Do you know how many times I have been told that in my life?"

"Lily did warn me not to upset her. It might be better if we avoided sounding like all those other people who eventually betrayed them."

Muta said, "That would be very wise."

Nyla said, "We are sorry. It is hard to find the right words to convey our sincerest wish to bring an end to the danger you are in."

"I have the right words for that. Leave us alone or suffer the consequences. I can flatten this whole country in a blink."

Randi shook her head. "She's still angry. We are not going to convince her our first time together. There is actually a greater risk that we will just antagonize her further. We need to build some trust with her."

"I promise you this, Sage" Joan said. "We will do everything we can at our end to keep you safe."

"You better or else. Splat, zap or boom."

The hotel's fire alarm started.

"Stay in your room. It will last only seventeen more seconds."

Randi nodded as she counted down the time. Doors began opening and then slamming. People out in the hall called for explanations and directions before stampeding past the room.

Once the alarm stopped, Cynthia asked, "Who is Lucinda?"

Nyla said, "Tubby Chase has brought his own unit to San Francisco. Do you know what they are doing?"

"The tracker has been destroyed. Nothing will happen until she wants it to happen. Make Tubby tell you about the Apostles. Lucinda was once one of them."

The screen went black.

# Chapter 26

Lucinda slipped out of her hotel room just after midnight, the beginning of their third day in Oakland. The second session they had just completed earlier in the evening had been no more successful than the previous night's session. The alleged terrorist cell they were brought here to find still eluded detection.

She stopped and listened at the door to her mother's room. Now that she was eighteen, and because they usually had screaming arguments otherwise, she was finally allowed to have her own room during their missions.

Tye's door was two doors farther down on the other side of the hall.

When she heard nothing from momma, she stepped across the hall, passed Herman Kolisnek's room and stopped at Tye's door. She reached for the doorknob but stopped before taking hold of it. An ear pressed to the door revealed all quiet inside.

Tonight, the next door was the one she wanted. She had patiently waited in her room, her door open just a crack, and kept watch. Two minutes after Cole Reagan entered Chase's room she exited hers.

Confident the Apostles were unable to eavesdrop on them while separated into their own rooms, Chase and Reagan conducted their discussion without concern.

She could detect that familiar sensation from them, arrogance, but she would have to listen at the door because none of the Apostles together or apart were capable of reading minds. Stuff like that, even if similar thoughts followed similar paths in everyone's brain, wasn't likely ever going to be possible. The psychic world, such as she had experienced it as a member of the Apostles, was all about sensations and perception, impressions and interpretations of emotional and motivational states. All that was possible, they were very good at that while working together.

But reading minds word for word? Come on, are you crazy? If you really want to know exactly what a person was thinking, you were going to have to know them almost your whole life or rely on them to tell you the truth. At the very least, you would have to be able to recognize their lies from the truth. They were really good at that, too, as a group. Too many times, however, they were more than willing to accept the lie and ignore the truth.

Tubby Chase had brought them to Oakland under false pretenses. He was one big, fat flashing neon sign of false pretenses.

She scanned the hallway, briefly looked out the window at her end of it at the lights of Oakland and then she placed her ear to the door.

Chase was saying, "They haven't even detected . . . don't know what to call it. A signal? A blip? An impression? A feeling? Whatever term they use, they have come up with nothing after two sessions."

"What do we do now, move them closer or call it off?"

"No. I wanted to leave them to do it on their own, but I think I'm going to have to give them some help. We'll go about it differently in session three."

". . . she's really here?"

". . . contact . . . Novus Somnia . . . intelligence is impressive."

They had moved farther away from the door.

She covered her other ear, closed her eyes and visualized projecting through the door into Chase's room. She'd never been able to do anything like that before, but, hey, it was worth a shot.

". . . massive international effort . . . scientists, doctors, engineers . . . all for one little girl."

"The report," Reagan said, "states they are using all the leading-edge technology they can find."

". . . more than just find . . . creating most . . . new . . . just for her . . . digital . . . nano-machines . . . bio-tech . . . genetic . . . synthetic . . . one-off prototypes. Her uncle . . . Berkeley . . . call it an exosuit."

Why couldn't they just stand still? Someone as heavy as Chase shouldn't want to move around so much.

"Weinberg was in at the beginning. Shit, that guy got into everything. Did you know about _this_ excursion of his?"

"God only . . . did to her . . . in vitro . . . embryo . . . DNA editing . . . ahead of the curve. I was blinded by all he . . . should never . . . trusted him."

"Is she the one who gave Rosen the bloody nose? She would have been only six then. That far away, how could she . . . ?"

Were the two of them dancing together now? They were bloody clodhoppers walking around the room. Their heavy footsteps made it hard to hear anything they were saying.

Her attempt at projecting through the door had ended right where it began.

After checking her surroundings again, including the night lights of Oakland, a thought caused her to pause before putting her ear back to the door. _This is my chance to leave_. Momma and the others were all nestled in their stalls like obedient cattle. Chase and Reagan were waltzing around inside the room while discussing their real reason for being across the bay from San Francisco. She could just walk right out the front door.

Okay, she couldn't just walk right out the front door and disappear. Chase had seen to that. Actually, John and Cedric had seen to that. After their failed coup two years ago, Chase had subcutaneous trackers placed inside each of them. They were short range, she knew that, but only Chase and Reagan and EMT knew how far she would have to go before she was out of range.

And then there was still that whole matter of Chase being one big, fat flashing neon sign of false pretenses. He could have been lying when he advised them of the new restrictions they were to work under and the trackers' limitations. He was a let-them-tug-on-their-leashes-a-bit-and-see-what-happens type. With Chase, every other word he said could be a lie. It was impossible for anyone, psychic or not, to believe a single word he said or know lie from truth. Chase was immune to the Apostles.

". . . different architecture than a normal brain . . . exocranial growth of neural bundles."

"What the hell does that mean?" Reagan stopped dancing.

". . . helper brains along . . . like a fucking cockroach . . . keep moving . . . off her head."

Both men laughed long and loud.

". . . and then . . . ridges on the top . . . neural . . . there, too . . . and bioluminescent sensors in the skin . . . blue."

"For what?"

". . . no idea yet."

She whispered, "For God's sake, sit down."

They stopped stomping around the room.

"She's made some predictions."

"The nurse calls them readings or prescience. Most of it is supposition and speculation at best and cannot be verified independently at this stage. Her mom denies any connections. For her it's all just people seeing patterns and connections where there aren't any. The correlations are high for that one incident with the stalker, but we don't have enough other data yet to say she would be a valid and reliable asset. I suspect we will confirm that soon enough."

"The calculated probabilities are better than the group here yields, especially since Lucinda started arguing with her mother all the time and resisting working with the others."

She stepped back from the door. Momma wasn't the only one aware of her increasing resistance to being an Apostle.

"We'll see what they can do tonight after a little prodding."

# *****

"The real reason you are here," Chase said once the Apostles were seated at the table, "is not a suspected terrorist cell." He let the expected exchange of glances pass through the group. "I've left you on your own the previous two nights with all this half-assed séance paraphernalia and you have given me nothing in return. That is very disappointing and reinforces my concern that your effectiveness is in decline. It happens to everyone eventually. But you will all remember what I told you when this group was formed about being useful or being finished."

Reagan used a dimmer switch to lower the illumination in the room.

"We have reason to believe that new presence you bumped into two years ago and then lost might be in this area. It could turn out to be a wild goose chase and nothing will come of it. Frankly, I am not convinced we have the correct person. I will tell you only that your target is a female child. I will leave it to you to find out all you can about her and report what you learn back to me."

Reagan tried to appear spontaneous, but what he said sounded rehearsed, "If she is the one, you will need to make room for her within your elitist circle."

Chase and Reagan left the room.

"A female child," Tye said. "I wonder how old. Maybe she's another hottie like you, Lucy."

"Mind your mouth, boy," Momma said.

"Let's get going," Atchison said.

Everyone focused on the candles of their _half-assed séance paraphernalia_ and the session began. Why they hadn't sensed the girl the previous two nights would likely remain a mystery, and the few details Chase provided them could have helped, but they had no trouble sensing the girl this night. The Apostles also had no difficulty manifesting a collective jealousy and fear of her either. The calculated jabs from Chase and Reagan and the clarity of this one's great potential easily highlighted her threat to them.

The jealousy and fear, as mother would say, spread over them like a thick dollop of butter over bread. This one was no apostle. This one was an outsider, an aberration, a freak among freaks. She was a biosynthetic abomination. Terms like that made it easier to hate her and conclude that she was dangerous.

But the girl was none of that to her. The one who bloodied Tye's nose in Wichita, and he had deserved that, was open, friendly, wondrous, engaging, playful and mischievous, innocently wise and formidable.

Someone else in the Apostles felt that about her, too, but she would deny any such impression to the others as well as to her own daughter.

The Apostles were sinking into their fear. Everything they sensed of the girl, every nuance of her personality and burgeoning capabilities was just another wave crashing over them when they came up for air. The accuracy of their reading of her was the first casualty. Distortion became the rule not the exception. Atchison and Hutt were working hard to reinforce those distortions.

The Apostles were concentrating more and more on their own protection. Momma reinforced Atchison and Hutt on that score. They had to circle the wagons against this one. No one would be safe against her. It wasn't a question of who might be jettisoned from the group to make room for her; it was a matter of survival for all of them.

The girl had the most infectious giggle to go with happy blue eyes that sparkled like precious crystals.

If only she could make a connection, but she was too weak on her own and momma would never agree to help her, and the girl was too young and too inexperienced yet.

"Lucinda, girl, you concentrate now." Momma reached over and tapped the back of her hand hard.

"That hurt." She pushed back from the table.

"Girl, you come back into the circle now."

"It's not a circle, momma, it's a square table." She blew out her stupid candle and outran her mother's rant to the door. She turned the lights back up to full illumination. "You are all chickenshits."

"Shut-up, girl." Momma rose from her chair.

"Yes, shut-up, girl," Tye said and chuckled.

Momma turned on him and smacked him with the slap initially intended for her.

She still felt the sting against her cheek.

"You stupid bitch." Tye jumped up from his chair.

"Stop it, both of you!"

Gwen was still blinking against the brightness, an affectation on her part of having just come out of a trance. Herman Kolisnek had pushed back in his chair and was enjoying the show. John Atchison and Cedric Hutt were having a quick executive meeting before intervening.

Before Atchison could say anything, she hollered at her mother, "He doesn't care about you. You are just a pet to him."

Chase and Reagan came back into the room.

Chase said, "We heard a vigorous discussion going on."

Kolisnek said, "It's just another Prima Dona tantrum from you know who."

"She's dangerous," Atchison said. "She will soon be unstoppable."

"She is just a little girl. She doesn't understand what she can do, what is happening to her. She needs guidance, that's all. If we brought her into the group, we could train her."

Hutt stood up to reinforce Atchison. "She is too simple to be trained. She would be too destructive. No one could ever control her."

Lucinda looked for support from any other apostle. Gwen and Herman looked away. Tye just smirked at her and blew her a kiss. Momma wouldn't look at her.

"You all make me sick." She pushed past Reagan and ran from the room.

Chase shouted at someone, "Let her go. Tell me everything you. . . ."

Wiping her wet eyes as she approached the window created halos around the night lights on the other side of it. The residual charge from the others raced along her skin. Her hair stood up when she ran her fingers through it. She was itchy everywhere. There was that persistent fear of anything that might end their oh-so-special status, the status they had insisted was below their station two years ago and had led to that failed uprising against Chase. There was that contempt for Chase and Reagan and normal people crackling through them every bit as much as fear was.

There was also something else persisting in all that persistence. Amid all of that fear, anger and hate was joy. It dodged the intensity of those negative feelings. It pranced where they stomped. It smiled and giggled where those emotions screamed with rage and terror. It was growing bigger than them, overwhelming them, pushing them aside beyond detection as it came closer and replaced them with friendliness and innocence.

Lucinda had to turn inward more than she ever had before. She closed her eyes to Oakland's lights. She covered her ears against the loud talk coming from that room. She took a deep breath and held it and reached for that joy, that light, that special something the Apostles couldn't possible offer her.

The girl was projecting more than the energy of sensations and emotions. The girl was sending . . . WORDS! And she could receive them!

"Hello, Lucy." The giggle was only in her head. It could only be in her head, but she checked the hallway for any of the others to come rushing out of the room after hearing it too.

No one came out into the hall.

Her lips moved when she thought, "Hello?"

"Hi. My name is Sage. You're so nice, much nicer than those other ones. I like you very much. Can we be friends?"

# Chapter 27

Nothing about the international experiment that was her daughter would ever become routine, but she was becoming more comfortable with the meetings and sessions she had to attend. The understanding of how impossible any of this would be if not for the generosity of Novus Somnia came to every meeting and session with her. Today's session in the medical wing of Small Wonders House was the last one required to finish mapping Sage's brain, her two nervous systems and all her 'unique and fascinating' neural bundles. If all the preparation leading up to phase two of Sage's synthetic neural network installation checked out, the procedure would be carried out in six months.

She had said to Dr. Humboldt, "This is like some NASA mission."

"That it is, Savannah, but everyone on the team is convinced Sage is worth it. We are all very excited.

Though everyone claimed Sage was at the heart of every incremental improvement in the program added to her chipset, though every indication of the minutest growth of her nervous system—primary, secondary or exocranial—spurred them all on to increase their efforts, it was hard not to think her daughter was getting lost in the excitement to come up with the next new lines of code, the next microchip or sensor to put into her, the next phase of the worldwide experiment. Even Jake, who was the most aware of who he was researching, had to be reined in every now and then when he got too enthusiastic over some minor improvement to the suit.

She wasn't as big a project as the Large Hadron Collider, but Sage was getting to be a close second.

With Sage lying on the table in the other room, her cap in place on her freshly shaved head, Drs. Humboldt, Lanyon and Paden, along with Ann Devonshire, Ramona Gilbert and herself, were in the Observation and Control room waiting for the final mapping session to begin.

"To note at the start," Humboldt said, "the third and final mapping session of Sage Lomax, aged eight years, seven days, is scheduled to take a little more than an hour."

Sage said, "Adjusted for being six weeks early, my age is really seven years, ten months and eight days, give or take a leap year or two."

"Are you ready, sweetheart?"

Sage gave a thumbs-up signal to her mother and giggled.

"As you all know, we can't use fMRI anymore. The magnetic field it generates could interfere with the functioning of the sensors imbedded in her head as well as the programming on the CPU."

Ramona said, "A belated happy birthday to you, Sage."

Sage just nodded once.

Humboldt cleared his throat. "Fortunately, the CPU, the sensors and Sage's own brilliant neurons give us even better images of what everything inside her is doing, as well as how it is developing."

Dr. Lanyon checked with the two technicians sitting at computer terminals. "We are using the updated imaging program today. My hope is we get to see more details of those bundles than ever before. Let's begin, please."

Sage wriggled to position herself and folded her hands together on her stomach. Her legs twitched and trembled. She still had trouble bringing them under control on her own when she first tried to lay still. She couldn't wear the suit during this procedure. Without it, she took close to two minutes before she could be completely motionless.

Selena Paden spoke into the microphone on their side of the observation window. "Today, Sage, we have some new tasks for you to do. They will be more like games than that boring old stuff of just tapping your fingers or twitching your toes that we had you doing in the past. For the moment, just relax as you always do and let us get our baseline data established for the new program."

Dr. Lanyon said to Savannah, "The tasks today will work her brain at the intellectual and emotional level. She will have to solve some problems and move a few objects on that screen above her."

"Her cap is connected to the computer program generating the images on the screen." Paden pointed out the three small monitors in their room. One had an animated herd of grazing sheep on one side of a white picket fence. "We will see if she can make them jump over the fence. About ten percent of the college students we tested could move at least one."

Ann chuckled. "You are going to make her count sheep. Don't be surprised if she falls asleep on you."

Humboldt, Lanyon, Paden and the two technicians all looked at the screen and then at each other.

"Didn't think of that, did you?"

She and Ann laughed. Ramona turned aside and covered her mouth.

She asked, "What are all those numbered balls bobbing about on the middle screen?"

Ann said, "Is she supposed to pick the winning combination for the Power Ball jackpot? I think it is about eight hundred million right now."

Lanyon and Paden weren't finding any humor in their tests. Humboldt was relaxed enough to crack a smile.

Lanyon said, "The plan is to have her find a specific numbered ball among all the bobbing ones and pull it down to the bottom of the screen."

The third screen was a three-dimensional game of tic-tac-toe.

"She goes against the program on that one, right?"

Paden shook her head. "Only if she feels up to it. Today is an evaluation of our new imaging program as much as it is of Sage."

Lanyon nodded to the technician controlling the administration of the tests.

He tapped the screen with the sheep. The fifty-inch television positioned above Sage but set off to the side of the table for safety reasons turned on with the animated sheep on display.

Paden asked the other technician, "Have we got her online?"

"She's hot," he replied.

Paden spoke into the microphone, "Do you see the sheep on the television?"

Sage nodded once.

"Do you see the picket fence?"

Sage nodded again.

The technician said, "She needs to keep as still as possible. When she moves, I get a blurry Christmas tree."

Savannah stepped up to the microphone. "Sweetheart, try not to move. It's a new program. You are making it difficult for the computer to keep up."

She smiled and giggled and then settled down. Her right foot lagged behind for ten seconds before it could quit twitching.

Paden replaced her at the microphone. "You are doing great, Sage."

"I am not doing anything."

"Of course, how silly of me."

"How silly of you."

"Please focus on the sheep now."

"They aren't real sheep, you know."

"We thought it would be easier to make them cartoons."

"I like cartoons."

"We know."

"Tinkerbell is my favorite."

"She was my favorite, too."

"Why didn't you put Tinkerbell on the screen? That would have been more fun."

"We will try to do that for you in the future. For now, we will have to make do with cartoon sheep."

"Do you want them to fly?"

Paden's voice rose as she asked, "Can you make them fly over the fence?"

"I can do better than that. Watch this."

Clouds began to pop into existence in the clear, crayon-blue sky above the sheep. Matching the simple animation below, the clouds were all identical clumps of white. They resembled the sheep below them but with no heads or limbs.

"That is marvelous," Paden said.

"That is nothing. Pay attention now."

One of the clouds began to descend until it hovered directly above the picket fence. It changed color to the same green as the animated grass.

Ann came to Savannah. "I know what she's doing."

The green cloud began to pulsate, distort and then stretch out into a bilaterally symmetrical body. Protrusions extended from it. Arms, legs and gossamer wings formed. Then Tinkerbell's head popped out of the top of it. She waved at them before waving her wand over the sheep. Golden pixy dust floated down onto the herd. One by one, the sheep began lifting off the grass and floating over the picket fence to the other side. Each one bleated as it did.

"There isn't supposed to be any sound." The technician reached for the volume control. It was turned all the way down.

Ann whispered in Savannah's ear, "She is a big show-off."

"She is that."

Ann nudged her with her hip. "It's getting harder to deny as rubbish all that stuff we've been talking about isn't it?"

"Don't be so damn smug."

"Look!" The technician controlling the screens rolled back from his console.

Three numbered balls had lined up at the bottom of the screen below the other ones still bobbing above them: 17, 31 and 47.

The other technician wrote the numbers on a slip of paper and stuffed the paper into his shirt pocket. "Eight hundred million; you never know."

Ann said, "They are all prime numbers."

"Then you are going to love this," Ramona said.

The 3D tic-tac-toe game was complete with Sage's X's in the eight outside corners as well as the center square.

Lanyon checked the monitors. "How did she know that? We hadn't given her the instructions for either task yet."

Everyone's cell phone started ringing.

"Don't bother answering them." Savannah stepped closer to the observation window.

Sage was holding her sides rolling back and forth on the table laughing. Her legs were twitching and kicking. A trick of the light while Sage was moving made her ears and the top of her head under the cap appear to give off a faint blue glow.

Dr. Lanyon tapped one of the technicians on the shoulder. "Did we get all that?"

"Oh, yeah."

# Chapter 28

Ann came out with them when they left Small Wonders House at 4:15 p.m. The clear afternoon sky when they arrived at SWH two hours ago had clouded over. The last hour of daylight was going to be dim.

Sage, still in her mischievous glory, had insisted on walking out with them using only her cane. At the top of the three stairs leading to the sidewalk, however, she took hold of the metal railing and hesitated. Her left leg twitched but refused to take that first step down.

Ann carried the suit in its case. "Did you want to go back inside and put on your suit?"

Sage shook her head, but she could not get her leg to obey her.

Savannah prepped the wheelchair. "We've got you, honey."

She and Ann put Sage into the wheelchair. Ann helped her take it down the concrete ramp to the waiting Novus Somnia van equipped to take wheelchair passengers.

"Can we go to the park?"

Ann said, "I think it's going to be dark and raining soon and you've had an exhausting day. You were brilliant, but you need to go home and rest now. That's what your legs are telling you, sweetie."

"Okay."

Sage never argued with Ann. She negotiated with her mother all the time.

Determined to again demonstrate how independent she could be, Sage lifted herself out of the wheelchair mostly with just her arms. She did accept support from her mom and the cane while Ann took the wheelchair away and placed it in the back of the van with the case.

Sage slid the van door open, took a deep breath and tried to lift her left foot. Again it would not obey her command. She took another deep breath and was able to lift her right foot enough to get her toes onto the step.

The driver, an impatient, muscular man in his twenties, stepped forward to lift Sage into the van.

Sage said, "I can do it."

"Please let her try."

The man nodded and stepped back but he rolled his eyes when he looked up at the dark clouds above them.

Sage took hold of the assist handle near the door, wiggled her right foot further onto the step and grunted. She got up onto the step and wobbled, but she had also managed to get her left foot onto the step and did not fall.

This was what life with Sage was. She was a determined girl, but she could take a considerable amount of time to accomplish anything that required neuromuscular effort and coordination. Even a secondary nervous system hadn't been able to help her with that challenge. The suit helped, but most of the time it didn't actually make her move any quicker.

"You are my awesome girl."

"I'm awesome."

Sage bent toward the bucket seat more than step, but she did get her feet to move, got turned and then got her bum onto the chair. After securing herself with the seatbelt, she raised her hands in victory. "Ta Da."

The driver got into the van.

Ann took hold of her hand. "The synthetic network they will be putting along her arms, legs and back should help. It has been effective in others with similar physical difficulties. And the data the suit has collected has helped them refine the programming. It will be better able to target the muscles that need it and apply the correct amount of stimulation."

"It's all getting to be too much. The suit hasn't provided the support or the freedom of motion it was supposed to. What if the synthetic network only makes her . . . ?"

"Look at what she did today, Savannah. She is a—" Ann was finally controlling her compulsion to keep using the M-word in her presence.

"You aren't with her all the time. She can just start reciting what sounds like lines of programming code. At other times she gabbles away as if talking to someone who isn't there. Last night, she couldn't get back to sleep after the nightmare."

"I have two therapy sessions to attend to here. If you like, I can come over in a couple of hours and we can review what happens in phase two again."

She hugged Ann. "I will have the tea ready."

Sage said, "Green tea, it's healthy."

Ann stepped into the van and kissed Sage. "You are so right, special girl."

"You are so right. I'm special and awesome."

The driver started the van before Savannah stepped inside. He pulled away from the curb as she was doing up her seatbelt in the bucket seat beside Sage.

While Sage looked out the window, Savannah took another look at her head and her ears. There was no faint blue shimmer, glow or translucence to her skin, nothing that could even be called shiny. Her blue, scaly freckles were just blue.

It must have been the cap. Those microchips on Sage's head had small sapphire-blue centers, as did the chips in the cap that plugged into them. With Sage giggling and thrashing about on the table, those blue pieces and the harsh, white fluorescent lighting had created the illusion; like writing in the air with a lit sparkler.

Making cell phones ring was quite enough, thank you. She didn't need to have her daughter become her own nightlight.

"Sage, how did you . . . ?"

"The program told me. They thought they were being clever. They thought they would surprise me. But they had to tell the program and the program told me."

"The program told you what numbers to pick and where to put the X's?"

"No. It only told me what I was expected to do. I told the program what I wanted and she did it for me."

"And the cell phones; did the program do that, too?"

"That was easy. I do that all the time."

"You make people's cell phones ring."

"Sometimes. Sometimes I just listen to the people out there. They are talking all the time; yak, yak, yak. Sometimes I talk to them, too, if they aren't too boring. Chores are boring. It's all do this and do that and pick up this and pick up that. Shopping is boring. Whining and arguments are boring." She giggled. "It really freaks them out. They're just talking and then I butt in. Some of them hang up right then and there. It's so funny."

The wireless capability of her cap was picking up cell phones. She would have to tell the technicians. They could fix that easily enough.

"Just like that, they stop. All freaked out, they stop, like I'm a ghost. It's _spentaminiastic_."

"What does that mean?"

"It's being all googly-eyed and hoping the slimy, sticky frog doesn't kiss you back." She laughed until she squeaked.

The driver was scowling as he looked at them in the rear view mirror. He did not help her get the wheelchair and case out of the back of the van when they arrived at home. He didn't help her get Sage out of the van either, which only prolonged his wait before he could drive away.

If Sage had on the suit, she might have suggested her daughter trying giving him a swift kick in the pants. She didn't suggest to him that perhaps he should find work somewhere else if children like Sage made him feel all _spentaminiastic_.

"Mom, they hired him more for his big muscles than his one tiny brain cell and zero personality."

Sage was able to walk into the house using only her cane, but it took her ten minutes to get up the five stairs to the porch and through the door. She then settled in the living room in her recliner. She took off her cap, turned on the television and then the Sony PlayStation, called up her favorite music folder and started her favorite song: _Chrystal Blue Persuasion_ by Tommy James and the Shondells. She then put on the PlayStation's kaleidoscopic display and sat back to enjoy the sights and the sounds.

Playing _Chrystal Blue Persuasion_ before any other song in her playlist folder meant Sage was stressed. That song always calmed her down quicker than any other piece of music she liked.

"You were fantastic today, sweetheart. I was concerned after your nightmare last night."

"There was too much _plumormanch_ in my head then. I'm fine now."

"What is _ploopermuch_?"

"You're saying it wrong." She giggled but didn't look away from the screen. "You make it sound like something that comes out of your bum."

"What is it?"

"Those noises you hear after you've gone to bed and it's dark and you don't want to hear them. I had too many in my head last night, but I'm fine now."

"Would you like some tea?"

"A small cup, please." Sage kept her gaze fixed on the moving display of colors.

Once the tea was ready, Savannah brought in Sage's small Tinkerbell cup with one-half tea and one-half skim milk in it and concluded that she too was more stressed than she realized.

For a moment, she was sure she saw the top of Sage's bald head faintly glowing blue. Those hard, blue, scaly freckles on her ridges seemed to be blinking off and on from front to back. She squeezed her eyes shut for a count of three and then looked again.

On second glance, glowing and blinking might have been too strong as descriptions. Tinted was perhaps a better term. Either way, the illusion didn't last long. As soon as Sage took her cup and began noisily slurping up the tepid tea, it was gone.

Her cell phone started ringing.

"Sorry, Savannah, I can't make it until closer to eight. There is a minor emergency at the hospital. I'll tell you all about it when I get there."

"We're not going anywhere."

"Not going anywhere," Sage said and slurped the last of her tea.

For supper, they had a four-cheese pizza from a box.

"Tinkerbell," Sage said after eating half of her second piece.

She left Sage watching the first Tinkerbell movie while she cleaned up in the kitchen. Twice, she snuck back into the living room to see if there was anything blue about her daughter. She saw no glow, blink, glimmer or tint of blue on Sage either time.

Ann arrived at the time she said she would.

With Tinkerbell over, Sage went back to just watching the PS3 display on the television while listening to The Blue Man Group, her head bobbing to the percussive music.

She made green tea and they sat at the dining room table to be closer to Sage.

"Do you know what the emergency was?"

"Sage didn't tell me, but I suppose she knows."

Ann smiled.

"What did I just say? You do know I was being sarcastic, right?"

"Sage knew before the rest of us did. Dr. Lytle was dismissed from the hospital today. Administration is only saying the decision was by mutual agreement."

"What have you heard?"

She shrugged and kept smiling. "Same as Sacramento; a number of complaints of unprofessional behavior but that is all." She took a sip of tea and arched her eyebrows.

"I'm not sure I want Sage going through all this phase two stuff. The surgery is complicated. They will be drilling more holes in her skull. And then there are those nodes and sensors going into her arms, legs and along her spine. No one even knows exactly what all those bundles of nerves are doing. They don't know what sticking a sensor wire into them will do to her."

"It's all a risk, that is true, but they aren't stumbling around in the dark. They have strong evidence that those nerve bundles play a role in Sage's motor control as well as other functions. Don't forget they connect her secondary network to her vagus nerve and the rest of her primary nervous system. Those bundles have likely helped keep her developing when the size of her brain indicates she shouldn't be. It could help her walk properly one day."

"Or it could do nothing, or it could completely paralyze her. Paden told me sensor wires normally only last for about two years before they are attacked as foreign bodies. Sage has had some of her wires in for almost three years."

"We've kept a close watch on them, Savannah. There are no indications of rejection. The signals are still strong. There is no inflammation. Just to be safe, they will be removed. These new ones will barely intrude past the inside of her skull."

A shiver scooted through Savannah.

"Each of the new sensor nodes is barely a half-centimeter in diameter once it unfolds after being put in place and it's flatter than a dime. Each node contains one hundred and twelve micro-electrodes that are barely more than bumps on its surface. That is far more than they used the first time. They know almost everything there is to know physically and neurologically about Sage that can be known. All of this new stuff, like the suit, is designed specifically for her and her unique challenges. But it won't be as intrusive as the first array was."

"When you started nursing school, did you ever imagine you would one day become a science and technology interpreter for an overwrought and neurotic single mom?"

"I guess I just got lucky." She leaned closer. "Are Jake and Faith . . . you know?"

Sage giggled and started talking. "You're so nice, much nicer than those other ones. I like you very much. Can we be friends? Good. That makes me happy. Good night."

They brought their tea into the living room.

"Sage, dear, who are you talking to?"

"I'm talking to you, mom."

"Who _were_ you talking to?"

"A new friend. She's really nice, not like the other ones. They are all scaredy-cats."

Ann asked, "What's her name?"

"Lucy."

"Where is she? Where are the other ones?"

Sage put her hand on top of her head. "In here _and_ out there." She pointed to the darkness on the other side of the living room window.

# Chapter 29

Joan McGowan arrived early to set up her laptop and find in her report the summary of the second phase of Sage's development: version 2.0 of what would become known officially as the array.

Randi came into the room a few minutes after her. "It didn't go well last night for Claudette. She did not get put through to President Trotter. She was intercepted at the highest level and rebuffed."

"But not by Trotter."

"Pretty near her. That is all she would tell me. Joan, Chase must have some serious chops in Washington to wield that level of protection."

"Should we find that—or anything about him, for that matter—surprising?"

Chase was the next one to arrive.

"Good morning," he said as he took his seat.

She had expected some moments of awkward silence during the review. She would describe procedures and technology she barely understood, and that was after knowledgeable people had patiently explained them to her as simply as they could. Members of the review committee would be stumped by all the terms and would hesitate to ask a question when she paused. Or they would be at times incredulous when she began to describe just what Sage was now capable of doing and what had happened at Novus Somnia last week.

Those were the awkward moments of silence she had anticipated, not sitting at her table keeping her eyes fixed on a printout of her report with Randi Boone sitting beside her equally occupied with that same report on her laptop screen while Chase sat alone at the committee table looking out at the cloudy morning through the windows behind her.

That he might not be looking past her and Randi sent shivers down her spine.

Cynthia Thorpe entered next and stopped three steps into the room as if she had just interrupted them doing something inappropriate and embarrassing. She nodded to each of them and silently took her seat.

Randi whispered to her, "I haven't heard any more from those two on the screen."

Then the room became quiet again.

Long, awkward silences could take on a life of their own. They expanded into bubbles that encased the people involved. Usually, no one had the courage to break them.

Nyla Rowe and Senator Sutton entered the room together.

Joan could have sworn she felt her ears pop.

"Good morning, y'all," Sutton said without any cheer in her tone. She picked up her gavel the moment she was seated beside Chase. "Randi, have you cancelled the tour of the Novus Somnia facility?"

"Yes, Senator."

Nyla quickly plopped down onto her chair as if concerned she might be sanctioned in some way if she wasn't in place before the gavel came down. As soon as she was seated, though, she smiled and shook her head. "Is there a problem?"

"I believe we have enough on our plates here for the time being. And with that in mind, let's get this out of the way right at the start, shall we? Who have you brought with you to San Francisco, Tim?"

"Good morning to you, too, Claudette." He made eye contact with every member of the committee and then Randi and her.

"You have a charming smile, Tim. Now spill it."

"I have a team here searching for Sage Lomax and her mother. People are dead. There is substantial damage at the Novus Somnia facility. We have no choice because of the danger Sage presents, which I believe Joan's report will eventually verify." He smiled at Sutton. "In short, I am just doing my job."

Nyla asked, "Who are the Apostles?"

"They are a specialized top secret unit. I need tell you nothing else. I am disturbed, however, that you found out about them."

"Muta told us last night."

"You are being manipulated. Either Muta is manipulating you or the Creators Almighty is manipulating you. Or the Lomax girl is; she's quite capable of that." He looked at each of them again. "Anything to do with Muta, the Creators Almighty, Sage and her mother, or the Apostles is all top secret. That puts them under my purview. I am sure Senator Sutton would also tell you that you are obligated to report promptly and directly to me any information about or interactions with any of those I have mentioned. Failure to do so could result in charges being laid and possibly imprisonment."

Chase had just revealed why he was so smug this morning. He knew Sutton hadn't gotten anywhere in Washington last night. He also knew exactly to what degree she had been told to toe the line concerning all those top secret items he'd just listed for the rest of them. The power struggle was over. Sutton had lost.

Sutton struck the table with her gavel. "Heed Timothy's words well. That is all I will say on the matter. I also feel compelled to comment on the possibility that convening this hearing at this time may have been premature given that the Lomax women are still at large." She banged the gavel hard again, twice. "Nonetheless, we shall continue until I am instructed otherwise." She glanced at Chase. "Joan, what are we to review this morning?"

"Turn to page one hundred and sixty-seven. We will summarize the procedures and results of phase two of the project."

Chase didn't bother to turn to that section of the report because he had neither bothered taking the paper copy out of its folder yet nor brought up the report on his laptop.

Not for the first time since this review had begun, the conviction surged through her that Chase could give this report every bit as thoroughly as she could. He could offer insights she could never gain access to. The SRC hearing on the Novus Somnia incident had become irrelevant.

"I will keep my summary as brief and as uncluttered with jargon as possible."

"We will all appreciate that."

She made sure Randi was on the same page on the laptop screen. "The key aspect of phase two for Sage and Savannah was the progress Sage made both before and after the procedure was complete.

"They installed three new chips into the Central Neural Control Module attached to the top of her head. The new sensor array was more complex in that it could gather more data and offer more controlling stimuli, and it was less intrusive. They were able to withdraw the old wire electrodes and discard the cap after installing both a wired and wireless system in the Lomax house. At regular intervals, Savannah only had to plug a small transceiver into the CNCM on Sage's head. They could then transmit data and receive updates through the system."

She smiled when she looked up from her report to see both Nyla and Claudette scratching their heads right where Sage's CNCM would be placed.

"They installed a network of microchips and sensors only along her spine. These were connected to her exocranial neural bundles near the base of her spine. Sage had made excellent physical progress leading up to the procedure. After further mapping of her nerve impulses when she tried to walk, the researchers decided those implants would likely be enough to help give her sufficient control over her legs with the aid of the suit."

Cynthia asked, "How would they know that?"

"I may have oversimplified that point. Based on their research of Sage and their testing of the synthetic network in other patients with similar mobility problems, they were confident the spinal implants were all that was needed. Communication between the new CNCM, the SNS and the suit's CPU had progressed rapidly to a highly effective level."

The more she tried to clarify, the more it seemed she was sounding evasive and defensive.

"Did her tremors end?"

"No, but they did decrease in frequency, intensity and duration. I can go into more details, but it would be very technical and dry."

"That is not necessary," Sutton said. "It is sufficient that we know it was successful."

"It was very successful. Sage was happy because she didn't need to keep shaving her head or wear that cap anymore. She quite enjoyed the suit and became very proficient with it during this phase of the project. They also used stem cells from Sage to grow neurite bundles and then inject them into her brain and spine."

This time with a bit more alarm in her voice, Cynthia asked, "How on earth did they know that was going to work?"

"Their research results and treatment plans for Sage are covered in the second addendum of the report. When I was putting all of this together, one of the researchers I questioned was a part of that team." She turned to the addendum. "Sage's neurons conduct electrical impulses thirty-seven percent more efficiently and faster than normal neurons. The neurites—new projections of nerves—developed quickly into networks that improved nerve cell communication throughout her extraordinary systems even further."

"It wasn't a perfect result, though," Cynthia said. "There were high costs involved. She developed stiffness in her spine. It became harder for her stand up straight, which could have negated any greater control she might have gained over her legs. Even the suit was unable to mitigate those problems with any consistency. They were recklessly playing with the life of a nine-year-old girl."

"She did lose some range of motion in her spine. She also exhibited more OCD problems after the procedure that, at times, made caring for her more difficult. Her nightmares increased. They usually involved fears of future threats coming closer to Sage and her mother as well as to others that Sage was unable or unwilling to identify. The medical team quit questioning her about them because of how upset she became when they did. Even Savannah and Ann were unable to persuade her to talk about them. And it became more evident she was developing talents that most of the people involved with the program were unable to comprehend or believe."

"I assume," Nyla said, "this is the point at which the core group at Novus Somnia decided to keep knowledge of those talents restricted to only the inner circle of the research team."

"Many of the international researchers had dropped away by this time because they had done their part. Some of them believed they had done all they could for Sage. Others believed they should not be doing any more with Sage until she was much older. A number of the researchers who had withdrawn or been dropped expressed concern in a letter to Novus Somnia that the project had gone past its original scope of giving Sage as close to a normal life as possible and had entered the needlessly adventurous and risky phase of experimenting with enhancements. It should be pointed out that Savannah Lomax was never made aware of these concerns"

"And despite them, Novus Somnia pushed to continue with Sage's implants and biotechnology updates."

"Attrition had naturally contracted the group to a more manageable size, but everyone remaining was sworn to secrecy and required to sign a nondisclosure agreement. It was the only way Savannah would agree to continue with them. Drs. Lanyon, Humboldt, who was working for Novus Somnia by this time, and Paden had an easier time of controlling what happened from then on. And, yes, they encouraged Savannah to continue with all the updates for Sage."

"They weren't giving her a lot of choice. How could any mother refuse to do everything possible for her child, especially if she was constantly told the consequences of refusing could be catastrophic? Even Jake's exosuit team had to eventually concede that some of Sage's physical limitations were beyond the help the technology available to them could provide."

"He never stopped making improvements though. And Sage did _eventually_ find her own way of making the suit work for her."

Sutton tapped the end of the gavel handle on the table. It appeared to be an unconscious act. "Is this when Sage began to glow blue?"

Chase just sat there with his arms crossed over his chest. Each member of the committee had clearly skimmed the report. Each member had clearly picked up on a certain aspect of it that was most important or interesting to them. He appeared to be just waiting for her to finish before he told them what really happened.

That was an absurd speculation. Chase would never tell them anything of what he knew.

"It was very subtle at first, but it quickly became quite noticeable when she was fully engaged once the second procedure was completed. The bioluminescent protein spread throughout her whole nervous system: brain, primary, secondary and exocranial."

"And then there was that incident with the home invasion."

"That happened about ten days after the procedure."

Sutton banged her gavel. "We will take a break for an hour and reconvene at ten-thirty."

Tubby could move swiftly for a man his size. He was out the door before Claudette, Nyla and Cynthia had reached her table.

Randi closed the laptop and stood up.

Sutton asked. "Am I the only one here with this horrible feeling we are in the middle of a sham hearing?" She asked Joan, "Can we complete this by tomorrow?"

"By tomorrow afternoon if there aren't too many questions for the witnesses."

"I am not sure I will bother to call them." She then said to Randi, "I think I will send you back to Washington now and put you to work organizing my itinerary for next week."

"Yes, Senator," Randi said and tapped the laptop.

"I will walk you out." Sutton then said to the three she was leaving behind, "I would suggest that you not get yourselves into trouble that is too deep to get yourselves out of on your own while I am away."

Once they were gone, Joan opened the laptop. Muta was in her warrior princess outfit again, complete with glinting sword and ample, barely covered, heaving bosom. She was sitting on a throne carved out of one piece of polished black stone. It was unnerving to see an animation respond to the sight of three real women looking in at it.

"Tubby is not only after Sage and her mother. He is also after Lucinda." Muta stood up and came closer. She drew her glinting sword. "She is similar to Sage, but far less capable, as are the other six Apostles." She held her sword out in front of her with both hands and pointed it at them. "Keep what you have just learned to yourselves. It is very dangerous knowledge."

# Chapter 30

Tye Rosen was only four years older than her, and now that she was nineteen, the difference in their age was even less significant.

"Rough day." He placed her tea and donut on his tray beside his coffee and granola bar and then led her to a table for two.

The restaurant of the Widow Creek Inn was almost empty at three o'clock in the afternoon.

"Rough day."

"I thought we had something near the end." He sipped his coffee after taking a bite of his bar. "I don't think Tubby is going to be pleased. Again."

"Maybe he's right. Maybe we are in decline."

"We're still doing enough to be an effective unit. The problem is getting Chase and Reagan to realize what we do isn't like one of their spy satellites. We're more like those old television antennas. Sometimes we get a clear signal and sometimes we don't." He shoved the rest of the bar into his mouth and finished his coffee.

"I supposed some people just can't be detected."

"I agree. For example, for us, we rely on the target's emotions to get our bearings, to see their glow. In all our successful missions we have been able to detect the targets high emotional energy in reaction to what they are doing or preparing to do. And what emotion do we usually detect?"

"Fear."

"Right, those perpetrators all felt fear. It's safe to say the ones we have caught could not control their fear sufficiently, something like blushing, I guess. They glowed like a three-hundred watt bulb."

"Is that how you see them, glowing?"

"It's just an expression. Like you and the others, I get the sense of being drawn closer to their energy. We're like psychic moths. But what if other people nearby—other signals—are feeling fear as well. That could confound our work."

"What if they don't feel fear?"

"What if they don't feel any strong emotion? In all that human noise out there how do we find a sociopath who goes about picking his victims, making his plans and committing his murders if he is cold and dark? And what about someone who feels confident and committed to what they are doing? Where is the glow in the fog from them? Do you think we could detect Chase or Reagan?"

"Cold, dark matter, those two."

He stood up. "Gotta go. Herm and I are going to make the most of our downtime. He found this pub two blocks from here. See ya." He left the restaurant without a glance back or a wave.

She did not finish her tea and donut.

Chase had recessed them until tomorrow morning because after three days in Widow Creek, Oregon, they were getting nowhere. He didn't explain why they were here. He rarely did. The only briefing they got was some risk associated with a possible domestic terrorism threat.

If he wanted to release the dogs, he could at least point out who he wanted them to attack. 'Get 'em, apostles' wasn't going to be very effective if he just kept sending them charging off into that dark fog without any hints that would sharpen their focus.

Would Chase even understand how many other glows in the fog they bounced off of even when the one they were after was the brightest one out there? At the best of times, it was still a stupid pinball game. Did he think they could smell them in that fog?

Her mother was about to enter her room when Lucinda returned to hers. "Where were you?"

"Having a cup of tea with Tye."

"Don't spoil your appetite. We will be dining soon." Momma unlocked her door but didn't open it. "And don't you bother with that selfish brat either. We have more important matters to deal with than your infatuation with him." It never changed between them. "He's just toying with you."

"Don't keep on about this stupid group. You only care about keeping it together because you still hope John will notice you one day."

"Mind your manners, girl. I'm still your mother. Now get changed and clean yourself up for supper." She opened the door.

"You should have called yourself Sybil, not Themis. Sybil is a prophet, Themis is known more for justice."

"Never mind why I picked her. She was a titan, that's all you need to know." Momma entered her room and softly clicked the door closed, which was really her way of slamming it in her daughter's face.

Lucinda's head began to pound the moment the thought occurred to her. _What irony is this_? She and momma had both been attracted to men who held them in contempt. The headache quickly added aching joints to her misery.

Lying on the bed in her room brought some relief to the aching joints, but that discomfort was replaced with waves of heat coming off of her. She lay on her back with her arms extended out to the side and her legs spread open wide, but that only brought modest cooling and didn't stop her from sweating. Her blouse was sticking to her.

Momma knocked on the door. "Come on, girl."

"I have a headache." Saying that turned the heat back up.

"Stop being so selfish."

"Momma, I really don't feel well. I have a bit of a fever."

"Suit yourself."

As momma's rapid steps receded along the hallway, the heat and pain began to fade away. She stopped perspiring.

"It's raining outside."

She checked the old radio beside her bed. It hadn't turned on. She looked at the door. Momma hadn't come back with the manager to get in. It wasn't raining outside her room's window.

"It's raining here."

She closed her eyes. "It's just getting dark here but it's dry."

"It's been dark here all day and raining, and my head hurts a lot."

"Mine does too."

"Not as much now, though."

"Not as much anymore, thanks to you. Why does your head hurt?"

"I got my new outside brain today. It's all hot and sticky, but I can let my hair grow now."

"Where are you?"

"At home, it was a minor procedure. That's what they told mom. I need some _pernunculinum_."

It was good thing that word had been placed in her head because she sure wouldn't have remembered it if she had only heard it.

"What is _pernunculinum_?"

Giggles entered her head. They made her tremble. "It's a tasty shade of plum and lemon candy that keeps moonbeams from penetrating my sore noggin. I have to catch filigrees to make it."

"There is no moon tonight, but my sore noggin could use some _pernunculinum_ right now, too."

"I will send you some."

"What else have you made from the trinkets in your Tinkerbell trinkets box?" She had to think the words exactly the right way or Sage did sometimes get lost in her game.

"The _fasilatemerascope_ recalibrates overheated flying brooms." Her giggling made it more difficult to describe her next fantastical invention. "Then there's the _twinkleheartpuckermatic_. It preserves or restores kisses so they are never lost. Just wind it up and touch it to your lips and you feel every kiss you've ever had over and over again."

"You better get some sleep. You've had a big day. Good night."

"You are looking in the wrong place."

"Where should we be looking?"

"Closer to Portland, but there is no moon tonight; they will be slaughtered. You cannot prevent that."

"I have to do something if there is a risk of people getting hurt."

"Good people will die, Lucy. Tubby's arrogance led to this fatal mistake. He thought he could fight the demons all by himself."

"Sage, I can't let anyone die if I can do something about it."

"You can't do anything about it. It has already begun and it will be over quickly. That is why you feel so bad. But she will survive and we are going to need her. Good night, Lucy."

She bolted from her room and ran as fast as she could to the restaurant. She couldn't be sure Sage was holding her back, but she couldn't seem to go as fast as she should be moving.

Chase and Reagan weren't with momma, Gwen, John and Cedric.

That hot pounding returned like a blast from a flamethrower. She staggered and had to reach out for the wall to keep standing. She was drenched in sweat again. _How could you be so stupid_? _When did those two ever mix with us socially_?

Was her confusion also Sage's doing or just panic?

Momma tossed down her napkin as she rose from the table. She came to her with those small, quick, angry steps she took. "What is it, girl? Have you finally decided to be sociable?"

"Where is Chase?"

"How should I know? And why should I care?"

Chase and Reagan entered the restaurant with Tye and Herman, gathered her and mother up on their way and continued to the table John, Cedric and Gwen were sitting at.

"We were looking in the wrong place for the wrong people," Chase said. "An FBI unit was just ambushed on a farm east of Portland. It was a massacre."

# Chapter 31

Dr. Humboldt checked Sage's eyes and throat before checking her ears. He checked inside each ear before looking behind them to inspect the reason they were in his examination room.

Sitting sideways on the table to accommodate Humboldt's examination, Sage wriggled and giggled. "That tickles."

Savannah asked, "What do you think they are?"

"These just appeared last night?"

"I only just noticed them last night."

"We know they weren't there before the procedure and that was ten days ago."

"They're itchy," Sage said.

"Are they always itchy?"

"Not always, but they're itchy now."

Humboldt took another look behind each ear. "They are exactly the same at exactly the same spots on the back of each ear along the top of the helix."

"Yes they are, and you can see them from the front, too, but what are they?"

He gave her his best bedside smile. It didn't work. "I understand your impatience, Savannah. It must seem like just one damn thing after another keeps happening."

"In this case, it is three damn blue things on the back of each ear. They don't look like her other spots. They're harder."

"Pretty blue," Sage said. "I like it." She held up her hands.

"See? Her fingernails are the same sapphire blue color as those beads on the back of her ears. The color is fainter, but it is clearly there. And it is the same situation with her toenails."

"The same situation with my toenails," Sage said and raised her bare feet to exhibit her blue toenails to Humboldt. "See?"

"What the hell is going on?"

Sage said, "What the hell is going on?"

After ten days of growth, her daughter's hair was barely more than stubble, which made it easier to see the same faint blue translucent color on her three ridges below the hard, darker-hued blue scales running along the tops of them. No one called them freckles anymore—sensory scales was the popular term now—and there were now almost too many to count all over her body except for her face.

Dr. Selena Paden entered the examination room.

"Take a look at this." Humboldt moved aside.

There was no point to screaming at Humboldt or Paden for an explanation. Dr. Paden had to be allowed to go through exactly the same procedure of examining Sage as had Humboldt. They were doctors, it was what they did and they did it frequently with Sage. But every examination Sage was going through, particularly since just before the procedure, was only resulting in greater mysteries and fewer answers for mother, child and researchers. Hard, blue beads on the tops of her ears were just the latest thing.

Paden took hold of Sage's ears and gently pinched them. "Does that hurt?"

Sage shivered and giggled. "It sends tingles all over me."

Paden checked her own fingers when she let go as if expecting some of the blue to come off on them.

"What are they?"

"I have never seen anything like them. They are not psoriasis, eczema, skin tags or anything like a wart or a mole."

"They are in exactly the same places on each ear," Humboldt said.

Paden inspected Sage's fingernails, toenails and her ridges. She then asked Sage, "What are they?"

Sage shrugged. "Blue bumps on my ears."

"Do they hurt at all?"

"They itch sometimes. Sometimes they tickle and tingle."

"Tingle?"

"When I do things sometimes they tingle." She touched her center ridge. "All the blue parts tingle. If they tingle too much then they get itchy."

"Can you show me what you do that makes them tingle?"

"Come closer."

Paden did as she was told.

Sage reached up and took hold of Paden's face. "You're pretty."

Selena blushed pink, but the blush didn't go away and soon became a deep red on her cheeks that spread down along her neck.

Humboldt nudged Savannah and nodded toward Sage's hand. Her fingernails were glowing, not brightly, but unmistakably.

Savannah shifted her focus to Sage's head. The ridges glowed translucent sapphire blue. The scales along them were a darker blue but also glowing. The scales on her arms were also slightly brighter. The black stubble of Sage's hair was standing up. Every strand of hair was perpendicular to her scalp.

"Are you tingling now, sweetie?"

Sage nodded and giggled. "So is Dr. Paden, aren't you, sweetie?"

Paden didn't respond. She didn't move. Her eyes were fixed on Sage, dilated and unblinking. The deep crimson on her face and neck seemed to glow as much as Sage's blue.

"Sage, dear—"

Paden gasped and stepped back. The blush ebbed away as perspiration appeared on her face.

"Selena, are you all right?"

She cleared her throat and nodded before fetching a cloth to wipe off the perspiration. She then wetted the cloth and patted her face and neck.

Humboldt asked, "What did you feel?"

"I don't know how to describe it." She asked Sage, "Were you feeling the same thing?"

Sage smiled and shrugged. "I don't know how to describe it."

"Honey," Savannah said, "I need you to try your best right now."

"It was all over at once," Paden said. "It was like being submerged in a bath of intense stimulus and calm at the same time. It was warm and cool." She looked at the two other adults in the room and blushed again. She said softly, "It was very sensual and pleasurable."

Sage giggled. "She tingled all over."

# *****

After another hour of examination and questions, but no more tingling by anybody, Humboldt and Paden were still unable to offer any explanation for what was happening to Sage.

"Gee, that's a surprise. What about the stiffness in her back?"

Humboldt concluded the examination by saying, "Neither condition presents a danger to her. At this point, we can only monitor her for any sudden changes."

"You mean for any _more_ sudden changes."

Selena patted her face again with the damp cloth. "We will send our information to Jake. Maybe he can make adjustments to the suit that will help with her stiffness."

That would be a surprise after the guarded report he had given her last night. "Sure."

The examination had been scheduled at the end of her work day at Small Wonders House. With her shoes back on and properly fastened with the Velcro straps to Sage's satisfaction, they left SWH and headed for Martine's Women's Fashions.

Sage did well to get to the CRV on her own with just her cane. That unreliable suit was becoming a frequent no-show when Sage needed it most.

Without any expectation of a meaningful answer, once they were on their way, she asked, "I haven't heard you calling out. Have the bad dreams stopped?"

"That one is over. There is no new one yet."

The closest parking spot she found available was three blocks away from the store.

"Can you walk to Martine's and back today?"

"No suit, no sweat."

That promising response encountered its first obstacle after they passed the used car dealership and were walking along the block that had three older houses sandwiched between two three-storey commercial buildings at each corner.

Sage was proceeding as she always did, reciting her customary narrative of their trek from the Honda to the store, careful not to step on any debris, litter or cracks the sidewalk put in her way. She swung wide of a hedge of rose bushes, which forced her out to the edge of the sidewalk and up onto her toes as if she were stepping along railway ties.

"Too prickly," she said and then froze.

Savannah checked to see if a branch of rose bush was hanging out too far over the sidewalk. The bushes were neatly trimmed. She looked for a puddle too big for Sage to step over. The sidewalk and street were dry after three days of sunshine.

"What is it, baby?"

"No crush butterfly." Still up on her toes, Sage pointed with her cane.

About six inches from Sage's left foot, a caterpillar was crawling toward a crack in the sidewalk.

"Beautiful butterfly; no crush butterfly."

There was nothing else to do but rescue the caterpillar.

One of Sage's freezes was nearly indistinguishable from a tonic seizure. Her muscles seized up and she became rigid. Trying to force her to move or pick her up would only result in high-pitched screaming loud enough to burst eardrums. During a freeze, that useless suit usually crashed and shut itself down. The freeze would not keep her from toppling over if she stayed up on her toes too long, however.

"I see it, darling. I'll get it."

She picked up the caterpillar, scanned the house bordered at the front by the rose bushes to make sure no one was looking out a window and then placed the caterpillar on a branch full of chewed leaves. She then scanned the sidewalk ahead for any more caterpillars or debris. Gum on the sidewalk would make Sage hysterical for fear of stepping on it and getting stuck on the spot _forever_.

"It's all clear ahead. We can go now."

"No crush butterfly."

"The butterfly is safe." _And it is happily devouring the leaves of an innocent rose bush_.

The dress she had found in Martine's last week was still there. It was a simple, sleeveless design of white with two diagonal lines across both its front and back the same sapphire as Sage's new adornments on her ears.

Was Sage capable of growing her own jewelry? She had seen the dress last week and had commented about the pretty blue color. She'd held up her fingernails to it. "See, mom, they match." Now she had what resembled three sapphire beads, like tiny pearls, that would fit on stud earrings except they were in backwards and protruded out the back of the helix of her ears at the eleven, twelve and one o'clock positions. Sage would never have to put on nail polish as long as she always wanted blue.

"Now you're just being crazy," she muttered on the way to the counter.

Sage followed close behind with her gaze fixed on the floor.

Savannah found herself hoping the staff had recently vacuumed the floor because heaven help them all if Sage spotted a thread lying dead down there again.

"I dread dead threads," Sage said after last week's episode in the store.

The slender, attractive, middle-aged woman at the counter, the one every customer mistakenly thought was Martine, the one who had gently laid the thread to rest inside a folded piece of tissue paper last week to appease Sage, took the dress from her, smiled and asked, "Did you find everything you wanted?" She glanced at Sage and then at Sage's feet.

Sage, her gaze still focused on the floor, answered for her, "Yes, now she's just being crazy."

On the way back to the car, she watched ahead in case that damn caterpillar had fallen off its dinner again. The way was clear.

"Mom, what is more intense, _remarkably_ or _incredibly_?"

"I would say _incredibly_ is more intense than _remarkably_."

"It is remarkably warm today."

"Yes it is."

"You will look incredibly hot in that dress tonight."

"Thank you, sweetheart."

The owner of the used car dealership was out in his lot rinsing off an old yellow Camaro. He should have been safer for them than the caterpillar or gum because Sage usually averted her eyes, particularly from strange men, and picked up her pace—again, going on tiptoes—to get past them.

This time, however, Sage stopped on the sidewalk next to the Camaro and said to the man, "All your cars are crap and some of them are death traps."

The man stopped spraying the car. "I beg your pardon."

"Sorry." She took hold of Sage's shoulders and tried to get her moving again.

Sage wouldn't budge. She wasn't rigid but she would not be moved.

"That one has been in an accident already. It is really a total-loss write-off even though you had it repaired. If you sell it to the boy who will come in later today because he likes old Camaros and spotted it yesterday while taking the bus to his dental appointment, the car will fail. Maybe the brakes will fail maybe it will be a blown bald tire. I'm not quite sure what it will be because it happens too fast to see. It will hit a tree when he tries to avoid hitting a woman pushing her new baby boy in his stroller."

"That's enough, sweetie. You are being rude and mean."

The man just stood at the other end of the Camaro with the sprayer nozzle turned off. Water dripped from it along his arm and down into the sleeve of his suit.

"The car will explode in flames. The young man will burn to death because the door, which is not aligned correctly, that's why you have to always close it three or four times before it catches, will not open for him. Then you will be in real trouble."

"Sage, stop this, right now."

"His father will come here two days after the funeral. You will be chatting up a beautiful brunette who has come by twice before to talk to you about that silver Mercedes convertible. You won't be able to take your eyes off her bazoombas and you will think you are going to score with her, but she thinks you are a worm and she only wants the car."

"Sage, stop!" Her hands tingled when she took hold of Sage's shoulders again. The tingle forced her hands open. Her arms fell to her side numb and unresponsive.

Sage's ridges glowed and flashed from front to back.

"He will come up behind you, put a gun to the back of your head and blow your brains all over her pretty face and those giant bazoombas. It ruins her pale-yellow blouse, which she had undone to undo you.

"But if you sell that other car to him," Sage said and pointed to a blue Toyota Corolla, "he will live to become Governor of California about the time you retire. Under intense political and public pressure, he will pardon a convicted mass murderer because of suspect DNA evidence. Two nights later, the killer, because he did do the murders, will break into your condo and murder you and the brunette, who marries you but she will never love you, but you won't care because you just want to get your hands on her bazoombas and bury your face between them.

"Either way, you are totally fucked. But if you sell him the right car, you will have twenty more years of ignorant, wedded bliss with those bazoombas. She will lie and tell you she loves it when you drool on them.

"And don't think you can take a boat to China after the boy shows up tonight and you nearly have a heart attack. If you go west, it is five thousand and ninety miles to Beijing, but boats are too slow. You cannot get away from your own murder. If you go east, you can fly twenty-five hundred and seventy-three miles to New York, where you will hide for a few days before you fly three thousand five hundred and eighty-two miles to Madrid and then twenty-one hundred and forty-one miles to Moscow and then three thousand six hundred and ten miles to Beijing. That would add up to eleven thousand nine hundred and six miles as the crow flies, but you won't be on a crow, you will be inside a jet the whole time. And his father will be inside it with you."

The man blinked rapidly at them a few times and started spraying the Corolla. "That is some twisted imagination your daughter has." He stared at the erect stubble on Sage's head.

"No more occipital delusions for me. All those new holes in my head relieve the dynamic fluid pressure that was misshaping my color perception. I can see right into your dark-purple blood and guts now."

"Whatever. And for your information, this car has not been in an accident and it is already sold."

Sage scowled at him and rubbed her hands together. The flashing blue of her ridges became brighter and faster. She lifted her cane as if she intended to strike him with it. "Your lies are going to kill someone. And you are going to burn in hell for that." She then smiled up at her mom. "We better hurry. You have to get ready for your incredibly hot girl's night out."

Sage smiled and waved at the man as they walked away.

# Chapter 32

Girl's night out was Ann Devonshire's idea. She had suggested it right after Sage's procedure was completed and then had charged past all of them to make reservations before anyone could either accept or decline. Ramona Gilbert and Selena Paden would join her and Ann at Ling Tau's Chinese restaurant on Cortland Avenue near Andover Street. Liz Bergeron had volunteered to babysit Sage for the night.

"Stay out as long as you like," she had insisted.

Ling Tau's was the third restaurant at that location in the past ten years. It had lasted for just over three years and appeared to be thriving. The restaurant section had only twelve tables. Only three of them were empty when she arrived at six o'clock with Ramona. Ann and Selena were already inside waiting for them. Mrs. Ling, mid-forties, short and elegant in her traditional red silk dress, greeted them and took them to their corner table.

The best thing about Ling Tau's was that it was only three blocks from home.

Once they had put in their orders, Ann said, "Selena told me about Sage's ears and tingling all over. That is amazing."

Ann would not be deterred by any of Sage's new developments.

"That wasn't all she did today." She told them about the used car salesman prophecy.

Ann chuckled. "I bet he dumps a load in his pants if a teenage boy shows up tonight."

She didn't want to laugh, but. . . . "You are horrible. I was mortified."

"Not as much as he was, I bet. He probably had a little trouble getting his hose to squirt after that."

Ramona said, "And he will never look at bazoombas the same way again. Good for Sage."

"You are all assuming she was correct about him."

Ann wiped her eyes. "Savannah, even you can't deny anymore that Sage is becoming an extraordinary girl with incredible abilities."

"I don't want her to have incredible abilities, especially not if they are going to lead to experiences like that all the time."

Selena said, "Savannah has a point. Sage's prophecy is entertaining, but we cannot verify any of it. She has a very vivid imagination that overtakes her when she gets over stimulated. We must remember that she has terrifying nightmares and an imaginary friend named Lucy. And there are others, as well, that she has not yet given names to."

"It is likely just all in her head. She called it an occipital delusion."

Ramona said, "There is one way to find out. We'll go talk to him after we're finished here."

"I'm not going to bother that poor man again."

"You just need a few drinks in you then you'll come round."

Their food and drinks arrived and they settled in to eat. As the designated driver, Ramona only drank water.

"Ryan sent another birthday card. Deborah actually sent it, but it's from him."

Ann asked, "How did Sage react?"

"The same way she always does. She didn't say anything. She just put it in the drawer with all the other cards. She's never had a dad and she seems to be all right with that."

"How are you with that?"

"It was hard for him. I was hard on him."

"Don't make excuses. It was hard for all of you."

"I'm not making excuses, but I understand. He was facing the prospect of all the special help Sage was always going to need. God, I hate the word _special_. And I wouldn't let up on him. Every time he tried to discuss Small Wonders House, I attacked. Now I work there. Sage spends most of her days there." She finished her rum and coke. "He also had that dangerous class actions suit. He paid a big price for running away."

"You're talking about his estrangement from his family. I thought they had worked all through that."

"They have now. Deborah and Christopher have been fantastic grandparents. I've always known many of the presents they brought for Sage were really from Ryan. They have been his conduit to her."

Ramona signaled to the waitress for a refill of water. "But he didn't go into the witness protection program. He didn't need to stay away."

"He was going to, but then the whole gang was arrested by the FBI. By that point, it was probably too difficult for him to return."

"Don't be too understanding, Savannah," Ann said. "He could have found the courage to come back."

"Sage should know her father. She should know why he did what he did. I just think he should be the one to tell her."

"You still love him."

"It's not that. I just think—" Her phone began vibrating. It was Bergeron. "Hello, Liz."

"You have to come home now." Liz was a very self-controlled woman, but her voice trembled. "Someone broke into the house. He's dead. The police are here. Please hurry."

"Liz, what happened?"

"She just touched him."

# *****

Ramona drove them back to her house. Two police cars and an ambulance were parked nearby with their lights flashing. Neighbors were standing out in their yards watching.

Liz was waving for her to hurry in before Ramona had finished parking.

"Sage is unharmed," Liz said and took them into the living room.

"Where is she?"

"She's upstairs asleep. He's in the kitchen." She picked up a glass of whiskey and took a big gulp of it. "He must have thought the house was empty, which was stupid because all the lights were on. We were playing hide and seek. I always have the lights on when we play."

Savannah couldn't decide what was more shocking, a home invasion or cool, aloof Liz Bergeron playing hide and seek with Sage.

"I need to see Sage."

Liz grabbed her arm. "You need to know what happened, what I told the police, in case they ask you any questions."

Ramona pried Liz's hand from Savannah's arm and sat her down on the sofa. "I'll just see what's going on in the kitchen."

Ann sat down beside Liz. She and Selena sat across from them and let Liz finish her drink.

"That stupid shithead should have seen us running everywhere. All he had to do was look in through a bloody window."

"Sage was running?" It wasn't the most relevant question at the moment; it just came out of her.

"Before, she used to just hide. She still gets a bit unsteady and stiffens up in her lower back and her hips if she becomes overexcited, but otherwise she moves quite well now. She's even more mobile in the suit, but she gets too hot too fast so we usually take it off before we start."

Selena asked, "What happened?"

Liz nodded and took a couple of deep breaths. "I had found her hiding in the basement. There aren't that many places to hide in the house and we've played the game so often now, but I go slowly so she thinks I really have to look for her." Liz looked at her. "She loves it when I catch her in the basement. She flies up the stairs squealing and screaming like I'm a big horrible monster coming after her from the darkness. Once she gets into the hall, though, she usually collapses onto the floor laughing."

"But tonight she didn't collapse."

"She was screaming and squealing like she always does, but she kept going all the way into the kitchen with me only two steps behind her." She arched her back as she relived that moment. "And there he was, this big, dirty, hairy bastard standing in the doorway to the back porch."

Ann poured Liz another whiskey but she refused it.

"Sage was standing in the middle of the kitchen near the island stiff as a tree. Her arms were pulled in close to her sides. Her hands were clenched into fists. Her face was relaxed but alert. She glanced only once at me." Liz held up her hand to Savannah. "I'm sorry. I hesitated. But in that quick glance from Sage I was struck by an overwhelming curiosity to know what she was feeling, what she was thinking, and she showed me."

"She showed you? With an intruder in the doorway, Sage showed you what she was feeling and thinking? How?"

She shook her head. "You don't understand. She didn't say a word, but I knew. In that instant, when she glanced at me, I knew exactly what thoughts and feelings were behind her lovely blue eyes. It was as if Sage knew I needed to know for myself and had transmitted it to me. She was keeping me in the loop about what she intended to do." She took another series of deep breaths. "She was also warning me not to interfere with her and to call the police."

"My God," Ann said and drank some of the whiskey.

"Her anger just permeated the kitchen like smoke from a grease fire. It was acrid and stinging with rage, if that makes any sense. I had run right into it and it burned my eyes. I think it forced him to stop, too."

"Why was she so angry? Was she afraid?"

Liz shook her head again. "She wasn't afraid, Savannah. She was furious with him for interrupting our game. And she knew he would hurt us. And she would not allow that. Savannah, you should have seen her. I wish you had seen her but I'm glad you didn't. She was fiercely angry, strong and determined. Then, good lord, she just brought him down."

Liz took the glass of whiskey from Ann and drank what was left of it.

"She walked over to him with no more hesitation than if he had just delivered a pizza. She was all rage, strength and determination in every stride she took. I don't know where the cane was. Then she touched him. If you had seen it you would still have trouble believing what you were seeing. She was marvelous, Savannah, unbelievably marvelous."

"How could she do that? What did he do?"

"Nothing! He did absolutely nothing!" Her voice was hoarse. "She just glared at him, held him with her stare like some snakes are supposed to be able to do with birds. I don't know how she did it, but she did. She looked at him and that fucking brute froze on the spot and let her come to him." Liz started trembling.

Ann put an arm around her.

"You should have seen his face. It went from hard and mean to terrified like he had just seen a ghost rise up through the kitchen floor to get him." Liz Bergeron wiped her eyes.

Ann handed her a tissue.

"She was glowing, too. I thought I was going into shock and hallucinating, but I don't think so. This bluish aura surrounded her. Her skin was translucent and blue as if there was a light shining through from underneath. Savannah, you have to believe me. She glowed." She pointed to her forehead. "The top of her head, those ridges, and her ears and her fingernails and those scales all glowed.

"She touched his arm. His face went slack, his arms hung down and he fell, like he had just dropped off a hook. All the color drained out of him. It might have evaporated. I'm not sure, but I thought I saw steam come off him."

"Did you tell the police what happened?"

"God, no, Savannah, I'm not an idiot."

"I'm sorry, Liz. I'm just a bit. . . ."

"After all you two have been through, I wouldn't want you to have to go through the aftermath of what really happened. I just told the police everything close to the way it actually happened except that he suddenly clutched his chest and dropped. I didn't say anything about Sage glowing or touching him. _She_ was the one frozen by the sight of _him_."

Ramona came back into the living room. "They are taking him away."

"And you say Sage is unharmed."

"Yes."

"Did she say anything . . . after?"

"All demons must die."

Ramona asked because no words would come to her, "That's all she said?"

"Yes, then she yawned and retrieved her cane from wherever she left it. She fell asleep shortly after the police talked to her." Liz stood up and went to look out the front window.

Ann got up. "I will check on her."

She stood beside Liz. "I hate that you had to go through this, but I can't think of a better person to be here with Sage for such a thing."

As the ambulance drove away, Liz sniffed and said, "Whatever happened to him, whatever Sage did to him, he deserved it. You remember that, Savannah. It bloody well served him right. He was going to hurt our little girl. He should burn in hell for that."

# Chapter 33

Cole Reagan appeared on the screen imbedded in the top of his desk at his Washington office at 5:05 p.m. EST.

"I'm sending you the edited surveillance video from four nights ago. While it isn't as conclusive as I'd like, I think it's convincing. The biometrics we got from her reinforces our suspicion that she is connected to the Lomax girl."

Chase opened the window and watched the video of Lucinda Cooper on her bed in her hotel room in San Francisco. For close to a minute she just lay on her bed with an arm over her eyes. Then she placed both arms at her sides and closed her eyes.

"At this point," Reagan said, "her heart rate increased to one-twenty and her temperature went up a whole degree."

"She's expending a lot of energy."

"My impression is she was mostly just a receiver. I'm sure there is two-way communication between them, but the majority of the energy behind it is from the girl."

The video ended after only three minutes.

Reagan said, "That was the only contact they've had since our arrival in San Francisco. It was just before eight o'clock local time, likely just before bedtime. The girl could have been telling her about the surgery she was going to have the next day."

"We can't know what was exchanged between them. How are they doing now?"

"Other than finding Vargas, they've been a complete bust today. They haven't been able to keep track of the Duquesne woman or Inspector Kozlowski since the explosions at the Devries house. Hutt claims the signal keeps cutting in and out, though they are sure those two were headed south the last time they picked up anything about them. And Weinberg might be too dark to be seen in that fog they keep talking about. They have never been able to find him."

"They have been like that for the past three days, then?"

"Yes, since the Lomax girl went in for her final procedure. There have been some complications."

"What kind of complications?"

"There appears to be some issue with her real brain or all that goo inside her head. I'm not sure what it is. We've also confirmed that Weinberg did indeed do some DNA editing of Sage Lomax in vitro before she was placed inside the mother. He might have arranged to have three embryos placed inside Mrs. Lomax, but only one took."

"Bring them in."

Reagan moved out of view of the camera but returned quickly with John Atchison, Cedric Hutt and Dorothy Cooper.

"Show them the video." He let them watch the full three minutes. Not one of them displayed any change in their expressions. "Any comments?"

Dorothy Cooper said, "Comments about what? She's just sleeping. And you are a pervert. Do you have a camera to watch her shower, too?"

"We have biometric readings that indicate she was not just sleeping, Mrs. Cooper. They are similar to the readings we get from each of you when you are working."

"She wasn't connected to me."

"She wasn't connected to any of you. She was communicating with the girl. She has been communicating with her frequently since shortly after you detected her."

"How can you know that?"

"Do not keep asking such stupid questions. It appears the horrendous threat you keep warning me about has been among you for quite some time without you even being aware of her. That makes her someone worthy of our attention. Lucinda has been channeling her to help you with your missions, which also means she has been revealing top secret information to her."

"You can't know that," Atchison said. "None of us are capable of transmitting our thoughts as words."

"We believe she can transmit and receive thoughts. As I said, the readings from Lucinda are similar to all of you when she is connected to Sage Lomax, but she exhibits a higher level of activity in the regions of the brain associated with speech than when your group is together. It is an inference, yes, but a powerful one."

Hutt said, "We told you she was a threat. If she is capable of true telepathy, we can't be sure how she is using Lucinda or anyone else."

"Right now I don't see a threat so much as I see potential. You're success rate had been remarkably high recently until she became unavailable. Now look at you. You can't even find the haystack today, and that fog you keep telling us about should be full of glowing needles given what is happening there right now."

Cooper said, "I will talk to Lucy."

"No you won't. None of you will do anything that jeopardizes Lucy's connection to the girl. What you will do is your best to become part of that connection and gather all the information you can. From now on, the girl is your only mission unless I tell you otherwise."

Reagan herded them out of the room. When he reappeared on the screen, he asked, "What if she dies?"

"Then she dies. But if she doesn't, we need to know exactly what she can do. We need to know what improvements the new array and probably that suit, too, have brought to her."

"Our contact can keep us informed."

"I still need the kind of insights only they can provide. We have Lucinda as lead. They just have to find a way to plug into her connection."

"And if they can't?"

"All organisms must change and adapt or go extinct. If the time of the Apostles is coming to an end, we are going to control the new species of freak who replaces them."

# Chapter 34

The second part of the morning session started with Sutton asking, "Did Sage Lomax kill the intruder?"

Chase replied, "Yes, she did."

"We cannot know that for sure," Joan said. "The autopsy concluded he died of a burst cerebral aneurysm."

"And who do you think caused that when she touched him? We know how conductive she is. I'm sure you have something about that in your exhaustive report."

"It could have been an exogenous aneurysm, one caused by some trauma to his head."

"I repeat who do you think caused that? She had no fear of the man. Bergeron described her as being furious that he had interrupted their game of hide-and-seek, and that she believed he would harm them. What did she do in response to that? Did she run and hide? Did she start screaming and go to the nurse for protection? Did she freeze like a terrified mouse? No. This frail, nine-year-old girl walked without the use of suit or cane straight up to that hulking intruder, touched his arm and sent him to the floor."

"He was a career criminal. He had a violent past. We can't determine what created the aneurysm or what caused it to burst that night."

"But there was concern about Sage's conviction that he was a very bad man—her term was demon—and had to die."

"You seem to know more about the incident than is in my report."

"That should also come as no surprise to any of you."

"There was some concern about Sage's apparent lack of conscience over the man's death. It amounted to nothing. Her emotional responses to strangers had always been a bit muted at best and sometimes she appeared callous, but she is mildly autistic."

Chase said, "The doctors have not called her autistic. They have only described her as having some of the same characteristics as autistic children."

"She does know the difference between right and wrong."

"Let's hope so; otherwise, we could be looking at another trail of—"

Sutton banged her gavel. "The man died, we can't know if Sage killed him or his luck just ran out. The incident is a dead end. Unless, Tim, you care to share with us any information you might have that is not in Joan's report about how this demon found his way into the Lomax house."

Chase sat back, folded his arms across his chest and smiled.

She banged her gavel again. "Then let's get on with this."

Joan pulled the laptop closer. What she saw on the screen made her hesitate.

Randi was recording herself. She was moving, using her iPhone to transmit the image. She was at another hotel. Somehow Randi Boone was able to both transmit a video of her as well as send a banner of text along the bottom of the screen: _At Chase's hotel; am up to no good_. _FYI: the people Cole Reagan is with are definitely not an elite Special Forces unit; not even close_. _The Apostles are just a bunch of dowdy, normal people_. _They appear to be preparing to move out. I love doing this_. _WKIT_.

The image and banner vanished. Her report reappeared on the screen.

Nyla asked, "Is there something wrong, Joan?"

Chase asked, "Did you lose your place in that very long report of yours?"

"Sorry, I've got it now." She flipped back a few pages on the screen. "After the intruder episode, life settled down for Sage and Savannah to as normal as it could get for them. The network that had been installed in the house to connect them directly to Novus Somnia turned out to be very effective for downloading updates and collecting data on Sage. The process was going so well, and Sage's progress was so good, according to Ann Devonshire, Savannah Lomax became reluctant to continue to the final phase of the Central Neural Control Module implants."

Cynthia asked, "Why did she go through with it, then?"

"I think if you asked her now, she would tell you that is one of her biggest regrets. But there were a lot of persuasive forces coming at her at the time, mostly with only the best of intensions behind them. As we have discussed before, they put intense pressure on Savannah to see it through. They were making incredible predictions of what the upgrade would do for Sage's growing talents. I think the overall optimism had taken a big boost as a result of Sage finally synchronizing with the suit, which only improved further after the procedure."

Sutton asked, "But not one of them had the wit to consider how much of that remarkable improvement was Sage and how much was the suit?"

"I'm guessing, but I think everyone was just basking in the glow of good times. They weren't considering such questions."

"Yet now," Chase said, "almost everyone agrees Sage was likely to develop those latent talents of hers eventually even without the technology implanted inside her or the suit."

Nyla said, "She has Weinberg's DNA tinkering to thank for that, Tim."

"Yes," he replied. "It's regrettable that he isn't available as a witness. I'm sure his testimony would make Special Agent McGowan's tome redundant."

Sutton tapped her gavel. "That wouldn't be a veiled comment that you are holding something else back from this review, would it, Tim?"

"If he were alive, Senator, I don't think anyone could possibly hold Harvey Weinberg back from anything he wanted to have or do."

"That wasn't the answer I was looking for."

"I don't suppose it was."

Rather than keep sparring with Chase or engage in a fruitless staring contest, Sutton said, "Please continue, Joan."

"I just want to verify something first." Cynthia turned the page. "You have reported that the implementation of the final phase was sped up."

"The people I have talked to, some of them, at least, are of the opinion that concern was growing over Savannah's increasing reluctance to continue with the project. The next phase was moved up one year to just after Sage's twelfth birthday."

Sutton asked, "Was this rushing into the next phase the cause of the mistake?"

"I believe so, Senator. I also believe this part of the report would be clearer in its presentation if the Novus Somnia programming technician, Pat Pritchett, was here to corroborate the facts, provide any extra details on the progression of events and to answer the more technical questions any of us might have."

"You are assuming we will have any," Chase said through a smile that deserved a slap.

"Tim, this is the crucial event, the stone in the water, if you will. Ryan Lomax re-entering their lives after the procedure certainly played a catalytic role in what happened, but it all began with the mistake at Novus Somnia while putting together the final Central Neural Control Module. Pritchett also had firsthand experience with Sage's abilities."

Sutton said to the men at the door, "Bring him here."

One of the guards left and came back three minutes later holding Pritchett by the arm but not in handcuffs. Pritchett wasn't likely going to do any time in prison because he was cooperating with the review, but if this was an epidemic they were dealing with, he would be the reckless patient zero.

Pritchett was cleaner than when she first interrogated him. Thirty-three, single, 5'8", 145 pounds, his dark-brown hair was no longer tied in a ponytail. Instead, it was short and parted in the middle and he had only sideburns now instead of a full beard. He wore black dress pants, a pressed white shirt and a navy tie. He squinted at the brightness coming in through the windows behind her when he sat in the chair intended for witnesses.

That chair had been left elevated to make every witness easier for everyone to see.

Sutton simply said to him, "Tell us as concisely as you can what happened from the time you assembled and programmed the CNCM to the time you finally advised Novus Somnia management of the mistake."

Randi appeared on the laptop screen again. A banner of text appeared a moment later: _Just talked to Muta_. _She says to be wary of Pritchett's self-serving lies_. _He tried to kill Sage three times, twice with guns_.

# Chapter 35

"Fuck!" Pat Pritchett alternated between staring at his Samsung Galaxy tablet and the nearly empty bottle of Jack Daniels. "Fuck me!"

How the hell did Gilbert expect him to get his ass back to Novus Somnia at this time of night when he could barely get himself off the sofa?

"Stupid fucking bitches." He laughed as loud as he could long after the humorous energy of that ambiguous phrase had dissipated. "Stupid fucking bitches."

Putting his numb hand on the sofa's armrest was useless. There was no strength or coordination in it to help him get up. Another course of action was required.

"Tally ho." He slid off the sofa, knocking into the coffee table and sending the Jack Daniels tumbling through the air.

His brain zeroed in its hazy focus on the bottle spinning through the air like a propeller that had just broke away from its engine. Each rotation—he counted four in total—resulted in a bit of whiskey spraying out of the bottle. By the time it landed on the carpet, the bottle was empty and a trail of whiskey stains traced its flight from table to floor.

"There goes my fucking deposit." Still on the floor, he rose to his knees, placed a tingling hand on a cushion of the sofa when he wavered and saluted the bottle. "Before your time, old buddy. Stupid fucking bitches."

The blurry, staggering journey out his front door, into his BMW M3 and then through east San Francisco to the Novus Somnia research facility wasn't even going to be a memory by morning. He could live with that. "Stupid—"

He belched and wound down the window as a precaution for the remainder of the drive.

He took out his cell phone as he walked and belched along the bright white hallway that would take him to the elevator that would take him down to Sublevel One, room 104—or Area 51, as his lame coworkers called it—and his work station. He pressed the button to call his buddy, Pyotr, the Russian in Mexico City.

They had created their fair share of havoc on the internet.

Pyotr answered with, "You are the biggest motherfucking loser of all time. You should have known from the start that you couldn't hang on to her. What kind of idiot judges a babe by her avatar?"

"You're saying she was too good for me."

"She's no good for anyone. She is a _su-pree-mo_ _beetch_ , my friend. I told you that when you hooked up with her. But you are a loser and losers don't deserve any woman that hot and that treacherous."

"Russian faggot." He scratched under his chin—the beard would have to go soon, it was too irritating—got into the elevator and pushed Sublevel Two. "Fuck!" He pushed Sublevel One too hard. His finger tingled. "Shit."

"What did you do, donkey fucker, catch your finger in your zipper?"

He hadn't been fast enough. The elevator doors opened at Sublevel Two. "Fuck." He pushed the button that would close the door as if it belonged to a pinball machine.

Sublevel One seemed to be tilted to his left when the elevator doors opened again. Area 51 would be a downhill journey. Bouncing off the wall across from the elevator elicited a loud grunt from him and another raft of curses.

"Did you piss your pants again?"

"Shit." His first attempt to enter his seven digit code to unlock the door failed. "Get your head out of your ass, faggot."

"Have you got something for me?"

"I'm at work, shithead." His second attempt failed as well. He must have poked the keypad hard because his finger now hurt. "Shit."

"The great warrior Abteroth has been made a cuckold by the Lady Celeste Ravenhurst and her new lover Sir Dicksherbutt. She'd been pegging you the whole time, shithead."

"It's Priest Chamberlain, and he's a twelfth-level mage of Carphenia."

"It could have been your girlie ponytail when she finally met you that put her off. It's as limp as the rest of you. Either way, you shouldn't have lost to him. New champion gets to plunge into the Ravenhurst treasure trove."

One more failure and Security would be on him before he could pop in another breath mint. "Shut up for a second. Suck your dick or something, I need to concentrate."

"That is a waste of time."

He swiped his card and keyed seven digits again. After a loud beep that felt like icicles being shoved into his ears the door popped open a crack.

"Was it good for you, too?"

His strides were steadier on the way to his workstation. Getting his computer up and running wasn't the hassle getting through the door had been, except for having to swipe his security card a second time to get the number pad to light up.

"Why are you at work?"

"Some little girl needs to get some chips rammed up her a-hole. I thought you might want some pointers on how to do it right."

"Is it that one you were telling me about?"

"I got a call from that Gilbert dyke. They're doing the operation two days from now instead of next year. So, the little spastic princess gets an array of five memchips and a new CNCM on a membrane the size of a large postage stamp. This retard will have more goddamn computing power inside her than all of NASA."

Even drunk he still knew that wasn't much of an exaggeration.

"They're putting all that in her head?"

"No, it will go near the base of her skull at the back. It has four flexible carbon nanotubes containing protein-coated wires inside." He was reading a description of the array off his computer screen. "Dr. Lanyon will hook them up to the ones they already put inside her head. The sensors go just under her skin this time. The new program will take care of all her functions after that. And it will grab that shitty suit by the jewels and make it obey her, too."

"Why don't we add some code of our own? We've done some pretty sick work."

"Are you crazy? As powerful as that program is, it is very intricate, which means delicate, dumbass. If we mess with even a part of it, the whole program crashes."

"So? Who cares if she starts doing a jig in public washrooms or goes down on the mailman? How are they going to know what caused it?"

"Contributing to the MassHysteria virus is one thing, but this is a little girl, a brainless freak, yes, but she's only twelve. I know you like—"

"If you don't have the nuggets for it anymore after last night, I understand. I bet Priest Chamberlain would be up for it."

"I am going to send you a razor-sharp dildo."

"Man, you are so pussy-whipped. You got three _beetches_ yanking your dick every which way and you can't stand up to any of them. Gilbert orders you to bend over your workstation and take it like a neutered dog almost every day. Ravenhurst ditched you. And now a teeny, tiny little retard fem fatale has you jerking off at work all by yourself? I'm not the one who needs a dildo, bugger-butt, even if it is only for old time's sake."

"Fuck me." He took out the array from its clean container. He should be wearing his protective suit, but WTF for demanding he do it when he was getting a righteous drunk on. It wasn't like he was going to puke on it or anything. "It still needs two memchips."

"Come again, oh great and mighty Abteroth."

"Just keep quiet or I'll hang up."

"Fuck, I don't care. You called me because you're a pitiful turd."

Through persistently blurry vision, he placed the array under the microscope. All the chips had been fabricated, but the final assembly of this freaky retard's customized CNCM array had to be by hand. With tweezers, he placed the two memchips (chips that could remember the last thing they did even if the machine they were in has been shut off) into their spots on the pentangle of memchips that surrounded the Central Neural Control Module.

His phone began to buzz.

"Gotta go. Gilbert is calling." He switched to the Gilbert call. "I'm doing it now."

"What's your status?"

"The array is complete. I just need to plug it in and load the program." What he didn't say was, "So if you'd get off the phone, bitch, and let me complete my work, I could go back home to another bottle of Jack."

Tonight, the warrior Abteroth would return to the planet Yarwon, decapitate Priest Chamberlain and impale the Lady Celeste Ravenhurst on a pike.

"Call me when you're done." She hung up.

"Shit." Pyotr was right. His life was filled with _beetches_ after his scrotum: Ravenhurst, Gilbert and now that retarded freak _ette_.

He connected the array to his computer and started downloading the program. He then pushed back and rested his hot and pounding head on his workstation desk. His stomach pinched and heaved the moment he sat back up. The room tilted and pitched and closed in on him.

"Fuck me, fuck me, fu—" He was just able to grab his garbage can in time to puke into it. "Shit, right through my nose, too. Fu—" He puked again.

The men's washroom was right beside Area 51. Once the heaving stopped and he was empty, he took the can to the washroom, poured everything from it into a toilet and flushed. The water level in the toilet went up not down.

"Oh, man, this sucks." His first response was to back out of the cubicle, but he stepped back up to the toilet when it didn't overflow. His shoulders were seizing up. "Stupid fucking bitches."

After some tricky rearranging of its contents, the toilet emptied with the next flush. He washed up and rinsed out the garbage can. Back in Area 51, he swapped garbage cans with another workstation.

The second joint finally settled his insides and mellowed his mood, but that tranquility only lasted until his phone rang. Settled and mellow was replaced with sharp abdominal pain when he checked the number. Tonight was stacking up to be one of the worst in his life.

"Hello, Pat." She was trying to sound all caring and concerned for him; a bitch to the end.

"What do you want?" His question triggered a huge, bile-filled belch that had him reaching for his new garbage can.

"I just wanted to make sure you were all right."

"How considerate of you."

"It's not you, Pat, it's me."

"Jesus, what the hell did you have to say that for?"

"Pat, it just happened, you know?"

"Yeah, sure." He pulled the garbage can closer. "Why did you even call?"

"I just hope we can still be—"

He hung up on her. "Stupid fucking bitches." His phone rang again. "She just called me. Can you believe that?"

"The knife is still in your back. She just wanted to give it another twist."

"Why are you calling me?" He set the can down.

"I have a little soothing mischief for you if you're interested."

"Keep talking."

"It's a virus I've been working on. It comes as an email, you know, a resume, an e-receipt, stuff like that. You can make the spoof shell whatever you want it to be. When they open it, it locks their computer and all the data they have. We can make them pay to unlock it. It's almost ready for cloud seeding."

"A ransom job, I'm in."

He checked his monitor. The program that was downloading into the array was huge. It was going to take another couple of hours to complete because the whole thing was being downloaded at once rather than just a module at a time.

"Show me what you've got and what you are thinking of doing."

"Wait for it." Pyotr, the Russian in Mexico City, ended the call.

He opened a second window to verify deliver of the package. The CNCM program stopped its download the moment he did.

"Why are you doing that?"

Lines of code appeared in the window. The download resumed.

"Of course, you want a shot at me tonight, too, don't you?"

While he and Pyotr made a formidable duo as creators of internet havoc, some of the code being downloaded from MasterFile into the CNCM was unrecognizable. That was unusual because he'd had his hands in most of the modules that made up the overall program. A lot of that code came from him.

"Those shitheads." Only corporate administrators could think up a name as dull as MasterFile for a program this powerful.

The CNCM download paused again as Pyotr's virus finished downloading in the other window.

"Ah, come on, give me a break. Just finish your goddamn job and be done with it. God, I hope that little twerp chokes on all this."

He opened MasterFile to full screen and pressed enter. For a few seconds nothing happened. Then his screen went blue and blank, leaving only a cursor prompt.

His head began to throb behind his eyes. "What now?"

He keyed in _check program_. Before he could press enter, though, every window came back up on his screen and the download of MasterFile continued.

"Stupid fucking bitch program."

He pushed his keyboard aside, folded his arms on the top of his desk and rested his head on them. Tonight was a further trial after that bitch's betrayal last night, but he'd be back on top again soon. That conviction, that certainty followed him into sleep. He woke up at 4:00 a.m.

"Shit." The program download and installation was complete. The centers of the microchips implanted in the CNCM glowed sapphire blue—a chintzy marketing device that served no functional purpose—until he disconnected it from his computer.

Why the Lomax girl warranted this expensive toy didn't matter, but the Russian had a point. Maybe a little code to make her suddenly strip naked in the middle of a shopping mall had some entertainment value in it. But she was just a little girl.

Really, unlike those other two, she hadn't done anything to him.

He double-checked to make sure the program had completely installed. The readout showed 24.72 gigabytes loaded. On his computer screen, the program size was 24.16 gigabytes.

"Fuck it." He needed to get home and get some sleep if he was going to destroy Priest Chamberlain, Lady Ravenhurst and Yarwon tonight.

# Chapter 36

Ann and Ramona once again provided moral support to her during Sage's final procedure to implant version 3.0 of the array and the program.

Before leaving to perform the surgery, Dr. Lanyon had again reassured her, "It is a simple procedure. Dr. Ellis Brenner will be assisting me." He chuckled. "And, of course, Liz will be there to make sure we get it right. Don't worry. It will all be over soon enough."

That was six hours ago. The simple procedure was supposed to have been a few minor incisions and taken only three hours to complete.

They waited in Dr. Humboldt's office.

Ann made sure they all ate and drank something. "You don't want to end up fainting when our miracle girl wakes up and smiles at you."

She didn't scold Ann anymore for using that banished word. This was the last procedure.

Dr. Humboldt had brought them all in yesterday for a long discussion about it.

"Everyone is in agreement," he said. "We have come about a far as we can with Sage and she has done remarkably well. We have seen progress and development beyond what most of us believed possible."

"I always believed," Ann said.

"We know that, Ann. And now so do the rest of us." He cleared his throat. "The team has concluded that, for now, this is all we can do for her. We have bumped up against barriers in terms of how much more synthetic implants, external devices and biological treatments can accomplish. Sage has reached puberty. This phase of her natural development is best left to just monitoring. The suit and the array will have to suffice for the next while."

Ramona said to her, "If she has any difficulties, we will not hesitate to intervene on her behalf, but only with your permission and Sage's, too."

"From this moment forward, Sage should participate in any decisions concerning further procedures for her."

"I agree," she had said. "She has said as much to both Ann and I."

Now they had waited twice as long as she had been told the surgery would take.

When Dr. Lanyon came in, the length of the surgery was the first issue he addressed. "It took longer because we had some difficulty taking those few remaining old sensor wires out, but the reason for that is very encouraging. She has grown more brain tissue since our last measurements only three days ago."

"How much more?"

"It is hard to determine at this time. Some of the new growth resulted in thicker neural bundles around the old wires than we had anticipated. Dr. Brenner and I had to slow down our procedure to make sure we didn't harm any of that new brain tissue when we removed them. It was challenging and fascinating. Sometimes, I wondered if that flashing bioluminescent protein was guiding us. The images on the monitor were that precise. But, Savannah, other than that, it all went as it should. There is no reason to worry. Sage will be awake in an hour or so." He made a point of shaking her hand before leaving.

She didn't want to be dramatic. Sage was twelve years old. Every procedure, milestone and development her daughter went through should be commonplace by now. Or, at the very least, she should be prepared for anything to happen. But right after Lanyon left, she collapsed onto the sofa.

# *****

Lanyon and Brenner kept Sage under observation for two days because the procedure had taken longer than they had expected and because Sage had taken longer to wake up than they had expected.

"Just to be sure," Lanyon had said.

In those two days, Sage had been listless and slept most of the time. She had been responsive to her mother and Ann and the others, but she had tired easily so they had kept the visits short. When Savannah entered Sage's room the third morning after surgery, Ann, Ramona, Felix and Liz were already there.

Sage was sitting on the edge of her bed dressed and ready to go home. The only indication of surgery was a two inch square white bandage at the back of her neck where they had made the incision to implant the CNCM array under her skin.

"I have another one," Sage said and pointed to her back. "It's between my shoulder blades on the left side but it's really small."

Liz explained, "That was where Dr. Brenner inserted the probe he used to guide and attach the sensors from the CNCM to the network bundles. There are no other sutures in her scalp because they went in through her chip plugs to remove the old wires and install the new sensors up there."

She knew all these details from Lanyon's description of the procedure the day before he and Brenner completed it, but for reasons she would not be able to convincingly explain to anyone, including herself, she seemed to have more confidence in Liz Bergeron's reassurances that Sage had been in no danger and had experienced only minor intrusions than in Dr. Lanyon's.

"I love all of you so much. We could never have made it through this without you." She hugged Felix, Ramona and Liz. She hugged Ann last and hung on to her until she could bring herself under some control again.

Ann whispered, "Sage said the same thing. Like mother, like daughter."

She had to hang on to Ann a while longer.

When she could finally let go, Sage was standing and took her turn hugging mom. As soon as she stepped back, Sage's eyes rolled up and she dropped to the floor.

# *****

It was that image of Sage that Savannah kept seeing as Drs. Lanyon, Humboldt and Paden tried to explain—once again—two days later what was happening to Sage: Sage's mouth opening to say something, her eyes staring for a second or less before rolling up as if she was trying to follow a fly and then her legs folding under her.

"The really good news," Humboldt said, "is Sage's brain is growing incredibly quickly."

"Is she in a coma?"

"Yes," Lanyon said and held up his hand to prevent Humboldt or Paden from either arguing with his answer or qualifying it. "We believe the coma is self-induced and is protecting her."

"She willed herself to go into a coma?"

He nodded. "She shut herself down to better process this upgrade."

"In all the time Sage has been your lab rat, the one constant has been how much ignorance has been part of everything done to her. Now you're telling me to accept that she put herself into a coma to let her brain grow. How did you come to that conclusion?"

Lanyon glanced at Humboldt and Paden before he said, "It could have been a joint decision between Sage and the CNCM."

"I was looking straight at her. She was not contemplating any decision like that. She just collapsed. There was no consultation between her and the array. There was no considered decision, no sober second thoughts. She just dropped into a dead faint."

"The CNCM could have—"

"Take it out."

"Savannah—"

"Take it out now! Take it all out!"

Selena said, "That would expose Sage to other potential risks."

"You are all a bunch of crazy, selfish bastards. And I was an idiot for listening to you and agreeing to any of this."

"Savannah," Selena said, "all of Sage's vital signs are fine. Her eyes respond to light. Her feet respond to strokes along their soles. Her heart rate and EEG are normal, as is her blood pressure. She is breathing on her own and there is no sign of inflammation inside her head, around the plugs or incisions or anywhere else. It appears she is just finally growing her brain. That is to say, that matrix inside her skull, as it has done before, is creating networks of nerves at a phenomenal rate. No one has ever just suddenly grown a brain at twelve years of age. She is expending a great deal of energy. This may be how her body copes. Keeping the rest of her quiet while the growth takes place could be protective."

Lanyon said, "With that bioluminescent protein inside her, you can almost see the nerves growing, making new connections and then kicking into action. Savannah, we believe this is all good for Sage."

"I'm sorry. I know everyone involved has wanted only to help her. But why is this happening now? Is it just coincidence? You put in the final array and then, abracadabra, she grows her own."

None of the doctors offered further explanations.

"Okay, then, does any of you care to guess how long it will take her to _reboot_ herself?"

Liz Bergeron entered Humboldt's office. "She's awake and she's asking for her mother."

# *****

Jake, Faith, Alwin and Dhillon couldn't wait any longer. Two days after bringing Sage home, promptly at 9:00 a.m., the four of them arrived at the front door.

"Wait till you see this." Jake gave her a sloppy kiss on the cheek and barged past her into the living room. "Where is she?"

"Brushing her teeth, we just finished breakfast."

Faith, Alwin and Dhillon waited to be invited in before catching up to Jake. Each of them carried what appeared to be a slightly larger than average briefcase.

Jake pointed to the cases as his team began setting up. "Remember how big that first prototype was? And look at this." He set down the backpack she hadn't noticed blur past her and pulled out the suit.

"I've seen that hundreds of times."

"Not this version, you haven't. I know it looks the same, but we have it down to only three pounds. And as good as the previous one was, this one processes four times faster and is fully synchronized with the program in Sage's new array. And now that her sensor scales have aligned properly, there is no telling what she will be able to do with it on."

She didn't say, "Yeah, I've heard that hundreds of times, too," because Sage had just entered the living room still in her pajamas.

Jake handed the suit to her and kissed her cheek. "This one is it, princess, I promise you. No more mishaps, no more tumbles, no more overloads and unintentional shutdowns."

Sage just smiled, took the suit and went slowly, stiffly back upstairs.

Jake took hold of Savannah's hand. "We've worked out all the problems, sis, really. Sage will be able to use this version of the suit as second nature. In the past, she would have had to concentrate on limited neural pathways or goals like picking something up while standing still or pulling her soup bowl closer _and_ _then_ pick up her spoon, or climb a set of stairs. We all know how much trouble that caused her until the last version of this suit, but now—"

Faith put a hand on Jake's shoulder. "Take a breather, Latham; my turn to once more overwhelm your sister with unbelievably complex technical details." She waited for Jake to take a few steps away. "With the programs in the suit and the array fully integrated, as well as with Sage's own phenomenal development, she should be able to chew gum and walk at the same time now, so to speak."

"You're telling me you've fixed the problem of confusing the unit's programming if she tries to multitask, so to speak."

"Exactly."

Sage came back into the room wearing the suit. She was wearing the booties that went with it but not the gloves.

Jake said, "Try to pick up the coffee cup from the table as you walk past. Don't stop, just keep going and hand it to mom. Okay?"

Sage just smiled again and started for the coffee table. She did seem to be moving smoother in the suit than ever before.

Both Faith and Jake converged on the table as Sage approached the cup. Alwin and Dhillon backed up.

Three steps from the table, Sage raised her right hand to reach for the cup. "Like this?"

"That's it," Jake said. "Fantastic. Just take your—"

Sage suddenly stopped. Her right arm dropped. Both arms just hung at her sides. "Uh-oh," she chirped. "Here I go." She went stiff as a statue and fell backward.

Alwin and Dhillon were just able to step forward in time and catch her before she hit the floor. Jake and Faith had frozen in place, statues of dismay and defeat.

Alwin and Dhillon helped Sage back up to her feet. Both of them were smiling.

"Gotcha." Sage started giggling. Before Jake could recover his wits, she took two quick, smooth steps and threw her arms around him. "I love you, Uncle Jake. Thank you. Thank you all. It's perfect." She hugged him again and kissed his cheek. "Where's my cape?"

For about a minute and a half, everyone stood around Sage congratulating themselves.

Then Sage began to glow and said, "Everybody duck and cover."

The house began to shake.

# Chapter 37

Success with the suit notwithstanding, for over a month after Sage came home, Savannah wondered every time her daughter looked at her if she would just suddenly collapse again. So far she hadn't. Even that 4.2 tremor along a section of the San Andreas Fault two miles south of San Francisco hadn't knocked her down.

Her phenomenal brain development had indeed, as Lanyon suggested, proceeded almost fast enough to just sit and watch it if that had been possible. In the past twenty-one days, though Sage suffered no further lapses into unconsciousness, that gel had transmogrified into a bundle of networked nerves unlike any normal human brain. But it was a brain.

Paden would rush when she spoke of the development every time they went to SWH for Sage's weekly examination. "There are certainly the usual structures, the superior frontal gyrus and the inferior as well as the lateral, temporal and central sulcus. But that doesn't even begin to describe what's in there. And you say she warned you about the quake seconds before it struck? The imaging program gives us wonderfully detailed pictures, but I would love to get inside for a closer look."

Sage waggled a finger at her. "Leave my head alone. You promised."

After twelve years of this, the phenomenon that was her nervous system elicited an indifferent shrug from Sage when Paden, Lanyon, Humboldt, and particularly Ann, kept explaining and describing to her how unique and miraculous she was.

Selena had gushed, "And then there are her sensor scales lining up so symmetrically like that along her legs and feet, her arms and hands, right out to her toenails and fingernails, and down along each side of her spine in three columns to align with both the suit's sensors and her exocranial nerve bundles, and covering her head in the same shape of that cap she used to wear. Cells normally only migrate like that early in embryonic development, then they differentiate and stay put. And the connections they are making are remarkable."

"Can I watch Tinkerbell now?" That was Sage-speak for: _You are all boring me, leave me alone_. Tinkerbell was still her favorite Disney female character of all time, but she had grown out of those movies.

In that month since Sage had come home, technicians from Novus Somnia had visited three times as follow ups to their two overview and training sessions on the new CNCM and what its programming was capable of doing for Sage. They reviewed with both mother and daughter how to connect to their upgraded home network and access MasterFile on Novus Somnia's mainframe supercomputer.

The first visit came the day after Sage came home and brought a nervous young woman named Jill Thompson. She brought a tablet with her that contained all the stuff she needed. "I just need to supplement some modules of the program," she had said. "It is part of the interconnect interface between the array and the suit."

"When isn't it?"

Sage said to Thompson what she had been saying to everyone since the procedure, "There is something in my head that shouldn't be there."

Jill Thompson had smiled at her and replied, "I'm sure it can feel like that sometimes, but it won't harm you in any way."

At least Thompson hadn't made the mistake almost everyone else had, including herself, by trying one more time to patiently and methodically explain to Sage every procedure she had gone through in her life, the amount of technology implanted inside her and how it was so helpful to her. If she had, Thompson would have been confronted with the same, somewhat hostile, response Sage had been giving everyone in return.

"You have no idea."

Thompson quickly completed the work she had come to do once she had settled down after almost dropping the tablet as she was plugging it into the node on the back of Sage's neck.

Two more visits by Novus Somnia technicians, men who both mumbled their names, installed all the patches to the master program to bring it completely up to date.

"She'll run smoothly now," the last one—who may have been named Robert or Flobert—mumbled before vanishing out the front door.

Sage still watched the PlayStation display while listening to music. She could also now surf the internet in her own special way thanks to all that amazing technology inside her that kept her running so goddamn smoothly.

Her wish for Sage to be a normal girl hadn't included her just staring at the screen all the time or looking up the latest news on her favorite scrawny, tattooed, naughty-boy singers.

When she mentioned her concern that night, Ann had wisely responded, "Careful what you wish for. That is the behavior of a perfectly normal teenage girl."

"You are irritating beyond human endurance sometimes."

"I love you too. How's she doing with the suit?"

"Are you a spy for Novus Somnia?"

Ann just chuckled.

"Now that everything seems to be working so well, she hardly seems to need it. She rarely puts it on unless, or so it appears, she is curious to see what she can make it do. Sometimes, I get concerned Jake will be disappointed or offended if he doesn't see her in it."

"She has to depend on enough other pieces of technology. I see it as a good thing if she can do without one. And don't worry about how Jake might feel. He would love it if his tech wasn't needed."

"The other day he and Faith informed us they have learned so much from developing Sage's suit that two other disabled people are now being fitted for their own suits. Not as sophisticated as Sage's because they don't have to be, but it's all very promising."

"See? Even if Sage is past needing the suit, they are going to still be deep into the technology for decades to come. Other people with similar needs are also going to benefit. That is a pretty good legacy for everything she's been through."

"I used to be jealous that you might actually love Sage more than I do, but I realize now that I'm jealous because I can't match your optimism."

"You have never given up in the face of enough daunting challenges to bring down the strongest, most optimistic person. Thinking everything is wonderful is one thing, Savannah. You have worked harder than anyone to make sure Sage has a wonderful life. No one loves Sage more than you do. I'm envious of that special bond between you two."

"Wow, we are blowing some ridiculously huge sentimental bubbles out our pie holes right now. I guess it's just relief that it's all over."

She and Ann ate the pizza Ann had brought over with her in the dining room. Sage took her two pieces in the living room. After Ann left, because she did have a personal life outside of Sage and Savannah Lomax, which now included a new man named Ben who 'might just be the one', she checked on her daughter.

Sage was still watching the PlayStation display on the plasma television, but she was also surfing on the internet using a tablet on her lap.

"Sweetheart, I was going to take a bath. Will you be all right for a while?"

"I'm good." Sage looked at her and smiled.

"Don't stay on too much longer."

"Mom," Sage said, "I'm not a machine. I don't turn off."

"Don't be a smarty pants. You know exactly what I mean. You have until I am out of the bath and then it's all tech off and mommy and daughter time."

"Can't wait," Sage said and went back to whatever she was doing on the tablet.

Now that all the procedures were over for Sage, now that the suit Jake had spent years perfecting may or may not be needed anymore, the challenge of trying to make sense of the mysteries of all that technology being applied to her daughter was being replaced by the mysteries and challenges of having an adolescent daughter who was perfecting her own bubble-popping apathetic and sardonic tone far too rapidly.

She started up the stairs.

"Mom," Sage called after her, "I love you."

"I love you, too, sweetheart."

She ran a hot bath, settled in and let herself drift off. That recurring dream of her and Sage in Holly Park started again. Sage still loved going to the park. In this dream, Sage always floated so walking wasn't a problem for her. She didn't need the suit, either, though sometimes she wore it, sometimes she didn't. Butterflies, bees and birds flew above Sage, some just overhead, some higher up. The dream proceeded as it always did until three boys the same age as Sage showed up in it.

Sage's beatific expression became a moue when she landed to confront them.

The boys picked up rocks and started throwing them at her.

Sage stood her ground and kept scowling at them though some of the stones were landing close to her. The suit had replaced her clothes, the first time that had happened in the dream. One stone appeared to be headed straight for her face, but ricocheted away before getting to her as if hitting an invisible barrier.

Sage pointed a finger at the boys. A moment later all the creatures flying above her soared up into the sky, aligned themselves together, birds, bees, butterflies and now big, ferocious bats, and then dove after her adversaries. Sage kept her finger pointed at the boys, who were now running for the nearest exit from the park. She and her suit glowed blue when she opened her mouth and started screaming.

Savannah sat up in the tub and rubbed her eyes. Sage was still screaming. She threw on her bathrobe and raced down the stairs to find Sage still on the sofa with her head back and her eyes closed.

"No access," Sage said, "All full up, no more, head full."

"What happened, sweetheart? Did you have another bad dream?"

Her ridges and ears appeared to have that pale sapphire glow to them again. "I told you before," she said. "There is something in my head that shouldn't be there."

# *****

The breach automatically triggered an alarm on everyone's computers. Pritchett looked around Area 51 at Robert and Jill and Derek. They had all done the same thing, dropped their arms to their sides, pushed back from their workstations and tilted their heads as they looked at the warning on their screens. Derek was the only one with his mouth open, though.

Ramona Gilbert rushed into the room and over to his workstation. "Show me System Status."

Jill Thompson rolled over to him in her chair while he brought up on his screen the System Status schematic. Derek closed his mouth but remained at his workstation, as did Robert.

"What is it and has it penetrated anything yet?"

The schematic lit up with red lines between points of connection that traced the intruder program's path of penetration. It was continuing to extend deeper into Novus Somnia's mainframe. Lines of code scrolled along the bottom of his screen, along the bottom of everyone's screens.

"It's not a Trojan horse," Thompson said. "They aren't even trying to hide it."

"It's not a worm. It looks like a straight-on brute force attack."

"Look at that!" Jill tapped his screen. "That's part of our own access code."

Gilbert asked, "What does that mean?"

"It means our intruder can go anywhere it likes."

"How did it get that? Is this from someone inside the facility?"

Pritchett started typing. "I don't think so."

Jill said, "It has penetrated our maintenance stuff for now, but it looks to be unstoppable."

"What about our research files?"

"They're safe," he said. "I put up a firewall I had just finished working on before the intrusion."

Robert said from his workstation, "I can't find out where it came from, but it did come from outside."

"Let me try." Jill rolled back to her station and began keying. "They're good."

"Good doesn't tell me anything."

"Whoever is doing this is also covering their tracks. There are roadblocks, diversions and even a dense data jungle that's impossible to penetrate. They could be coming from anywhere out there. Wait!" Thompson opened two windows. "There may be more than—"

"They're gone," he said.

"Poof, they just disappeared."

"How could they do that? Wouldn't we be able to trace their escape? MasterFile is supposed to be able to do that?"

"It could be AI," Derek said.

"You're suggesting a thinking program just hacked our system?"

_Fuck_. Trying to explain things to the great unwashed masses was betraying the magic of this world. He didn't have to this time, though.

"Forget that," Gilbert said. "Where did they go? What did they get?"

"They went everywhere," Thompson said. "We have been completely penetrated."

Derek, Robert and Jill went about tracing all the paths.

"They had access to almost all of it. My firewall stopped them before they got too deep into our research files, but it will take us a day or more to identify specifically what was taken or compromised."

"We have the code they left behind. We might get something from that." Jill was nodding her head vigorously enough to strain her neck. "I track at least two, maybe three, different vectors of penetration. Impressive, very impressive."

"Never mind that for now. Will the firewall you threw up prevent any further attacks?"

"I think so, but we will need to analyze how the program did what it did before we can develop a more effective defence."

Jill said, "I know how they got in."

"Was it one of those backdoor things, an unprotected virtual I/O port or something like that?"

_Just please shut the fuck up._ They were committing blasphemy when the great unwashed masses tried to sound like they knew what they were talking about.

"No ma'am. They knocked on the front door. MasterFile just let them right in and handed over the pass codes."

# *****

Ending every day with an internal conversation with Sage made life with the Apostles a bit more tolerable.

Sage asked, "What did you do today?"

"It was a quiet day. I did some shopping?"

"Alone?"

"You know better than that. I don't know why they try to make me believe I'm not being followed. That trick you showed me really works. I know how many there are and where they are at all times."

"How many today?"

"Six. That's the most I've ever had following me. It was like a parade."

"They know about us."

"They can't know about us. I've been careful."

"No, you haven't. They have cameras in your room."

"They have always had cameras in my rooms."

"Lucy, you move your lips when we talk. They know."

"But they don't know who I'm talking to."

"Yes, they do. They know all about us. Novus Somnia knows about the Apostles."

"They can't know. We're top secret."

"Someone there knows and put it in their computer."

There was no need to ever question Sage's knowledge base. "How did you find out?"

"I'm meeting new friends. I asked them for help. I have to go now, Lucy. One of my other new friends is coming with, I think, some bad news. Good night, big sister."

# Chapter 38

Ramona talked to her when she called Novus Somnia about Sage. "How is she doing?"

"She tells me she's fine. It was just a shooting pain through her head. She doesn't have a fever. I couldn't see any inflammation around her implants."

"We are dealing with a minor system glitch at the facility at the moment. It might take a few days to get someone there to see her."

She looked at Sage.

"Mom, I'm fine. It was nothing."

"As soon as you can Ramona thanks."

"If she has any problems, Dr. Lanyon has a portable diagnostic program for MasterFile. You can plug her into it to stabilize her."

There was no end to the cybernetic and mechanical jargon used when describing the status of Sage's health. At least Small Wonders House had a repair shop she could take Sage to.

"I am grateful there is a diagnostic program that can stabilize my adolescent daughter. Every parent should have one of those."

# *****

Pritchett put his best professional smile on once he was at the front door of the Lomax house.

"Tag, you're it." Derek had punched his shoulder right after Gilbert left Area 51.

Derek, Jill and Robert had all taken their turns at attending to the little freak show hidden in there. This time they got to stay behind at Novus Somnia to attend the critical incident analysis of the attack two nights ago.

"She's right," he had said to them before leaving. "It stinks in here."

Savannah Lomax opened the front door a few seconds after he rang the bell.

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Lomax. I'm Patrick Pritchett from Novus Somnia. Ramona Gilbert asked me to come by."

As she stepped aside to let him in, she asked, "How many of you are there?"

He scratched himself under the chin and then smoothed out his beard. "I'm sorry?"

"I haven't seen the same person visit since Sage had her last surgery."

_Who the fuck cares_? "There are four of us, Mrs. Lomax. It was my turn to come here."

She shrugged and led him into the living room. Sage Lomax, a skinny girl with a head too big for her body plunked on top of a slender neck sat on the sofa.

"You don't have a tablet," she said. "Jill had a tablet like mine."

The freak speaks. Those big, twinkling blue eyes of hers were spooky cold.

He opened his laptop and placed it on the coffee table. "Your mom was a bit concerned because you experienced some pain the other night. I have brought a more sophisticated diagnostic program that requires more memory and a faster CPU speed than any tablet has."

_Or we'll be at this all goddamn day_.

Mrs. Lomax was short, with a solid frame, slender hips for a woman who had given birth, tight buttocks and a really decent rack on her. Not much sag in those two even after having had a freak hanging from them. Her blue eyes were almost as inviting as that other interesting pair belonging to her.

"There is an electrical outlet on the wall behind the sofa if you need it."

_I should tell you what I really want to plug into_. "Thanks."

"We moved the sofa out," the girl said and changed her position to sit cross-legged on it.

"Thanks again."

He plugged in the laptop because a full diagnostic of the cyborg-brat was going to take well over an hour.

Anticipating his next requirement, she bent forward so he could plug the cable into her node. With all those bluish spots lined up in rows, her skin resembled that of a leopard in places.

Mrs. Lomax asked, "How long will this take?"

_I could just wipe her clean, mom, then you and I could do some slow dancing and a bunch of squeezing while she sits there drooling_.

"It should be about an hour or so. We'll just gather the data, make sure everything is working as it should and install a couple of updates."

"I thought she didn't need any more updates."

"Sorry, Mrs. Lomax, if someone from Novus Somnia told you that, they were mistaken. The program in Sage's array is very powerful and very sophisticated, but it would be unrealistic to think it would not have to be periodically updated. The ones I have brought today are small, refinements really. Normally, Sage would have just automatically received them the next time she connected to our mainframe."

"Would you like some coffee, tea . . . ?"

_Can I just get on with this_? "Thank you, no, I had lunch before I came here."

"You may proceed," the staring freak said.

Had she even blinked once since he'd come into the room?

He called up the program module that communicated with the CNCM. "I will install the updates first." The two updates installed in less than a minute. "I assembled that array inside you."

The girl said nothing.

_Scrawny little cyborg-bitch_.

The initial data download should have been as quick as the update installs but it stopped almost as soon as it began. His laptop screen offered the error message: NOT AUTHORIZED. ACCESS DENIED. He tried again and received a more intense warning message: SECURITY LEVEL EXCEEDED. ACCESS DENIED. CEASE ALL ATTEMPTS TO RETRIEVE DATA.

"Why is it doing that?" Mrs. Lomax had come to look over his shoulder. "Is something wrong?"

When he turned to reply, he almost hit her left breast with his nose. He jerked back.

Sage was smiling at him. Her cold, blue eyes were squinting in disapproval of him.

"Does this have anything to do with your minor system problem at the facility? Perhaps you should unplug your laptop from Sage so she doesn't catch the same virus."

"It wasn't a virus," he said. "It was just a glitch."

"Maybe your laptop has that same glitch."

"I'm pretty sure it doesn't, Mrs. Lomax, but we'll start over just to make sure." He closed the program and rebooted his laptop.

Mrs. Lomax sat down beside her daughter and inspected the node at the back of her neck. "Should I unplug her?"

"This will only take a few seconds."

Once the diagnostic program was running again, he tried to download the data. This time, his laptop screen displayed: SECURITY PROTOCOL 2078LVL1AUTHGIL374. DATA CORRUPTION RISK.

The doorbell rang.

"Excuse me." Mrs. Lomax left to get the door.

He brought up two windows on the laptop. One displayed the information about what the CNCM should be. The other displayed what information his laptop was getting from it. The CPU speed was the same, as was the capacity of the memchips and standard RAM. But the program showed 24.16GB as the size that should have loaded onto the array from MasterFile. The display of the actual size of the program on the array showed 24.87 GB.

He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to remember back to the night he was preparing the array.

"Do you have a headache?"

He shook his head. What were the numbers? He remembered they were different, but what was the difference? _Oh shit_. His eyes popped open. Sweat beaded on his forehead. His palms felt damp.

The difference had increased from 24.16GB versus 24.72GB to 24.87GB now. There were more lines of code in the program on Sage's CNCM than in the MasterFile program, and more code had been added since the implant. The updates mostly replaced lines of code that were already part of the program. At most, they would add negligible size to it.

"Are you sure you are all right? You are very flushed. Does your beard itch? Is your ponytail too tight?"

He scratched under his chin. "Let me try something else."

Mrs. Lomax came back into the living room with a taller and thinner but equally attractive woman. "Patrick, this is Ann Devonshire."

"Hi." He opened another window on the laptop.

"Patrick," Mrs. Lomax said, "I think you should stop. The message warned of possible data corruption. Somehow Sage's array may have wirelessly picked up that same glitch your main computer has."

"That isn't likely. The updates loaded with no problem."

Devonshire leaned over to see what was on his laptop screen and stuck her tits into the middle of the conversation. "But you can't be absolutely sure about that. Why don't we give it a day and try again through the home network once everything has been fixed at Novus Somnia?"

He said to Mrs. Lomax, "I've got this."

"Just call Ramona first and get her opinion before we do anything that could make things worse."

_You mean before I do anything_. "Mrs. Lomax, I was on the team that developed this program and all its ancillary software. Most of the code in there is from right here." He tapped his temple.

Sage giggled. "Nothing in there now but bats, rats and teeny-tiny boogers crawling around."

"Sage, that was unacceptable. Apologize right now."

"It's all right, Mrs. Lomax. I'm sorry, Sage, if I upset you. I will be only a few more minutes." He smiled at Mrs. Lomax's very squeezable breasts. "I'm not thinking straight, that's all. Your daughter is very perceptive and she's right. I do have a headache. Could I get a glass of water, please?"

Devonshire said, "I'll get it."

Mrs. Lomax said, "I'll get you some Tylenol."

"That would be great, thank you." After this freak was taken care of, a suitable reward would be spending the afternoon on a bed with those two.

Once they were gone, Sage leaned forward and said, "Tricky, but you shouldn't drink so much. And you binge too much on old television shows and gaming. You'll never get back to the top of the heap again. Your color is awful."

He checked his hands, his chest. He smelled himself.

"I didn't say you stink. I said your color is awful. It's all blotchy with dull greys and browns and greens. Mom and Ann and Lady Ravenhurst would rather pour salt on you and watch you shrivel than diddle you. Any woman would. You're just too slimy."

"How did you . . . ?"

She smiled and sat back. "You're so obvious and I am very perceptive. Your beard does look very itchy. Your ponytail is too limp. It's not very masculine."

_A brainless, freaky stick girl with attitude; just what I need_.

He opened the folder he wanted and then opened the quick scan and repair program it contained. After scratching under his chin again, he started the program.

The network system installed in the house began to beep the emergency signal.

"Shit."

Mrs. Lomax and her friend came running into the room.

Sage was blinking rapidly and shaking. Then she grabbed her sides and started giggling. "Gotcha."

The program completed its task and closed. The beeping stopped. The emblem that signified top secret research files at the facility, a shield that resembled a police badge with _N_ and _S_ in the center of it, appeared on the screen.

He began sweating again. Some of the extra size of the program was from bits of information from Novus Somnia's secret research files. Those lines of code he hadn't recognized were from Pyotr's malware program. It had installed into the CNCM, activated and then found and loaded some of the secret files onto the array. More files had been added during one of her automatic updates.

He closed the laptop. "My bad, but that did it. Sorry for any inconvenience or distress I may have caused you." He took the water and Tylenol. "Thank you."

After saying goodbye to the freaky stick girl with the huge, empty head and the two excellent pairs of tits, he drove straight home, locked himself in and spent the rest of the day thinking of ways he could correct his mistake. The solution came to him once he dropped from his equation the variable of protecting the girl.

# Chapter 39

The Hunter-Killer virus was ready. He and Pyotr christened it Repticon for Retard Eliminator Protocol. It took six hours to complete even with Pyotr's help. It was one of the best ones they had ever come up with and might have more uses after tonight's mission was complete. It also took six hours because he had gone through half a bottle of Jack while working on it. He had no idea what Pyotr had been consuming to keep himself going, but he had been a wild man creating Repticon.

"This will be a simple search and destroy mission. It should be over in seconds."

Pyotr said, "We are wasting an excellent opportunity here. You do realize we could use her and my program for our own purposes. No one would know it was us."

"Call you back once I'm there."

"Hey, buddy, one piece of advice; take a cab, man. The way you're talking, I can tell. You are in no condition to drive."

"I got this, bugger-butt."

The BMW seemed to be reluctant to take him. It took three attempts before it would start, but he got down the hill to the intersection and stopped for the red light without overshooting the crosswalk line. "I am the warrior, Abteroth."

The sun had just set, but it was getting dark quickly because of the clouds. It would be foggy in the bay tonight.

When he looked through the front window of the BMW again, the afterimage of the sunset lagged behind and made his temples pound. "I hate it when he's right. I should have taken a cab."

The light turned green. He belched, put on his signal, turned right and felt a bump come from the passenger side of the car. Had he hit the curb? He checked his rear view mirror and had to squint before he could make out what the bright yellow and blue heap lying on the sidewalk was.

"Fuck." He had hit a cyclist. "Fuck!"

Another quick check confirmed the cyclist was moving. He looked around, saw no pedestrians or other traffic and pressed the pedal to the floor. He went through the red light at the next intersection doing over sixty miles per hour. Again he was lucky. No traffic had been going through with the green.

He pulled over, turned off the engine and checked behind. The cyclist wasn't coming after him. He laughed at that consideration. "I should have brought Jack with me."

No police vehicles, fire trucks or ambulances were coming with their sirens on. The streets were clear of traffic and pedestrians.

He turned the BMW back on and drove as carefully as he could the rest of the way to the research facility.

"Déjà vu, man," he muttered when he had trouble entering his security code to unlock the door to Area 51. He did not have the same problem signing in to his computer. As soon as it was ready, he called Pyotr.

"Have you done it?"

"Get your finger out of your ass, will ya? I just got here. I need to make sure she's asleep first." He opened the window that accessed the maintenance program module dedicated to Sage Lomax. "How does a little retard warrant so much time, money and resources? All that computer power is wasted on her."

"Who are her mother and father?"

"They're nobodies. She's a records clerk or something like that at a care home for other retards. He's a lawyer in San Diego. He's been out of the picture for over ten years."

"Smart man. Who needs the baggage?"

"But this empty-headed freak gets thirty-five percent of MasterFile's capacity. I mean, fuck me, that much power could run everything at Cal-Berkeley for a year." He started the connection program.

"Where are we?"

"Just keep stroking. This will take a few seconds." He definitely should have brought the Jack with him. "There, I'm in. Good, her readings indicate that deficient brat is asleep."

"Offline."

"She soon will be. I just need to load and send." He connected the USB flash drive to his computer, opened the folder and started loading Repticon.

"This could harm her."

"If she flat lines, she flat lines. I need to get that shit out of her head no matter what it takes. They will just think she died in her sleep. Freaky retards like her die in their sleep all the time. They just stop breathing. Besides, she's likely to just need a reboot with a clean download, that's all. She might not be able to move her arms and legs for a few days, she might shit herself all over the place, but she will be fine."

"How does she function with no brain?"

"MasterFile does everything for her. This little bitch would never have gotten out of diapers if not for us."

"You're taking a chance doing it at your workstation. Don't they keep track of all your keystrokes?"

"Repticon will take care of that once it's finished with her. It will just look like a routine maintenance and update check. And I don't have any other options. I need the access protocols from here, dickhead."

"Is it done? It was only supposed to take a few seconds."

"It takes a minute or two to get everything loaded and lined up properly, then, zingo-zappo, she will be wiped clean and—" His screen went black. He moved his mouse to get it to come back on but nothing happened. "Fuck!"

"You finished too quickly again, didn't you? The ladies aren't going to like it if you can't keep it up for more than thirty seconds. Thompson will go back to her toys."

Nothing he did could bring his desktop screen back up. Had Repticon turned on him?

"You are a drunken, punkin' reprobate." It was the girl's voice coming out of the monitor's speakers. "You are a schistosomiasis-head." She giggled.

The monitor came back on. Sage Lomax's blue face looked out at him. She stuck out her tongue. Her head was bald and her blue skin, particularly the three ridges on the top of her head, flickered. Her ears blinked a series of three blue flashes along their tops like some stupid traffic safety marker.

"You have failed and now you will pay."

Pyotr said, "Who is that? Did someone come into the room?"

Sage said, "Who is that? Did someone come into the room?

"She's on my monitor," he said.

"I'm on his monitor." She stuck out her tongue. "Repticon is dead. I ate him all up." She licked her lips. "Tasty little byte-sized chunks. Smelled like pumpkin. Almost made me _regurgiburpitate_ , though."

He tried to open another window on the monitor. Nothing would work.

"She really is in there with you?"

He held up his phone to the monitor so Pyotr could see her blue face and the light show of her ridges and ears.

"Good luck, buddy." Pyotr terminated the connection.

Sage was looking around. "Let's see what's over here." Her face moved off screen to the left.

He tried to shut down his computer. It wouldn't respond to any command. He ducked under his desk and started pulling out the plugs.

Her voice came out over the facility's public address speakers. "You can't stop me. I can do anything in here. I can go anywhere. I can see everything. I've been here before, you know."

"The hacker."

"Had a nice look around, learned some good things and some bad things. But now I know it all thanks to you and Pyotr, the Russian in Mexico City."

"Please stop. Someone will hear you. I'll do anything you ask, just keep quiet."

The monitor for one of the other workstations came on. Sage's glowing blue face appeared on it. "The cyclist wasn't seriously hurt, _Ass_ -teroth, but she will be in hospital for a few days. You broke her leg."

How did she know about that? "I'm sorry."

"Do not try to harm me again, or my mother, or Ann, or anyone. And tell your stupid Russian to keep his hands to himself or I will tell the Mexico City police about him. They will cut off everything that dangles from him and then stick him in a barrel of gasoline in the middle of the city and then set it on fire."

"I will."

"Go to the police. Tell them what you did. Do not tell anyone about my visits."

The face disappeared. The monitor turned off.

He called Pyotr back. "You are a fucking Russian chickenshit. She knows about you, too, about your program in her array, and what you do down there."

"What do we do?"

"We are not going to get in through her head. She just gave Repticon a digital enema. Can you get me a gun? You must know someone down there who will sell you one. It needs to be untraceable."

"What do you want a gun for?"

"We have two options, motherfucker. One, I tell management what's on her CNCM and let them go into full-blown emergency damage control. I can tell them she was the hacker, which she was using your program, and came in again while I was working on something that would stop her. We can then just let them take care of her. Believe me they will not want what she has in her head to get out into public domain. The problem with that option is they will likely take their sweet time deciding what to do about her. Who knows what damage she will do while they're all blowing each other? Both of us are vulnerable. She threatened to tell the Mexico City police about you. Two, we kill the freaky little retard bitch ourselves."

"I can get a gun to you."

# Chapter 40

The package from Pyotr arrived three days later, Friday night. The timing was perfect. He took the Glock G22 .40 semiautomatic with him when he headed for Bernal Heights the next morning. He parked three houses down on Highland Drive at 6:38 a.m. in his Chrysler 200 rental to keep watch on the Lomax house. While he waited, he ejected the fifteen-round magazine from the Glock. With one ready to go, he had a total of sixteen rounds. He was an excellent shot. But hitting bull's-eyes and animals was one thing, hunting people was entirely different.

Pyotr, that prick, enjoyed pointing that out to him when he'd called at midnight and asked, "How are you going to do it?"

"I'll pick my time and spot."

"Cut the bravado bullshit, Patty. This isn't Yarwon. This is real. The Glock is real. It has killed three times already. It will not appreciate being mishandled by a cowardly amateur." The last two questions Pyotr asked highlighted the risk he was taking, "What if she's never alone? Are you willing to end both of them if you have to?"

Ending either one of them or both of them turned out to be a tedious mission of following them through their Saturday morning routine. No wonder killers usually tried to lure their victims into some kind of isolated meeting. At the rate the Lomax women were going, he was going to rack up a thousand miles on his rental and still never leave San Francisco.

They finally got started at just after eight o'clock by first taking their Honda CRV for gas and a wash. Then it was off to the Diamond Heights Shopping Mall for breakfast at Starbucks and grocery shopping at Safeway. They were so goddamn slow because the girl had to use a cane everywhere they went. If mom would just leave her behind in the CRV one time, it could be all over in a shot.

Pyotr called while he was waiting for them to return to the freshly washed CRV. "Is it done?"

"I haven't had the opportunity yet."

"Listen, buddy. The longer you wait, the harder it gets. And I was right, wasn't I? They are always together." He laughed. "Call me when you're finished, one way or another." He laughed hard again and hung up.

Once they were finished at Diamond Heights, it was back to Highland Drive to unload the groceries. The girl insisted on carrying a small bag into the house, which only made the unloading proceed that much slower.

The option of doing them inside the house reintroduced itself to his original plan of bushwhacking them somewhere from a distance. He could tell them he was just following up on his house call, but then they would know who killed them. He also might leave evidence behind.

After almost an hour of waiting, just as he was about to nod off, he had to duck down when Savannah and Sage came out the front door and walked past his rental on the way to Holly Park. What was the point of going for a walk if that gimp had to get around using a cane? Where was this fantastic suit of hers? It was supposed to help with her walking.

In the exterior mirror on the passenger side, he could see Sage looking back at the car. _She's just looking back_. _People do that all the time_. _It doesn't mean she's looking at you_.

He remained ducked down for another two minutes remembering what the three days at work had been like for him since his confrontation with that FLRB. She hadn't attacked Novus Somnia again, but she had left nasty little surprises for him to deal with from time to time. Information from confidential files would suddenly appear on his screen.

Once, Jill Thompson had caught sight of one. "What is that?"

He had opened another window to cover it. "Just something Gilbert wants me to clean up for her."

Using Gilbert's name had dissuaded Thompson from asking any more questions.

Lines of code he and Pyotr had secretly added to various internal security programs would also pop up. He had been forced to delete every line they had entered. Years of inspired preparation had to be wiped out. It had been the worst time of his life.

That FLRB's tormenting of him was coming to an end this morning.

He followed them into Holly Park, the Glock neatly shoved into the right pocket of his black 49ers hooded sweatshirt. He pulled up the hood and put on his sunglasses as his targets disappeared past the top of the stairs taking them up to the center of this pimple on the city's butt. He had left the face mask of the Grinch at home after Pyotr had ridiculed that part of his plan, too.

"You are an idiot. Look, Patty, do you want me to call someone? I can just make them disappear for you."

"Now who's blowing smoke out his ass?"

"I got you the Glock, didn't I?"

He regained sight of them walking along the path near the baseball diamond in the northwest section of this circular park. He stayed in the shadows under the trees that were clumped together in the center of the park.

Sage stopped to look at some flowers. Though she still had the cane with her, she wasn't using it very much.

In the shade with his hood up and his sunglasses on, it would be hard for anyone to identify him. He had been a sprinter in high school. Even if he took a straight line, though, it was still over a quarter-mile back to his rental.

"Fuck it."

He may not be as fit now as he was then, but he could get to the car quick enough. He might have to find a hiding spot to hole up in if witnesses came after him and forced him to take a more circuitous route back to the Chrysler. Any witness, however, would more than likely rush to the shooting victims when mother and daughter went down.

The decision was made, then, they both had to go.

He may not even have to run. If he just ducked back into the shade and made sure no one had spotted him he'd be in the clear. In the commotion, he could just walk away. That was it! Speed would draw attention because he would be going in the wrong direction, the suspicious direction.

As one of the witnesses, instead, he could toss the Glock away in the trees—it was untraceable, after all—and jog over with the pinheads to see what had happened. He could be one of the people calling 911. If he only shot the retard, he could offer help and comfort to the mother and her tits.

Better not risk that. It was foolhardy bravado, as that dick, Pyotr, would be happy to tell him.

Mrs. Lomax and her gimpy daughter were about sixty yards away near first base. That was the real challenge. He could hit them from where he was, though the brightness looking out from where he stood in the shade presented some aiming challenges. He couldn't be sure of a kill shot from this distance, though, and he wouldn't get second shots at both of them.

If that FLRB survived the first shot, she would probably know in an instant that he had been the shooter. She had to go down first. If it took two shots to get her, big-tits momma was going to benefit from a bit of luck tainted with a shitload of survivor's guilt.

Two birds flew out of a tree behind him, passing only inches above his head.

He ducked and swatted. A few seconds after disappearing into the glare over the baseball field, they flew back at him. He heard them screeching but didn't see them until they were almost in his face.

"Shit." He swatted again and staggered back. "Must be near their nest." He walked out into the sunlight in right field before ducking back into the trees again a few feet away from where he came out.

Two women's softball teams were gathering near the stands behind home plate.

Sage and Savannah had stopped to watch them. The girl was using the cane for support again. She could be tiring. If they sat on one of the nearby benches, he might be able to get closer before blowing her circuits out all over the ground.

A man approached them from the west.

When Pritchett put his hand up to shield his eyes from the sun coming over the treetops, he saw what appeared to be a cloud of dots hovering about ten feet over the girl's head.

Mother and daughter looked toward the man approaching them. The cloud of dots swirled upward before swooping down toward Sage and vanishing into the shadows.

Savannah Lomax seemed to recognize the man. She took a number of steps onto the grass to greet him. Her daughter remained on the path near the first base track still leaning on her cane when mom and the man started talking.

The two birds came swooping at him again.

"What's your problem? I moved. Fuck off!" He swatted and ducked and reached for the Glock. Something stung his hand before it could get into his pocket.

He shook it and swatted at the air again before taking a look. While inspecting the swelling red spot near his thumb, a bee landed on his hand and stung him the moment it landed.

A cloud of bees swarmed him as the dead one landed on the ground. Swatting over his head, he ran out onto centerfield. The cloud of bees came after him, but after a few more seconds of just circling above him without any more attacks, they flew off.

His two targets were still there. Mom was waving for the girl to come join her and the man. The cyborg-brat looked straight at him before responding to her mother's request. She pointed the cane toward the sky as she walked away from the diamond. The cloud of bees had returned to hover over her head.

"What the—" His stomach gurgled, fluttered and pinched. That pinch squeezed its way down through his abdomen as he sprinted for the public washrooms.

# *****

He called only Gilbert and told her he had discovered the hacker's identity. When they met in her office at Novus Somnia, Drs. Lanyon and Humboldt were with her.

He had gone home first and changed.

Gilbert got straight to the point. "Who hacked us?"

"The Lomax girl."

"How do you know this?"

"I didn't at first. When I made my home visit, I noticed the size of the program in her array was bigger than the MasterFile program that had been installed. I thought nothing of that until I went back to investigating the hack. I found a handshake between MasterFile and the girl's array coinciding with the time of the hack."

Gilbert said, "When did you discover this?"

"Three nights ago; I guess the home visit had planted its own worm inside my head. I just had to come in then and take a second look." They would appreciate the irony of him talking about himself as if he was a computer.

"Why didn't you tell us then?"

"I still couldn't be sure until she did it again." This part would be dicey, but he had doctored the internal records to match his version of the story. "I was trying to find something else that would confirm my suspicion besides the handshake when suddenly there she was."

Humboldt asked, "What do you mean 'suddenly there she was'?"

"I mean just that. She had entered our computer. The first time might have been an accident. She might have even been unaware of the intrusion. As you all know, her array can communicate with MasterFile at any time, even if she's asleep. There have been no security concerns in the past because all of her modules were given the highest clearance rating."

That generated lightbulbs-on glances between them. Those glances might have exhibited hints of accusation in them.

"You are saying the array made the intrusion."

"I believe it did on its own the first time. I still have not verified how, but for some reason, or glitch, it did more than just download routine updates. It took a look around inside our mainframe. What's more, it copied some files. That is why its size increased."

Dr. Lanyon was the one who started pacing. "But the second time, three nights ago, you believe Sage Lomax willfully came back into MasterFile."

"It looked like another attack except the intrusion just overlaid our regular programming."

"Overlaid?"

"MasterFile goes about its business while the malware piggybacks on it to see what's what. Then it starts poking around here and there doing what mischief and damage it can and extracting anything it finds interesting. That is why it appeared to be more than one intruder. It already knew its way around the first time. It knew exactly what it was looking for the second time."

"That sounds like AI to me," Humboldt said.

"No, it is just programmed to appear intelligent and purposeful, perhaps even thoughtful and problem solving because it was programmed by someone who knows our system."

He let that sink in for a few moments to keep them headed in the right direction.

"It still sounds like artificial intelligence to me."

"Yes, it does, except there is very little artificial about it. The malware is being controlled and changed as required. It is rapidly adapting because of its familiarity with MasterFile. Advances in AI are being made by creating algorithms that resemble networks of neurons similar to a brain. They are capable of layered processing between input and output, what is called deep thinking, but they cannot yet do what was done inside MasterFile."

"But a human can."

"And if she has the cooperation of MasterFile . . . ?"

Gilbert said, "She can control her array and through that our mainframe."

"She can now. Our records indicate she grew her own brain after that final procedure. You three are more up to date than I on her current development and what she can and cannot do, but I would guess her brain has gained complete control of the CNCM. It does more now than just help her regulate some of her functions."

"How do you know this for certain?"

He had them now. "She talked to me through my computer. I tried to stop her, but MasterFile would not recognize her as a threat. She ate the few lines of code I had input as part of a new layer of security I was creating and incorporated them into her own malware to suit her purpose. Then she went through every file in our mainframe. She saw everything. She told me that. She copied every single one of those files into her array, including the ones from the facilities in Virginia, India, Puerto Rico and Mexico."

Those lightbulbs in their heads were getting almost bright enough for him to see them through their skin and bones.

He had one more spur to poke them with. "She knows all about Harvey Weinberg and what he did to both her and her mother twelve years ago. She knows about her two identical sisters, including where they are and what they are supposed to be capable of. She also knows about some group called the Apostles."

# Chapter 41

At first, Sage seemed reluctant to join them when she waved at her. She looked away toward the trees past centerfield. For a moment, she thought Sage would go into one of her fits of stubbornness and stay where she was, but then she came to them, though she did wave her cane over her head as if threatening someone.

"Sweetheart, this is your father."

Ryan hesitated before stepping forward to hug his daughter.

Sage raised her arms when he did but she did not hug him. She also did not hit him with the cane.

He let go of her and said, "You have certainly grown into a lovely young woman. You have your mother's wonderful blue eyes."

"I have my own wonderful blue eyes. They sparkle like stars from other universes."

"She will give you responses like that sometimes."

"You do not need to explain or offer excuses. Whatever she does is perfectly fine with me. It's who she is."

Sage asked, "Why are you here?"

He squinted as the sun completely cleared the trees. "Thank you for asking that straight out. I was worried we would get stuck in some prolonged and awkward conversation before we got to what we really need to talk about." For a few seconds, he looked away to watch the two women's baseball teams warming up.

For a few seconds, she worried Sage would point her cane at him and tell him to stop ogling their bazoombas and bum-buns. He would be the seventh man she had done that to in this park.

Though Sage kept that warning to herself, she was glowing with agitation. Every other parent on the planet learned to read their children's faces and behaviors to know how they were feeling. She had learned to recognize the subtle and intricate differences in Sage's glows and flashes. Her daughter was upset and becoming more so.

"Could we find a private place to talk?"

"I'll make us some coffee."

On the slow walk out of the park, none of them said anything. Sage kept looking everywhere and stopped frequently to give her tiring legs a rest. Though she had put on the suit, this was the second time she had not bothered turning it on before they went to the park.

How was she going to get them home if Sage spotted some insect she would insist needed rescuing, or a branch or weed on the path she would refuse to step over? Jake had worked wonders to make that suit compatible with Sage's needs, but he had neglected to give mom an override button that would make it walk Sage back home if she froze.

Just before they exited the park to cross Holly Park Circle at Highland Avenue, Sage said, "Cowardly bushwhacker."

That comment guaranteed a continuation of the silence between them until they got into the house. Sage sat on the sofa and turned on her calming display with Rene Fleming singing arias, Sage's current favorite. Her ridges stopped glowing.

Ryan came with her into the kitchen. "You've been talking to mom about me."

"She was telling me about you reaching out to reconnect with your family."

"I'm sorry. It wasn't my intention to use mom as an envoy between us, but once we were talking again, she suggested it might be better if she talked to you first rather than have me just show up on my own."

She finished preparing the coffee maker and turned it on. "But you did just show up on your own. Deborah never mentioned anything about you coming to San Francisco."

"She didn't know." He sat down at the small table in the nook. "I understand if you hate me."

She took out two coffee mugs. "Still black?"

"Still black."

"Me too." She left the cups beside the coffee maker and sat down across from him. "I don't hate you, Ryan. And I'm not angry either. It's been eleven years. We've moved on."

He nodded. "From what I've seen so far, and from what mom and dad have told me, you have done a fantastic job with Sage."

"I've had a lot of help."

He slumped back. "I know that, too, but none from me."

"It is good to see you, Ryan, I mean that, but I don't want you making confessions to me or excuses or offering amends. I'm glad you are reconnecting with your family. As far as you and I and Sage go, however, let's just have a cup of coffee and see what happens."

He put both hands flat on the table. His eyes were tearing up, but he just nodded again.

When the coffee was ready, she poured it out and retrieved some chocolate chip cookies she, Ann and Sage had made two nights ago.

He had two cookies and drank half of his coffee before he spoke again. "I don't want to overstay my first visit. I don't want to be presumptuous."

"Then have another cookie and finish your coffee."

He did as he was told. "I will understand your refusal, but I would like to be part of Sage's life again, if not yours as well. I have no right to expect anything other than a hard kick in the ass, but—"

"Stand up."

Again he did as he was told.

She stood up. "I will have to talk to Sage. She's old enough now to be involved in any decision about who is part of her life."

"Agreed."

"Then it is time for you to go. And from now on, you call first and get permission rather than just come by. I'm sure you have my number."

He gave her a piece of paper with his iPhone number on it. On the way out, he leaned over to kiss Sage's forehead.

Sage did look away from the display to watch him leave, but she did not respond to him in any other way. She certainly didn't start glowing or flashing again.

Savannah sat down beside her daughter.

"Why does he want to come back now?"

"I think this is very hard for him, sweetheart. I'm not sure how I feel about it, but you know how great Grandpa and Grandma Lomax have been, and Auntie Regina and Taylor and Micah. Your father is part of that family and I know he loves you very much." She put her arm around Sage. "I would like you to know who your father is."

"I would like to know who my father is, too."

# *****

Sage's urgent request to communicate exploded in her head hard enough to make her grunt and bright enough to blot out anything else.

Momma said, "What's the matter with you now?" Momma's face was only a bright pink blur until her greying hair and brown eyes finally came back into focus. "Well, speak up, girl. What is it?"

"Yes, girl," Tye said, "speak up, girl."

The Apostles were dining in a hotel in Boston, celebrating their success at foiling a plan to repeat the Boston marathon bombing next year. They had resolved this case without any help from Sage, a rarity these past two years.

Another explosion of such intense need rocked her in her chair as if someone had yanked on her hair from behind. She grunted again.

Gwen Hunter took hold of her hand. "Lucy, what is it?"

"I'm sorry. I think I'm still feeling some residual of that man's hatred."

"I'm not surprised by that," Gwen said. "You have been outstanding on this mission, Lucy. Some residual charge from him still bothering you would be a natural consequence."

Even Atchison acknowledged her this time. "Gwen is right, Lucy. He was the worst we've ever encountered and you took the brunt of that."

Tye said, "Yeah, girl, I don't know how you're still upright."

"Please excuse me. I just need to lie down for a while."

Atchison, Hutt and Kolisnek stood up for her.

Momma just kept staring at her empty plate.

Back in her room, she took up her position on the bed, closed her eyes and opened herself up. This was the first time the connection with Sage brought any pain with it. She cried out when Sage charged right in.

"It's going to get bad quickly now."

"What's wrong?"

It all came in as fast, hot, sharp penetrations.

"Sage, stop, please! You're hurting me." Needles were being shoved into her brain. "Tell me one thing at a time."

"Novus Somnia is doing bad things with babies before they are even born."

"What kind of bad things?"

"Bad things like they did with me."

"What did they do to you?"

"They put things into me and they took things out. And they've been doing it to other babies. _He's_ been doing it."

"Who?"

"The most evil man in the world: Harvey Weinberg. He's really old, really powerful and he's really smart. He's really selfish and he's really, really evil."

She had to close her eyes to the pain and lost consciousness for a moment. "He's supposed to be dead. Chase told us that after our mission in San Francisco last year."

"That's what they think. And mom was talking to my dad today. He wants to come back into our lives, but I don't want him here."

"Why not, honey? I wish I still had my dad in my life."

"He's not my dad. Mom was tricked into having me so Harvey could do things to me while I was in my dish. I know all about it now."

"Who is your father, then?"

"My father is legion."

That stabbing pain returned as some frightening but fragmented series of thoughts passed between them. She missed them all but still went through the pain of them.

"Lucy, I will tell you something else I know now for certain. You _are_ my sister. Harvey did something to you and your mom and all the others years ago. Part of you is inside of me because you were the best fit."

Another attack of pain prevented her from responding. It was all she could do to keep from flying off the bed.

"I am going to need your help very soon, big sister. Be ready when I call."

"I will . . . little sister." Her cell phone began buzzing. "I'm being called to a meeting."

"They believe Abteroth's story. You are all in danger now because of me. I'm so sorry."

# *****

Clarke's EMT was dismantling their operations center in the hotel's largest meeting room when she joined the other Apostles there. Chase and Reagan were over by a window talking.

Chase waited for EMT to leave with the last of the equipment before he gathered them around the table. "Sage Lomax hacked the computer at the Novus Somnia research facility in San Francisco. She accessed all the top secret files concerning the Apostles."

Tye chuckled. "Talented babe."

"More talented than any of you," Reagan said.

Atchison said, "I told you she was dangerous."

Her connections with Sage had strengthened her talents. They were telling her now that Chase was satisfied with Atchison's expected warning.

Chase looked straight at her. "We need to find out all we can from her."

Momma said, "Why don't you just bring her in?"

"Novus Somnia is working on a way to reinstall her original program and at the same time delete all the sensitive information she has acquired."

Reagan said, "Despite what you might think of us, Mrs. Cooper, we do not want to harm a girl. We just want to correct things."

"Back into the bottle and all that," Tye said, "Best of luck to you both."

Reagan was lying and he was doing that on purpose because he knew they would all be able to detect the lie. He believed they would all be confused and worried. They wouldn't know what he and Chase really had planned or what Sage really knew about all of them or what she intended to do with her new knowledge.

Chase said, "We know she hacked the computer. We do not know if she knows what she is doing. She may not be aware of what she has or understand any of it. The key here is to protect the sensitive data about you people and reset her to where she should be."

Gwen Hunter had never said much in these meetings. She may have indeed never said anything of significance in any prior meetings. Therefore, everyone was taken by surprise when she said, "Why don't we just go to her?"

Even Chase and Reagan were stymied for a moment.

"We are like her. We know she has displayed some of her talents to her mother. Would it be that much of a shock to either of them to learn there are others like her?"

"We are a top secret unit," Hutt said.

"Oh, for God's sake, Cedric, just listen to yourself. You sound ridiculous. Sage Lomax is far stronger than all of us combined. We all know that and that is why her having knowledge of us is so terrifying. We've been attempting to _monitor_ her as best we can for years and we've failed miserably. Do you really still believe she isn't aware of us or what we keep trying to do?"

Lucy said, "She is. We all know that, too, if we're honest with ourselves."

"She probably has a good laugh at our expense. So why don't we stop all this psychic spying nonsense and go introduce ourselves to both of them? We could help each other. You get more with honey than with vinegar." She said directly to Hutt, "We are not top secret to Sage Lomax, especially now."

Chase just said, "It's an option." He and Reagan then left.

Why hadn't he confronted her about her connection with Sage?

Momma said, "She's too dangerous."

"Momma, she isn't dangerous. I've been connected to her for two years. She's very sweet and she's even helped us without the rest of you knowing. But right now, she's afraid. For Sage Lomax, the whole world is turning against her."

Gwen said, "We could help her with that."

"Yes, we can. It's Chase and his people we have to be concerned about. Sage is one of us and she got more from Novus Somnia than just our files. Momma, she told me a man at Novus Somnia did things to her before she was born." She made eye contact with every apostle. "He did things to each of us. You all remember Harvey Weinberg, don't you?"

Kolisnek said, "He was the one who examined me when I joined. He administered all those tests we had to take."

"He examined all of us. He took samples of our blood. Momma, he put some of our blood into Sage right after she was conceived, maybe even before that." Momma would have trouble understanding a more scientific explanation about gene splicing and DNA editing. "She has Cooper blood in her, momma. She probably has bits of DNA from each of us in her. If that doesn't make her one of us, I don't know what does."

Momma growled at her, "Don't you try that nonsense with me. You've been lying to us for two years. I'm not going to believe anything that girl tells you or anything you tell us."

She grabbed her mother and shook her. "You are an ignorant, cowardly fool."

Reagan came back into the room. He was wearing his holster. "Pack your things. We leave in ten."

# Chapter 42

The instructions that had just appeared on her laptop didn't make sense: _Ask him about Holly Park_.

"Just one moment, Senator, please." She typed in five question marks and pressed enter. She then said to Pritchett, "You advised Gilbert, Lanyon and Humboldt of the identity of the hacker in the afternoon of Saturday, May fifteenth, is that correct?"

"That is correct." Pritchett was calmly answering all the questions put to him, but he was having difficulty sitting still in the chair. He fidgeted before every answer he gave.

A response appeared on the screen: _Ask him if he intended to kill both Savannah and Sage at Holly Park that Saturday morning_.

"Mr. Pritchett, isn't it true you had followed Mrs. Lomax and her daughter into Holly Park that morning intending to kill them?"

Pritchett looked around the room as if he expected to find someone had just snuck into it. He transformed from a confident but nervous witness to a terrified man.

"Sit still, Mr. Pritchett," Sutton said, "and answer the question."

"How do you know that?"

It was easy to follow the cues that came next. Randi was a fantastic asset.

"You followed them after you had failed to wipe Sage's program while she was asleep. As a matter of fact, your failure allowed her free access to MasterFile and led to the danger she and her mother would soon face. Sage was too powerful to try anything like that against her again so you decided a more direct approach was required. You followed them into the park. You hid in the trees out beyond centerfield and watched them. But you lost your nerve and left. Is that correct, Mr. Pritchett?"

He nodded and sagged down into the chair.

"And your story for Gilbert, Lanyon and Humboldt was not the truth, was it?"

Chase said, "Joan, Mr. Pritchett has not been charged or even implicated in any wrongdoing in this incident."

"That is because this gutless wonder has unbelievable luck. So many people died, but he still gets to pretend he's the avenging warrior, Abteroth, of planet Yarwon."

" _Joan_ ," Sutton said, "that will be enough of that. Are you going somewhere with this? Do you have any further questions for the witness?"

"Just one." She made him wait a few seconds for it. "Did you know that aside from all the high-tech capabilities that freaky little retard bitch, as you call her, now has, she can also control the birds and the bees?"

Pritchett didn't respond directly to the question. He gasped, fainted and slid out of the chair onto the floor.

Sutton called a brief recess to allow the paramedics on hand to tend to Pritchett and return him to his room.

Chase took the opportunity to leave.

Sutton, Rowe and Thorpe came to her.

"Joan," Sutton said with equal parts sternness and surprise in her tone, "none of that was in your report."

"I acquired that information just recently. I have not completed my investigation into the details yet. I'm sorry, Claudette, he bothered me. I know it was unprofessional, but I just had to get in a few jabs at him."

"No need to apologize. You saved me the trouble of hitting him over the head. Every time I do that to someone, I have to answer far too many tiresome questions afterward."

"Can we bring in Ann Devonshire for the next part? She was there for most of it when the visitation rights conflict escalated."

Chase still hadn't returned when Sutton reconvened the hearing.

"I'm not waiting for him anymore." She banged her gavel.

One of the guards at the door left and soon returned with Ann Devonshire.

Once she was settled in her chair, Sutton asked, "Ms. Devonshire, before we proceed with our questions, perhaps you could provide the committee with a brief comparative analysis of Sage's brain versus a normal teen brain."

Joan looked at her hearing procedure notes.

"It's quite all right, Joan, Cynthia suggested that to me and I'm afraid my curiosity has got the better of me. Ms. Devonshire, please." Sutton tapped her gavel lightly on the table.

Ann Devonshire said, "Senator, I'm not sure there is such a thing as a brief comparative analysis of Sage's brain to anything."

"Do the best you can, dear. Just provide us with the most awesome highlights. Start with a normal teen brain and—" Sutton waved her gavel in the air.

"The easiest way to describe what befuddles us while we are teenagers and then when we later have to deal with them when we're parents is the rapid but staggered development of the adolescent brain. First, the limbic system begins spinning at about one hundred thousand rpm, driving emotions into whole new and uncontrollable intensities. Unfortunately, the prefrontal cortex, which will eventually control the impulses that come from this hyper-emotional engine, doesn't mature until we are in our twenties."

"I'm sure we all know someone who has never matured to that level."

"The teen brain also goes into hyper-drive at interconnecting all its different components. More white matter develops. That's the myelin that wraps around the axons. Myelin makes every nerve work more efficiently. A teen brain transmits information thirty times faster and can compute three hundred times faster than a pre-adolescent brain. It can hold over four terabytes of information. The estimate on Sage is more than double that, but it is just an estimate."

Cynthia asked, "Does Sage's brain have the same components as a normal brain?"

"She has a limbic system and basal ganglia. She has all three layers of the meninges: the dura matter, arachnoid matter and pia matter. She has prefrontal lobes and most of the other regions we expect to see in a human brain. All that came about when her brain finally grew to its normal size. But her lobes are more developed than a normal teen. Any description of Sage's nervous system must always be tempered with the caution that its architecture is so unusual and presents complexities no one completely understands."

"You are referring to her exocranial bundles of ganglia and her secondary nervous system."

"All of that and more, Dr. Thorpe."

"Are you referring to her reading of people's color and their futures? None of that has been verified yet."

"Sage's extensive neural network is estimated to have eighty percent more connections between her brain and her exocranial network than a normal human nervous system."

"This exocranial network is what causes the stiffness and limited range of motion in her back."

"It also hinders the use of her legs, but it isn't the bundles of nerves, as dense as they are, that does that, it's the thick, rubbery protective protein encasing the bundles that causes the stiffness and interferes with the movement of her legs. It's everywhere up and down her spine and extends into her pelvic girdle. Even her suit is unable to compensate for it anymore without causing her a great deal of discomfort. It has been detuned to coincide with her new limitations."

Sutton said, "You're telling us Sage's brain revs past one hundred thousand."

"Maybe one hundred times faster with a one thousand fold greater capacity, but that isn't really a good analogy. I'm not sure what is."

"Let's talk about some of the remarkable capabilities she has. She can shock people the way an eel can."

"She can generate her own charge, yes, but she can also conduct a charge through herself so long as there is a large enough difference in electrical potential between her source and the target. The suit facilitates and amplifies this ability."

"That is what happens in a lightning strike."

"Yes, but I haven't personally seen her call down one."

Nyla said, "There was a massive electrical storm the night of the Novus Somnia incident. The facility was struck a number of times by lightning, which is believed to have caused the explosions and fire that destroyed it."

"There are clusters and bundles and even more densely tangled regions we believe play specific roles in what she can do, but we know very little about their functions and probably never will now."

Cynthia asked, "Do you think the new alignment of her sensor scales played any role in her ability to conduct electricity?"

"I would be speculating."

Sutton said, "Give it a shot."

"Yes, they do, but, again, I have no idea how. We know those scales are made up of three layers of polar cells. The two outside layers play a role in insulating and containing the higher charge potential of the middle layer. When she needs to discharge, the two outer layers stop insulating the inner one as well as release their own pent up electrochemical energy."

Sutton said, "That sounds like an organic capacitor."

"Others have described them as such. We know the new alignment of the scales along her arms, legs and spinal column, as well as the array of them on her head, increased her conductivity because the suit provided data to confirm that, but events happened so fast after the procedure, and after Ryan Lomax came back into the picture, that we never got the opportunity to evaluate how it affected Sage. We also know there are fragments of neural cells, more bundles, inside every cell of her body. They connect to her SNS. The neurons of the SNS are made up of an inner neuron enclosed inside a thicker, hollow neuron. The outside wall of the inner neuron and the inside wall of the outer neuron are also polar and are exodic, that is they conduct their electrical impulses toward the periphery. All of that, and probably more, could have contributed to what she did at Novus Somnia, but I can't be sure. I also cannot be sure what it is costing Sage to do such things."

"Thank you, Ms. Devonshire. I think we will leave any further discussion of Sage's complex nervous system for a less official setting. I am sure we all have many more questions to ask." Sutton had tapped the handle of her gavel as she said each sentence. "Joan, we will now proceed with the return of Ryan Lomax."

"Would it be accurate to describe Savannah's reaction to Ryan Lomax's response to their first meeting in eleven years as intense anger at being betrayed?"

"Sucker punched was how she described being served with the writ."

"He met her on the morning of the fifteenth. On Monday, the seventeenth, she was served with the writ concerning his application for visitation rights to Sage, and eventually joint custody. Is that correct?"

"He didn't want joint custody. He wanted possession of Sage so he could—"

"We will get to that, Ann."

"Savannah had little time to prepare. They were to meet in the judge's chambers that Friday, the twenty-first."

"You helped her find a lawyer and you accompanied her to the courthouse."

"I was there to stay with Sage while they were in chambers."

"It didn't go well for her."

"She was at her end. It was that simple. After all she and Sage had gone through together, Ryan was the last straw. Their world fell apart quickly after that hearing."

"By the end of that day, Novus Somnia was a smoking ruin, Ryan Lomax was dead, and Sage and Savannah had disappeared, along with a federal agent and your colleague, Elizabeth Bergeron." Sutton then asked, "Mr. Lomax believed he had little chance of persuading Mrs. Lomax to agree to his request, isn't that correct?"

"But he had no right to Sage. We all know that now."

"No one knew that at the time."

" _He_ did."

Joan said, "Ann, I can imagine how upsetting this is for you, but we will get to that in a while."

"Sorry. In answer to the senator's question, yes, that is how he and his lawyer presented his case. He claimed Savannah was full of hostility toward him. She refused outright his request to be part of Sage's life again. He claimed he had no choice but to start legal proceedings to make her cooperate. But it was all a ruse. Ryan Lomax had made a deal with demons and he had come back only to make his final payment."

# *****

Reagan was on the screen of the fifty-inch Sony in the room set aside for him. Joseph Clarke was next to him. Dorothy Cooper stood in the background next to the line of computer workstations and Clarke's EMT people working at them.

Clarke said, "McGowan still has a direct feed to the girl, Muta and the boy. They are working together. That's the good news. There are four points out there now with Lucinda Cooper joining her. The Lomax girl has to keep her focus on communicating with McGowan. We're close to finding her. That suit is boosting her signal."

Reagan pointed back to Cooper. "She just told us they are seeing the glows in the fog now."

"What is the bad news?"

"She just went toe-to-toe with GateGuard. Even with the upgrades and firewalls we put in after her attacks at Novus Somnia, she just blew right through them. Some of our files were protected because she wanted to get in and out fast, but not enough was left untouched."

Reagan said, "She accessed all the ident biometrics. She can go anywhere now. She can open any security door whether it is digital, virtual or otherwise."

"Are the Creators Almighty in on this?"

"They have a very unhealthy symbiotic relationship. She is handing over sensitive stuff to them right now and we can't do much to stop her unless you want to unplug the whole federal government."

"In turn," Reagan said, "they are giving her and Muta all the software she demands as fast as they can input it. The boy delivers it to her."

"Military stuff and most of our national security data are not available to her because of air-gapping. They aren't connected to anything she can penetrate. At least not yet, she can't. They are connected to each other, though. If she ever finds her way into any one of them, look out."

"How knowledgeable is she about this?"

"You mean is she omniscient yet?"

"Does she understand what she has inside her, what she is capable of? She is only twelve years old. We may be able to stop her from causing much damage without having to harm her if she is just throwing a tantrum."

"She may understand what she _can_ do and even _how_ she does it, but mostly she just instinctively uses all that technology and software to augment those natural talents of hers to do whatever she wants. And you have to keep in mind that Novus Somnia not only installed sophisticated technology and programming to help her with her problems they also installed the most advanced wifi and Ethernet capabilities available. Some of it is prototypical stuff that came straight from the researchers involved with the project. We have no idea how it works or what it is truly capable of. And that suit plays a bigger role than anyone realized. She had been clever enough to keep all she can do while wearing it well hidden until that night. It is our opinion that if she isn't stopped soon eventually nothing will be safe from her probing or attacks. She could gut everything in a matter of seconds. My advice is to keep candles and matches handy."

"What does she want?"

"All that Pritchett stuff came straight from the girl. And it upset her, too. She really glows when she gets excited. In the real world, I wouldn't want to get anywhere near her when she turns that blue glow on, but in the ether, it turns her into a beacon. Her impenetrable data jungle dissipates somewhat. We start to see openings and possible pathways into it. We won't be sure how far we can proceed until we try."

"How can we stop her?"

"An EMP presents a significant risk to the girl."

"How?"

"Her nervous system and the equipment inside her are hardened and protected because of that tough, rubbery protein coating that's grown around them. Do you think she knew she was going to need something like that?"

"Is that rhetorical?"

"We wouldn't know how much power to use. A nonnuclear EMP would have to be detonated close to her and the explosion would likely be of greater danger to her than any EMP discharge. There is an experimental microwave EMP emitter we could try. It isn't very powerful, but it might knock her down or confuse her or render her powerless long enough to contain her. We could probably neutralize the suit, but doing that might not matter much to her now. We might have better luck if we just do what they did and use those electric guns from Novus Somnia."

"Look how that turned out. What about the boy?"

"He's good, but he's not her caliber. Muta has a crush on him, so she will not respond kindly to any attempt to catch him. But right now, Sage has to stay focused on her link with McGowan. If you can keep her busy and challenged, she will glow even more within that thinning jungle around them." Clarke hesitated and looked at Reagan.

"Go ahead, tell him."

"She's really angry at you for what you did to Gilbert. That could prove useful."

"I will see what I can do. Keep them at it and get the drones ready. Bring her here."

Reagan brought Dorothy forward.

"You will have one chance only to control your daughter. Do not forget that."

Reagan pushed her away.

He said to Clarke, "Get over here. It's time to bring this absurd review to an end."

# Chapter 43

She, Sage and Ann arrived at the Civic Center Courthouse on McAllister Street at 9:30 a.m. She held Sage's hand and looked up as they entered the building.

"I've spent years getting comfortable with hospitals, doctor's offices, Small Wonders House, every laboratory Novus Somnia has and all those international researchers putting Sage under their particular microscopes to all but dissect her. I've had to learn biology, physiology, neurology, electrical engineering, computer programming and physiotherapy. Now I have to start dealing with this behemoth."

All the well-dressed legal experts walked here and there as if they were in their living rooms. She, Ann and Sage went up in a crowded elevator. Sage squeezed her hand as soon as they exited.

"There's Brenda." Ann led them to her lawyer, Brenda Hirsch.

Hirsch said, "You and I need to review something before we go in."

Ann took charge of Sage as she and Hirsch entered a small room containing two chairs side by side next to a table.

Brenda Hirsch wasted little time getting her briefcase open and extracting the papers she wanted to review.

She sat down only when Brenda sat down.

"Did you know Ryan had been contributing to Sage's treatments?"

The little window that looked out onto McAllister Street seemed to shrink as she shook her head. "I just know he left us," was all that came out of her.

"Savannah, these are records from Novus Somnia. They confirm he contributed most of his take-home pay to support the work they were doing with Sage. It is a drop in the bucket, yes, but he lived a modest material life so he could help. The judge will look favorably on that. Didn't anyone there tell you about his contributions?"

She shook her head again. Would Gilbert or Humboldt or Lanyon have known? Gilbert might have known, but the doctors likely didn't concern themselves about where the money came from. If Gilbert did know, had she been trying to spare her pain or Novus Somnia the problem of dealing with an enraged mother who might refuse to continue with their project?

Someone knocked on the door before opening it. A woman in another expensive suit stepped in and said, "Judge Benedict is ready for you now."

"We will be right there." She took hold of Savannah's hands. "We will be in the judge's chambers. Are you ready?"

"Does that matter?"

Judge Jean Benedict was in her late fifties. She had been a judge in family law for fifteen years. Ten of those years had been in San Francisco. Brenda Hirsch had told her during their first meeting that Benedict was fair-minded and would take into account Sage's wishes.

Upon entering Benedict's chambers, any small amount of reassurance Hirsch's comments had provided remained outside in the hall. Sitting behind her desk, Judge Benedict's resemblance to Vice-Principal Phoebe Castro from junior high didn't give her any cause for optimism.

Benedict held up her hands. Hirsch and Alicia Newcomb, Ryan's lawyer, handed over their respective briefs to each hand.

Of course, Ryan would wear a sensible, inexpensive blue suit despite being a successful lawyer. She was the only one in this room who was going to struggle to understand the legal implications of everything that was presented and discussed.

Benedict dropped the two briefs onto her desk like they were late term papers. Did all authority figures behave like you were back in school or was there some convergent evolution at work here?

"I have read both preliminary depositions and, frankly, I am very surprised. Mr. Lomax chose to abandon his young, vulnerable wife to cope alone with the special needs of their disabled daughter, born without a brain, no less. Now that Sage is a fully realized and healthy young woman, he wants to crawl back into her life."

Newcomb said, "Your honor, Mr. Lomax fully understands the optics of his apparent irresponsible behavior."

Benedict said, "He'd better."

"He went through a breakdown at that time, your honor. His daughter's special needs and a particularly dangerous class action suit involving organized crime and corruption at various levels of government proved too much for him. But he did not abandon Sage and Savannah. As our deposition shows, and the Novus Somnia records corroborate, Ryan provided as much financial support for the care of Sage as he could. Some years, his donations to her care amounted to half of his net income. He has lived a modest life to help as much as he could."

"The money is appreciated, counselor, but why not come back to them after the class action suit was completed? The gangs were apprehended."

"Yes, the vast majority of them had been rounded up, but not all. And my client did suffer a breakdown. He could not shake the fear that at any moment one of the ones still on the loose could show up to confront him. He became obsessed with the possibility he would bring that danger back to his wife and daughter if he returned to them. Indeed, he broke all connections to his family for years and moved to San Diego."

Benedict looked over some papers on her desk. "He has just recently reconnected with his mother, father and sister."

"He has, yes."

Benedict glanced at her and then at Ryan. "That is a very neat story, Mr. Lomax. Some might consider you a hero for all the danger you took upon yourself. It also sounds very pat."

Ryan said, "Yes it does, your honor. I would attack every facet of it in court if I encountered such a tale."

"Eleven years is a long time, Mr. Lomax."

Newcomb said, "He was in counselling all those years. It took a long time for him to recover, but he did finally reach a point where he could consider going home."

"That was not his home anymore, counselor."

"I did not know how to reach out to Sage and Savannah. I focused on reconnecting with my family first."

"He has never stopped loving his daughter. He has never stopped loving his wife."

Brenda said, "This is a sudden and convenient story from Mr. Lomax. We were just advised of the money part of it."

"Mr. Lomax was going through a very difficult time. He believed it was better to remain anonymous out of concern for the emotional impact it would have on Mrs. Lomax and Sage."

"He certainly did that, for eleven years, as a matter of fact."

"It was always his intention to return one day and resume his role as a father to Sage."

"Now that it suits him and Sage is past the worst of her many challenges."

"Counselors, let's get off this merry-go-round and try to make some progress. The fact remains that eleven years is a very long time to be an absentee father. Why now?"

"Love, your honor. He loves Sage. He still loves Savannah, too, although he understands reconciliation with her may be out of the question."

"You're goddamn right about that. You want hostility, you have it now."

Benedict slapped her desk. "While I understand your reaction, Mrs. Lomax, please control yourself."

"I was not hostile last Saturday. I don't deserve this."

Brenda took hold of her arm. "The scenario presented by Mr. Lomax stretches credulity to the breaking point, not to mention presenting this _pat_ story as a trump card. He comes back unannounced into his daughter's life last Saturday. They have what my client considered a brief and harmless but perhaps encouraging first meeting over a cup of coffee and sends him on his way with only a demand that he call ahead before he comes for any more visits. What does he do in response to this? He has a writ issued to Savannah on Monday and we're in your chambers the following Friday. His intentions are clear to us, your honor, and they appear to have been well planned and implemented."

Newcomb said, "Your honor, we understand Mrs. Lomax's intense scepticism, and Mr. Lomax regrets implying she was in any way hostile with him last Saturday. He did, however, sense a chill from her that transmitted to his daughter and led him to believe Mrs. Lomax would resist any efforts on his part to re-engage with them."

"God, this is so much bull—"

Brenda squeezed her arm.

Ryan said, "I do not want to cause Savannah or Sage undue emotional stress. But I love Sage. I want to be in her life again."

She jerked free of Brenda's grasp. "No! I don't care how much you contributed to Sage's care. You betrayed us for the second time with this. You stay away from us. I don't need you. Sage doesn't need you."

"That's enough, Mrs. Lomax. We'll take a ten minute recess. Ms. Hirsch, talk to your client."

Brenda took her straight back to that small room. "Savannah, you can't lose your temper like that."

"How should I lose it?" She kicked over the chair she had sat in before. "I loved him once. I thought I might still love him. He's just a snivelling weasel now."

"Judge Benedict probably has the same opinion of him, but California family law and Jean both support full access for both parents wherever possible. Ryan has been through counselling, he has a successful law practice in San Diego. He has a plausible story for abandoning you and Sage. There were forces in his life beyond his control. We can try to shoot holes in that story all day, but it is credible enough. He has never been violent. He has a record of paying what he could to support caring for Sage."

"I never asked him for anything."

"That only makes his voluntary contributions all that much more than just a begrudging donation he was forced to contribute." Brenda set the chair right and sat her down. "Judge Benedict is going to grant Ryan supervised visits. We can't stop that."

"What if Sage doesn't want them?"

"Her needs and wishes will carry weight when the final decision is made, but Benedict will give both her and Ryan a chance to reconnect before asking Sage what she wants. Jean will want Sage to learn the why and wherefore of her father's behavior before Sage makes any decision about further contact with him."

"Why did we even bother to come here? There was never any chance I could keep him out of our lives."

"Nothing is settled yet, Savannah, but you should prepare yourself. Ryan will be given an opportunity to reconnect."

They reconvened in Judge Benedict's chambers after the ten minute recess. They were finished twenty minutes later with a court order for three supervised visits between Ryan and Sage beginning with the first one tomorrow.

On the way out of the Civic Center Courthouse, Ryan came to them. "I am sorry."

"You can't have her. You can't."

"I will be there at ten o'clock." He didn't try to hug or kiss Sage before walking away.

Sage said, "Don't worry, mom. He is about to fall back into that big hole he was in, but he really does love us. We will need that love from him soon." She gave the courthouse a dismissive wave. "All done here. Time for ice cream."

# Chapter 44

Chase brought a man in with him when he finally returned. "I apologize for my absence, Senator, but I have just discovered something relevant to this hearing. This is Joseph Clarke. He is part of my team and he has new information on Sage Lomax's current activities."

Sutton tapped her gavel and said to Ann, "You can step down for now, Ms. Devonshire."

"Sit next to me," Joan said and turned the laptop toward Ann when she took Randi's chair.

Clarke replaced Ann in the witness chair.

"Please tell us who you are, Mr. Clarke."

"I am the leader of the computer operations team under Mr. Chase's command. We are in San Francisco attempting to find Sage Lomax as well as monitor anything she is doing in the digital domain."

"By digital, you mean computers."

"Anything electrical: computers; communications networks, including cell phones and towers; satellites; power lines; anything connected to accessible grids or transmitted wirelessly."

"What new information do you have?"

"You are aware of some of Sage's capabilities and you are aware of the artificial intelligence known as Muta and her boyfriend."

Nyla said, "What boyfriend?"

"He has similar capabilities to Sage. He can also enter the cyber-world of computers. The three of them have been working together since before her final procedure."

"Who is the boy?"

"We can't identify him. Muta creates too much interference every time we get close."

Sutton asked, "And what are they up to now?"

"They found a way into a number of government departments and harvested the biometric data used for security: retina scans, fingerprints, facial recognition."

Nyla asked, "Have they accessed anything yet?"

"We have tracked some of their packaging and transferring of the data. Some of it has been offered to the Creators Almighty via their interface with Muta."

"Are they likely to use it in an attack?"

"We can't be sure, Senator, but those people are more mischievous than terrorists. They would certainly use sensitive information to embarrass the government or anyone they see as an enemy, but they have shown no indication in the past to be much more than a nuisance."

"Can we stop those three?"

"At the moment, we cannot. Sage can go through anything. She is the smart virus everyone believes is impossible to create, elegant, adaptive and blunt at the same time. She has a smorgasbord of data available to her and two other digital accomplices in there dining with her. It is only a matter of what she decides to consume first."

Chase said, "She is the fox loose in our virtual henhouse."

"Lurid metaphors from the both of you," Nyla said, "but she hasn't done anything yet."

"She has stolen biometric records and programs. Military facilities are not vulnerable, nor are our most sensitive secret service databases, but she can access anything that is connected in any way to the internet or broadcast wirelessly even within a secured signal." He shook his head. "There is little that is truly safe from her and those other two. Working together, they are capable of launching incredibly rapid brute force attacks that we would never see coming. All of that potential for mayhem makes her the greatest cyber-terrorist threat we have ever faced. And she is angry at all of us."

Sutton said, "From what we've heard here, she has a right to be angry at the whole world." She asked Clarke, "What do you think an angry girl with all that ability will do?"

Ann said, "She will defend herself and her mother, but she only wants to be left alone. She has other priorities at the moment."

"What other—"

"We can't leave her alone," Chase said. "She is too powerful and too unpredictable. Let's not forget why we are here in the first place. There were a number of deaths associated with her capture by Novus Somnia people a week ago."

Nyla countered with, "Don't forget, none of our agents were injured."

"One is missing."

Ann nudged her just as every other member of the committee jerked back as one organism. They were all looking at the same thing on their laptop screens that Ann was pointing to on hers.

Sage's blue face had just appeared on every screen. She was bald. She was angry. Her three ridges cascaded with pulses of bright colors from front to back that resembled a display by cuttlefish.

"In four minutes," Sage said, "I will shut down everything everywhere."

A clock appeared at the bottom of the screen and started counting down.

Ann said, "Sweetie, it's me. You don't have to do this. You're free now."

"You don't know what I know."

"What do you know?"

"I know all about Tubby and Harvey. I know all about Virginia and India and Puerto Rico and Mexico. There are others like me. Harvey made lots of others like me. Didn't he, Tubby?"

The clock clicked over to three minutes left.

Joan asked, "What do you want, Sage?"

"Leave us alone. Let me do what I have to do."

"Sweetie, no one here wants to hurt you. These people aren't like the ones at Novus Somnia."

Cynthia and Nyla shook their heads at their screens.

"Can she see us?"

Clarke said, "You should assume she can."

She shook her head. "We just need to know what happened at Novus Somnia. People died. An agent is missing. Because of that, a number of people are concerned about your capabilities and what you might do with them. They are worried you could be a threat."

Ann said, "You don't want to hurt anyone, do you, sweetheart?"

"Mom says I should tell you no. But I will hurt anyone who tries to hurt us."

Chase and Clarke were headed for the door.

Sage said, "Harvey is not dead."

Chase and Clarke stopped.

He said, "He is at the bottom of a lake in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia."

"That's what you think."

Chase shook his head. He didn't believe her, or he didn't want to believe her. Harvey Weinberg caused more fear in Tubby Chase than this extraordinary girl did.

Ann had noticed the time remaining. "Sage, please do not shut anything down. You could harm innocent people. You could accidently harm people who helped you."

Sage tilted her head away.

"I think Savannah is talking to her."

"I know you are after the Proteus Group. They were at Novus Somnia. They were the ones who came after me. But Tubby did, too."

Nyla put her face close to her screen. "Sage, can you see and hear me?"

"I see and hear all of you. Why have Tubby and that man left the room?"

"I don't know. I didn't see them leave. We were all looking at you."

"Fifty-five seconds," Cynthia said.

"Do you know who the Proteus Group is?"

"Harvey works for them sometimes." She tapped her temple. "And I know three other people who work with them. Two of them work in Washington, one of them works at the government research center in Virginia."

"Sage, there is only twenty seconds left. Please don't do anything. We can help you. You can help us stop the Proteus Group."

"Too late for that: Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one."

The clock reached zero and vanished. Sage's ridges were flashing as brilliantly as any gaudy neon sign in Las Vegas. The lights went off but their laptops stayed on.

"Gotcha."

Senator Sutton put a hand over her heart.

"Thank you, honey," Ann said.

Nyla asked, "Who are those three people, Sage? What did Chase have to do with the incident at Novus Somnia?"

"We have to go. He's coming now with his toy planes and his trained monkeys."

The laptops went dark. The lights came back on.

Senator Claudette Sutton banged her gavel hard. "Tim is doing what he has to in the face of a possible terrorist threat. I see no point to continuing this premature review; therefore, I officially adjourn the Senate Review Committee's hearing into the Novus Somnia incident. But I reserve the right to reconvene it once all this rigmarole is settled."

Claudette, Nyla and Cynthia came to her and Ann.

Claudette said, "Well, ladies, now that I have discharged our responsibility to the committee, what can we do to help?"

Ann said, "I can take you to them. But first, you need to know what happened at Novus Somnia."

# Chapter 45

Ann said, "I'm sorry, Savannah, but I have to go. Will you and Sage be all right?"

"We're going to Westfield for Pralines and cream," Sage said. "He won't ruin our day."

Savannah shivered. Sage had just recited word for word what she was thinking. "I promised we could have some Häagen Dazs after we were done with the lawyers."

"Mom always has coffee."

"Call me when you get home." Ann gave each of them a kiss on the cheek to go with a tight hug. "Don't forget. You've come this far together."

"We've come this far together," Sage said. "Still some distance to go, though."

She drove along Market Street to Fifth Street, turned there to get to Mission Street and parked in the Fifth and Mission Parking Garage across from the mall. They entered through Bloomingdales and proceeded to the food court on Level LC with Sage providing continuous instructions on how to get there as she always did.

"We took seven steps less today. It isn't a record, we needed to do twelve less to break that, but I'd say we did quite well."

"We should have put on the suit for you."

"I'll get it later."

This treat was supposed to be for their mutual benefit, but Ann should be here with them. Ann had been the de facto second parent in Sage's life. No matter what happened with Ryan's visitation rights, she had to make sure Ann didn't get squeezed out of her daughter's life . . . out of their lives.

She left Sage looking in through the front window of Claire's Boutique at the rings and delicate, bejewelled watches on display while she went to the Häagen Dazs store across from it. When she came out with one order of Coffee and one of Pralines and cream, Sage was standing next to a young man sitting on a bench tapping away at his tablet.

"You don't need to cheat," Sage said to him. "You just need to find the discipline to concentrate and put in the effort."

"Tell me something I don't know." A UC-Berkley backpack lay on the bench beside him.

"You are brilliant, but it does you no good to be smarter than Einstein if you are lazier than the dead."

The man stopped what he was doing and looked up at Sage.

Savannah rushed over. "Here's your ice cream, sweetheart. Don't bother the man. He has a lot of work to do."

Sage took her serving and scooped a spoonful of ice cream into her mouth. "You will discover an effective treatment for a number of autoimmune diseases. Thirty high schools, forty primary schools and a disease you prove was being constantly misdiagnosed will be named after you. You will win the Nobel Prize. Sixteen statues of you will be built, one at your alma mater." She scooped up another spoonful of ice cream. "You lose out on getting your name on the science chair, though. I want Uncle Jake to get that, but he won't either."

The man shot Savannah an expression of bewilderment, amusement and irritation that had become all too familiar.

"Your three children, two sons and a daughter, who you will dote over because you love little girls, will grow up to hate you, but realize their mistake and love you again before you die."

"Thanks a lot, kid." He asked Savannah, "Is she ever right?"

She took a spoonful of coffee ice cream. "That is up to you."

He laughed and went back to his work.

She took Sage to her favorite sitting spot. "Sage, you can't keep doing that with people."

"He needed to know that. He needed a little shove."

She glanced at the man, who looked at them at the same time, smiled, nodded and went back to his work.

Sage finished her Pralines and cream. "He will do just fine now."

She finished her coffee and said, "Washroom time."

When she came out of the cubicle, Sage had already left the washroom. "Damn." She rinsed her hands and rushed out to see if Sage had returned to the man.

He was gone.

A couple in their late teens were looking through the same window of Claire's Boutique that Sage had been looking through. It was the one she always had to stop to look through. Sage was approaching them from behind.

"Oh, God."

Westfield was busy this Friday morning. A shifting labyrinth of moving people forced her to take a circuitous route to catch up to Sage. In the past, losing sight of her mother while out in public induced epic panic attacks in Sage. Her mother now knew how that must have felt. By the time she reached her daughter, the teenagers were engrossed by Sage's prophecies.

Sage said to the redheaded girl, "You will have close to thirty years together. Early on, when money is tight because you are a spendthrift, he will lose his temper twice and strike you once, but he will never forgive himself for that, so you will stay with him."

The couple looked at each other and made faces.

"You think you are going to be a medical laboratory technician or maybe a pharmacist, but you will eventually own a chain of shops in California that sell only organically grown and environmentally safe native flowers. There will be no invasive plant species in your store. One shop will go right over there."

Another glance of amusement passed between the couple.

The girls asked, "How did you know I like flowers?"

Savannah wiped her damp hands on her pants and tried to step forward to pull Sage away, but she couldn't move. She couldn't tell if Sage was stopping her or if she just needed to know what the next prediction would be.

She could still talk. "Sage, sweetheart, you shouldn't say things like that to people, especially strangers like this lovely couple. They don't know you." She said to the couple, "I am sorry. She can't help herself."

"It's quite all right," the boy said. "Let her go with it."

She cringed, but still couldn't get any closer to stopping Sage. "We need to get home for lunch, Sage."

"But he is the wrong color for her, mom. He will be a loser his whole life because he just keeps dreaming it away with 'what ifs'. And he will blame everyone else but himself when those dreams do not come true. He is capable of doing good things, maybe even great things, but he won't face what he has to face. He will make all kinds of excuses and present them as plausible and sincere explanations of his own psychological limitations, but he is just ineffectual, that's all there is to that."

Sage barely looked at the boy, keeping her gaze fixed on the girl. Were they as unable to move as she was? The throng of people going every which way on Level LC never seemed to come near them.

"He will fail at everything he does. He will hold four jobs in his life, lasting only ten years at the longest one. He will cheat on you three times, once with your older sister, June, three weeks before you marry because he is fascinated with her bazoombas, which will force her to move to London, the one in Ontario, Canada, not the original."

Sage smiled at the girl. "But don't worry. You will make more than enough money for the both of you. And because you will have no children that will be a lot of money in the end."

"Sage, please stop this nonsense."

Her voice snapped the girl out of her trance, but when she tried to take a step away, Sage took a firm hold of her arm.

"He will drive his fancy car that you bought for him into the pillar of a freeway overpass to kill himself. But he will have a huge life insurance policy because you both decide to insure him for the same amount as you even though he won't be worth one-fifth what you are, so you will get even more money. His last thought before he hits the pillar will be that he is finally worthy for you because he is worth more dead than alive."

The boy growled, "Let her go." He helped his girlfriend get free of Sage's grasp.

Tears ran down the girl's cheeks.

She could move again and took hold of Sage's hand. "I am so sorry. Please don't think she means any—"

"Let him go with it." Sage squeezed her hand.

For just a moment, Savannah's body tingled and became rigid.

The boy turned his crying girlfriend toward the escalator. "You have one weird kid, lady. She should be locked up somewhere."

The couple walked away.

Sage said after them, "Don't worry, I will be."

"Sage, I know you are upset about going to court and the supervised visit tomorrow, but you can't say stuff like that to people."

"I have to tell the truth no matter what. You always say so."

"It might be better to keep some things you believe to be true about other people to yourself, especially if they haven't happened yet."

"Okay. My feet hurt. If we had broken the record, they would hurt even more."

She started them back to Sage's favorite sitting spot, but stopped when she saw through the increasing crowd two men sitting there. The last time Sage hadn't been able to sit at her favorite spot because mom wouldn't tell the people to move, she got very upset. Sage's behavior was regressing. A third mortifying scene with more strangers was all but certain if they continued that way.

"You know what? My feet hurt, too, and I'm tired. Let's go home."

Sage was staring at the two men at her spot. "Yes, we should go now."

_Thank heaven for little miracles_. She let out her breath and wiped a bit of ice cream from Sage's cheek.

Sage pointed to her spot. "Because mystery men on my bench are following us and were watching me talk to the boy and girl. They're going to lock me up somewhere. Going to lock me up for a long time and stick needles into me, and when they're finished doing that, they are going to send me to a jail on an island just for children like me. They built it a long time ago because Harvey wanted it. And those other ones, well, they just want to cut me into itty-bitty pieces because the plan has changed and they have their new orders from Harvey." She smiled at her mom. "Danger, Will Robinson, danger." She waved her arms about like the robot on that old show. "The Apostles think I am a false prophet, and you know what happens to them."

She looked at the two men, who both turned to look their way and got up.

"One of them hates me. He's afraid of me. He thinks I will kill him. He's looking for any excuse to pull the trigger. Better to ask for forgiveness than permission, he's thinking."

They went up the escalator near Café Bellini to Level One.

The men followed them up. There were too many other people on the escalator to determine beyond doubt if those two really were after them.

She took them up the next escalator and led Sage to the washrooms by the 49ers team store. After first making sure they were alone, she quietly asked, "Why would you think those men are after you?"

Sage whispered back, "Because they are."

"Who are they? And why would they be after you?"

She pointed to the top of her head. "I have something in here that shouldn't be there. It came from them and they want it back."

"Are they from Novus Somnia?"

"No, they're from Washington. Tubby sent them."

"Who is Tubby?"

Sage smiled. "You'll see."

The two men were standing near the top of the escalator when she and Sage came out of the washroom.

"You need to buy something in there right now." Sage pointed to the 49ers store.

She took Sage into the store and sent her off to find something at the back of it. She then concealed herself as best she could between the racks of team clothing and peeked out into the mall.

One of the men was just entering the Microsoft store while the other man walked over to the hallway leading to the washrooms and stopped. He made no attempt to conceal his actions; he looked straight at the team store. And why shouldn't he? He was probably just waiting for his partner to rejoin him before they came in. He was probably a fan of the team.

Her daughter was turning coincidence into something sinister because she was upset. It would have been better to just go straight home after the hearing.

Sage brought over a black sweatshirt with the team's logo on the front. "Buy this. I will take care of those two."

"What do you mean you will take care of them?"

Sage kissed her. "Mom, you can't keep denying what is right in front of you. I am special or those two men wouldn't be here. It is not just coincidence. I am your great big miracle. Ann knows it and so do they. Why don't you?"

"I do, sweetheart, I do." She took the sweatshirt from Sage. "Don't hurt them."

"I don't have to."

As the clerk rang up the purchase and offered her the card reader, she took a quick look out through the entrance.

The man near the washrooms was still watching the store. Sage was near the entrance watching the man. When she waved at him, he didn't respond in any way at first. When two men came out of the washroom, he grabbed hold of the lead one and punched him. The fight was on. The man's partner came running out of the Microsoft store to help. Three other men quickly joined the fight. A crowd gathered around the men as mall security personnel came running straight into the middle of the melee.

"Thank you. Have great day." The clerk handed over the bag containing the sweatshirt and headed for the front of the store to watch the fight.

His two colleagues joined him.

Her daughter took her by the hand. "We have to take one hundred and ninety-six steps as quickly as we can, but we should not run. I might fall if we run." Sage led her into Bloomingdales, down one floor to ground level, out of the store and across Mission Street to the parking garage.

All the way home, Savannah kept watching for vehicles following them. Three vans at first appeared to be, but one after another they eventually turned onto other streets.

"Are we being followed?"

"They don't have to. They know where I live. They will come for me." Sage looked at her. "But I don't want to go with any of them. I want to stay with you."

She checked the rear view mirror before turning right. "No one is going to take you away from me."

# Chapter 46

Ramona Gilbert was waiting on the front porch when she and Sage arrived home. "Hi," she said. "How did it . . . ?"

She rushed past Gilbert as fast as she could with her daughter in tow through the front door and straight into the living room, set Sage on the sofa and went to the front window to see if any vehicles had turned onto Highland Avenue behind them.

Ramona closed the front door on her way in. "I came to find out how it went at the courthouse."

She closed the venetian blinds. "No, that is wrong. I won't see them coming if I do that." She opened them again and then raised them out of the way.

Sage rocked on the sofa. "You won't see them coming if you do that."

"Savannah, what's wrong? You're trembling."

She took a step toward Sage, who had turned on the PlayStation and the television. "Sweetheart, are you all right?"

Ramona took hold of her hand. "Savannah, what happened?"

The unbelievable story came out of her in sporadic, incoherent fragments as she returned to the window to look out on Highland Avenue. Ramona had to listen to something shrill about the court-ordered supervised visits for Ryan, predicting brilliant and horrible futures for people, eating ice cream, two suspicious men, a fight, a black 49ers sweatshirt and three vehicles following them that weren't really following them.

Ramona patiently waited for her to finish and take deep a breath. "Freaky day."

Vivaldi's _Four_ _Seasons_ was coming out of the television speakers. Sage was watching the display that went with it.

She flopped down beside her daughter. "This is all too fantastic. I'm letting my imagination run wild. Family law has done to me what science and technology couldn't." She nodded. "Yeah, that's it. I've finally snapped."

Sage snapped her fingers. "Yeah, that's it."

"Not necessarily," Ramona said and went to the front window. "See that van out there?"

Savannah came back to the window. Sage followed and stood just behind her to look out.

A white, Ford Econoline van was parked directly across the street from her house. The name on it was Chips'n'Dust Pruning and Landscaping.

"So?"

"It's been parked on the street every day for the past three days."

"Ramona, I've just come out of a psychotic episode. I'm not in the mood for any sinister neighborhood gardening mysteries."

Sage said, "No need for sneaky weeds indeed."

"Do you see any signs of trees or bushes having been pruned or cut down? Do you see any neighbors having any landscaping done in their yards?"

After leaning forward and craning her neck to see as far as she could in each direction along Highland Avenue, she began to laugh hard, which led to a bout of coughing. "I'm sorry, Ramona. I didn't mean to give you a fright, too. I'm just angry, tired and now delusional as well."

"Finally snapped; only occipital delusions for all of us now."

"Let me make a few calls and see if I can find out who in this neighborhood hired them. Once I find out, then we can have a good laugh." She smiled at Sage. "You both look tired. Why don't you go upstairs and relax for a bit? I will let you know what I find out."

She sighed. "It's nothing, but you are right about us being tired."

"My feet hurt," Sage said and scowled at Ramona. "Freaky day."

Sage's bedroom window provided a better view of Highland Avenue. After getting Sage seated on her bed, Savannah took a peek out. She still couldn't find any signs of recent pruning or landscaping in the neighborhood. On the way back to the partially open door, Sage smiled and waved at her but otherwise exhibited no signs of distress.

Sage's calmness was the best evidence that all of this was just the stress of the hearing and Sage's disturbing prophecies affecting her. Of all the aspects of her life with Sage, her daughter's lack of a contextual connection to some of the events she experienced was still one of the most difficult to cope with. Sage could be hysterical over the slightest thing one moment—like a dead thread—and then, like a switch had flipped off, the event would suddenly no longer carry the emotional intensity it had only moments earlier.

Sage's distress over the upcoming supervised visits could have just manifested itself in those embarrassing displays of fortune telling and then as a concern about being followed by two innocent men who happened to be sitting on her favorite bench. Now that they were home, she was the one upset and Sage had already forgotten all about the brouhaha at Westfield.

But Sage had said they were after her, two different groups were after her. And that fight happened right after Sage waved at one of those men.

At the bedroom door, she stopped to listen when she heard Ramona talking.

". . . all right . . . good . . . not a problem . . . no, Devonshire isn't with them . . . take care of it . . . time do we have . . . yes, I'll do that, too."

A hot flush spread across her face as the idea occurred to her that Ryan could have been having her followed to get something he could use against her. Or else he was concerned she might take Sage and run. Ryan never could stop thinking like a lawyer.

"Bastard," she muttered with her face turned away from Sage. "You're not putting us through this." She reached into her jacket to take out her cell phone but stopped before making the call. Sage still had on her outer clothes, too. "Sorry, sweetheart. We didn't take off our jackets like we're supposed to when we came in."

Sage said, "We're not staying long."

She called the number Ryan had given her last Saturday and flushed again when she remember how what she had thought was a good first attempt at reconnecting had turned so horrible so quickly for them.

He answered on the second ring, "Hello."

"Why are you having us followed?"

"What are you talking about?"

Again she turned away from Sage and lowered her voice. "You don't want me skipping town with her. You've put a tail on me . . . on us."

"No, I haven't. Savannah, what I said in chambers is the truth. I only want to be part of my daughter's life again. I was wrong. I—"

"Shut-up! Just shut-up!" She returned to the window. A glance at Sage revealed her daughter scowling and shaking her head about something. Outside, there was no way to know if the Chips'n'Dust van or any other vehicle on Highland Avenue contained men intent on snatching away her daughter.

Sage began playing with the draw string of the hood on her jacket.

_She had said they were after her because she had something in her head that shouldn't be there and they wanted it back_. "Shit."

"Savannah, what are you trying to tell me? What happened?"

"Nothing, I guess. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have called you. I really shouldn't have."

Sage got off the bed, came to her, took hold of her hand and leaned against her.

"I'm glad you called. I know it seems weird after this morning, but you can call me anytime, you or Sage. I want to be there for both of you. I know I can't make up for my failure, but I want to do whatever I can for you now."

"That—"

Sage tugged hard on her arm. "We better go. They're here." She pointed out the window.

"I don't expect you to forgive me, but—"

"She says they're here."

"Sage? Who's there?"

Two men in stained, dingy white overalls got out of the Chips'n'Dust van. Two more men dressed in the same outfits climbed out of the back of the van. All four men then started retrieving their tools from the vehicle.

"Oh, God." She stepped back, but Sage grabbed her.

"No, mom, watch."

Ryan asked, "What is it?"

"They're here, four men in a van. They're here like Sage said they would be."

"Tell me what's happening."

Sage began tugging hard on her arm again. "I don't want to go with them."

"What do I do? What do I do?"

"Can you still see them?"

She peeked out the window. The four men were shoving what could be tools or weapons into the pockets of their overalls. "Yes."

"What are they doing?"

"Getting their tools, I think." She looked out again. "Oh, God." The four men were checking their earpieces as they crossed the street. "She's right. They've come for her."

"Who has come for her, Savannah? Think about what you're saying. Who would come for Sage and why would they?"

"How the fuck should I know? But I'm not staying here to find out."

"Get out of there and meet me at Bernal Heights Park as soon as you can. I can get you to a safe place. Call me once you're on the way." He ended the call.

She started to dial 911.

Sage stopped her. "They wouldn't get here in time. We would be all gone." Sage pulled her to the door to peek out.

Ramona was at the bottom of the stairs with her phone still to her ear. She was talking quietly to avoid being heard. She took hold of the banister the moment the call ended and placed an earpiece in her other ear.

Sage said quietly, sadly, "She's one of Tubby's people. I knew it but I didn't want to believe it. I knew it. Go to the attic. The attic will tell you lots. The attic will set us free."

The four men entered the house and joined Gilbert at the bottom of the stairs.

When she started up, Gilbert called to her, "It's all right, Savannah. We're here to help you and Sage against the ones who do want her."

Sage whispered, "Some truth there, but she's mostly lying."

"You bitch. I trusted you."

She grabbed Sage and ran to the attic door in the ceiling near the master bedroom. Sage tripped and began to fall, but put a hand against the wall to keep her feet.

Gilbert and the four men did not rush them.

"Savannah, just listen to me, please. We are DHS agents. We're from Washington. My boss is Tim Chase. I was a plant at Novus Somnia because we suspected a group of criminals had infiltrated there. They are out to destroy our country. Tim alerted me this morning of their intention to snatch Sage from you. We had people following you."

"Mostly true," Sage said, "but still a lot of lying. Tubby makes her lie all the time even though she doesn't want to lie to us."

Using the hooked handle resting beside her bedroom door, she pulled open the door to the attic and then pulled down the ladder.

"You're lying," she screamed at them before pushing Sage up the ladder. Sage felt lighter than expected and didn't have any difficulty getting into the attic. Ann would insist getting her up the ladder had been another miracle. She scampered up after her, closed the door and bolted it.

"My feet hurt." Without the suit on, she would seize up if she tried to move too quickly.

Who were the other people after Sage? If Gilbert was even partially truthful and they were from DHS, it might be better to find out why she was really here.

"That would do us no good at all," Sage said. "They will come through that door very soon." She pointed all around the attic. "See?"

Electrical and optical cables were strewn everywhere throughout the attic, snaking down into walls, along joists, creeping up to exit through the roof. Their house hadn't just been wired for Sage to communicate with MasterFile.

"How long?"

"Since they learned what Harvey did to me in my dish."

"Harvey? What dish, sweetheart?"

"The dish I was in before I was put inside you."

"Jesus." Her stomach pinched and heaved. "Why?"

"Because you wanted me, mom. Dad is only partly my dad. He couldn't be my whole dad because he didn't have enough daddy bits inside him. So Harvey found bits of other daddy's—not all of them human—and used bits of them as well. It was all part of the deal."

The men with Gilbert were attempting to pry open the door. They were not trying to smash through it.

Gilbert called to her, "Savannah, you and Sage are in great danger, but not from us. They will do anything to get her. We can protect you. We have people who can help Sage develop her abilities. She knows who they are."

"Lucy is nice, but the others are scaredy-cats. They don't like me, except for Gwen. Gwen and Lucy want to help me because you get more with honey than with vinegar, but not the others."

The bolt on the hatch would give at any moment.

Sage calmly walked over to the skylight Ryan had put in before she was born. It was his doorway to the stars. "We should go now."

"No stars," she muttered back.

"They're there, mom. You just can't see them until it gets dark." She opened the skylight to the roof. "But I can."

She helped Sage up onto the roof, but once she closed and latched the door, that was the end of her escape plan. She had left Sage's cane behind, too. How could they . . . ?

"Why suggest the attic, dear? There is nowhere to go from here."

"Nowhere to go but up and down," Sage replied, wrapped her arms around Savannah and hugged her as tight as she could.

Her lungs emptied completely with one hard exhalation that left her dizzy. A charge went through her—them—from toe to head. Her teeth chattered and her hair rose as the charge passed up through them. This wasn't just some static discharge passing between them. It was a controlled current. She hugged Sage back and looked down to see they were floating over the house and rotating slowly.

Two of the men climbed out onto the roof but hesitated when they saw their quarry floating away from them

Risking another look down, she saw the van below them with its rear doors still open.

In a singsong voice, Sage said, "Float like a leaf, float like a leaf all the way to the ground."

They continued to rotate slowly and began to descend. The two men on the roof came to its edge as they landed softly on the front lawn.

"No keys," she said. "I dropped them on the table on the way in."

Sage let go of her, giggled and took out the keys. She then walked to the CRV and touched it. The engine started and the two front doors unlocked.

The two men on the roof remained where they were just watching. One of them had taken out his phone to record Sage's demonstration.

"What about the van?"

"Stop the van, stop the man. Stop the van, stop the man."

As Gilbert and the other two men came out the front door, the van began to smoke from under its hood and inside at the front.

"Time to get going, mom," Sage grabbed her by the hand and hustled her into the CRV.

After backing out of the driveway, she took a quick look in the rear view mirror at the van. The hood blew off in the explosion. Black smoke and flames quickly filled the inside of the van. The four wheels exploded and flattened.

When they passed the house, the two men on the roof, Gilbert and the two men with her all grimaced in pain and yanked out their earpieces.

Sage waggled a finger at them. "Naughty, naughty boys and girls."

Savannah pressed the gas pedal to the floor.

# Chapter 47

The van was taken care of, but Ramona had her own car.

As Savannah turned left onto Andover Street, Sage said, "The engine control module is fried."

"Did you just do that?"

"I did it before we entered the house."

"This is impossible."

" _Mom_ , you have to stop saying that. I'm going to start taking it personally."

She checked to see if any other vehicle had turned onto Andover from Highland. None had. Slow, deep breaths kept her from getting dizzy again as she reviewed what they had just been through and what Sage had done to aid their escape. Her daughter might very well be everything Ann ever claimed she would become. Sage might be a god.

"Don't get melodramatic just yet," she said to herself through another big breath.

"There is still plenty of time for that," Sage said.

"Who is this Timothy Chase Ramona works for?"

"Timothy Bartholomew Chase is the boss of some of the people who want to catch me."

She stopped at the intersection of Cortland Avenue before steering the CRV slightly to the left to cross the road and continue on Andover. "Some of the people, but not all of them?"

"Not all of them. Ramona was telling the truth about that. She's with the needles-and-jail-island people, not the cut-me-to-pieces people. Timothy Bartholomew Chase became T.B. Chase. The T.B. became Tubby when his equator got too big." Sage held out her hands to indicate how big Chase was. "But no one calls him that to his face unless they don't like him or are mad at him. If you do, he will pound you good."

Eugenia Avenue was clear. Savannah rolled through that stop. At Powhattan Avenue she turned right and then left at Anderson Street to Bernal Heights Boulevard, which circled Bernal Heights Park. Another left turn onto the boulevard took her to a parking area near the labyrinth at the southwest corner of the park.

Once they were out of the CRV, Sage asked, "Why do you trust him?"

She checked for Gilbert and the four men with her to race into the parking area after them, but they didn't. "Can we trust him?"

"We must do it this way or he won't be able to help you when you really need him." Sage led the way up the steep trail that would take them to the AT&T microwave tower at the peak of this piece of folded rock.

The tall grass on the sections of the slopes that weren't bare waved and bent in the constant breeze off the Pacific.

"Do you know where he is?"

Sage shook her head. "We have to go this way. He will find us."

Ryan Lomax was not Sage's father, not completely her father. Some man named Harvey had fiddled with Sage's DNA while she was still in vitro because he had some ulterior motive. But did he? Or did he just want to see what would happen? Sage had said some of the DNA inside her wasn't human. Did he do that just because he could?

They had been unable to conceive a child. She had been the one to insist they keep trying, but Ryan had been the one to contact Novus Somnia to arrange for them to use their fertility program. It had been a series of injections to be given and pills to be taken according to a mapped out schedule of her body's cycles.

"Shit."

Sage might not have been the only one this Harvey had fiddled about with. What else was in their drug Ovagamex? Was that the only drug they had given her?

Sage said, "He's up there near the top."

Ryan was standing on a rock outcropping. He was waving down at them.

She looked back to the parked vehicles. There was a black van and a Ford Explorer and other cars and trucks, but Gilbert and her unit weren't getting out of any of them.

If they had no other vehicles, they couldn't know she had come to this park. But weren't people like them supposed to have a mind-boggling list of resources at their fingertips? If they had tapped her cell phone, they would know Ryan had told her to meet him here. Or they could just use it as a GPS locator to find them. They could have attached a tracking device to the CRV.

Was there some helicopter in stealth mode above them keeping track of every move they made? Was a drone flying overhead transmitting video of their futile attempt to escape back to some other, bigger command center van? Had Tubby Chase aimed one of his special satellites at his special prize? Had he launched one just to keep watch on Sage?

Savannah looked straight up at the heavy clouds coming in from the Pacific Ocean and raised both of her middle fingers into the air.

"I know the feeling," a man coming down the trail said. He was holding hands with a woman. "It's been such a wonderful day. Now they have to come in and ruin it."

"They're not coming this way," the woman said. "It stays pretty dry here."

Sage started back down to her.

She smiled at the couple but didn't warn them to flee before her daughter started making prediction about their future.

"Have a great day anyway," the man said and the couple continued down the trail.

"Don't worry about them," Sage said. "They will be fine."

"That's a load off my mind."

"No one tapped your phone or put a tracker on the car because they knew I would find out and disable them. They wired the house before they realized I was this talented. I've been using it to watch them, too." Sage pointed to the man who wasn't her whole father. "We better hurry."

Bernal Heights Park was busy. A warm spring day had brought lots of people to it for a Friday afternoon hike up to the top. What could Gilbert and her people do amid a crowd like this? The DHS was here to protect the country and its citizens not make every witness to their kidnapping of her daughter disappear.

If Sage suddenly targeted someone and switched into her oracle mode, however, it would be impossible to get her away from here quickly. Maybe there were just too many people here to zero in on any particular person's future.

There was one new method they could use to make a quick escape. "Can you fly, sweetheart?"

"No, but I can float for a few minutes; longer if I'm wearing the suit. Jake made it that way especially for me."

"Can you float up to your father?"

"Mom, do you really want me to do that with all these people watching?"

"Sorry, my bad."

"Your bad, but it's all right. I had considered it. My feet still hurt and we left my suit and cane behind. But floating is better for coming down slowly than going up. It takes a lot more energy and control to go up. And it's too windy here. I might just drift away like an escaped balloon if I tried."

"How's your back?"

"That is the least of our worries at the moment."

She looked southwest and spotted Holly Park. Their life had been over there since Sage's birth. Holly Park was Sage's favorite place. Small Wonders House and the Novus Somnia research facility were nestled amid new developments near the old Candlestick Park site. She and Ryan used to come here frequently to jog and hike, but she couldn't remember ever bringing Sage here.

The trail was a challenge. By the time they reached the top and Ryan came jogging over to them, she was sweating and short of breath. The incongruous thought occurred to her that she needed to get back into her fitness program. She was still too young to feel this way from a bit of exertion.

Sage had tightened up. She was limping and becoming unsteady on her feet.

Ryan stopped before reaching them.

"He's having second thoughts," Sage said.

"About helping us?"

"About helping them. He wasn't supposed to give me to them until tomorrow, but plans changed when Ramona and Tubby stuck their noses in where they don't belong."

A man and woman who had been sitting on a bench near where Ryan had stood to wave at them got up together and came toward them. The woman carried what looked like a black medical bag.

"Lots of needles in there," Sage said. "He loves us, but he owes them so much and they won't take no for an answer . . . _ever_. And they're everywhere."

Ryan suddenly sprinted to them. "We have to go."

"What is going on? You said you would take us somewhere safe."

"I'm supposed to hand you and Sage over to them." He nodded toward the couple, who seemed uncertain about what to do now that Ryan had come to them.

"Why? Who are they?"

"They are part of group that's spread all over the world. They have incredible power."

"Not like mine." Sage turned and pointed.

Two men were coming up along the same trail they had used. They didn't appear to be confused or have any hesitation in their strides. One held a handgun at his side.

"They wield political and economic power everywhere. Savannah, we are very, very small and inconsequential to them. That's how they operate. They pick people and make deals with them. They give them everything they believe they need. They create children like Sage because you so desperately wanted a child of your own and I couldn't give you one. And they demand the impossible from you in payment."

The two men stopped about fifty feet from them. They were taking their cues from the man and woman.

"I don't understand any of this."

"It wasn't you, it was me. When Novus Somnia tested us, it was me who failed, not you."

"I told you so," Sage said, "not enough daddy bits, not the right ones, anyway."

The man and woman were still standing off. The woman signalled the two men to stay where they were.

"A man there—"

"Harvey."

"Yes, Dr. Harvey Weinberg convinced me he could give us a child. We made a deal that required me to keep up the charade that you were the one who had the problem. Then they told me to leave. That dangerous trial was real, but it was also a cover story to get me away. Those people had it moved to Los Angeles."

"What do they want?"

"They want me," Sage said. "They want to cut me into itty-bitty little bits and grow more like me. It's what they believe they need."

"What's their goal?"

"I don't know, but most of us won't be around at the end to see it if they have their way." He took hold of her shoulders. "Demons have come into our lives, Savannah, and I let them in."

Sage smiled at the two of them. "You can get melodramatic now if you want to."

"Honey, float away; I don't care who sees you."

"I won't leave you."

"They don't want me."

"Yes they do, mom. You have two more of me inside you and Harvey wants them back. He will be very angry if they fail. They don't want to make Harvey angry. And I can't rise up with any speed here because there isn't enough energy available even with the microwave tower. No suit, remember? They would just shoot me out of the sky and I'd go boom, splat. But there is something I can do. It's going to freak you out, mom, but I think you will agree that it's appropriate given the context of the situation."

The woman opened the bag and took out a needle. Before the man beside her noticed what she was doing, she jabbed it into his neck. He was able to duck away and take a few steps before dropping to the ground with the needle still in his neck.

"Jesus." Ryan dropped to his knees. "Sage, I am so sorry."

"I know. You only wanted to be part of my life. But that's exactly what caused the problem in the first place."

Savannah tried to reach for Sage but she was once again as unable to move as she had been at Westfield.

The two men started running for them. They both had handguns out now.

Other people had noticed the fallen man. Some were coming closer, some were recording what was happening on their phones and others appeared to be calling for help.

Sage's ears glowed sapphire blue. The ridges under her hair pulsed with the same color, as did the exposed sensor scales on her hands and temples. Veins of blue glowed beneath her skin.

The woman jerked forward as if someone was pushing her from behind. The fear on her face was the confirmation Savannah's mind needed. Sage was doing all this. The woman realized their hesitation had led to failure. She was going to pay a horrible price for that.

Sage was transmitting all this to her. This was what Liz Bergeron had experienced.

She opened her mouth but no words came out. The harder she tried to say something, the harder it was to breathe.

The woman staggered forward like a puppet controlled by a drunken puppeteer.

People had reached the fallen man. Most of them backed away as soon as they spotted the needle protruding from his neck.

A woman screamed.

The woman stopped coming closer and dropped the black bag. Her mouth was opening and closing but no words came out of her either.

"All demons must die," Sage said with a cold detachment Savannah had never heard in her daughter's voice before.

The woman reached up for her head. One hand went to the top and the other took hold under her chin. With one violent twist and push, she broke her own neck and fell to the ground.

A child screamed.

Sage turned to face the two armed men and put her hand on Ryan's head.

Savannah was allowed to turn just enough to witness what was going to happen to them.

"Please," Ryan pleaded.

"Be quiet."

Someone in the crowd hollered, "Look out."

"Behind you, Sage," Ryan shouted.

At the edge of her vision, she could see dark blurs dropping to the ground. Other blurs were fleeing down the trails or through the windswept grass or along the bare patches of land.

Sage grunted and dropped.

The moment she did, Savannah could move again, but before she could get to Sage, hands grabbed her from behind.

Sage was shaking and jerking on the ground. Stun gun tags were stuck to her. The wires from them led up to the microwave tower at the top of the park.

Two men carrying plastic rifles came running downhill from the trees near the tower. They ignored the fallen man and woman and came straight for Sage, following the retracting wires to their target.

She struggled against the strong hands holding her. "Let me go, fuckers. She needs me."

Sage's eyes fluttered but she no longer moved and she did not glow.

Ryan tried to crawl over to Sage, but one of the plastic rifle crew clubbed him on the head.

The hollering and screaming was receding as everyone fled.

She had failed her daughter. Gilbert had warned her of these people and had offered protection from them. She should have trusted an agent of the government. She should have trusted Ramona no matter how betrayed she felt. It was the last thought she had before the stab to the back of her neck sent her down into darkness beside Ryan.

# Chapter 48

The back of her neck was stiff and hot when she regained consciousness and reached for the tingling puncture wound. The fluorescent glare in the room stung her dry, itchy eyes.

"We gave you a sedative," Humboldt said from somewhere to her right.

Only when she tried to turn that way did her mind register that she was lying on a stainless steel table. She sat up. Her legs dangled over the edge, numb and tingling and likely incapable of supporting her if she tried to get to the floor.

Humboldt stepped forward, tilted her head and put drops in her eyes before stepping back. "Unfortunately, one of the side effects can be dry, itchy eyes."

Felix Humboldt, Seymour Lanyon and the two men from the park who hadn't had plastic rifles were in the Novus Somnia laboratory with her.

Humboldt was holding a gun in his hand but it wasn't a normal gun. Its design was similar but it was sleeker and it was almost the same blue color as Sage's glow.

"Where is she?" Raising her head made the back of her neck spasm. Hot, sharp barbs shot along her scalp and converged at her eyes. She smelled acetone.

Humboldt said, "Believe me, Savannah, when I tell you I had argued for a subtler and cleaner approach to getting what we wanted, one that would have minimized any injury and unnecessary fright."

She squeezed her eyes shut. "Where is Sage?"

"Indeed, Seymour and I were only going to delete the program on the array and start over, but then the plan changed." He stepped back to stand beside Lanyon.

When she put her hand down to support herself, it slipped back and struck something soft and warm. Ryan was on the same table beside her. His face was relaxed and still as death.

Humboldt said, "There is a mild paralytic contained in the sedative. It relaxes all the muscles and gives that death-like stillness. Harvey Weinberg created that from his work with jellyfish toxin. Novus Somnia developed it further and weaponized it this past year into a spray that can be used by police and military to disable enemy combatants."

"What have you done to my daughter?"

"I can understand, Mrs. Lomax," Lanyon said, "that she would be your primary concern. That's healthy. But you do not have to keep asking. We know what you want."

Humboldt held up the gun. "Novus Somnia invented this, too. That is to say it invented the three-D printer that can make it. We also made those electric rifles that put Sage down. We had to modify them specifically for her. We needed to disable her but not damage anything inside. It was a tricky business to come up with something that would achieve both of those competing goals.

"But you see, Savannah, the situation with this gun is very much like your situation with Novus Somnia." He held the gun up to look at it. "This thing was simply the by-product of other research into printing plastic devices and models. The Ovagamex you took was a by-product of research into DNA editing, and the genetics of brain development and function."

Lanyon said, "Actually, for all we know, Weinberg may have intended exactly that adjacent result. He is both brilliant and inscrutable."

"Just take what you need from her and let us go." Her demand sounded obvious, ridiculous and hopeless the moment she said it.

Lanyon nodded toward Ryan. "Apparently you have a stronger constitution than your husband, Mrs. Lomax."

"Don't call me that."

Humboldt pulled back the hammer of the gun and aimed it at her for a few seconds before easing the hammer back into place and putting on the safety. "This holds thirty rounds. The bullets are smaller and they don't have the range of the ones from larger handguns, but the discharge is as quiet as having a silencer attached, and they travel almost twice as fast. It's a remarkable device, easily concealed, perfect for door-to-door, urban operations, a product of happenstance, as is your daughter."

"She is not a device."

"Granted, that was an inadequate description of Sage. I would recommend that you try remembering all those garish adjectives Ann has used to describe her. There is so much wonderful new stuff in her now, more than we ever hoped for. I can tell you, Savannah, if he were here, Harvey Weinberg would be as happy as a little boy at Christmas."

Lanyon came closer to her. "She has been the driving force behind so many advances in microbiology, cybernetics, robotics, nanotechnology, computer programming, virtual memory enhancement, digital communication. She should be awarded a Nobel for scientific inspiration."

"But that new brain of hers tops everything else. Compared to her enhanced natural abilities those microchips and electrodes inside her are little more than novelties for her amusement now."

Lanyon checked his watch. "It's time. She should be prepped by now." He held up a syringe in his other hand. "I promise you this won't hurt the way the sedative did. We just need to retrieve that special cargo you're carrying."

"How can I have two more like Sage inside me?"

"The short answer is Harvey Weinberg. The man was a miracle worker or you would not have Sage. Once he had finished editing and splicing her DNA, he put three of her into you. Two of them are dormant, in stasis, use whatever term you wish."

"You've had Sage for twelve years, Savannah, all three of them, really. Be satisfied with that. You weren't supposed to get any of them, but Harvey had a moment of sentimental weakness." Humboldt pointed to the syringe. "This is the first of a series of injections you will receive over the next forty-eight hours, all in accordance with Harvey's instructions. They will reactivate development in the two ova you are carrying and Harvey will then extract them from you. He has compatible surrogates in Mexico waiting to carry them to term. Who knows, you might even get to meet him before this is all over."

"Then we will give you a final injection and you will simply close your eyes forever."

"I didn't want that, Savannah, but we have new orders."

One of the two armed men came to gather up Ryan.

She swung a punch at him when he got close enough, but he easily deflected her fist, grabbed her by the shoulder and punched her in the right side of her forehead. The force of the punch ripped her shirt where he was holding her and sent her sliding off the end of the table.

Humboldt hollered, "Don't hurt her, you fool."

Thunder rumbled in the distance as she landed on the floor. Her legs folded under her. Though she was able to use her hands to cushion her landing, her right elbow still struck the floor hard.

The man who had punched her suddenly grunted and staggered backward. Ryan flew off the table, tackled him and drove him into a counter full of laboratory equipment.

Lanyon was the closest to her. Like the other three men, however, he had turned to watch the struggle between Ryan and the guard. The other armed man had pulled out his gun but he couldn't get a clear shot at Ryan.

A stool behind Lanyon and Humboldt rested only two short steps from her. It was lighter than she expected and came off the floor easily. She swung it as fast and as hard as she could into Lanyon's back.

Lanyon dropped the syringe and staggered into Humboldt. She followed his trajectory from behind him and swung again, hitting him in the side of the head. As Lanyon fell sideways first into the counter and then to the floor she pushed forward with the stool straight into Humboldt's knees. She clubbed him over the head when he buckled forward.

The old man sprawled out onto the floor as two loud shots were fired behind her.

She found the blue handgun near the table, picked it up and aimed it at the second man as he turned to aim his gun at her.

The idiot must have thought she would immediately drop the gun because he didn't shoot. _No, that isn't it_! He couldn't shoot her, he wasn't allowed to. She was almost as valuable to them as Sage was until they got out of her what they believed they needed. Brilliant Harvey Weinberg hadn't anticipated this scenario.

She fired twice at his chest. She then aimed at the man on top of Ryan and fired twice at his back. The pistol had very little recoil.

Ryan pushed the man off and then used the counter to pull himself up. The left side of his shirt just above his belt was red with blood. "A ricochet fragment." He pointed to where one of the bullets had struck a stainless steel cupboard door under the counter. "It really is just a scratch."

Humboldt and Lanyon both moaned at the same time and began to get up together.

She put the gun to Humboldt's head. "Where is she?"

"In laboratory six one level above us."

She asked Ryan, "How are you?"

"I'm good." He handed her four clips for the plastic gun. "It's a semi-automatic. Just hold the trigger and it will keep firing."

She grabbed hold of Humboldt.

Holding the handguns from the other two men, Ryan took charge of Lanyon.

This part of the facility contained most of the laboratories and was three storeys high. They stepped out onto a catwalk on the second floor that overlooked the central fabricating floor. Everything had been shut off. Everyone had gone home for the weekend.

"Is there anyone guarding the lab?"

Humboldt didn't answer until she tapped the back of his head with the tip of the plastic barrel. "There should be four men at the door. They are heavily armed. You won't stand a chance."

She looked up but the catwalk above them was solid and sprayed with dark-grey sound-insulating foam. "I'm sure they've been told how valuable I am at the moment."

Lightning flashed outside. Thunder rattled across the bay.

Ryan said, "Which way?"

"Those stairs are closer."

"Take the elevator," he said. "They will hear us coming up the stairs and see us. They won't see us coming in the elevator."

"Be quiet." She pushed Humboldt to get him going and remembered how that woman at the park had been staggered by what appeared to be a force striking her in the back.

Had Sage been applying a force to the woman's back or just controlling her muscles? Had the woman moved that way because she was trying to resist her own body?

"Wait." Ryan reached over and pushed a button on the plastic gun. Two red laser beams turned on, one over the other. "Just point and shoot."

The large elevator was on their floor, probably used to bring up her and Ryan. It was noisy, so the guards would hear it coming.

Once it reached the next floor, she prodded Humboldt with the gun to get him to step out. "Nice and easy or you go down before anyone else does."

Ryan did the same with Lanyon.

They stepped out behind the doctors. She stuck the gun out between Lanyon and Humboldt, aimed the red spots at the first guard she could see and squeezed the trigger. The gun still offered little kickback in her hand as it sprayed the four men with bullets until the magazine was empty.

Once she started shooting, using Humboldt as a shield, Ryan pushed Lanyon against the wall beside the elevator and fired both guns he had until they were empty.

She quickly ejected the empty magazine and shoved in another, but no one returned fire.

Pushing Humboldt hard in the back again, she growled, "Go."

The two doctors led the way into the empty laboratory. Ryan dragged in the four men.

"You told me she was in here."

Neither Lanyon nor Humboldt said anything.

After bringing in the last dead man, Ryan closed and locked the door. He took three steps toward her before collapsing.

"On your knees, hands on your heads and don't move."

Lanyon and Humboldt did as they were told.

Lightning flashed again. Thunder rumbled directly overhead. Rain began clattering on the building's metal roof as she knelt down and touched Ryan's neck. His pulse was rapid and weak. Blood was spreading out on the floor from his left side.

She stood back up with the gun still aimed at Lanyon and Humboldt. She gripped the handle, squeezed the trigger back and aimed it right between Humboldt's eyes. One red dot glowed against the middle of his forehead, the other near the top of his nose. "Where is Sage?"

# Chapter 49

During one of the many lulls between missions, she had watched a nature program that explained how predators used their senses to track their prey. Raptors could see into the UV band of light to track the urine trails of rodents. Coyotes and foxes could do the same using smell. Snakes used smell and infrared: heat detection. Sharks had lateral lines to go with sensors along their snouts.

How was she being guided? The corridors below ground that she'd been compelled to enter and then proceed through certainly had no urine trail she could detect; nor did she want to. There was no infrared trail either and she couldn't detect body heat in any way through the concrete walls surrounding her.

But here she was six floors below Novus Somnia's main building coming closer to Sage. Was she detecting Sage's essence, her life force, a psychic transmission coming directly from Sage that was hindered by neither barrier nor distance? All of those overwrought and overused terms just seemed absurd when she considered them as labels or explanations for what was taking place between her and Sage.

Sage had warned her she would soon need her help. Some of her genes had been spliced into Sage. They were sisters . . . partly. Her mother was probably partly Sage's mother, maybe as much as Savannah Lomax was or Gwen Hunter was. The idea that John Atchison, Herman Kolisnek, Tye Rosen and particularly Cedric Hutt may have contributed something to Sage's DNA, that they were all partly her father, curdled her stomach.

It should just be her and Sage and Savannah. No one else had any right to them or any right to be part of their existence.

She turned a corner into another concrete corridor. Half the lights in the ceiling had been extinguished. The other half fluctuated in sequence between being completely off and dazzlingly bright. Sage was very close now.

Lucy put her hand on the wall to her right and blushed. "That is just stupid, girl. However Sage is guiding you, you aren't going to feel it coming through concrete."

Cameras, almost as many as there were lights, lined up along the ceiling. None of them exhibited any light or other indication they were on.

It didn't matter. She had come this far. With whatever this link between her and Sage was, she had been able to sneak into Novus Somnia just as heavy rain had started falling onto the facility. The lightning and thunder that came with the rainfall seemed to have settled overhead as she entered the main facility and then went straight to the 'Restricted Access' elevator that would take her six storeys underground. Though it had appeared to be locked, it responded when she pushed the button.

Disabling three guards along on the way had been easy; though that was likely more Sage's doing than hers. Not once in the whole time she had been a member of the Apostles had she been able to generate even one spark of a static discharge. But those men had been unable to scream out in pain or alarm when she had grabbed them because of the high current that had gone through them. She had merely felt a tingling rise up from her toes and leave through her fingers.

She downed the last guard with her very own shocking version of the Vulcan neck pinch. She had snuck up behind him, pinched his neck and, just like that, he'd dropped his rifle and folded up like a flower at sunset. She hadn't bothered to pick up his rifle. Sage would have let her know if she needed it.

The way was clear after that, though she still had a considerable distance to go once the last guard was taken care of. When she thought about how far she still had to go, data came to her. Novus Somnia had over two miles of tunnels in its six subterranean floors.

Through her connection with Sage she had been made aware of two different groups after her new little sister. The one that had her now was associated with some worldwide organism called the Proteus Group. Creepy Harvey Weinberg worked with them periodically and had edited and spliced Sage's DNA while she was still an embryo. He had maybe tampered with the DNA of every member of the Apostles as well. The overall suspicion about him from both sides, however, was that Weinberg just worked for himself with whoever could provide him with what he needed.

Weinberg appeared to be the only person on earth who had no reason to fear the Proteus Group. That was significant, given what they had been responsible for over just the last five years.

The group Chase controlled, including her Apostles, could be as dangerous as the Proteus Group. On the surface, they appeared to be less dangerous, but Sage knew, therefore she knew, that their motivations and plans, Chase's motivations and plans, were damn near identical to those of the Proteus Group. Chase had collaborated with Weinberg in the past while he worked at secret research centers in Virginia, Puerto Rico, India and Mexico almost as often as that other group had, perhaps more frequently.

At a T-shaped intersection, she closed her eyes, held her breath and waited. Machinery hummed on the other side of the wall to her right. The lights fluctuated in brightness at a quicker pace here, acting as a Sage detector. She was almost there.

Footsteps approached from behind her. Two people were coming.

The connection wasn't telling her which way to go anymore. There was just fog inside and out. Sage could have become incapacitated.

The footsteps were heavy. Boots! Armed guards!

She could duck around one of the intersection's corners, but even with madly flickering lights, they would notice her the moment they came her way. If they turned the other way, she could follow them. At this end of Sublevel 6, Sage was the only experiment in progress.

She slipped around the corner to her right and waited. Her move hadn't come with any certainty it was the correct way to go, but she had to have some faith in her own miniscule abilities. Her connection with Sage, stronger here than ever, had enhanced them some.

The footsteps slowed and were joined by talking. The two men were being sent instructions.

"Say again," one said. "Where is the Lomax woman?"

They were almost at the intersection.

"On our way."

The footsteps stopped.

"Do we both need to go?"

"She's holding Humboldt and Lanyon at gunpoint. She killed Eddy, Linc, Isaac and Ron."

"Fucking bitch. Dibs on a head shot."

"By my guest."

The two men turned around and started running back along the corridor.

Where were they holding Sage? The constant flickering of the lights was giving her a headache.

She peeked around the corner. The men were almost at the intersection at the other end. The lights in that section of corridor had stopped flashing. The lights going the opposite way from the direction she had turned had gone off and stayed off. The ones above her were blinking off and on in sequence along her section of corridor.

"Well done, little sister."

The light above the laboratory door was always on. As she came closer, each light she passed remained on. Her headache also became more severe, but that was an acceptable burden to carry if it took her to Sage. Arrival at the door to Sublevel 6 Laboratory 12 brought an end to all the flickering.

She braced herself for a shock and took hold of the doorknob. No charge passed through her. The knob was neither burning hot nor freezing cold. It also wasn't locked. She turned it slowly and opened the door a crack.

Three men in laboratory coats and two armed guards stood around a stainless steel table raised into a vertical position. Like some hokey monster in an old movie, they had her little sister strapped to the table. They had made a mockery of her first view of Sage. Capturing her was despicable and what they had in mind for her was abominable, but how dare they ridicule her sister in such a way.

Straps held her legs and arms to the table. Another strap went around her hips, another around her chest. Some asinine contraption of metal bands and wires had been placed on her head. It was designed to restrain Sage and suppress her abilities. It was supposed to be her crown of thorns.

These five men feared her and loathed her.

She opened the door all the way and said, "Hello, little sister."

It would be simple, and wholly inadequate, to just describe Sage's escape as her opening her eyes the moment she greeted her, the buckles on the straps opening, melting away or disintegrating and Sage lifting off the table with a glowing sapphire aura around her that flattened four of the men straight away. A more accurate term, and one Sage would wholly agree with, was that she had _fantazmagated_.

Her own small contribution to this transmogrification and jailbreak was a gesture with her right arm coming up as if to throw a knife at one of the armed guards when he aimed his rifle at her. Whether just a psychological reaction, whether Sage in her moment of splendor had augmented the effects of the gesture—put some thrust behind it—didn't matter.

The man clutched his chest and went down as if he'd been struck.

Sage had hair under that crown when Lucy first spotted her secured to the table. By the time she had landed on the floor and reduced her blue glow, she was bald. Her ridges, ears, neck, fingernails and face all shone sapphire blue. The sparkling whites of her eyes had become a slightly lighter shade of blue.

Lucy Cooper began crying, averted her gaze and dropped to her knees.

Sage giggled and stroked her hair. "Don't be silly, Lucy. I'm just a girl."

"Yeah, and Noah was just a cruise ship captain." She stood up and embraced Sage. Her toes tingled, her hair stood up. "I brought the suit and the cape."

"I won't need the cape until next week." Sage stepped out of her embrace, took the backpack from her, removed the suit and began to undress. After struggling to get one leg only part way into the suit, she stopped and frowned. "Help me, big sister, please."

Helping Sage put on the suit frequently felt like she was trying to dress a plank. Sage just couldn't seem to bend in certain directions when she needed to. Sometimes, she couldn't bend in any direction. Sage's legs wouldn't cooperate with either one of them. Once it was finally all the way on, she zipped it up at the back and stepped away the instant she felt the tingle against her fingers.

Sage and the suit brightened. Sage lifted off the floor. "Mom's in trouble."

# Chapter 50

"You two are crazy. A few minutes ago you were preparing to remove two Sage clones from me, do God knows what to Sage and then kill both of us. Now you're trying to talk your way out of this by reminding me how much help you provided to us." She fired three more rounds near Humboldt and Lanyon. "I will not waste any more bullets on threats. Where is she?"

Neither man would look at her.

She placed the gun against Lanyon's head. "Put your hands on the floor."

He obeyed, but he offered no information.

The people Humboldt and Lanyon were involved with clearly held them in a tight grip of fear. This must be something like belonging to gangs or terrorist cells. Once you were in, you were in to stay. Fear of what the group you belonged to would do to you if you betrayed them was scarier than what the enemy might do to you.

"Everything has risk." She shot Lanyon through his right hand.

Humboldt lurched back when she pointed the gun at him. "Help your partner."

"She's in Sublevel Six, Lab Twelve."

She allowed Humboldt to treat and bandage Lanyon's wound before taking them out onto the catwalk. "Which way?"

Before Humboldt could answer, the elevator they had come up in began to rise from below.

# *****

He stayed behind after everyone else had left when he found out who was coming. From his workstation in Area 51, Pritchett watched them bring in Savannah Lomax, her freaky little daughter and some guy who looked dead.

Half the team took the girl into a restricted section on the main floor. He'd never been allowed in there, but he knew exactly what taking Sage in there meant. They would take her down and cut her to pieces.

Though he had never been in that section or the subterranean floors below it, he wasn't completely shut out. Getting access to the CCTVs on those secret floors had been tricky, but hardly impossible. Disguising his Trojan horse as a routine diagnostic program verifying video signal strength and resolution allowed him to keep an eye on what was going on all the way down to level six for the past week. It was just a precaution, insurance in case the powers that be at Novus Somnia decided he should be the scapegoat for that freaky little retard bitch downloading all that dangerous information about what they had been doing.

Most of the activities he'd seen and recorded couldn't be considered obvious exposure of illegal or reprehensible behaviour by Novus Somnia and its employees, but management wouldn't likely take the chance he had nothing he could use against them should they try making an example of him. None of the activities he'd spied on had been as interesting as what he was watching now.

They had the FLRB strapped to a table. She was wearing the restraining helmet he'd helped design after her attack on MasterFile. If she tried anything, a charge would shoot through her jellied head and fry everything including the jelly. Management thought the device would only incapacitate her, but . . . _oops_.

With all the stuff they had been doing for more than a decade in Virginia, India, Puerto Rico and Mexico with that guy Weinberg, it was just stupid to be concerned about possibly harming a FLRB and her gelatinous brain. Why they had bothered to bring in the mother and that zombie guy was unfathomable, too. Abteroth took no prisoners. Just take them out into the bay and toss them overboard once it was dark enough. The storm outside would conceal what they were doing. Instead, the other half of the capture team took Savannah Lomax and the nearly dead guy into a laboratory and deposited them side by side onto a table.

When he switched back to the CCTV feeds on Sublevel Six, the guards were missing from their posts. Lights were flickering on and off in the corridors leading to Laboratory 12. Then he lost the feeds to the subterranean corridors. The lights in Lab 12 were still on, though.

Sage Lomax didn't move, or couldn't move. Her eyes were closed. The men standing around her either didn't know what to do next—he knew what should be done—or they were waiting for further orders.

What further orders did they need? Just take a chainsaw to her now. They could pickle her brain if they really wanted a souvenir, but the kid, her mom and the nearly dead guy were never getting out of Novus Somnia alive. Why the delay in getting on with it?

Pritchett switched back to the video feed from the other lab. "What the fuck is going on here?"

The Lomax woman and that nearly dead guy were holding Humboldt and Lanyon at gunpoint and were taking them out of the lab. The two Novus Somnia Security guys were dead.

The CCTVs didn't record sound because the melon heads in management didn't want anyone who shouldn't be listening in on confidential conversations. All laboratories were soundproof so the four men standing guard above Lomax wouldn't have heard any shots fired.

Lomax and the man took Humboldt and Lanyon up to the next level in an elevator. They started shooting the moment they stepped out of it. They used Humboldt and Lanyon as shields.

Armed guards from an outside security company had been added since that FLRB had violated MasterFile. They seemed to be everywhere in the facility day in and day out. About half of them remained for the night shifts. With four outsiders and two of Novus Somnia's own down, plus the missing subterranean guards, the only ones left were the two with the freak and two more patrolling the site.

After a complete reboot of the system, the CCTVs on Sublevel 6 were back in operation. He scanned through each video feed of the corridors. It was difficult to make out anything with the lights flickering on and off, but good fortune soon came round the corner into view.

The two guards on patrol were near Lab 12.

He rushed to the door and keyed the code into the intercom that would allow him to talk to only those two men.

"We have a problem," he said and quickly described what the Lomax woman had done and what lab she was now in. "She's holding Humboldt and Lanyon hostage in lab six on level three. A man is helping her. They've killed four of your comrades and two of our own people."

"We're on our way."

"Meet me in Yellow Three. I'll take you in through the back of the lab."

"We got this. You stay where you are and monitor what she's doing. Keep us advised."

He returned to his workstation and scanned the corridor on Sublevel 6. The two guards were running back to the elevators. A woman's face peeked around the other end of the corridor to see where they were going before that feed went dead again.

The two guards would take seven minutes to reach Humboldt and Lanyon. The Lomax woman might hear them coming or see them before they could take her out.

Yellow Three was an employee-only corridor that ran between the two rows of laboratories on that level. It was used to deliver supplies and equipment. He could easily get to Lomax four minutes before the guards arrived, sneak in through the back door and— "Shit."

All of the video feeds shut down.

Lomax, her partner and the two doctors might not even be there anymore. She would be looking for her daughter. They could access the elevators to the sublevels from the second level, but they would have to go along the catwalk to get to the restricted area first and then descend a flight of stairs to reach them.

Laboratory 1 had what he needed. He could get into it from Yellow Three. Lomax would have to bring everyone past the lab because it was beside the door to the restricted section. He'd have to be fast, though, if they were already on the move. The one freight elevator to the employee corridors had been shut down for the weekend.

He would save Humboldt and Lanyon and end the threat to Novus Somnia when he ended the Lomax family. This was better than that aborted attempt at Holly Park. They were contained in here and would be easy targets. He had allies here who would be grateful and would take care of clean up for him after it was all over.

Pritchett exited Area 51 at the back into Green Sub-One and ran up the stairs. Once he entered Yellow Three from the stairwell, the door to Lab 1 was immediately to his left.

# *****

A woman stepped out of the elevator and hesitated when she saw the plastic gun aimed at her.

As soon as Savannah made eye contact with her she knew. "Lucy?"

"Yes. There are two guards coming."

"How did you . . . ?"

"Sage sent them in another direction, but they will figure it out soon enough."

Her knees buckled. Lucy ran to her and kept her from falling. "She's all right, then?"

Lucy took a deep breath. "Oh, yes, she's all right. Um . . . ah . . . she's more than just all right. You'll see soon enough, but we need to get out of here."

"What about these two?" She aimed the gun at Humboldt and Lanyon.

"Leave them. She says they are nothing and will get what's coming to them soon enough. Please, Savannah, we have to get out of here as fast as we can. She's charging the buildings."

She started for the elevator, but Lucy stopped her.

"Not that way. We need to take the stairs." She turned them around and gently pushed Savannah from behind.

Neither Humboldt nor Lanyon dared to move when they ran past.

A set of metal stairs to their right went up and down where the catwalk turned ninety degrees to the left just before a closed door to a restricted section.

At the metal stairs, Lucy grabbed her. "Stop."

The door to Lab 1 opened behind them. That surly technician who had visited their house stepped out holding one of those plastic rifles. As Pritchett turned to face them and aimed the rifle, Lucy stepped into him, put her hand on his chest and grabbed the metal railing of the catwalk with her other hand.

Lightning flashed directly above them. Thunder pounded against the roof. Pat Pritchett began to tremble and smoke. In less time than it took Savannah to register what was happening, Pritchett was lying on the catwalk. Humboldt and Lanyon had also been downed. Lucy removed her smoking hand from the railing and tackled her.

Two shots from the corner of a catwalk near the roof ricocheted off the metal stairs. What sounded like two screams was drowned out when all the machinery on the main floor started up at the same time.

A bluish-white glow lifted off from the higher catwalk. Tentacles of the same bluish-white, like ropes of lightning, wiggled and crackled and connected the glow to the catwalk above them and every machine below.

Lucy helped her up. "I told you she was more than just all right."

As the glow descended toward them, the tentacles of light connected to the machines let go of them and connected to the catwalk she and Lucy were on.

"How does she do that?"

"When the current inside her starts up, she feels an attraction to some objects and repulsion from others; copper and iron provide the strongest responses. The more energy there is around her, the more she feels it. Then she just uses all that to float."

"And that light show?"

"That's just her special effects. She's a big show-off."

Sage became visible as the glow diminished until it was just her and the tentacles floating toward them. She was wearing the suit. It was as dazzling as she was. She was just Sage once she landed, except she was bald and her skin was a translucent blue that revealed a darker blue network of nerves glowing beneath it. The air around her crackled and snapped when she looked down at Pritchett.

Lucy's voice was solemn when she asked, "Is this the one?"

With an equally solemn tone, Sage replied, "He is the empty man. He will try to fill that emptiness by collecting people's souls."

Pritchett moaned and opened his eyes. His shirt had holes burned through it where Lucy's fingers had made contact. His skin was blistered.

"What are you telling us, sweetheart?"

"He will kill if we do not stop him now."

"You can't just kill him. He hasn't done anything yet."

"He will," Lucy said. "I felt it too when I touched him."

"You may have only felt his fear, his hate for us. Maybe he hates everyone, but he might never do anything to anyone. Just because he has those thoughts, it doesn't mean he will act on them. We all have dark thoughts. I'm full of them right now."

Sage said, "Your dark thoughts are within the context of the situation you are in, mom. You have killed only because you had too. His dark thoughts are a constant of his life. He will kill because he needs to."

Lucy nodded. "He will kill."

"We don't know that."

"I do. All demons must die."

"Sweetheart that is not how we do it. We can never be sure. I accept what you are capable of, Sage. I know that I might not ever comprehend fully all you can do, but even you cannot be sure of something like that. You cannot take it upon yourself to judge others based on what you see them doing in the future no matter how powerful you are."

"One month from now when his dark thoughts finally take him over and he merges with his avatar, Abteroth, he will begin collecting souls like they were scalps. He will kill thirty-four people over the next three years. Most of them will be girls or young women."

"Savannah," Lucy said. "I know this is hard to accept, but Sage is right. I have felt other men like him. He will become a homicidal maniac."

"He will see his failure and humiliation here as an epiphany. This episode of his life will connect him to his destiny. He will collect the souls to make himself stronger. He will see no other way to proceed. It is his salve and his salvation. He must do it."

"If we do not stop him now, all that Sage has predicted will come true."

"He will grow stronger. There will be no stopping him and his mission will never be complete. Only Grace and Jane will be able to stop him then. And they won't be ready to do that until he has collected thirty-four souls."

"Grace and Jane?"

"They are like me but different."

"Sage, honey, I can't let you kill him or any of these men. There has already been too much of that today. Please, let's just get out of here."

Sage turned away to face the fabrication floor. "Take them and wait for me outside." She and the suit began to glow brighter until she vanished inside the brilliant bluish-white and lifted off the catwalk. She floated up to hover over the center of the building.

Savannah helped Pritchett up.

"What's she going to do?"

"Ever hear of Sodom and Gomorrah?" She pushed him from behind to get him started toward Humboldt and Lanyon. "Don't look back."

Even though they made good progress out of the building, she kept pushing at Pritchett's back with the gun. Lucy kept pushing on Humboldt and Lanyon. The gun may have been leaving a bruise on Pritchett's back. Lucy's hand may have been leaving scorch marks on those two.

At the closed and locked entrance gate, she said to Pritchett, "You heard what she said about you, right? You know what she wants to do with you?"

He nodded.

"She knows what you are and she can always find you, and tonight is the one and only time I will stop her."

He nodded again.

They all watched the light show coming through the windows of the main research building. Blue became red and then yellow and then white. Their frequency of change quickly became too fast to follow. Lightning flashed overhead and then began striking Novus Somnia. Explosions sent flames and smoke up through the collapsing roof. All of the buildings began imploding.

Sage floated up and out of the conflagration and over to them. "Lots of energy here." She wiped debris off the suit.

Headlights approached the gate from outside the complex.

Savannah put Sage and Lucy behind her and aimed the gun at the approaching Bluebird school bus. Three ragged breaths later, she began trembling and laughing. She was trying to protect her daughter, who had just brought down the wrath of God on Novus Somnia, with a plastic gun. She was still a bit giddy when Sage and Lucy unlocked the gate and took her to the bus. When the door opened, her vision was clear enough through her tears to recognize Liz Bergeron behind the wheel.

"That's Gilbert," Bergeron said of the three sets of headlights rapidly coming closer.

# Chapter 51

Rather than get into the bus and make another useless attempt to escape, Sage closed and locked the gates to Novus Somnia by merely looking at them. Satisfied Pritchett, Humboldt and Lanyon couldn't go anywhere, Sage took her, Lucy and Liz to stand behind the bus and wait for Gilbert to arrive.

Gilbert had reinforced her original team with two other groups of four armed men each.

The rain was easing off.

"Did you cause this storm?"

"No, mom, I just told it what I wanted it to do." Sage kissed her and took hold of her hand. "Don't worry. They can't hurt us and I won't harm any of them."

Gilbert left her twelve men behind and approached them

"I like you, Ramona," Sage said.

"I like you, too, Sage, both of you, very much."

Something in one of the buildings exploded. The fireball erupting from it revealed clearing skies to the northwest.

"You were here to work undercover for Tubby but you fell in love with us."

"Yes, I did."

"Tubby is very unhappy with you for that."

"You know I wasn't originally put here for you."

"You were here to keep an eye on Harvey and the work he'd done."

"But then we learned he'd done things to you in vitro."

"That is when Tubby ordered you to remain to monitor my development and progress. You wanted to tell us, but he wouldn't let you. He wanted to know if anything Harvey put inside me could be put in the Apostles to make them better."

"It took a very long time to see any results, and then . . . wow."

"It's presented him with quite a dilemma, hasn't it? I'm proof something worked, but Tubby doesn't know how much of what I am is Harvey's doing, the technology inside me or just me and my freaky brain."

"I don't want to see any of you get hurt."

"Those special guns your men have won't stop me anymore. Ramona, we have to leave now. I won't harm any of your men, but I won't let them prevent us from going."

"What are you going to do with all that information?"

"Only some of it is important to me. I don't care about the rest of it."

Lucy said, "You can believe that, Miss Gilbert."

"Take those three men at the gate, but we are going."

"I have orders to detain you for questioning."

Savannah let go of Sage's hand, stepped forward and hugged Ramona. "How?"

She turned Ramona around. Every one of her men was lying on the ground unconscious, as were the three men at the gate.

Sage hugged Ramona. "Forgive yourself; we have. Come back once you have done what must be done."

Lucy handed keys to her. "The car I took is in the visitor's parking lot. You have to disappear now."

"I am sorry for any pain I—" She wiped her eyes and headed for the car.

# *****

They drove across the Golden Gate Bridge, leaving San Francisco shrouded in fog that was occasionally illuminated by lightning.

"There's a place in the hills near Stinson Beach," Liz said. "Ann and I started preparing it when you were served with that writ. We thought you might need it."

"The underground."

"We reached out just in case."

"He died saving my life."

"Then he was a good man in the end."

She understood the dismissive tone in Liz's voice. Had Ryan really understood the deal he'd made until they came to collect the final payment?

"He was truly sorry," Sage said.

"Are you going to introduce me to your new best friend?"

"This is Lucy Cooper. She's not your daughter, mom, but she is my sister."

Lucy said, "At least partly, I am."

"You are an apostle?"

Lucy blushed and stammered, "My mom thought up that name."

Lucy spent the majority of their drive to Stinson Beach telling them of her history with Chase and the Apostles, about her mom adopting the name Themis for herself and about the fear of Sage within the group.

"Momma, John and Cedric are the ones who fear her the most."

Sage just smiled. "I will have to do something about that."

Her daughter was transformed. Not only did she possess incomprehensible abilities, everything she said could be inspiring and terrifying at the same time.

Liz turned off Highway One at Stinson Beach and took them along Panoramic Highway up into the Marin Hills overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

"There are a lot of big, very private estates up here. The one we're going to is owned by what you might call a consortium of female subversives. It's a refuge for women and children trying to escape abusive relationships. You will be safe here until we can arrange our next move."

Sooner or later someone was going to tamper with human genetics the way Harvey Weinberg had with Sage. It was too compelling to resist no matter what controls and sanctions the international community tried to impose. Now she was on a bus with a girl who might very well have been able to float to their sanctuary under her own power.

An image of Sage glowing in her suit and swooping along power lines flashed through her mind.

"Mom, that would have just generated a lot of unidentified floating daughter calls. We don't want that now, do we?"

"We don't want that. Still, my daughter the super hero does have a nice ring to it."

One day she would ask Sage to show her all that she could do, but not tonight. Tonight she was just taking a ride to safety and the beginning of a new life with her daughter and her daughter's sister in a bus driven by a woman who, like Ann Devonshire, and even Ramona Gilbert, had always been there for them.

Though she had believed herself reasonably calm since leaving Novus Somnia—who could interfere with Sage's wishes, after all—some stress had to still be pressing in against her because the drive up Panoramic Highway to their sanctuary, obviously shorter, seemed to take longer than the drive from San Francisco had.

Her daughter the super hero had fallen asleep, but then she'd had a busy day.

Lucy had been content to keep watch over her sister until she had drifted off as well.

After guiding the bus up through a number of twists in the road, long, gentle curves and then switchbacks, Liz turned left and took them slowly up a gravel drive lined with Redwoods for about a mile before the huge rancher and all its external lights came into view.

Ann Devonshire came out of the house as Liz parked the bus.

"Let them sleep a bit longer," Liz said.

She hugged Ann and hung on tight. "I thought I would never see you again."

Liz came by carrying two cloth bags full of groceries. "We decided to keep her involvement secret for as long as we can. She will be our liaison to the outside world."

"I have to go back, but I wanted to be here when you arrived." She took a few seconds to watch Liz enter the rancher. "Weird, isn't it? While you and Sage and Lucy were battling the evil that was Novus Somnia, I was cleaning house and Liz was shopping for groceries."

"We'll just go with it."

"I'll retrieve our miracle."

"You'll get no argument from me anymore."

Ann giggled when she entered the bus very much like Sage giggled. Sage had a big sister by genes and a big sister by . . . well, she had many big sisters. Sage had probably known that a lot sooner than her mother did.

Savannah entered a ranch-style mansion sprawling with open spaces, high vaulted ceilings, tall windows, bloody big skylights and a kitchen half the size of the main floor of her house. Through the great room's windows, she could see the lights of Stinson Beach and the occasional glimpse of the inky Pacific. The view was going to be breathtaking in daylight.

Ann, Lucy and Sage, limping behind them now that she was on foot again, came in carrying the rest of the groceries. Even a super hero couldn't escape her chores.

She asked the question she'd become so accustomed to asking that it was as automatic as blinking, "What now?"

Sage said, "We have to wait. All the pieces needed to end this aren't in place yet." She looked around the rancher. "This is wonderful. What have we got to eat? I'm hungry."

# Chapter 52

Cole Reagan was holding a tablet reviewing their preparations list when he and Clarke entered the convention room.

Dorothy Cooper, John Atchison and Cedric Hutt stood together. Gwen Hunter, Herman Kolisnek and Tye Rosen stood a few steps away from them. It was the standard clumping pattern of the Apostles.

Two other agents were in the room standing just behind Reagan. Four of Clarke's team were packing up their equipment. Two were still monitoring.

"We have two Bell four-twelve's and one Apache, if necessary, fueled and ready and ten minutes away."

"What about the drones?"

"There is a command drone with a squad of six smaller and faster drones to go with it. They each carry four missiles. We also have six surveillance drones that can hover over the site and provide the targeting coordinates to the drones."

"I only want to use them as a last resort."

Clarke said, "That's assuming we even can. Atlas is going to have to be very close to her."

Dorothy Cooper came over to them. Atchison and Hutt followed her a few steps back. The other three remained where they stood.

"She's coming." Cooper squeezed her eyes shut, grimaced and shook her head.

As if whatever pain that had just struck Cooper had ricocheted between the Apostles, Gwen Hunter gasped, Atchison grunted and rubbed his temples. Hutt wiped away the blood coming from his nose. Kolisnek and Rosen took stances as though resisting a strong wind. Both of them closed their eyes. Rosen took a step backward.

"Which one?"

"Both of them," Clarke said from one of the monitoring stations still in operation. "That data jungle of hers is clearing up. The fog is gone. We can track the both of them."

"Why now?"

Cooper said through a sneer, "It's an invitation, Mr. Chase, for you. And do be careful, Tubby, she doesn't like you any more than I do."

"Get the drones in the air now." He went over to the monitor station and looked at the screen. "Why would she go back there?"

# *****

"So," Joan said, "Chase's agent isn't, in fact, missing."

"More like on special assignment," Ann said. "Ah, here it comes now."

When the names of the three men appeared on the laptop's screen, Senator Sutton staggered back as if she'd been struck. "I've known all three of those men for years. This must be a mistake."

Nyla said, "Senator, considering the data Sage Lomax and Muta have access to, I think we can assume this is not a mistake. And remember, too, our task force investigation indicates that much of the time, the lower-level players do not know they are working with the Proteus Group."

"Those two are not lower-level players in Washington, Nyla. And the other one is a government research facility director. I will need proof before I take this back to Washington."

"I'm getting it now." Joan handed over the flash drive after the download was complete. "That's over a gigabyte of documents, eleven hundred separate files. I hope it will be enough proof."

All of them quickly scanned through some of the documents on her laptop.

"I am not going to comment further," Sutton said, "because the only words that come to mind are very crude and nasty. I will only say this. I am going to personally see to it that those three burn."

The laptop chimed for an incoming call.

Randi came on the screen via her iPhone. "Chase and his entourage are on their way out. I overheard his aide tell him the helicopters were waiting for them. I do not know where they are going, though."

"Come back here," Sutton said. "We have other things to deal with at the moment."

Cynthia said, "You know, I actually feel a bit sorry for Chase and his people."

"Senator," she said. "You and Randi need to get that information to Washington. And neither one of you should be involved with what we have to do next."

"Good luck to all of us." Sutton left with the flash drive.

Muta appeared on the screen. "Did you get it all?"

"Yes, thank you. Do you know what is going to happen?"

"Tubby is going to have his pants pulled down and get his bare bottom spanked in public. See you there."

Muta ran off into the forest scene behind her, shrinking until she was little more than a flickering pixel. Nonetheless, they all watched her leave and the forest collapse into the screen after her.

Nyla asked Ann, "Why is Sage returning to Bernal Heights Park?"

"We better hurry." Ann got up from the chair. "We don't want to miss anything."

# *****

They stood near the top of Bernal Heights Park on a bare patch of ground just down from the trees east of the AT&T microwave communications tower. They were less than one hundred yards from where Novus Somnia had captured them.

Lucy Cooper stood beside her six steps up the slope behind Sage.

Sage stood motionless in the sunny warmth of a clear June day other than to move her head to watch SFPD evacuate the park and set up barricades. She wore the suit and a black cape that descended to her waist.

"Now," Lucy said, "she really does look like a super hero."

"Wonder Girl," Sage said without moving a muscle.

"And the cape adds to what she can do?"

"Jake's team designed and constructed three different capes according to her specifications. This one is very conductive because of the aligned fibers in it. It plugs in around the collar of the suit."

Though it was almost three o'clock in the afternoon and the temperature had risen into the high seventies, Savannah couldn't stop shivering as she watched the SFPD go about its business. The eeriest part of their behavior was leaving them alone.

Disconnecting from the moment wasn't the wisest course of action, but she couldn't help thinking of the robot Gort in the movie _The Day the Earth Stood Still_ when she looked at her daughter equally motionless and unconcerned about so many people with guns near her who thought of her as a terrifying threat. The momentary disassociation with reality could be attributed not only to the situation but also to overhearing one of the police officers explain to one of the evacuees that they were clearing the park in preparation for filming a scene for a movie.

The evacuee had asked, "Is that what they were doing here last time? It looked so real. Is it Netflix? Is it a Marvel comics' movie? I think I recognize the girl in the costume as the one they shot. What does the _WG_ stand for? Is she going to fly? I don't see any wires."

The cape flapped a bit in the breeze.

When the SFPD units were through evacuating the park, most of them left as well, descending to stand off at the barricades. About a dozen remained and started stabbing the ground with foot-long rods. The exposed top of each rod glowed red a few seconds after being planted.

Lucy said, "That's for Clark's EMT unit. They send lasers to each other and then a coordinated signal back to both drones and their base of operations."

"What are they for?"

"It's called Atlas. It gives them a ground-level, three-D image of the area. It's usually used for targeting."

She watched the police withdraw once they had placed over thirty sensors. "And they think that's going to work against my Wonder Girl?"

Lucy shrugged and smiled. "Heathens, every one of them." A few seconds before Savannah heard the helicopters approaching, Lucy said, "They're coming."

Sage faced southwest to watch the two passenger helicopters approach by flying first over Holly Park and then over their own house.

Both helicopters landed downhill from them on the other side of the access road that curved up to the AT&T tower and its support facility, a single-storey building with walls covered in graffiti. Chase and two other men got out of one helicopter first. Once they were clear, two more men exited it and jogged clear. They carried conventional automatic rifles. Two pairs of men got out last and unloaded portable electronic equipment from the helicopter. They then jogged clear of it and began setting up the equipment on the folding tables they had brought with them.

Electronic equipment near Sage; Chase had brought idiots with him.

"The Apostles," Lucy said and identified each one as they got out of the second helicopter. "Momma, John Atchison, Cedric Hutt, Gwen Hunter, Herman Kolisnek and _that_ _one_ is Tye Rosen."

Chase had enough sense to send the helicopters away once they were unloaded.

Upon their arrival at the park, Sage had said to her, "No one need get hurt, mom. I hope for a fair exchange, that's all."

Sage had not elaborated on what criteria she would use to judge this exchange as fair or not.

Chase and the two men with him remained near the six other men until the four technicians had their laptops and some other electronic gear she didn't recognize—possibly for Atlas—hooked up and operating.

Six square contraptions with propellers at each corner flew up the slope to hover over them. Each one had two cameras attached to the bottom of it to go with two parabolic microphones. They rose up until they vanished into the pale-blue sky above them.

A strong gust of wind from the southwest brought the salty odor of the Pacific Ocean into the park. For a moment, it wrapped the cape around Sage.

Chase, the four men with him and the Apostles crossed the access road and came up the hill to stand before her daughter the super hero.

Savannah's heart fluttered.

A black Ford Explorer came slowly up the access road. It stopped where Chase and his people had crossed. Ann was the first to get out of the SUV. Three other women exited the Ford only after Ann waved for them to come with her. The four women came up the slope past Chase and his group and then past Sage—though Ann did blow Sage a kiss—straight to her and Lucy.

Ann said, "This is Special Agent-in-Charge Nyla Rowe of the FBI. This is Special Agent Joan McGowan, also of the FBI. And this is Dr. Cynthia Thorpe, special advisor to Agent Rowe.

"You've brought a lot of special women with you."

Dr. Thorpe said, "Not as special as the one we're all here for, I think."

"We are just observers," Rowe said, "nothing more."

Sage looked back at them and smiled. Her ridges, her ears and her fingernails began to glow sapphire blue. The suit and cape began glowing a few seconds later. "It's time to get started."

# Chapter 53

She had kept the plastic gun with her. If necessary, she still had over sixty rounds she could use against anyone Chase sent after them.

The three agents with Chase spread out. The other man stayed where he was, as did the rest of the Apostles when Dorothy Cooper joined Chase to approach Sage.

When she took a step to go to her daughter, Ann and Lucy restrained her.

"Please, Savannah," Lucy said, "we must stay out of the way or we might jeopardize Sage's plan."

"I won't let them hurt her."

Ann said, "I don't think they can."

Nyla Rowe, Joan McGowan and Cynthia Thorpe closed ranks around her.

Had Sage orchestrated this gathering of reinforcements just for her?

"Yes," Lucy said.

"Why not?"

Even in the brightest sunlight, Sage's sapphire glow was easy to see. "You are here out of concern for your country's security and safety."

Chase said, "I would hope we all are."

"It is my country, too, Mr. Chase. I have as much right to it as do you, as do all those others like me who will soon come forward. My country has no need to fear what I am. Its people have no need to fear what we are."

Ann said, "I told you she was a miracle. One moment, she barely sounds twelve years old, the next she sounds like she's been around for a thousand years and has the wisdom of the ages. I hope our future has more people like her in it."

She patted her abdomen. "It could end up with at least two more."

"They will come to see that, Timothy, even if people like you won't. _You_ have no need to fear me."

"People around you have died. One of my agents is missing. You have stolen sensitive security data."

Sage raised her hand. "There, it is gone."

Chase held up his hands. "Just like that; you wave your hand and blink and I'm supposed to believe it is all gone?"

"You can trust me, Tim, even if Harvey did make me."

"Trust is a lot to ask for. How do I know the Creators Almighty have deleted the data you gave them?"

"They didn't, I did. All of the data you are worried about has been deleted, including any copies anyone foolishly tried to hide from me. I will protect our nation's security until other safeguards are in place. No one can break in. The Creators Almighty, Muta and my other virtual friends are doing that now. GateGuard will shortly be invincible and all the departments that need to know what changes we are making are being given the details now. You can confirm this with your associate, Joseph Clarke." Sage pointed to the man who had remained where he stood when Chase approached. He had gone to the two tables of equipment to supervise whatever those two teams were trying to do. "See for yourself."

At first, Clarke shrugged his bewilderment, then he began nodding his head until, finally, he held a thumbs-up to Chase. He hollered up the hill, "You have to see this! It's ingenious!"

The five men became engrossed with what they were seeing on the two laptop screens. They pointed to the screens repeatedly, celebrated like their team had just scored, patted each other on the back. Clarke kept signalling Chase with his thumbs up.

Chase was frowning when he looked back at Sage. "That's a nice trick, little girl, but how can we possibly know you and your friends haven't installed malware into our systems? How do we know what we're seeing is real?"

Rowe said, "He's trying to make her angry."

"Why?" Ann said. "She's cooperating. She's helping. She's told him she isn't a threat."

"Ann, you may think she is a miracle, but to Chase, telling him she isn't a threat is the same as a nuclear bomb telling him it will never go off. He just can't take the chance. He wants to see what she will do when she's angry, when there is at least the threat that she is no longer in control."

"He doesn't want to see what I will do if I get angry." She reached into her jacket pocket and gripped the handle of the plastic gun.

Chase and Cooper came closer until they stood face to face with Sage. She, the suit and the cape stopped glowing. She held the cape to keep it from flapping in the breeze.

"You have done nothing yet to convince me you can be trusted. You've done nothing to convince me you aren't dangerous. What happens when things don't go exactly the way you want them to? What would you do if I grabbed you now and detained you?"

Sage's sapphire glow returned. It was beautiful in the sunlight. Her daughter's brilliant, naked scalp could be revered as a symbol of some better future. It was hope.

Savannah shook herself free of such whimsy and put her thumb on the hammer of the gun.

"Tim," Sage said with the patience of a parent trying not to scold, "Harvey has been very busy all over the world. I have much to do because of him. I must not be stopped or this country, indeed the whole world, will face unprecedented danger."

"I suppose you are going to insist you are the only hope for saving all of humanity."

"No, Tim, I am the only hope for only some of humanity. The rest are already lost. But all the people of the world will be lost if I do not complete my work. My hope is you will understand and let me go about my business. We can be allies, Tim. I will send you and Nyla Rowe's task force every bit of information I find about the Proteus Group because they are my enemy, too. They wanted to dissect me. Their people died at Novus Somnia. I will tell you where he is if I can find Harvey. I have set up a contact network."

"Weinberg is dead."

"No, Tim, he wasn't in the vehicle when the avalanche took it into the lake. He knew you had sent Frank after him. He all but asked you to. He used your best agent to sanitize a site he had already finished with. He wanted you and Jacqueline to get everything Frank recovered from there."

"Do you know where Frank Gillett is?"

"That would be telling."

"You can say anything, but you can't back it up with proof."

"We need him for the next little while. You two will get back together soon enough."

Dorothy Cooper stepped back. "This is nonsense." She called to Lucy, "Show some sense, girl."

"I am. You need to believe, momma, all of you do."

"This is not a second sermon on the mount," Cooper shouted back. "This is just a girl who thinks she is more than she really is."

"No, momma, you are the one who thinks you are more than you really are. Sage is everything you can imagine her to be and more."

"I will put an end to this right—" Dorothy Cooper staggered back and wiped blood from her nose. "Stop that, you little fool."

"No, momma, you are being the fool."

Dorothy looked down at the blood on her fingers. "You can't do this to me."

"I don't want to, Dorothy, but Lucy is coming with me. She is my sister and I need her. I need all of you."

With Gwen Hunter leading the way, the other apostles started up the hill.

"Come with us, Themis," Kolisnek said as he and Rosen gathered up Dorothy Cooper when they passed Sage and Chase.

Bewildered and offering no resistance, Cooper came with them as they all gathered around Lucy. Dorothy kept muttering over and over, "Is she really the one?"

"Yes, momma, she is. We can do good work with her, meaningful work for the whole world." Lucy then said to Savannah, "With the suit, the cape and the Apostles, she has all the power she needs now."

While everyone had been distracted by the defection of the Apostles, Chase had retreated back across the service road.

Two units of four men each came charging downhill from the trees at the western edge of the AT&T facility, repeating the same maneuver the Novus Somnia group had used against Sage.

Savannah pulled out her pistol, but Rowe and McGowan restrained her.

McGowan said, "You would only make it worse."

The three agents with Chase charged across the service road.

Lucy came to her. "Just watch."

The Atlas sensors began blowing their tops and fizzling out like badly made fireworks.

Two of the men running downhill suddenly tripped and fell. Then two more did exactly the same thing as though following some practiced comical routine. All four men rose to their knees at the same time and began vomiting.

Two more men fell and rolled downhill a couple of times before ending up on their backs. They began shaking and convulsing as though experiencing seizures.

"She's controlling their reflex circuits," Lucy said. "She's been teaching me how to do it. You can disable someone without harming them."

Sage hadn't bothered to even turn around when the two units began their charge.

Only two of those eight men were left, but they slowed and eventually stopped their charge to go help their comrades. One of them pitched his rifle as far as he could throw it. The other one just dropped to the ground after tentacles of electricity rose up and grabbed him around his ankles.

"She's affecting their neurotransmitters," Ann said.

"No," Lucy corrected. "They are doing it to themselves. She is just providing the stimulus to get them started."

"Either way, they are overloading at the synaptic cleft level."

Nyla Rowe took the pistol and magazines from her just as the four surveillance drones fell to the ground.

The three agents downhill from them stopped their charge and stood with their rifles aimed at Sage. One of them had to jump out of the way of a falling drone.

A faint roar came from the southwest.

"I am disappointed, Tubby," Sage said with that same parental tone, aged a bit and less patient now. She didn't raise her voice but everyone heard what she'd just said over the racket of the drones speeding their way.

"Shit," Rowe said. "I didn't think he'd actually use them. Everyone take cover."

She just got caught up in the stampede up to the trees. Rowe, McGowan, Thorpe and the Apostles helped the incapacitated men to take cover as well.

Rowe hissed, "Stupid asshole. He's determined to push her as far as he can."

The three agents had retreated back to the other side of the service road to watch Chase's toy planes converge on Sage.

Ann, Lucy and Dorothy kept her from running back to her daughter.

Dorothy said to Savannah, "Forgive me. She is the one."

On a clear, warm day like this, Bernal Heights Park should be packed with people and their pets taking selfies, hiking or just relaxing in the sun. Instead, lightning crackled up from the ground into the AT&T communications tower, sending a loud microwave EMP booming through the air.

The lead drone, about thirty feet long, black with a v-shaped tail pointing down and missiles under its wings, and the smaller squad coming with it all exploded at the same time.

Fiery debris fell near where she and the others had stood. Nothing came near Sage.

Chase cried out as wiggling tentacles of electricity wrapped around his ankles. Despite his efforts to resist, he soon dropped to his knees. This hard, unsympathetic giant of a man quivered and trembled against the charge going through him. He fell forward into a crouching position.

Dorothy hooted in triumph. "He's done for now. Two points of contact will complete the circuit."

Chase collapsed facedown onto the ground, but he kept twitching.

Dorothy stepped forward and hollered at him, "You look like a big, fat walrus trying to swim on land."

Savannah heard a sudden burst of laughter before she recognized it as her own.

Dorothy turned to the other Apostles. "I wish we could have done that to him."

There was one synchronized nod from all of the others.

Rowe started for Chase, but Lucy stopped her. "The ground is still full of charge. You would only go down, too."

Chase stopped moving as if he'd just been harpooned.

Savannah heard another sudden burst of laughter that she quickly recognized as coming from Dorothy. The other apostles then started laughing. Rowe chuckled a bit, too.

She led the way out of cover to see Sage still standing in the brightness of the day, still glowing, still smiling and still as unmoving as a statue.

The three agents with Chase lay on the ground unconscious. The eight men they had taken to cover were also unconscious. Those eight were in the shade.

"Some people never learn."

Ann giggled. "That's our girl."

Sage said to Chase, "We must go now. You will never see us again. But you will be witness to all that we do."

She allowed Chase to regain his feet, but his arms still twitched a bit as he tried to wipe himself off. Once, his legs almost gave out. He stood as still as Sage had been. His mouth opened but he said nothing.

The spectators behind the police lines cheered and applauded the scene they had just watched.

Sage turned and came to her. "Ann and Liz, Joan, Nyla and Cynthia will always be there for you. And Ramona will come back soon. You won't be alone."

"Sweetheart, what are you saying?"

"Mom, you heard what I told Chase. Harvey has been busy all over the world making other children like me. Soon, he will return to take back what he has given each of us. We must prepare ourselves."

"You can't leave. You're my daughter. You're only twelve years old."

Sage hugged her and kissed her. "But sometimes I sound like I've been around for a thousand."

She trembled in her daughter's embrace and held on as tight as she could. "I won't let you go. We've been through so much."

Sage kissed her again. "That is why I can do what I have to do." She stepped out of her embrace. "You have always been my great big miracle."

Lucy and Ann came over to hold her hands.

"What now?" She had to smile. "Sorry. I'm so obvious."

"Though dad was only partly my dad, he did love you because you are perfect. Six months from this very day, you will meet a man when he brings his son to Small Wonders House. Don't worry, mom, I took care of its funding a week ago. It is all legitimate. His name will be Paul. His son is Alex. Alex has severe epilepsy and will remind you of me.

"Though you don't believe you can right now, you will fall in love with him. You will help him with Alex, who will grow up to become an English teacher and a writer of beautiful poetry. Paul will fall in love with you because any man who knows you would fall in love with you. But he is the best one for you. Ann and Ben will be your best friends for life. They will be matron of honor and best man at your wedding."

Ann gave up a little chirp of happy surprise.

"You will mostly live happily ever after because you deserve that. You will have moments of sadness. That can't be prevented. You will cry when you think of me, but Paul will always be there for you, and so will Alex, Ann and Ben, and the twins and everyone."

The Apostles gathered around Sage.

"Are you a messiah?"

"No, mom, but she will be here soon. Harvey didn't plan for that. We are all of us much more than he expected."

"Will I ever see you again?"

"I will come back before the end."

"What do you mean by that?"

Sage's blue-on-blue eyes sparkled. Her ears and ridges began to flash. She took hold of her mother's face with her warm, glowing hands and kissed her again. "It is time for you to sleep now, mom. Always remember I love you. Tell Jake and Faith that life is too short to be all intellectual all the time and pussyfoot around."

# *****

She woke up as Ann brought the van to a stop. The sun hadn't quite set over Stinson Beach yet. Ann and Cynthia were still talking about what Sage had done to the men at Bernal Heights Park.

"I wouldn't have been surprised," Ann said, "if she had made them twirl and dance."

"Or just go completely rigid," Cynthia said.

Nyla Rowe looked west once she and McGowan got out of the Explorer. "Look at that view. Jaxon should paint this."

Liz Bergeron had a late dinner prepared for everyone.

Ann and Cynthia took her aside while everyone else went into the dining room.

Her head pounded when she asked, "What happened to me?"

"She put you to sleep. She apologized for the headache, but it should pass quickly once you've ate something."

Cynthia said, "She, Muta and the Apostles are making sure we weren't followed or tracked."

"You can go back to your home and your job in a week or two once everything is settled. You will not be harassed in any way by Chase or any branch of national security or law enforcement. Nyla, Joan and Chase have agreed to that."

"What did she mean she will come back before the end?"

Cynthia took a deep breath. "She has developed diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma. It's a very aggressive form of brain cancer that usually strikes children between five and nine years of age. It often starts in the pons."

Ann took hold of her hand. "It didn't strike her before because she didn't grow her brain until recently. It produces tumors of the glial cells, which normally support and protect the neurons."

"The neural bundles along her spine have developed lesions and tumors. They will eventually spread up to her brain. She estimates she has about three years left, maybe five."

"Why did you let her go? We could have helped her. We could have done something."

Dr. Thorpe shook her head. "She gave Ann and me a very detailed medical description of what is happening to her, Savannah, including some epigenetic causes arising from the technology placed inside her. Her body just isn't designed to support that amazing neural complex inside her for long. In her own words: 'Harvey hadn't yet perfected his techniques when he made me.' We presume her statement means Weinberg still had not developed an accurate method at that time to insert his experimental DNA segments precisely where he wanted them, or control their activation and deactivation. He was impatient. I'm sorry. Nothing can be done to prevent. . . ."

Ann wiped her eyes. "She promised she will return to you before then."

"What am I going to do?"

"She told us to look after you and make sure you eat. And you know what a snit Liz will have if you miss her spread."

"Do you think any of her prophecies will come true?"

"We only have to wait six months to find out about you and Paul. Ben and I have some planning to do starting tomorrow. Boy is he going to be surprised."

Jake and Faith came to fetch them for dinner.

Faith hugged her.

Jake hugged her. "The network is all set. We will be able to talk to her anytime anywhere."

Faith took hold of Jake's hand.

He held them up to show her the ring. "We got her message loud and clear."

"She is a miracle."

Ann said, "Our very own."

# Chapter 54

For the third time this week, he got off the bus near the corner of Galvez Avenue and Horn Avenue close to the old Hunters Point shipyards.

The area, once a major economic force in San Francisco, was being transformed by development into an 'exciting new community for families and the future of San Francisco'. Most of the parcels already developed with new residential buildings were southwest of where he got off. The shipyards were still being decontaminated and reclaimed by the navy. The vast majority of the area was still empty, with the closest inhabited section being a line of old buildings along Horn Avenue, mostly studios occupied by local artists.

What amounted to a bare mound of rock that hadn't been leveled when the navy took over the shipyards in 1939 lay to the southwest. All the buildings on it had been demolished years ago. Scrub, grass, bare rock and fragments of concrete foundations were all it contained now. It provided a buffer zone between the newly developed residential areas and the area he was interested in tonight.

The eastern end of this lump of rock sloped down sixty feet to Spear Avenue to the south, Horn Avenue to the east and Galvez Avenue to the north. It resembled the prow of an aircraft carrier with the flight deck removed. Halfway up this slope from Horn Avenue, a copse of trees overlooked the artists' studios. A path running north to south bisected the copse into a lower half near the bottom of the slope and a upper half that extended to the top of the slope before giving way to the scrub, grass, fragments of concrete and one ring road that resembled a badly designed race track plunked down on top of this very low nose of a hill.

The ring road extended from the end of Coleman Avenue at the eastern limit of the new construction. Construction company on-site trailers circled its perimeter. Like every other night, he had walked up Hill Drive to the top of this mound at Coleman Avenue so he could approach the upper half of the wooded area unseen by anyone on the slope.

At just after 1:00 a.m. on a foggy Saturday, he took up his position in the upper half of trees to wait for the two girls who had been coming to the lower half almost every night for the past two weeks. Happenstance had dumped exactly what he needed in his lap. Cruising Bayview-Hunters Point hadn't yielded any results until he had spotted the two African-American girls sneaking up the slope from Horn Avenue to the lower copse of trees.

He hadn't needed to take the bus; he had just been biding his time. His BMW was parked a block away. The route straight to it was surrounded by those trees, tall bushes and a few derelict buildings still standing in the area. He could conceal himself easily and make a quick getaway once he was done. Tonight was the night to get it done.

After making his life hell, that freaky little retard bitch had made good her escape. Novus Somnia was gone, thanks to that FLRB, and along with it his job. That useless senate review had been disbanded and its members had scattered like leaves in the wind. No one had given him a second thought. Even Pyotr, his fucking Russian friend in Mexico City had abandoned him.

The two girls arrived on foot as they had the past two weeks. The drizzle that had been coming down all day hadn't discouraged them and neither had the fog rolling in from the bay. They took up their usual position along the trail at the top of the lower section of trees. They could keep watch on Horn Avenue from their perch, not that they had actually been doing much these past two weeks despite all the appearance and promise of illicit behavior on their part.

This pair of pretenders weren't likely in senior high school yet. They dressed the way they thought they should to do what they had yet to work up the nerve to carry through with. The short skirts, the white nylon stockings—stark against their dark skin—the dangling earrings, the bright red lipstick, the undone buttons on their sheer, see-through blouses and the push-up bras were a laughable tease for this pair of jailbait wannabes.

They weren't runaways. They were not enticed or coerced newbies to the street. It was a cosplay game for them and they didn't yet have the guts to completely commit to the game. They were two adolescent girls trying to inject some excitement into their lives before their summer break was over, before middleclass boredom tempted them to inject other stuff into themselves.

"Tonight, little girls, you get into the game whether you want to or not." They were going to be easy targets.

Their previous sojourns into playing ladies of the night had resulted in running away any time a potential customer came too close. They usually ended up hiding in the trees together giggling. Most of the time, when some vehicle containing a potential customer had cruised by, they had retreated into the shadows before even being spotted.

They had scampered off into their shadowy wooded sanctuary two nights ago when he had approached on foot to put them to the test. Their biggest sins to date had been smoking and drinking the wine they had smuggled out of their parents' wine racks.

All that pretense and tease was going to end tonight.

They were pretty girls. They were fresh, well fed, perhaps even entitled. They could belong to affluent parents who were part of the Silicon Valley community. They had been given so much they couldn't help but feel empty and convinced they were missing out on some vague special something they knew just had to be outside their comfortable, cossetted life.

Tonight they would learn what it felt like to lose everything they had taken for granted.

In all the time he had watched them play at being naughty, they had never had sense enough to watch their flanks or their rear. They had been overconfident about their concealment and had always kept their focus downhill on Horn Avenue when they weren't just standing around smoking and sipping wine.

Their big moment of excitement so far had been spotting a real pimp bring his real hoes to the streets below them to conduct real business. But witnessing none of the romantic risk they had imagined in what transactions they saw had not deterred them. They had been thrilled and had missed the real sadness and threat of what was taking place before them.

"You haven't seen anything yet, babes in _my_ woods."

He called the taller, skinnier one, the one with the lovely long legs, Dixie. He called the shorter one, the one with the bigger tits, bigger ass and those tight braids of hair along the top of her head Trixie.

No more splashing around in the shallows. Tonight, Dixie and Trixie were going to dive into the deep end of the pool.

Though the Novus Somnia facility was a wasteland of ash and rubble, Area 51, being one floor below ground, like all the other sublevels, had been protected from most of the destruction that FLRB had caused. Along with other employees—the clueless ones who had no idea what had happened to their workplace—he had been allowed to retrieve personal effects after the preliminary phase of the investigation was complete. He had used that opportunity to retrieve the two things he needed to complete his hunts.

Dixie and Trixie appeared to be losing motivation for their unrealized adventure quicker than they usually did this time. They remained concealed—or so they believed—in the lower section of trees and started smoking and drinking as soon as they reached their preferred lookout spot. They weren't interested in getting close to Horn Avenue twenty feet below them even though Saturday nights always provided more potential customers.

Staying where they were was only going to make his work that much easier.

He ducked deeper into the shadows of the upper section of trees to where he had earlier stashed his duffel bag and took out the case containing the electric rifle. He hadn't got the chance to use it on the FLRB's mother, but no one could stand up to the charge it delivered. And it could deliver two quick hits before it had to recharge.

Novus Somnia had done some good research. It had done more than just develop microchip arrays and lines of code to put inside that FLRB. Tonight, Dixie and Trixie were going to experience firsthand one of Novus Somnia's major accomplishments.

He opened the case, took out the parts and assembled the rifle.

This was going to be fun. He would just watch them twitch about on the ground for a while before he dragged them into the seclusion of the trees for what he would do to them next. The big question was who did he shoot first?

There was always a possibility the second target would rabbit. But Dixie and Trixie both wore short, tight black leather skirts and shoes with stiletto heels. They teetered when they came up the path, when they scampered for the shadows away from Horn Avenue. They looked like tightrope walkers about to fall with every step they took. The second target couldn't possibly get away with any speed.

Dixie was the bigger target and also the less competent in high heels. Trixie would be the first to start twitching.

He aimed the rifle using the night scope he had attached to it. The invisible laser exhibited a green line through the scope straight at Trixie's back between her shoulder blades. The readout indicated she was only thirty-three feet away and the rifle was still fully charged.

The two shots presented no challenge at all. Trixie went down flat onto her back once she was hit and started flopping around with the vigorous and promising muscular spasms of a strong, healthy young woman.

Dixie didn't try to flee. At first, she just looked down at her partner in imaginary crime. Then she started laughing and nudged Trixie with her foot because she thought her convulsions were nothing more than a prank. Then she knelt down to check her friend.

"Stupid little fucking bitch."

The second shot, taken the moment Dixie took out her phone to call for help, sent her sprawling on top of Trixie. The two of them just jerked about on the ground together as though wrestling with each other. They could injure themselves if that continued for much longer.

He ran to them, took out the portable stun gun that went with the rifle and zapped each of them again to make them first go stiff and then slack to lie perfectly still. He carried Dixie into the concealed area he had picked out from the many available to him. Then he fetched Trixie. He lifted Trixie over his shoulder and patted her fine, firm ass as he took her back to his den.

As it turned out, who to shoot first wasn't the big question of the night. Who he should play with first was. Up close, Dixie was scrawnier than he'd thought and Trixie's boobs were even bigger than he'd hoped for.

After securing their hands behind their backs with zip straps, he turned them over and laid them out side by side for an easier comparison. He took out scissors and knelt beside Trixie, but he didn't need to cut off her blouse. He could just finish unbuttoning it to get access to those huge, soft chocolate mounds.

He felt along the braids atop Trixie's head. They reminded him of those glowing ridges on top of that FLRB's empty noggin. So what if she knew what he really was? She was long gone now.

Once the blouse was undone, he encountered his next bit of good luck. He didn't need to turn her over again. The clasp of her black bra was at the front.

"I gave you every opportunity to stop, Pat," Gilbert said from behind him.

Pat Pritchett swung around with his scissors held to strike but saw only a red laser dot on his chest.

# *****

Joan McGowan couldn't be sure the table she had just set her laptop on was the same one she'd used the first time. Like the first time, however, she was the first one into the room, which did appear to have been left as it was in anticipation of their return. The only significant difference was the blue shades drawn down over the windows behind her to decrease the glare from the sun.

Nyla and Cynthia came in next and took their same seats. Senator Sutton and Randi Boone came in two minutes later. Randi took the chair Chase had been using.

Sutton took her seat and said, "Timothy won't be joining us. He is currently overseeing with Nyla's colleagues from the FBI the joint investigation of a recently discovered domestic terrorism plot."

A man holding an AR-15 entered the room and stood just inside the door.

Nyla said, "Special Agent Richard Peterson will be posted in the room for the duration of the hearing. Six other special agents are posted outside. A surveillance team has access to all the hotel CCTV feeds as well as the additional ones they have set up. FBI and California Highway Patrol SWAT teams are also in position."

Randi asked, "Do you really think they will try something against us?"

"We are getting very close, and we all know the warning came from a credible source."

Sutton produced a sheet of paper. "Those three are singing like birds. Two members of the European Parliament have been apprehended in Bonn. Two lower-level members of China's National People's Congress have been arrested. Even North Korea is cooperating after a military coup plot was uncovered and prevented. With China's constant persuasion, they have agreed to continue being a member of the international task force centered in Paris."

Randi added, "The constant persuasion has come in the form of conditional relief from some of the economic sanctions against them."

"I'm not sure you are aware of this yet, Cynthia, but Jacqueline Duquesne has been appointed the Canadian liaison to said international task force."

"She's well qualified for it."

Sutton took out her favorite gavel. "As you have all no doubt heard, Pat Pritchett was found dead near the old navy shipyards two nights ago, the victim of a single gunshot to the chest. I have also been informed that his Russian friend in Mexico City was reported missing two weeks ago."

Special Agent Richard Peterson coughed.

Sutton tapped the handle of the gavel against the table. "We do, however, have a number of other witnesses on our menu. Ann Devonshire, Liz Bergeron and Dr. Selena Paden will be here tomorrow. And Savannah Lomax has agreed to be questioned. Dr. Lanyon has given his deposition to Nyla's task force concerning his involvement with _them_. He has been cleared and made available to us for further questioning. Now, Cynthia, what about . . . ?"

"There does appear to be two dormant embryos inside Savannah. The doctors who examined her do not believe they present any threat to her life. She has decided to leave them where they are for now and just monitor them."

"And Joan, I understand we may have a few special guests make appearances later today to provide us with some very provocative new information."

Joan opened her laptop. "They are scheduled to be here this afternoon at two, Senator."

"Then, ladies, whaddya say?" Sutton banged her gavel hard against the table. "Shall we try this again?

THE END

Thank you for reading my book. If you enjoyed it, please take a moment to leave me a review at your favorite retailer.

K.G. Lawrence

_Other Books by K.G. Lawrence_

**WEAR SOMETHING RED**

Book 1 of the Proteus Group Series

Former FBI agent, Joan McGowan, returns to Dominion, Oregon to become the sheriff. Her hopes for a new beginning for herself and her daughter, Shana, are threatened by secrets and suspicions the moment they arrive. WEAR SOMETHING RED is the first book of the Proteus Group series.

# Chapter 1

FBI Special Agent-in-Charge, Joan McGowan, and her team of Travis Meyer, Erica Jensen, Arnold Davidson, Tommy John (TJ) Eccles and Miranda Wong, rode in her van. James Torres and his team followed in their SWAT van. The lights of both vehicles were off. It was exactly 11:30 pm on a moonless August night when she entered the Crowley farm east of Portland. Maple trees lined both sides of the gravel approach road. Travis rode shotgun. He was looking at the buildings through his night-vision binoculars.

"Shit." He pointed to her left. "It looks like they have a machine gun nest on the roof of the barn."

Arnie confirmed through his binoculars. "I see a square of sandbags six high with two heads sticking up above it. One of them is watching us through binoculars. Joan, we're not prepared for—"

A fusillade of bullets penetrated the passenger side of the van. Erica cried out, grabbed her side and slumped against TJ.

"Find cover." She stopped the van and jumped out.

Another round of fire struck both vehicles as Travis and TJ dragged Erica out of the van.

She looked for the SWAT team, but had to duck back behind the driver's door when three bullets zipped past her head.

Torres and his crew were scrambling for cover. They were dragging two of their men toward the trees away from the line of fire and into greater darkness.

A series of explosions set the maple trees on fire one after another creating a line of torches that illuminated her team and made them easier targets.

Travis hollered at her though he was only two feet away, "Erica's dead. We're in the kill zone; we gotta move."

The machine gun on top of the barn opened fire on Torres' unit. Two more SWAT crew were hit.

Two others had raced back to their van and were pulling out whatever gear they could get as fast as they could. One of them was shot in the leg. Before the other could drag him away, the SWAT van exploded.

"There." She pointed to a pasture of tall corn.

Torres and what was left of his unit were already entering the cornfield. They had left three of their own behind.

Gunfire came from everywhere. Her team's arrival had been anticipated. They had been surrounded using precise military countermeasures conceived to be rapid and overwhelming.

"Joan, come on!" Travis grabbed her to get her going.

Arnie came to her, but dropped to the ground at her feet before he could say anything. TJ and Miranda had made it to the cornfield and Torres' unit.

Travis pushed Arnie off her foot. "Joan, come on!"

Gunfire began sweeping across the cornfield from all directions.

"There were only supposed to be three of them," she muttered.

"Fuck that." He tried to pull her over Arnie, but suddenly jerked back, twisted and fell sideways against the van.

She fired her AR15 into the darkness through a 180 degree arc. It sounded like she had only hit tree trunks.

Powerful explosions started going off all over the farm. Fireballs shot into the sky, adding additional haphazard lighting to the scene.

An explosion on the other side of the van rocked it into the back of her head and knocked her down onto Arnie's body. She tasted blood when she pushed herself back up. Something had struck her right cheek. The gash was about two inches long and almost as wide as her finger. Blood had run down from it into her mouth.

Torres' people returned fire sporadically, but mostly they were just trying to find better cover than stalks of corn.

She checked for the flash of the machine gun to see where it was aiming, but it stopped firing. A moment after that, the nest exploded and set the barn on fire. A brief cry of victory erupted from the cornfield before even heavier crossfire strafed it again.

There were only supposed to be three suspected terrorists at the Crowley farm. They weren't supposed to be this well trained and equipped . . . or reinforced.

She ducked under more gunfire aimed at the van and checked Travis. He'd been struck in the neck just above his bulletproof vest. He spit up blood when he tried to speak.

"San Francisco." He coughed and sagged down into death. The apology and regret in his eyes hadn't been necessary.

She peeked out from behind the driver's door toward the farm buildings. The barn was fully engulfed in flames. The farmhouse was dark.

"Joan," TJ called from across the drive. He was signaling there was cover back toward the entrance to the farm.

Another burst of gunfire swept through the cornfield. Another one of her team cried out.

A man lunged from the darkness at TJ, then another. They knocked him to the ground and clubbed him. Each one looked at her before they dragged TJ up to his knees, grabbed his hair, raised his head so he could face her and then decapitated him with one hard swing of a machete. They were doing all this for her, a display for the commander of the operation. One of them picked up TJ's head and prepared to toss it at her.

She aimed and fired. They both exploded in flames and dropped onto TJ.

Two more men running along the access road opened fire on her. They passed through the light of each burning tree and vanished into intense darkness only to reappear again at the next tree. They were dressed in the same gear as the other two: cargo pants and hunting vests. All the pockets were likely stuffed with incendiary explosives.

Martyrs to their cause: to attack at the heart of American law enforcement and security. Michael and Shana would never be told how she died. Her casket would need to be kept closed after they were through with her. The critical incident report would be classified Top Secret for reasons of national security and available for high-clearance level Internal Review Only.

She laid down on Arnie and returned fire. Neither man tried to avoid being hit. They were determined to be the one to get the commander. Radicalized young men, they were already the exalted dead.

She squeezed her eyes shut and kept firing. First one man exploded into a running fireball, then the other just ten feet from her. A piece of burning vest with two ribs and tissue stuck to it bounced off the van and landed beside her. A pair of burning legs dropped to the ground three feet to her left.

Spotlights shone down on her as two helicopters flew in.

Miranda stood across the access road just looking down at TJ and the burning remains of his two killers. She was covered in blood.

When Joan detected movement to Wong's right, she launched herself across the road, but a bullet struck her right shoulder and knocked her back against the van. She could just see Miranda moving in and out of the blazing light while fighting off two men wielding machetes. Lights came along the access road just before everything went dark.

She woke up to Deputy Assistant Director Lorne Wozniak asking, "How did we end up with this debacle? Our intelligence was valid and reliable; now eleven of our own are dead."

She was in the back of an ambulance with bandages on her right shoulder and her right cheek and an IV in her left arm. The rear door was open. It was morning.

Wozniak was questioning Torres and Wong. "Just how many were there?"

"We've counted what could be nine," Torres replied. "There may have been more. It felt like there were more."

Wong, her arms and hands wrapped in bandages, said, "They all wore vests containing thermite. There is little left of any of them but ash and smoke."

Torres glanced at her. "They used tunnels to surround us."

"Tunnels and eleven of us dead in less than fifteen minutes," Wozniak said. "You'd think we were in Iraq."

Joan laid back and closed her eyes. She was out again in seconds.

# Chapter 2

She turned off Highway 44 to enter Dominion, Oregon, looked over at Shana, fourteen, and swallowed hard. The heat of late August could do nothing against the chill inside her. Her breath caught when she started to speak.

"Mattie tells me they expect Dominion to more than double in size over the next ten years now that Do-Dads and Karyon Research are coming."

"Good, then it will have twice as many losers in it."

Joan's face flushed with heat. "There are lots of places to ride around here. The highway has a good shoulder. We could go all the way to Widow Creek and back. I'll show you some of my favorite routes once we're settled. It's going to be fantastic, you'll see."

Shana lowered her head and looked out the window. "Every friend I had is back in Portland."

"Portland is barely a hundred miles to the west. It's not like we've moved to another galaxy."

"You could have fooled me."

"You'll make new friends. You may even find a new BFF." She winced. You have to stop giving her material to work with.

"Like you and Mattie Griffin? How long has it been?"

Sweat beaded on her forehead. "Seventeen years."

"Must be a record for a BFF; seventeen years since you've last seen each other. That's longer than I've been your special treasure. And I've never heard of her. And then she calls, out of the blue, to offer you this job."

"She heard I was no longer with the FBI. She called only to advise me of an opportunity, that's all."

Of the three survivors, she had lasted the longest at the Bureau after . . . A year to the date after the Crowley Farm Incident, she was the only one of the fourteen still alive.

"And you just grabbed it." She stuck her ear buds back in.

"We're not doing this again. I've taken the job. Let's make the best of it."

She took the Mazda CX-5 downhill from the highway onto Thurlow Street to officially enter Dominion. Her ears popped as if she had just taken them through some barrier that would block any attempt to escape. Shana would love that. She could spend all eternity pointing out to her mother what a mess she'd made of their lives . . . again.

Was this the right time to be making this move? She had to make it the right time. Waiting for the perfect moment and just wishing for a few quiet years with Shana before her bold, courageous, overconfident daughter struck out on her own was too passive. She had to focus on the moment, keep to her plan and hope coming back to where her mother and father had died didn't somehow cost her Shana, too.

She looked around as they proceeded along Thurlow. Nothing seemed to be in the right place, but she'd never been familiar with this part of town.

Shana tapped the navigation screen protruding above the center console. "You just missed your turn."

Her glowing face threatened to burst into flames. Hot on the surface, freezing at her core; that was some way to return to Dominion. She pulled to the curb, checked both ways and then made a U-turn to get back to . . .

"Turn right at Middlemarch." Shana took out her ear buds. "Who names a street Middlemarch?"

"The street didn't exist when I lived here. The town didn't come this far west. That's why I didn't recognize anything."

"This must be part of their rapid growth you were told about . . . or that other galaxy."

"Shana, so help me."

"Just kidding." She put her ear buds back in. "Main Street is three blocks ahead. You turn right there." Her daughter's naturally condescending and sarcastic tone then added, "You'll probably recognize that one."

Joan sighed and turned right at Main Street.

Mattie Griffin, in her red Griffin Real Estate blazer, white blouse and grey skirt, was standing in front of her office with Harry Madsen, the retiring sheriff. A rotund man in his sixties, Madsen was the one who officially offered her the job of replacing him.

She parked and got out. Shana stayed in the car bobbing her head slightly to whatever song was coming out of her ear buds.

Mattie, thirty-six, her hair short and neat and back to its natural tawny color, still looked like she could perform every wicked cheerleader move as easily now as she could back in high school. She held out her hand but quickly pulled it back.

"Oh, I'm being so silly." Mattie hugged her. "It's good to see you again, Joanie. I've missed you very much."

Joan glanced at Shana's bobbing head as Mattie squeezed her hard.

Shana glanced back, deigned to smirk at her and mouthed, "Seventeen years."

Mattie released her and stepped back, bent over slightly and waved hello at her head-bobbing daughter. "She's certainly pretty, and tall, too, from the looks of her."

"Six feet one inch," she said.

Madsen asked, "How old did you say she is?"

"Fourteen."

Madsen only shook her hand and tipped an imaginary hat at Shana, who had her head down and her eyes closed.

"I just wanted to let you know I'll be hanging around for a bit longer. I still have a couple of cases I'm investigating. But I will do my best to stay out of your way. Take the weekend to get yourself settled. I'll drop by the office and fill you in on Monday." With first a wave to her and Shana, then to Mattie, he walked off.

What was Madsen up to? Was he lingering so he could look over her shoulder despite having promised when he offered her the job that he wouldn't interfere? Was he going to stick around just to meddle? Monday, she would set him straight about that first thing.

"What two cases?"

Mattie shrugged. "You know the one. It's made us famous: Stanford Wiley and his Ponzi scheme."

"He embezzled lots of money."

"Oh, it's much more than that. He bilked thousands of clients out of billions of dollars. I think it's supposed to be the largest haul ever. No one really knows how he did it and not even your former employer can find any of it."

"Why is Madsen still involved?"

"I believe someone there asked Harry to stay on the case."

Her ears joined her face for this new burst of heat.

Mattie said, "Never mind about that for now. I'm sure Harry will bring you up to date on Monday. Who knows, he may even ask for your help. After all, you'll be in charge then."

Mattie could be right. Madsen could be exactly what he said he was. Harry Madsen, Kate Eiger, the former mayor and Leonard Jones, the current mayor, had interviewed her for the job. Madsen had been the most challenging at times because of his experience, but once the interview was over he had also been the one to tell her the most about the changes to Dominion since she'd left. He remembered her and Mattie and their troupe of girls causing minor havoc as teenagers, especially during that summer at Quarrelle Lake. He had behaved as if she were already the sheriff, though there were still two other candidates for the job yet to be interviewed. One, so he'd told her, had more relevant experience as a sheriff.

"Shall we go?" Mattie was trying to usher her back to her Mazda.

"Sorry."

"It's a lot to take in right now, but you'll settle quickly." She chuckled. "It's like riding a bicycle."

"What's the other case?"

"Just a local missing person; Albert Nguyen vanished about three weeks ago."

"Why is that a case? Are there suspicious circumstances?"

"He delivers produce to local stores and restaurants. I can't see anything suspicious in that. Harry's most likely hanging on to it because he and Albert were friends." She led Joan to her Mazda and then pointed to her silver Mercedes C350 Coupe across the street. "Follow me. It's an old house, a Victorian design that needs a lot of work."

"What kind of work?"

"Nothing serious, just the kind of renovations you told me you like doing." She hurried to her Mercedes, waved and got in.

Joan got into the CX-5, started it and made a U-turn to tuck in behind the Merc.

"I guess," Shana said, "all sheriffs are allowed to make U-turns anywhere, anytime. Oh, wait you're not the sheriff until Monday."

She scowled at her daughter, which brought a wider grin to Shana's face than she could manage in response to Mattie's greeting. There had to be a good military college in the Ural Mountains, there just had to be.

Following Mattie took them back through the same territory she had traversed after first entering the city.

"You remember this part, don't you?" Shana said with a sardonic tone that would make that famous Vulcan greeting sound like an insult.

She just responded with a snarling smile and wondered about Madsen's two remaining cases. She knew about the Wiley case. She knew about the billions of dollars that no one could find. Looking up as much as she could with the expectation that she would be brought into the case as sheriff; she had soon run into roadblocks from her former superiors with the explanation that she was no longer privy to information on FBI cases.

Madsen was still privy to information on FBI cases. Why ask him to continue rather than pass the case to her? She may not have enough relevant experience for sheriff work, but she certainly had enough FBI experience to know how to work that type of case.

Before she'd been cut off, Colin Foster had told her Wiley's schemes even threatened national security. Would Madsen know what that threat was, or was his handler at the FBI keeping him on a short leash?

Nestled in a crescent-shaped valley on the west side of the Cascade Mountains sixty miles south of Mt Hood, Dominion had grown from a Department of Forestry fire monitoring station prosaically nicknamed Firetown to be incorporated in 1928. During her time here, the only outsiders who ever came to Dominion were the campers, and later the cabin folk, who came for the area's one natural treasure: Quarrelle Lake. Campers favored the Midnight Fire Campgrounds at the north end of the lake, the cabin folk resided just west of that in Cabin Country, away from where Dominion's boisterous children, including her troupe in her day, hung out in the south at the end of Ditchburg Road.

Dominion had done a competent job of keeping up with change even after two of its main employers, Timber Brewery and its companion Treeline Winery, closed their doors just before she left seventeen years ago. According to Madsen, all 6,897 citizens of Dominion were excited about the coming of Do-Dads and Karyon Research and the plans to develop both summer and winter sports facilities for tourists. There were plans to expand Cottage Country to go with ambitious plans to revitalize Dominion's core. And in amongst all this anticipation, Stanford Wiley, a local financial advisor, had developed an internet-based investment con to both embezzle billions of dollars and then hide it where no one could find it.

Shana said, "Unless you want to change your mind and leave, which is all right with me, you better make the turn."

Mattie had moved to the left-turn lane at the corner of Lafleur and Madigan, two streets new to her.

She quickly checked, saw that no other car was coming and slipped the Mazda in behind the Merc.

"I suppose sheriff's get to do that all the time, too."

Joan glanced at the Cascade Mountains to the north and east. If she took Shana up the old forestry road and dumped her, it would take her at least two days to get back on her own.

Mattie turned left when the light changed.

Joan had to wait for two cars coming the other way before she could follow.

Shana muttered, "That must be rush hour."

She floored the gas pedal as she made her turn. The CX-5 didn't have enough power to win a race with a running Harry Madsen, something she couldn't imagine him even doing anymore, but combined with the sharp left turn she'd just made, it created enough centrifugal force to knock her daughter into her door.

Shana sneered at her before continuing her search for some song on her smartphone. She had stopped slouching, however.

"Sorry."

"No you're not."

"Ours is a special relationship."

"Whatever." Shana found her song, started it and put her head back against the headrest. She closed her eyes and hummed along to the songs every now and then.

Joan stayed behind Mattie as they passed through a newer neighborhood—newer in that it wasn't there when she'd moved away after the murder-suicide of her parents.

Finally, Mattie reached Yew Street and pulled over to park.

Joan parked behind her. It was an older neighborhood, but well maintained. Smaller homes and tract houses dominated the area. The occasional newer home, and even a couple of new ones currently being built, stuck out amid the modest residences like ostentatious neighbors. These homes weren't built to last forever, but seeing old ones go down always seemed cold and sad. It was a sentiment she and Shana and Michael shared.

She remembered this area of Dominion. Riley Hitchcock, the biggest liar in her class, who had always claimed to be related to the famous movie maker, had lived on Oak Street a few blocks away. The first time she had ever exposed her breasts to a boy was to Riley in his basement when she was fourteen, her daughter's age.

Shana was a gorgeous young woman with long, fine brunette hair like her mother, a tall, lean, athletic body, brown eyes sparkling with shards of bronze in them that were only going to break more hearts as she became a full grown woman, and breasts that were perfectly sized and perfectly shaped for her frame. While Riley Hitchcock had been fascinated and thrilled, he'd also been a bit disappointed at her lack of substance at fourteen. He would have fainted if he'd seen Shana topless.

Mattie was out of her Mercedes and standing by the gate before Joan had turned off her Mazda.

Her throat felt dry. The list of things she and Shana needed to talk about was just getting longer with every day she put it off.

"Oh, look," Shana said in an almost flawless imitation of Mattie's voice. "It's even got a white picket fence. Isn't that delightful?"

How could she have even heard Mattie with the window up and those damned buds stuck in her ears?

Shana was a mother's dream come true, but surely a quick smack up the side of her head might be enough to bring about a change in her attitude. The risk was that it would probably just get worse. And she would never hit her daughter anyway so it was an empty threat.

Joan got out, surprised to see Shana also getting out rather than remain in the Mazda. Having to stretch out cramps and find relief from a numb bum was a great motivator.

The Mazda was a bit short for Shana's length, especially with the rear of it full of stuff pressing against the back of her seat. It also drove like a go-cart, complete with point-and-shoot handling and transferring to its occupants everything the road had to offer by way of bumps and noise.

Mattie started her spiel the moment they got to her. "As I told you in my email, this house had been tied up in probate, but that's settled now and the executors are eager to clear the estate. We'll finalize the paperwork once the other executor is back from Eugene. Shall we go in?"

As she looked at their new home, Joan realized she hadn't been inside a house in Dominion since the night her old home burned to the ground with mother and father inside. She had spent the last few weeks in a motel room, having lost everything in the fire, before leaving to attend UCLA.

"That neighborhood we passed through," she said.

"Fleetwood Grove."

"Named after the dowager, Abigail Fleetwood, who spent her husband's fortune reclaiming areas he had clear cut to make."

"See? It's all coming back to you."

Shana said, "Just another thing to look forward to."

Mattie's smile didn't waver a bit. "Albert Nguyen lives there."

"The man who disappeared?"

"See?" Shana said. "You remember that, too."

"Shall we?" Mattie took hold of the gate.

**REMBRANDT BE DAMNED**

Book 2 of the Proteus Group Series

#  Chapter 1

Within the hour, Jaxon Trevelyan would fall overboard onto a dead man. At the moment, he stood on the aft deck of the RBD Dagger concentrating on not becoming any queasier than he already was.

The Dagger belonged to Jerome Remington, one of the most powerful sharks-in-a-suit in New York City. He was President of Remington Bakersfield Draper, or just RBD. If you didn't know who they were and what they did from their headquarters in Lower Manhattan that was your problem.

"There you are," Cissy said as she came out of the salon. "I've been looking all over for you."

Cecilia (Cissy) Remington was the reason he was on the Hatteras 100RPH trying to make his stomach behave as the yacht pitched about on the Atlantic.

They'd met three weeks ago at an exhibition of his best friend's newest paintings.

She'd started with, "If that's his mad slash of brush work, it looks more like his plop and dribble technique."

Mad slash of brush work had become the catchphrase description of Sean Hennessey's style after his drunken appearance on the cable program New York City Arts.

He had countered with, "It's his own."

"It would have to be. I don't believe anyone else would bother with it."

She had changed into white slacks, a navy blue sweatshirt with the North Shore Yacht Club emblem on it and deck shoes but no socks. Her new earrings, her bracelet watch with a face so small one needed a magnifying glass to read it and the ring on her right ring finger matched the color of her sweatshirt. She went without a necklace on this jaunt.

"I can't go very far." Every word was going to be a challenge. Who knew what might come out with it?

She had pointed to a portrait of a nude girl. "Is that supposed to be his tribute to Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring?" She'd squinted and looked closer. "What is that?"

"Naked virgin with a squid stuck in her hair."

"And that, I suppose, is his rendition of Rembrandt's Slaughtered Ox."

"It's Canadian Back Bacon, actually."

Cissy kissed his cheek. "You didn't tell me you were such a landlubber."

He'd defended Sean's reputation admirably, or so he'd thought. "He likes to poke fun at other painters."

"Well, that Long Island Shore landscape is atrocious. I've seen more artistry in crop circles."

Sean Hennessey had painted that atrocious landscape to poke fun at his best friend's two landscapes of the eastern shores of Long Island after Hurricane Sandy had struck.

"Because," Sean had told him, "you're so bloody religiously serious about it all."

What he had meant to say to her in response was, "Why don't you shut your lovely lips before I make them fat." What he had said was, "He does mock quite a few of the masters, yes."

"We agree then. He makes a mockery of painting as art."

Then she had turned her invective on him, including remarks about what his level of artistic skill must be like, considering she had never heard of him or any exhibition of his works.

He looked past Cissy at the other guests gathered around the bar. Seventeen people were on the yacht, not counting the crew. None of them seemed to be having the difficulty he was with the Atlantic.

"I didn't know I was until tonight."

He had left the gallery rather than throw his punch in her face.

She had followed him out to continue their argument, or so he'd thought. Instead, she'd asked him out on a date. He'd politely declined and walked back to his studio. She'd sidled up beside him, slipped her hand into his and they'd spent the rest of the evening and most of the next day screwing their brains and artistic disagreements out. In between bouts of vigorous, physically hazardous sex, she had examined his paintings and declared that she loved them, that he had real talent and that she was exactly who he needed in his life.

They'd had hot, sticky, dirty, wicked sex—Cissy's term—at her penthouse condo on Central Park West—at 2300 square feet, it was four times the size of his apartment and about twenty times more expensive—every night since, which included a couple of times each out on her east terrace and then her south terrace.

Cissy invoked in him the same awe and admiration he had previously reserved only for Rembrandt's works. Her beauty was natural and undeniable. Straight blonde hair hung to the small of her back when it wasn't whipping around in passion or sprawled about her when she was looking up at him with green eyes, a small, elegant nose and those thin lips he could only conclude were perfect. Her body, lean and firm and far suppler than his, did everything she asked of it with fluid obedience.

When they weren't busy throwing his spine out and then putting it back into correct alignment, she was constantly telling him about all the wonderful things that were going to happen to him as both a man and an artist now that she was in his life. One of those wonderful things was supposed to be this cruise on her father's yacht on the last Saturday of April.

"Maybe the lobster didn't agree with you."

The Dagger was out of the North Shore Yacht Club at Manhasset Bay. Jerome Remington and his guests had spent the day coming down the East River to New York Harbor. The Dagger then sailed up the Hudson to pick up him and Cissy at the North Cove Yacht Harbor at 7:00 pm. The Dagger was on time. He and Cissy came from her condo by taxi after dining there and were ten minutes late, which had nothing to do with NYC traffic. The plan was to sail out past Sandy Point for a short excursion into the Atlantic before hugging the east coast of Long Island to disembark at the Freeport Bay Marina. There, they would dine late, spend the night and return to Manhattan tomorrow.

"It isn't the lobster."

He gripped the railing and looked out at the faint lights of Brooklyn coming on against the setting sun. They had been on this damned aquatic rocking horse for only an hour and he wasn't sure how much longer he could hold on to supper before making more room for their planned late dining. The smell of salt and foam wasn't helping him keep it down. The chill in the air that made him shiver only increased his queasiness.

She kissed his mouth; a great act of courage. "I'll get you something for it. I know just what you need."

She glided back into the salon and descended a set of circling stairs down to the galley and staterooms.

Jerome Remington, two other men and an African-American woman dressed as neatly and appropriately as Cissy were having a quiet but strained conversation near the bar. Remington, the woman and the tall, thin one of the two other men were focusing their conversation on the fourth member of the entourage: an older, shorter, heavier man nowhere near as vital as the trio against him. He was constantly gesticulating as if trying to hold them all off and offer his apology at the same time. The quartet, at the suggestion of the woman, moved away from the bar and headed below using the same stairs Cissy had used.

"Don't you look casual," a high, nasal male voice said, "and I'd say a bit green around the gills."

The man, six inches shorter than him, held out his hand. "Adrian Remington. My two seaworthy mates here are Bryce Kessler and Eugene Draper. We've been waiting for three weeks to meet you, but my devious sister has been keeping you to herself. We thought we would seize the opportunity while she was away."

Jaxon shook hands with men in their mid-twenties, all wearing similar yachting gear, complete with red, white and yellow windbreakers with the yacht's name and the three-banner RBD emblem on them. He wore faded jeans, old Nikes, a grey American Museum of Natural History sweatshirt over his blue Empire State Building T-shirt. It was his casual wear. He wore it a lot.

The three men were drinking martinis. They were tipsy but not in the same way he was.

Over the top of Adrian's head, he spotted the man Remington had been intimidating come up the stairs alone, go straight to the bar and order a drink.

Adrian, his straight blond hair slicked back over his head, stepped away to look him over, nodded and flashed a smirk at his two buddies. "I see she hasn't started dressing you yet. But just wait, she'll turn you into a Ken doll soon enough."

Adrian had the same slender build as Cissy and was just as tanned. It made Cissy appear healthy, composed and graceful. It made Adrian appear emaciated, even with the tan, and effete.

While the bartender mixed the drink, the African-American woman came up the stairs and snuck up behind the man.

Jaxon gripped the railing harder when the Dagger suddenly pitched upward and dropped back down an instant later.

Adrian reached up to put an arm around Jaxon's shoulder as he sipped his martini. "You strike me as a nice guy, Jax, which means you're only going to finish last with this crowd, _and_ with Cissy. I'll give you a month or two, tops. She'll lose interest quickly, she always does."

Bryce, about his height and ten pounds lighter at 6'1" and near 180, said with sage wisdom as he lifted his martini to his mouth, "Always." He finished the cocktail in one gulp, ran his fingers through his thick bush of blond hair two shades darker than the Remington siblings' color and headed back to the bar for another martini all in one smooth motion.

Bryce, Adrian and Eugene might look a little bit more casual and seaworthy if they had some regurgitated steak and lobster on their jackets, chinos and deck shoes.

The woman put a hand on the man's shoulder, whispered something into his ear and waved off the prepared drink.

"You paint stuff," Eugene said, "isn't that right?" As short as Adrian and the heaviest of the three, he clearly came from similar wealth, but on him the clothes still had an ill-fitting, hand-me-down appearance to them. He was the dowdy tagalong of the trio.

"I paint."

She took the man by his arm, giving every impression she could and would twist it behind his back if she had to, and led him back to the stairs. The guests politely looked away, but conversations paused until the pair started down.

"I understand it's very clear stuff, comparable to Rockwell's work for The Saturday Evening Post. There's no doubt what it is and no doubt what it isn't . . . art, right?"

Adrian asked, "What exactly is it, Jax? What do you paint?"

Eugene answered for him, "Landscapes, stuff like that. I understand you've painted almost every bridge in New York, and the rivers, and the derelict areas, inspiring stuff like that."

"Is that right, Jax?" Adrian plucked the olive out of his glass and popped it into his mouth. "And it's art, right?"

"Art is so subjective, though," Bryce said and ran his fingers through his hair again before taking another sip of his martini. "Jaxon's paintings of what's left of the Domino Sugar factory and the Red Hook Grain Terminal aren't half bad."

He hadn't noticed Bryce return.

"Damned by," Eugene muttered.

Adrian put his arm around him again. "She does like struggling artists, Jax, I'll give her that. So, what does that make you? You're not an American in Paris because you're not in Paris and your new patron is actually younger than you."

Eugene finished his drink. "He's a Canadian in New York."

"I didn't know that. You're from Canada?"

Jaxon nodded.

"Whereabouts? Would I know it?"

"Abbotsford, British Columbia."

"Abbotsford, British Columbia." He smirked again at his two buddies. "Never heard of it, Jaxon, old man, but I'm sure it's a place to be proud of." Without looking, he held the empty glass out for Eugene to take back to the bar for a refill. "I'll bet your high school yearbook had you as the one most likely to live off women for the rest of your life."

"I don't have a rich father."

Adrian tried to yank him into a headlock, which only forced the twerp up onto his toes and brought his face close enough for a head butt. "First, she'll always be heartbreakingly too busy and unable to see you that night or for the foreseeable future. Then she won't return your calls. Then what?" He shrugged, still squeezing hard on Jaxon's neck. The force was more downward than sideways.

Jaxon clung to the railing and didn't act on his impulse to grab Cissy's pipsqueak of a brother by the waist of his chinos and just . . .

Eugene returned and handed over the martini, which required Adrian let go of him to take it.

"Oh, yes, after you've driven yourself mad with worry, she'll call you and tell you she just has to see you right away, which will delight you until you find out she only wants to tell you there's someone else."

"You'll be number seven," Eugene said. "I think it's seven."

Adrian counted on his fingers, Bryce and Eugene joined him.

"Seven or nine," Adrian said.

Eugene and Bryce were smirking the way Adrian had as the trio finished their martinis together. Adrian suddenly stiffened. Eugene and Bryce suddenly looked west at the last of the sunset and lowered their martini glasses as if trying to hide lit cigarettes from their parents.

Jerome Remington and the woman had come back up to the salon. They spoke to the bartender and were handed a number of towels before returning below deck. Cissy came up the same stairs holding a glass of water a few seconds later. She scowled when she saw who was with him.

"Uh-oh." Adrian cringed, but there was no real concern behind it.

Cissy brought him the drink. She was taller than her brother by a couple of inches. "This should help."

He drank what was clearly not water. It was bitter, sent frigid bugs scampering down his spine and convulsed his stomach. When he tried to thank her, he belched in her face loud enough to be heard over the Dagger's twin diesels, the wind rushing past and the slapping of the water against the yacht's hull.

"Fog's rolling in," Adrian said. He tried to lower his voice but it just cracked. "Best we get this tug turned around before it gets too thick."

"You three are the only things thick around here."

Adrian tried to give her a kiss, but she gracefully dodged his projectile of a face, which sent him staggering for the port side of the yacht. Bryce and Eugene were just able to catch him.

"Have a good evening, dear sister. And you, too, Jaxon, old boy, enjoy it while you can."

He waved at them both before taking his two buddies for more martinis. The guests near the bar moved off as the trio approached.

"Pay no attention to him," Cissy said. "Half the time he doesn't mean what he's saying because half the time he doesn't know what he's saying."

"And the other half?"

"He's usually unconscious or off somewhere with those other two."

He noticed movement to their right before he could ask how far back seven or nine took her.

Captain Pierre de la Tour came to them from the salon. He took off his cap when he reached them and said to Jaxon, "Mr. Remington will see you now, sir."

# Chapter 2

"I thought we were going to meet him together."

She kissed his cheek and shrugged. "Father has his ways."

Captain de la Tour said, "If you will come with me, please, sir. Mr. Remington does not like to be kept waiting."

Cissy took his glass and encouraged him with a gentle push from behind. "I'll be waiting here, darling."

The captain led him down the circular stairs to the lower deck and then forward to Remington's master bedroom suite. Remington and the three who'd been with him at the bar stood around a circular table. The captain nodded to Remington and left.

"Jaxon Trevelyan." Cissy's father came to him with his hand held out. "Jerome Remington. I'm very glad to finally meet you."

He was taller than Cissy by a couple of inches, not slender like his two offspring, had dark hair and hard, blue eyes. His grip was strong, his hand felt rough. Like shark skin should feel, Jaxon supposed

"Let me introduce my colleagues. This lovely young woman is Nyla Rowe, our Chief Operations Officer. I'm quite sure we would be dead in the water if not for her captaincy."

It was the first nautical metaphor he'd heard since boarding the yacht.

"She has incredible organizational skills, a talent for details that bewilders me, a superb analytical mind, and she's tough enough to shrivel your balls. For all I know, she may be running the company in ways I'm not even aware of."

"That's what makes me perfect for RBD because you're only concerned with results." Rowe shook his hand. Her grip was as strong as Remington's, though her skin had no roughness to it. "That's an interesting spelling of your first name, Mr. Trevelyan."

Her strong jaw line set off an oval face. Large brown eyes and hints of epicanthic folds imparted a sultry quality to her countenance highlighted by properly shaped eyebrows, proudly flaring nostrils and full lips covered in red lipstick that went with her nail polish. Her black hair was long and pulled back from her face into a high bun that made him think of a Nubian queen. Unlike Cissy, she wore no jewelry and her watch was a very bland digital-faced device for practical purposes only.

"Actually, it's a misspelling of my intended first name."

"How so?"

"When I was born, the computer at the hospital that was supposed to record all of my particulars for legal registration was broken. They had to fill out the form by hand. And wouldn't you know it the doctor's writing was illegible. When the form was submitted to vital statistics, whoever transcribed it read the scribbled 's' in my name as an 'x'. I have had to bear the shame of it ever since."

Rowe, her confident eyes capable of holding as firmly as her handshake, said, "It's unique."

The rail-thin man stepped forward. "Morris Triton, Jaxon, good to meet you." His handshake was as rough as Remington's. Their eyes were level with each other's.

"Morris is my partner in crime masquerading as the CEO of Remington Bakersfield Draper."

The man they all seemed to have been picking on earlier still appeared as cowering as he had at the bar. "I have no humorous anecdote for my name, Mr. Trevelyan. I'm John Smith."

"Speaks for itself, doesn't it?"

There was no humor in the man at all. He rolled his r's but that was the only hint of an accent he gave away.

Remington chuckled and moved to prevent Smith from stepping forward and shaking his hand. "If you will excuse John, he was just about to rejoin our other guests."

Smith left the suite almost bowing as if a peasant who had just be granted leniency from his lord. Probably most people at RBD had the same reaction after an audience with any one of these three.

Nyla Rowe went to a small bar and poured a drink from a pitcher. She brought the martini to Jaxon.

He declined. "I'm afraid the Atlantic and I have been arguing over what I am made of since the beginning of the trip. One of those may force me to reveal exactly what that is."

Rowe smirked at him the same way Adrian, Bryce and Eugene had—and Cissy, too, when she'd pushed at him, now that he thought of it—and returned the martini to the bar. "We can't have that."

"So, Jaxon," Remington said, "Cissy tells me you're an artist, that you have just completed your MFA at Columbia, that you have an apartment in Brooklyn and share a studio in Chelsea with three other artists, and that, as with all talented but as yet undiscovered artists, you are struggling to make ends meet."

Rowe was drinking the martini he'd refused. She was looking at Triton over the top of the glass. If eyes were windows to the soul, those two souls were intolerant of artists as precisely categorized as Remington had just done to him.

"New York, ya just gotta love it."

"Perhaps I could help you with your monetary issues."

Had this been one of Cissy's wonderful things planned for him? She'd been evasive when he'd asked her for details of what she was doing on his behalf.

Rowe finished the martini and said, "He means a job, Jaxon, that's all."

Remington chuckled. "Of course that's what I mean."

Triton said, "He wasn't offering to buy you off to get you away from Cecilia. She can handle herself, I assure you."

Remington asked, "Is that what you thought?"

"It wasn't that. I've known Cissy for three weeks. In that brief time I have been overwhelmed by her enthusiasm and drive to help me. I appreciate everything she's done, but, as with all talented but as yet undiscovered, struggling artists, there is a difficult balance between accepting help and giving in to it."

"I'm not sure I follow you on that."

Rowe said, "He means enthusiasm and drive, indeed assistance of any kind, if it is before he is ready as an artist, may do more damage than good. Is that right, Mr. Trevelyan?"

"Partly. Both the artist and his work must be ready. And I'm not just talking about enough work for an exhibition, but work that is ready to be exhibited."

"You have your MFA," Triton said. "How much more do you need to be ready?"

"If I knew the answer to that . . ."

"I think I understand," Remington said. "I won't insult you by pretending I understand the artistic temperament, but I do understand preparation, imagination and hard work. I understand there is a commonality to achieving excellence in all things, and that the artist, perhaps above all others, needs a unique environment to develop that regime and get the results they hope to achieve. I'm just offering the opportunity to keep a roof over your head, food on your table and clothes on your back until you do."

An empathic and generous shark-in-a-suit; who knew? "What kind of job?"

"Security guard," Remington said this without any hint of mockery, sarcasm or bile. This offer was his noblesse oblige. At least he wasn't offering him a job as a waiter or chauffeur. He probably offered those jobs to struggling actors. "RBD always needs security guards. You could work whatever shift you want, pick the one that best suits your artistic timetable."

Thank you, Cissy, thank you so very fucking much.

"Sounds good."

"Marvelous, and don't you worry about a thing. Nyla will take care of getting you processed and fitted with a uniform."

Rowe was smirking again like Adrian had. A few highlights of steak and lobster bits in her bun would augment her appearance nicely.

He wondered if Adrian rather than Cissy had a hand in this offer. That trio struck him as great practical jokers to rival Sean. But Remington was right about him needing the money. New York was a fantastic city. In his opinion, it was the best city in the world and he never wanted to leave it, but New York City sure as hell wasn't easy to live in.

"Now," Remington said. "If you will excuse us, Jaxon, the three of us suffer from OCD and still have more work to do."

With that the audience was over.

Jaxon didn't bow or crouch or nod or acknowledge RBD's royalty in any way before he left the master bedroom suite and returned to Cissy. He found her on the flybridge aft deck reclining on a lounger and talking to a woman about her age.

Rather than get off the chaise, Cissy reached up, pulled him down and kissed him. She then handed him the drink she'd prepared for him. "Don't worry, darling, it just tastes sweet. It has no alcohol in it."

He sipped a bit of it rather than risk offending her. She had gone to the trouble of making him another drink she was sure wouldn't upset his delicate tummy. While he loved New York City, he was really beginning to hate the Atlantic Ocean.

The drink was sweet and fruity, but instead of achieving what it was supposed to, it only made his stomach flutter the same way drinking diet pops did if he didn't eat something with them. The butterflies in his stomach—wriggling worms, really—that had disappeared during his audience had returned with hot stingers attached to them that kept stabbing into his delicate internal parts.

"This is Constance Penelope Smythe, from Saint Albans. We've been best friends since we were eight years old."

Constance Penelope Smythe got up from her chaise and shook his hand. "Call me Penny; it's not such a mouthful."

She was model tall but not model thin. Her tanned shoulders were broad and muscular. A sapphire sundress revealed equally tanned and muscular arms and legs. She had been a rower at one time. Her posture was erect and strong. Cropped tawny hair was cut so it wouldn't get in her way. She wore sandals on her long, bare feet.

"It's hard to have fun on the water when your stomach won't cooperate. My first few times, I had trouble swallowing anything."

"It's not swallowing that I'm worried about."

Penny smiled small, white teeth that suited her. She didn't need row after row of huge, dazzling beacons to enhance her beauty. "You'll get your legs. For now, just try to focus on points and not take in the whole."

"You may find this hard to believe right now, but I worked on a fishing boat for two seasons off the coast of British Columbia. I had no trouble then with—"

"Man overboard!" The alarm came from someone on the deck below.

The yacht shuddered and pitched when it came to a stop as fast as it could. Penny caught him when he staggered.

He, Cissy and Penny headed down to the back of the lower deck, tucking in behind and following the captain and crew at the main deck level. The captain ordered everyone else to stay where they were.

Adrian, Bryce and Eugene were already on the lower deck holding martinis and looking over the side. They ignored de la Tour's command to get back, but did so when Jerome, Morris and Nyla arrived.

Captain and crew went about the job of bringing the man back on board.

"Oh, God," Cissy said when she looked over the side, "the boat must have struck him."

He looked over.

The crew had snagged Smith with a pole and a rope and had just lifted him out of the water. His forehead was bashed in above his right eye. The skin had been abraded as well as peeled back to expose the skull, which had both large and hairline fractures on it.

"Oh, sh—" There was no point to focus on when he looked out at the darkness surrounding the Dagger. The lights of the yacht became bright shards of red, white and yellow that stabbed at his eyes. The salt and diesel smell rushed into his lungs and churned his stomach.

He heaved, vomited onto Smith and fell over the side onto the body. Smith cushioned the impact, but he still bumped forehead to wounded forehead just before they both dropped into the water.

Salt water rushed into his mouth as he thrashed about grabbing for anything. His hand found purchase on Smith's suit coat, but it was slippery and his fingers couldn't keep hold of it. He pulled himself out of the water only to slip back under just as he was taking a breath. More salt water rushed into his mouth. The sparkling lights above him were drifting away. His body wanted to cough out the sea as he kicked for the surface. His hands found Smith's belt. He pulled hard to get his head above the waves just as Smith's body began to roll. He went under again.

If he didn't cough out the water they'd be pulling two bodies out of the Atlantic.

Something pushed against his back then wrapped round him. An octopus? He reached for tentacles and felt arms. A moment later, he felt legs knock against the back of his as someone took them both up to the surface.

His head rose into the cool, salty air. He coughed hard enough to scratch his throat.

"I got you," the man said.

The Dagger was about fifteen yards away, the only brightness in the night, a splotch of silvery red paint on a black canvas, except it bobbed up and down.

He coughed when the man spoke again and the man had to repeat himself.

"Just relax, sir. I've got you. They're coming."

He squinted against the spray of foam and saw splashes approaching them. Two men were coming to help bring him in. He coughed violently again when he tried to thank the man holding him up. The Dagger and its lights started to come into focus. The gentle pitching of the yacht settled his stomach. He looked for Cissy.

The other two crewmen put a lifesaver around him that was secured to the Dagger by a rope and they all started swimming back. Cissy came into focus as she reached over the side. Penny came into focus as she took hold of Cissy's shoulders and backed her out of the way.

Smith bobbed up and down in the waves like an abandoned air mattress. They had temporarily secured Smith to the port side of the Dagger with three ropes so they could come get him.

Three yards to go and the Atlantic splashed a wave into his face that had him coughing and gulping for air again.

Adrian, Bryce and Eugene were alternating between coming to the side to check the progress of the rescue and recovery and then stepping back to laugh even harder.

The three men took him astern to get him up onto the back platform three feet below the lower deck. Captain de la Tour, Triton and Rowe were coming down the stairs with one other crewman to assist getting him back on board.

He reached for the platform and grabbed hold tight enough to make his shivering hands ache. When he turned in the water to thank the trio that had jumped in to retrieve him, he saw Smith come floating around from the side of the yacht. He tried to say something, but his trembling tongue and lips wouldn't form any words. As de la Tour, Triton and Rowe hauled him up onto the platform, he pointed and grunted.

The three men splashed after Smith while someone took off the lifesaver and threw a blanket around him. Cissy and Penny came down to the platform despite being hollered at not to. Cissy hugged him. Penny returned to the lower deck.

The trio of rescuers brought Smith's body to the platform as Triton and Rowe also returned to the lower deck. Cissy held on tightly to him.

Jaxon looked up at the lower deck, at Rowe's irritation with what she would see as his weakness, at Adrian and his buddies laughing at his predicament, at Jerome Remington's concern about who his daughter had brought into her life. The boat lurched down when the crewmen rolled Smith onto the platform behind him. He dared to take a glimpse at the body as Cissy tried to usher him up to the lower deck.

"Oh, sh—"

Gravity pulled on him as the Dagger dropped away. With another heave, he vomited again, slipped out of the blanket and Cissy's grasp onto Smith and they both slid off the platform back into the Atlantic.

#  Chapter 3

Captain de la Tour brought the Dagger back to the North Cove Yacht Harbor. NYPD Harbor Patrol escorted them in. Two detectives and an ambulance were waiting.

Jaxon sat on a bench near the berth where the Dagger was moored. He had changed into clothes from one of the yacht's crew and still had the blanket around him. The Atlantic had swallowed him twice and a good deal of it was still sloshing around inside his stomach to replace what he had lost during their argument. It had sprayed salty foam into his lungs. The chill of it wouldn't leave him.

He watched the two detectives taking statements from the other guests and the crew. Jerome, Cissy, Penny, Adrian, Bryce and Eugene had already given their statements. The ambulance had taken Smith away about ten minutes ago.

Footsteps approached from the parking lot but it wasn't Cissy.

Rowe asked, "How are you doing?"

He coughed before he could speak.

"That good, huh? Maybe you should have drunk that martini."

"I'm doing better than Smith. What were you all talking about?"

"That is none of your business."

"Do you think he fell overboard, jumped or was pushed? Did someone hit him or did he collide with the Dagger after he was in the Atlantic? Did Adrian cut the body loose just to see if it would still float?"

"Have you talked to either of the detectives yet?"

"He looked frightened when he was with you three, like you were ganging up on him."

"Where's Cissy?"

"She's with Jerry and her bro. It's a family tradition in the face of threat or trauma to circle the wagons. She'll be back in a few minutes."

"Just relax, be cool and answer the detective's questions when he gets to you."

"What else would I do? If you're worried I saw something I shouldn't have, like a knife in his back before it fell out, you can be assured that I didn't."

"Why would I be concerned about something like that?"

"Just wondering out loud; like with that Adrian cutting loose thing."

"Don't." Rowe knelt down to be at eye level. "There's an opening in the graphic arts section of our marketing department. It's probably a better use of your talents, though I can't imagine they're that impressive."

"Thanks."

"Don't be too grateful. You don't know what I have in mind for you yet."

She walked back to the parking lot when the older of the two detectives started their way. In just a few seconds, their conversation became a very animated but hushed argument. The detective bristled at something she said. After a few more seconds of them glaring at each other like boxers about to fight, he nodded. They both looked his way for a moment before leaving together. If it was a matter of taking each other's worth, Rowe appeared to have won that round.

Jerome, Cissy and Adrian came to him.

Remington asked, "What did you and Nyla talk about?"

"She wanted to know how I was feeling."

Cissy asked, "And how are you feeling?"

"I can still feel the planet turning, but at least I'm connected to it again."

Adrian stood to Jerome's right and a step behind being the silent and dutiful son. Cissy was on her father's left with her arm looped together with his; an interesting family portrait.

She said, "And what else did you two talk about? She was with you for longer than it would take to just find out how you are feeling."

Was she jealous of Nyla Rowe? As ridiculous as that notion was it did warm him.

"She thought there might be a position for me in the graphic arts section of RBD's marketing department. She said it would better suit my impressive talents."

"See what I mean?" Remington smiled down at him. "She might actually be running the company behind my back."

Adrian appeared as ill as he had felt on the Dagger.

Jaxon could think of nothing comforting to say to him.

Rowe and the older detective came to them.

"Detective Hewitt," Remington said, "is there something else we can help you with?"

"You can all go now."

Jaxon asked, "Don't you want my statement?"

"It's been an upsetting night for you. Ms. Rowe told me what you've been through and I'm sure you didn't see any more than anyone else concerning Mr. Smith's fall overboard. Go home and get some rest. I will call you in a couple of days to take a statement."

It was a straightforward and tragic incident, Smith had just fallen off the boat, but Rowe clearly had some influence over the NYPD. Sending him home to wait a few days before giving a statement was not standard NYPD procedure for something like this.

Cissy helped him up. "I'll take you home." She gave Rowe a disingenuous smile. "Thank you for finding something more appropriate for Jaxon's talents."

Rowe smiled exactly the same way before escorting Hewitt back to his partner. They talked a great deal as they went. Hewitt appeared to be coming around to whatever she was telling him.

"Max will be here in a few minutes," Cissy said.

He felt warmer by the second as Cissy escorted him to the parking lot. His ears still had water in them, so he might have only imagined Cissy hissing as they passed Rowe and Hewitt.

Captain de la Tour came to them. "Is there anything I can do for either of you?"

"I could use something hot to drink."

He said to Cissy, "Your brother, Mr. Kessler and Mr. Draper will be staying on the Dagger tonight."

"That's a party waiting to happen. What about the other guests?"

"I believe, Mr. Trevelyan, they have all gone home." He headed back to the yacht.

Cissy said, "You don't keep anything to yourself, do you?"

"God, I'm thirsty."

She headed back to the yacht and miraculously returned with two hot chocolates to counter the wind that was coming in from the harbor. April in NYC had been unusually cold this year. Though it had warmed up the past three days, the nights still got chilly quickly. They found shelter on a bench on the leeside of a stone wall and drank up. She huddled close to him and said nothing while they waited.

They had reached a level of comfort in their relationship that required no small talk or forced conversation until Max arrived. Manhattan was the antithesis of a deserted island. Part of the most boisterous and enthralling city in the US, in their silence he could imagine they were the only two on it right now.

When Max arrived in the BMW 760Li, Cissy insisted on opening the door for him and helping him get settled. She put on his seatbelt.

"I can do that."

"Nonsense," she said and kissed his cheek. "What you need right now is some tender loving care. I'm going to take you to my place and give you all that I have."

They drove back wrapped together in the blanket and that same comfortable silence.

Once out of Battery Park City, Max took them past the new World Trade Center up through Tribeca, Greenwich Village and Chelsea, the Garment District to 8th Avenue and then through Columbus Circle to Central Park West and on to 88th and Cissy's condo in the Upper West Side.

Along the way, Cissy had taken hold of him and ducked under the blanket, but then had thought better of it, brought her head up and just snuggled against him until Max parked in front of her building.

Cissy was sincere, he knew that, and he did look forward to everything she was going to do to and for him. He just couldn't shake the notion that Rowe's offer of a better job was somehow a tacit request for him to keep to himself whatever suspicions he had about what might have happened to Smith. With that in mind, Cissy's earnest efforts would likely be as much in vain as Grace Kelly's were with Jimmy Stewart in the early scenes of _Rear_ _Window_.

Rowe probably just knew he would be of greater use in Graphic Arts for whatever she had in mind. And Grace Kelly did eventually win over Jimmy Stewart. She only had to almost get murdered to do it.
**JELLYFISH**

Book 3 of the Proteus Group Series

Chapter 1

Vlad Drăculea was dead, but that was not the end of him.

Father Antonio Rossetti, a loyal servant of God and the Vatican for forty-one years, chaffed in the heavy white robe he was required to wear as he looked down at the pieces of wood on the table before him. Hewn from the mountain forest behind the monastery and constructed with lengths of thick, rough planks in accordance with exact directions provided by the codex, the table sat in the front chamber of the monastery. It would require the whole brotherhood to move it to any other location. It was, therefore, immovable because most of his brothers had been sent away, a precaution to prevent the complete annihilation of his order.

Rossetti finished his second glass of wine and looked to the entrance door. Father Bernardo Alessandro was late.

Held hostage by the Ottomans for most of his adolescence, tortured for his constant defiance of them, Vlad had grown into a hard, vile man, but no man had been more justified in his behavior. And he had been an effective soldier against the Turkish horde in the service of His Holiness. The time had come for the Holy Order of Loyal Pius Brothers to honor the agreement between House Drăculeşti and Pope Pius II.

At thirty-six, Alessandro was the youngest of them and had been a priest for less than a year. He was to bring it from the Piazza Santa Maria La Nova under escort of six soldiers of the Papal army assigned to the Catterdale de Santa Marie Assunta church. He should have arrived hours ago.

The hooded white robe, the red sash around the waist, bare feet and no hair anywhere on the body were the required vestments for this mix of holy and pagan consecrating ritual. They had also been required to adorn their flesh with symbols.

Father Rossetti looked down at Christ's cross on the top of his right foot, the sacrifice on the path to God. He had forbidden the addition of the dagger to that image. On the left foot, each of the brothers had painted a date tree to symbolize their toil on earth. There were to be no symbols on their bare faces and heads.

The chalice for Christ's blood was drawn on the back of his right hand. Looking at it caused his heart to thrash about like a bird trying to escape its cage. But there was no escape from this unholy ritual. The image of the box designed and constructed by Andrea Alonso for His Holiness—the box that now lay in pieces before him—was inscribed on the back of his left hand. He was required to carve symbols on each piece before putting the box back together.

Both hands trembled when he poured and drank his third glass of wine.

Younger, steadier members of the brotherhood were more capable with the chisels, but he was the head of the order. This part of the ceremony was exclusively his responsibility. If he failed, his order failed. The agreement would not be honored. Vlad would be betrayed again by those he served.

Tonight, though, even three glasses of wine couldn't bring the tremors under control.

He picked up a chisel and grabbed the first piece of wood. The prescribed order in which the specific symbols for each piece were to be carved was listed on the vellum pages of the codex that lay beside his empty glass. Each page contained a vivid—garish—illustration of a symbol.

Two priests entered the chamber the moment he began his work. They stopped at the other end of the table.

Father Buonfiglio Napoli and Father Camillo Vincenzo had been reluctantly sent from the Vatican to assist with this detestable but obligatory ceremony.

Father Napoli, forty, a short, furtive man, whispered, "Do we have to go through with this abhorrent . . .?" A man of slight stature, Napoli presented a frail, stooped and insignificant character. How had he become involved in something like this?

"Pay no attention to him," Vincenzo said. "He has been complaining since we left Rome."

No two men could be such opposites. Father Vincenzo had been a soldier before coming to Christ. A head taller than any of them, his shoulders almost twice as wide as and far more muscular than the measly Napoli, Vincenzo was hard, direct, fierce, loyal, composed and resolute. Every move he made was deliberate and strong. Vincenzo had exhibited the steady hand to outline in ink each symbol on each section of the box that he was required to carve.

It was a pity Napoli was unable to draw upon some of Vincenzo's strength for himself.

Of all his outstanding features, and that aura of strength about him—he might be able to move the table by himself—his eyes were the most disturbing. They penetrated and dissected and mocked every time they took hold of someone. Father Vincenzo gave all the appearance of someone preternaturally possessed of both this earth and some mysterious knowledge of the ages beyond what mortal man could comprehend.

Wondering again if Vincenzo was possibly an angel sent to see through to its end this obligation left to them by His Holiness Pope Pius II, Father Rossetti poured more wine into his glass, adjusted the two large candles to bring their flames closer, adjusted the reflective glass to better illuminate the pieces before him and continued with his work. "His Holiness decreed that he may rest in the Piazza Santa Maria La Nova. But his heart must be returned to his homeland."

"But, Father Rossetti," Napoli whispered, "it is a dark ritual older than Christ himself." Napoli had barely raised his voice above a whisper from the moment he arrived. "This man was a demon, Father. I would rather his heart were impaled for all to see the same way his victims were cruelly displayed to the world."

Vincenzo took hold of Napoli by the back of his neck. "Look there, Father. Perhaps it will help you to remember what this man did for us." He turned Napoli toward the wall of skulls. Nameless heroes, the Vatican's holy fallen warriors, rested in niches carved into the mountain stone that made up the rear wall of this lonely and vulnerable monastery.

Rossetti started on the fourth symbol. Carving had done what the wine couldn't. His hands had become steadier with the wood, chisels and knifes in them. Another consideration passed through his mind and his beliefs. Was Vincenzo exerting some influence over him?

Father Napoli was only expressing the doubts Rossetti had experienced as well. The Drăculeşti Codex from Vlad's homeland was written near the end of Christ's life. It dictated what they must do to properly honor the agreement. It contained the symbols he was to carve onto the pieces of the box and identified which ones went where. The codex had been written by the first priests of Wallachia to accept the word of the one true God and the sacrament, and had then had folded this new enlightenment into their existing pagan beliefs.

How many generations of such distortions would it take to completely obliterate the Son of God's original message, and in the process create an enduring and apocryphal legend for the brutal man they were attending to tonight? At best, he could only hope the correct man was remembered to have had love for all in his heart.

Once released from Vincenzo's grasp, Napoli came to him mewling, "We should not be doing this."

"I am but a loyal servant of—"

The doors to this old Franciscan monastery creaked and scraped and began to swing open before them. Twice, it stopped before opening completely to reveal the two wounded men at its threshold.

"My God, what has happened?" Vincenzo rushed to Father Alessandro and the wounded soldier holding him up.

Father Rossetti and Father Napoli remained at the table.

Alessandro clutched the leather sack under his right arm. His left was draped over the blood-covered soldier as they staggered together into the great hall.

Vincenzo took Alessandro from the soldier, who then fell to the stone floor holding his left side. Half of an arrow shaft protruded from the soldier's lower chest.

"Help him," he whispered to Father Napoli.

Napoli bowed and shook his head. "We should abandon this folly. They will surely have followed them. We will all be killed."

Rossetti poured another glass of wine for himself. "We must perform the ceremony before they get here, then. Do as I ask, Father, please." He drank the wine in one swallow and began assembling the box. The carvings weren't complete, but they had no more time.

Napoli, a completely ineffectual man, staggered over to the soldier as if also wounded. One step away, he hesitated, convinced he would be struck down once he touched the man.

Father Vincenzo brought Father Alessandro to the opposite end of the table.

Rossetti remained where he was and pulled up the hood of his robe once the box was completely assembled. He then pulled out the key and opened the lid. "Do you have it?"

Alessandro nodded weakly and came along the edge of the table with Vincenzo's help. He held up the leather sack with its round object inside. Blood seeped from a wound on his neck.

"The Black Army's Elite Guard of the Holy Crown of Hungary ambushed us. He does not want it returned to Wallachia." He proffered the sack to Father Rossetti.

Rossetti averted his eyes and made only the minutest nod of acceptance.

The aroma of honey wafted out of the sack when Alessandro placed it beside the box.

"We must hurry," Alessandro said. "They will be here soon." He sagged into Vincenzo's arms.

Vincenzo set Alessandro down onto a chair and returned to Rossetti.

The box was simple enough, carved out of a block of Wallachian oak—Vlad's favorite wood for making the stakes he impaled his victims on—and then intricately cut by Alonso into the segments of the puzzle he'd just completed. The hinges and lock were of brass. The curved lid was unadorned with jewels so as not to detract from the elegant carving of the winged dragon crouching atop it that also served as a handle.

A gift from Pope Pius II before His Holiness died, it had been used to deliver the ransom paid to free Vlad, had been emptied of Drăculea's family heirlooms. Now it would hold for all time the darkest part of him.

"Father Rossetti," Vincenzo said and tugged on his sleeve, "let us be done with this and get it away from here as quickly as possible."

He glanced at Alessandro struggling to take his last few breaths. Father Napoli had remained where he was to pray while the soldier died on the floor at his feet. They were all going to die for this disgusting man.

"Yes, let us do exactly that." He held his hand out to Father Vincenzo.

Vincenzo handed over the small leather pouch he had been commissioned to bring with him.

Rossetti opened it as Father Alessandro died and slid off his chair. Napoli had fallen to his knees before the dead soldier and was still praying over him.

"Leave him," he said when Vincenzo started for their fallen brother. He didn't look into the small pouch; he just turned it upside down, poured out the soil into the box and placed the other key into the brass lock once the pouch was empty. He didn't raise his voice when he said to Napoli, "Bring me your charge and we will finish this."

Unable to control his shivering, Napoli looked up from the soldier, his head shaking, his mouth opening wide to cry out his protests once more. Before he could, they heard the horses galloping into the monastery's courtyard.

"Hurry." He held out his hand to Napoli. It was trembling again.

Father Buonfiglio Napoli started crying. "Please, Father Rossetti, we must flee."

"Bring me your charge, you pathetic man."

Napoli rose to his feet and scurried back to the table. He handed over the amulet given to His Holiness by Vlad's daughter.

Rossetti set the amulet into the box. "Now the last of it." He glared at Napoli.

Shrinking back, Napoli struggled to push the large leather sack over to him.

"Give it to me."

"No, I can't." Napoli covered his face and turned away. "I won't."

With a moue of distain on his face for his companion from Rome, Vincenzo took the heart from the sack and handed it to Rossetti.

Outside, monks screamed as they fell to the soldiers. They had no weapons or fighting skills. All they could do was put themselves between the attackers and the monastery doors.

He placed the heart into the box, grateful that he had been spared the need to recite any of those vile words, closed the lid and locked it. "Take it."

"But Father, you are supposed to return it." Vincenzo pulled out a sword from beneath his robe. "Go, I will hold them off for as long as I can."

"I have no doubt you could give me ample time, brother, but I am too old to make the journey. I will remain here. Take it now and leave. You must hurry."

He closed the codex and bound it with the two leather straps attached to it. He then handed it and the pouch that now contained the keys over to Vincenzo as well. "You must complete the ritual before it is assigned to its place of keeping. Remember to return the keys to where they belong and keep them separate."

Brother Vincenzo placed the box, the pouch and the codex into the sack blessed to carry them. "God be with you, Father Rossetti, I will not fail you."

"It will not be me you fail, my dear brother. God be with us all."

Vincenzo crossed himself before fleeing through the hidden door at the back of the monastery to join the escort of six men waiting in the woods to the north.

When Napoli started after Vincenzo, Rossetti called to him. "Come stand beside me, Father. We are in _His_ hands now."

The last of his brother's fading moans in the courtyard could barely be heard over Napoli's whimpering as he squirmed over to him.

Three soldiers of Matthias Corvinus' Black Army entered the monastery. To show their respect they had sheathed their swords.

The Captain made the sign of the cross and asked, "Father, where is it?"

"It is gone." Father Rossetti put his arm around the small, shivering man beside him, took a firm hold of Napoli's shoulder and fixed his gaze on the Captain's eyes.

Those eyes would be no match for Vincenzo. The ritual would be completed, the agreement would be honored.

The three soldiers drew their swords.

His legend, and his curse, have begun, Rossetti thought, may God forgive us. 
Chapter 2

Jacqueline Yvette Duquesne entered her penthouse apartment in Vancouver's West End just after midnight to find the message light on her phone blinking. Algernon had insisted she keep a landline. He was the only one who would use it to leave her a message.

"Merde!"

She took the time to put her suitcase in the bedroom, undress, relieve herself and get into her bathrobe before she returned to her phone and played the message.

Algernon Devries' crackling voice said, "Jacqueline, _ma chère fille_ , get your lovely ass down here to San Francisco as fast as you can. I've sent my jet to YVR to pick you up."

Algernon knew the International Air Transport Association codes for every major international airport in North America and Europe, and most of the ones in Asia.

"Merde!"

Algernon Devries had been her employer and her mentor, but he was no father figure. He was, in fact, quite the lascivious old creep at seventy-three. She had been with him for twelve years and had sampled—been a victim off, actually—his proclivity for sexual games involving audience participation. That one time had been enough to lead to an ultimatum of understanding between them of just what she would and would not do for him from that moment forward.

He had accepted her terms without reservation. "I apologize for misinterpreting your enthusiasm for experiencing new adventures. I did not expect such reticence. Again, I am sorry for misreading you."

Algernon's apologies, gracious on the surface, always hit like a major insult.

He had never before summoned her like this while she was already on assignment for him. He couldn't suddenly be impatient to get the pistols; that wasn't Algernon's way. He preferred the anguish of anticipating her arrival and any new gift she was bringing to him. But even narcissistic Algernon Devries, with his perfect alabaster skin, knew that time was running out on him. He was becoming more impatient to fill his bucket before he kicked it.

The thing to do after a message like that was to just get her lovely ass to YVR as quickly as she could. She was already packed, _but_. . . .

She used her landline to call Algernon. He'd be up at this time of night because the man was part vampire and rarely went to bed before sunrise.

On the third ring, Algernon answered, "Are you on your way?"

" _Ralentir, vous vieux fou_." Slow down, you old fool.

"Your accent gets sloppy when you're tired. Are you on your way?"

"I just got in after fourteen hours in the air on one commercial flight after another because you needed your jet for something else. " _Je suis épuisé_." I am exhausted.

"Nonsense."

"They weren't where they were supposed to be. I had to go to Belgium, and there was only one pistol left. I'm still looking for the Chamberlain manuscript, but I have information that indicates it might be in Leeds."

"Forget those. I need you here by morning. Get your firm little butt to the airport, _ma chère fille_."

"I need some sleep."

"Sleep on the plane. You will arrive at five-fifteen. There will be a taxi waiting for you. Being Saturday, there won't be much traffic. It will take another forty-five minutes to get to my house at that time of morning."

Algernon always had to verbalize all the timing details even though she was every bit as adept at calculating things like that after years of weary travelling on his behalf. For Algernon, however, it was some part genius, some part autism and a big part obsessive-compulsive. He could no more keep quiet about such details going through his head than she could just stop breathing once and for all.

"Algernon, what is it?"

"We acquired the amulet a few months ago and that led us to someone who knew . . . never mind that. I don't want to talk about it over the phone. We've got it now; that's all that matters."

"We? Who else—"

"See you at six, do not be late." He hung up.

"Merde! Merde! Merde!"

Working for Algernon had made her wealthy. He'd left her to her own methods to accomplish what he asked of her, but his one inviolate rule was that she came immediately when he summoned her. He was even sending his jet for her.

This last assignment had taken her to her birthplace, Montreal, then to Reykjavik, Riga and Belgrade before ending up outside Bastogne on the Ardennes Plateau to acquire one of Algernon's priorities for the past three years. It was late November. The clothes in her suitcase were for the snowstorms she'd encountered in Europe. Algernon's jet would just have to wait.

She showered and then put on clothes he would certainly notice. Then she removed her winter clothes from the suitcase and replaced them with more appropriate wear for November in San Francisco. There wasn't that much difference between what came out and what went in.

She also removed the one pistol she had purchased. The pair had belonged to some obscure member of the aristocracy at the time of the French revolution. The aristocrat was actually from Spain, one Manuel de la Rosa, who had killed seven men in duels with them and then had used them to unsuccessfully defend his family during a robbery by the revolutionary rabble in Paris. She had failed to find Clive Chamberlain's original 1668 manuscript about the true age of dragons in England, rumored to have been commissioned by— _that_ _idiot_ , Algernon told her—King Charles II.

Packed and closed, she took her suitcase back down to the lobby to wait for the cab. She boarded the Gulfstream G450 at 1:48 am.

She was grateful for the adventures and for the wealth that twelve years with Algernon had brought her. She would help find the manuscript if Leeds provided anything she could work with. She would see what it was that excited him so much, but she was finished with all these treasure hunts. She would tell him exactly that the moment she entered his mansion. And this time, she would make him listen to her. 
Chapter 3

As Jacqueline Duquesne was taking off from YVR in Algernon Devries' Gulfstream G450, Special Agent Brian Laskey was parking his black Ford Expedition in the parking lot of the San Francisco Coast Guard Unit's Seizure Pier. His field office had received a call about the Coast Guard bringing in the MV Viaje Costero—Costal Journey—a thirty-meter cargo ship out of Tijuana found drifting near the Farallon Islands with a dead crew aboard. As strange as that was, it was what condition they found the crew in that was even stranger.

The caller had provided no details over the phone other than to say, "You won't believe it even after you see it."

He wasn't going to find out what that was any time soon, however. When he got to the gate, it was closed and locked, with two extra wraps of locked chains around it and two Army guards posted at it. Four army vehicles were parked on the other side of the gate.

He approached with his FBI badge out. "I was called in about a ship full of dead people."

The Viaje Costero was being sealed with plastic sheets over every opening. A base of operations was being set up by army personnel.

The guard on his left, a sergeant, said, "You can't go in, Sir. Both the ship and the pier have been quarantined. No one is admitted.

"What happened?"

Unable to keep the tremor out of his voice, the sergeant replied, "USAMRIID is in there now, Sir."

"How did they get here so fast?"

"It is my understanding Colonel Thorpe was already in Frisco, Sir."

"Can I talk to Colonel Thorpe? I have to tell my boss something."

The sergeant looked through the chain link fence at the activity taking place on the other side as he talked quietly into his radio. After receiving a response, he said, "Just wait here, Sir."

"You have children, don't you, Sergeant?"

He nodded. With the temperature near freezing, sweat still ran down from both temples. "I do, yes, two boys."

"They look like they know what they're doing in there."

The sergeant looked again and wiped his brow. "I hope so, Sir."

A person in a hazmat suit emerged from a tent that had plastic corridors running from it up the gangplank to the cargo ship as well as to three other tents. In a matter of seconds, the woman had her helmet off. She gave instructions to two other members of the team, patted the closest one on the back and then started walking toward the gate. Her strides were strong and quick. Her brindle hair hung straight down to just above her shoulders.

The two guards saluted her. She saluted back.

He raised his hand and showed his badge. "Special Agent, Brian Laskey. We got a call about a ghost ship."

"Colonel Cynthia Thorpe. It's a ghost ship all right, but it's also much more." Her clear, confident eyes were dark brown. Her nose was thin with small nostrils below a slight upturn at the end. The hazmat suit made any observations about her physique impossible.

"More than what?"

"It appears there was a toxic spill of an unknown substance on board. When the Coast Guard crew entered the control deck, they found a grey powder on the floor and all over the crew's clothes."

"How are they?"

"None of them are showing any signs of infection or exposure to toxin poisoning, but we will keep them in quarantine and under observation for the next while."

"You were already in San Francisco?"

"I'm here for a NATO conference on respirable toxins. My CO relayed the call to me when it came in."

"What happened?"

"The Coast Guard got a call from a US Fish and Wildlife Services research team on Southeast Farallon Island after they spotted the Viaje Costero drifting four miles to the south. When they went to investigate, they found seven of the crew dead. They appear to have either come down with something or been overcome by something. Three other crewmembers are missing."

Behind her, other members of the USAMRIID team, also in hazmat suits, were bringing body bags out through the sealed plastic corridors. "What happens now?"

"I'm sending everything to our new level four biosafety lab at the Rocky Mountain Laboratories facility in Hamilton, Montana. A team from Fort Detrick is already on the way. I've talked to Dr. Vincent Needham at RML. He thinks he knows what might have turned the crew into mannequins."

"Mannequins?"

"Their skin is stretched all tight and smooth. It looks like mannequin skin . . . plastic and with no variation in color tone. Every pore appears to have been plugged and covered over. All their hair is gone. We found it mixed in with that grey powder." She shook her head. "I've never seen or heard of anything like this before."

"Was it an attack?"

She shrugged. "It could have been. If it was, it was a concerted attack by more than one person. The crew was strewn all over the ship."

"Why attack a cargo ship out of Tijuana? Were those three missing crewmembers part of the attack?"

"That is your job, Special Agent Laskey. From what they tell me, the Viaje Costero was converted from a single hold to a dual hold cargo ship with a capacity of four-seventy-five DWT, dead weight tonnage. It also has six cabins for passengers. We don't know if they had passengers on this voyage or if some of the crew were using the cabins."

"This could go right past me if you guys are involved. What's the cargo?"

"I haven't had time to go through the hold or the manifest yet, but we did find aerosol dispensers near the crew, the kind used to spray perfume."

"Is that how they were attacked? Can anyone actually do something like that?"

"It's certainly possible. It would be cumbersome if it's a respirable toxin to do it that way because you would have to get very close to your target to deliver it, which would put you at risk as well unless you'd been inoculated against it or were wearing protective gear. If you were wearing protection, I would think your targets might see you coming and get suspicious."

"Where are the attackers now? How did they get off the ship? Was the attack part of a bigger plan to have the ship brought in to a populated area? Is there more of that stuff or something else on board that poses a threat?"

"I'm here to contain and investigate whatever happened on the Viaje Costero from the perspective of a possible new toxin spill or intentional weaponized use of such a thing." She raised her headgear to put it back on.

"I can't go away emptyhanded."

"That can't be helped until we are sure there is no longer any danger. Any evidence that can assist in your part of this investigation will be sent on as soon as possible, I promise." She put her headgear back on. Her muffled voice sounded like it was coming from a breathless young girl. "Give your card to the sergeant. I left one of mine for you with him. My contact number at the conference is written on the back. My mobile number is on the front."

"Aren't you going to Hamilton with the . . . ?"

"I'm the head of the American delegation to the conference. I have to be here." She pointed to the other people in hazmat suits. "If this is a bioterrorism threat, we will be the first responders."

"It's a good thing you're here."

"If this _is_ a bioterrorism threat, already being here could be irrelevant." She returned to the Viaje Costero and helped her crew bring out more body bags.

# A Vague Recollection of Something Blue

Book 5 of the Proteus Group Series

# Chapter 1

From his vantage point one hundred feet higher up to the north and hidden by Mexican nut pines, Frank Gillett could clearly see through his Vortex Kaibab binoculars the confirmation that the tip Ferris had received three days ago was correct.

"Hector Garcia Ortiz is sitting out on the patio by the pool. I see two Chinese men, both in their sixties, standing closest to him. Two Europeans, also in expensive suits, are standing in the shade under a trellis a few feet away."

Thomas Ferris's voice crackled in Frank's earpiece when he asked, "Is the general with them?"

He spotted the man wearing lots of braid. "He is talking to Hector. He has two aides with him. One is a colonel, the other is a captain."

"What about getting in?"

"Give me a minute." He rubbed away the itchiness in his eyes before looking through the binoculars again.

A travel brochure might describe this compound as a hacienda-style resort nestled in the rugged Sierra Madre Occidental Mountains northeast of Quizuani in the state of Sonora. A quick flyover might convince tourists such a description was accurate except for the wall. The compound had been cut out of the forest decades ago. It would be presented as offering an exclusive, tranquil and serene get away from it all.

Not from where he sat crouched amid the forest understory.

Sitting at an elevation of 2987 feet at approximately 29°03'56.04"N by 110°11'30.72"W, the compound was enclosed by a sloping wall ten feet tall. The base was twelve feet thick, the top four feet. Wrought iron railings had been placed along the outside and inside edges at the top. They had been webbed with razor wire, and possibly electrified. It formed a hexagonal barrier to the world, Garcia Ortiz's base for his incomplete pyramid. There was no gate to drive vehicles through or any other obvious entrance into the compound through the wall.

A pool sat in the middle of a patio formed by the U-shaped, two-storey house. A man-made lake gouged out of the mountain and stocked with fish lay four hundred yards to the east of the compound just before the slope he was perched on began its steep rise to a peak elevation of 3309 feet.

Two M2 .50 caliber machine guns atop the wall were positioned at two of the wall's corners and directed toward the only approach road, ploughed out of the mountain by slave labor shortly after the end of the Mexican Revolution. Two men were stationed at each gun.

Ferris asked, "What do you see?"

"Dangerous shit everywhere, that's what."

"Do you see any of them, by the pool maybe?"

"Not a one. There are no women in the pool or sunbathing beside it. The pool doesn't have any water in it."

"They wouldn't be sunbathing."

"I know that. I was just commenting that there are no women to be seen anywhere. That has to be a first for him."

What he did see was men patrolling along the top of the wall. Four of them carried Mendoza HM-3 submachine guns. Eight other men on top of the wall carried either AK-47s or Fusil FX-05s Xiuhchoatl (firesnake) assault rifles. They were Mexican army brought by the general, though they wore mufti here. Six more men also armed with HM-3s were scattered around the pool and patio. They would be Hector's men.

Three armored Mercedes-Benz S55 all-wheel drive sedans that had brought the Chinese and European visitors were parked in the gravel parking lot along the west wall. Four Mercedes-Benz G-Class SUVs had brought Alonzo Polida and his men. All those vehicles were likely armored at least to the BR6 level. He hadn't brought anything with him that would penetrate them.

The two Streit Group Puma-APCs belonged to the owner of this spa resort, which catered to the criminal elite of Mexico. At one time or another every leader of every major gang in Mexico had come here, though none of them at the same time. This was the only diplomatic nexus in Mexico for negotiations between gangs. It was neutral territory, had been so for the past twenty years. No two gangs would come at the same time to prevent already hot blood from boiling over. It offered the opportunity to open by proxy negotiations between rivals to prevent or end escalating violence. It had accomplished some major decreases in bloodshed over the years and a few mergers that let most of the participants live. All the gangs respected its role.

Garcia Ortiz's gang, no longer called _Los Tres Carniceros_ , had lost most of its power thirty years ago. This refuge from the intensely violent Mexican criminal underworld was the only real power it still had aside from dabbling in some minor international drug trade and sex trafficking. None of the gang's history, however, had anything to do with why he was perched on the side of a mountain trying to find a way in.

"Shit."

The top of the wall also contained three SAM missile launchers, two anti-aircraft guns and, like the machine guns, two men were assigned to each. Hector Garcia Ortiz had also put crates of ammunition within quick and easy reach of any man on top of the wall. Whatever was taking place inside the compound this time, Garcia Ortiz was determined to keep it between only himself and his guests.

Thomas Ferris's voice came in clearer than it had since Frank had left him behind to take up his position. "Is it a go? Can you get in?"

A helicopter equipped with a GM 134 minigun on its nose and another sticking out its right opening rested on a pad inside the compound near the south-pointing corner of the wall.

"Frank, do we go?"

"Dammit." He put the binoculars back into their case and returned the case to his pack. He then rechecked what he had brought with him.

Two Uzis, eight grenades, three incendiary bombs and a Glock hardly compared to artillery, armor-piercing ordnance, ten more men than expected and about ten thousand rounds of ammunition.

"Give me thirty minutes. I see something I can use as a distraction." He secured the pack and started down the slope.

Descending presented no risk of exposure because of dense understory. As long as he stayed in the forest at the edge of the compound, he could keep out of sight of the guards. The moment of high risk would come as soon as he reached the road leading to the gravel lot. Sixty yards of bright, open space stood between him and what he needed.

Human behavior was on his side. None of the men on the top of the wall wanted to be on guard duty. They were macho warriors. Being on guard duty was an insult to their masculinity. Their leaders and their comrades down on the patio were on the side of the wall where all the action was taking place. They were stuck keeping watch for a surprise attack even though this rump of a gang had no enemies concerned enough about it to ever launch one.

Hector might have eschewed having women to make it clear to all concerned that this was a business meeting. The men on guard weren't missing any of the usual fun.

The two men at the machine gun placement overlooking the road, the ones who would have the clearest view of him crossing the clearing, were playing some game. Two of the general's men were watching the game. None of the other men on guard were in position to spot him.

Frank took off across the uneven ground. He was faster than any Olympic sprinter, but he wasn't faster than a speeding bullet, and he was only impervious to the small caliber ones if they weren't fired at close range.

Keeping his gaze focused on the wall, he used the APCs for cover to make his way back into the forest on the southwest perimeter of the compound. The cool breeze at this altitude had provided some relief, but the sprint, about eighty yards in total, had left him drenched in sweat.

A glance back at the APCs revealed one to also have a .50 caliber machine gun on its roof, but it was unmanned. A guard stationed at the Mercedes sedans was even more bored than his compatriots above him. Unable to see what was happening on the other side of the wall he could only smoke and watch four heads looking down at something else he couldn't see.

The barrels of fuel were clustered against the wall fifty feet away from the sedans, but the guard presented another option to the one he had originally considered.

"Change of plans," he said. "I'm turning off. Give me about an hour."

"And if I don't hear from you by then?"

"Go home."

Frank withdrew his earpiece and put it in his pack. He left the pack concealed in the woods and brought only the Glock. Holding his hands up with the barrel of the Glock in his left, he emerged from the forest and walked straight to the smoker guarding the cars.

The man cocked and aimed his HM-3 as he spit out his cigarette. He took a moment to glance up at the top of the wall and tried to get someone's attention.

Frank said, " _Necesito hablar con el Señor Héctor García Ortiz_."

The guard raised the gun. "¿ _Estas loco_? _Tira el arma antes de que suene la maldita cabeza_." Are you crazy? Drop the gun before I blow your fucking head off.

Frank dropped the Glock and kicked it away.

"¿ _Qué quieres con el jefe_?" What do you want with the boss? The guard walked to the Glock, picked it up and stuck it into the waist of his pants. He glanced up at the men on the top of the wall and muttered a number of curses before spitting at Frank. "¿ _De que se trata_?" What's it about?

" _Alquien me contrató para matarlo y creo que están ahí con él ahora. Los dos hemos sido traicionado_." Someone hired me to kill him and I think they are in there with him. We've both been double-crossed.

The man spit again before looking down at the smoldering cigarette he had jettisoned. "Fuck. Don't move, gringo."

Frank chuckled and nodded. "Not a muscle."

The man produced a walkie-talkie and began chattering rapidly and angrily into it. He wasn't talking to Garcia Ortiz. He was cursing whoever was on the other end for not doing their job and threatening them with a possible report to the general. After a few seconds of silence, the man's cell phone range. He stood at attention and answered it. Slower this time, he repeated to the boss what Frank had told him.

" _Si Señor_." He hung up the phone, pulled out a keypad remote control and adeptly pressed three numbered buttons on it with his thumb. Video games and texting were making everyone _digit_ -dextrous.

A section of the wall began smoothly sliding backward. It stopped after backing up four feet.

The guard stepped behind Frank, poked him with the HM-3 and took out the Glock.

Two steps into the breach, to his right, a passageway barely wide enough to proceed along single file wended its way through the wall. The base of the wall was wider to allow this passage full of sharp turns to be framed inside it. The passage likely circled the whole perimeter.

The guard prodded him to enter the tunnel. Only six feet into the dimly lit entrance section, they had to take a ninety-degree right turn. Six steps later they had to turn ninety-degrees to the left to enter the longest straight section of tunnel, about eighteen feet.

" _Sigue moviendote_." Keep moving. The guard pushed at him with his hand this time.

Frank grabbed the hand, pulled the arm over his shoulder and yanked down, snapping the man's elbow.

The man cried out, but Frank turned around and smashed his palm into his face. The Glock dropped to the ground as the man fell backward into the concrete wall and slid down beside it.

After retrieving his Glock, Frank nudged the man with his foot. When the guard didn't move, Frank took possession of the HM-3, stepped over the man because he wouldn't be able to turn around with the body over his shoulder, and picked him up.

A sharp turn to the left at the end of the straight section brought him to a short corridor that opened onto the patio. Garcia Ortiz, the general, his aides and the guests were all there waiting for him. Frank walked slowly out into the bright sunshine. The inside of the compound was shielded from the mountain breeze. It was at least five degrees hotter than outside the wall. He dropped the man at his feet then dropped both guns and held up his hands.

" _Señor Garcia Ortiz, ambos tenemos la misma_ . . ." Mister Garcia Ortiz, we both have the same . . .

The blow to the back of his head came from his right.

# Chapter 2

The last of the renovation work was completed by 10:00 am. Ralph Price, 47, the owner of Price Renovations and Repairs, and his two employees, Isidora Ramos Olivarez, 24, the carpenter, and Menno Alfieri, 30, at 5'11" and 228 pounds the self-proclaimed heavy lifter of the team, packed up their tools and returned to the two vehicles on the driveway.

The owner of the house, Abraham (Abe) Leavitt, was at work at White Sands.

Ralph made sure all doors to the house were locked. Isidora and Menno were waiting at the back of his van when he was done.

"Well," Menno said, "that's it then."

"Don't get discouraged," he said. "Something will come along."

Isidora lowered her sunglasses. "We've been on this job for four months. In all that time no other calls for work have come in."

"They will. I've been through slow periods like this before. It will pick up. Trust me."

Isidora put a hand on his chest and kissed his cheek. "We do trust you, Ralph, but you can't perform miracles. If there's no work, there's no—"

He stepped back and checked over the tools in the van.

Isidora pushed her sunglasses back. "Do you need any help at the office?"

"I'll take care of it."

Menno asked, "Are we still on for tonight?"

"The Double Eagle at six. My treat and I don't want any arguments."

"See ya later."

Menno and Isidora got into Menno's truck and drove away.

Because he couldn't stop himself anymore than he could stop the sun from rising every morning, Ralph Price climbed into the van and went through it to make sure everything that was supposed to be there was there and nothing that wasn't supposed to be there wasn't. Everything was in its place. Nothing was missing and nothing had been added.

He then drove out onto West University Avenue. At Avenida de Mesilla he turned right to get to Calle De Meadanos. A left there and two blocks later he took his van along the lane to the back of his office, which was sandwiched between the Flores de Primavera flower shop and Julio Rosa's Butcher Shop.

After another check through the van, he entered through the back of his office, the workshop—what Isidora sarcastically called their fabrication center—and made his way to the reception desk at the front. The message indicator light was blinking.

He took the time to remove his overalls before pushing the button on the phone.

The man spoke with a Spanish accent, not at all surprising in Mesilla.

"I am Beltran Nunez Gutierrez. I live on the other side of the Rio Grande. I have a possible renovation job for you, Mr. Price, but I am not sure your company can handle it. We can discuss that when you get here. Take the Calles del Norte past the Rio Grande to South Fairacers Road, then north to Mesilla Hill Drive and turn left. Stay on Mesilla Hill Drive until Raasaf Circle. Turn right there and keep going past Raasaf Drive along South Nizhani Trail. My home is at the end of the road. I expect you here at eleven o'clock precisely. Until then, Mr. Price, _tienes mi res petomas profundo_." You have my deepest regards. He left his phone number.

The answering machine, which Isidora had set up for him and usually took charge of, asked him to push button one if he wished to hear the message again, two if he wished to listen to his other messages—the machine had a vicious sense of humor—or three if he wished to delete all messages.

Price was familiar with the area where Nunez lived, but he replayed the message again to verify exactly where the house was. The second playback revealed more of Nunez's authoritative tone. Beltran Nunez Gutierrez was accustomed to being in charge and giving orders with every expectation of complete obedience.

After writing down Nunez's phone number, he took out his cell phone and called Menno first. "We've just had a providential call."

Isidora would love it that he was using bigger words.

He recited all the details to Menno and then said, "We'll discuss it at dinner tonight. I have to call Isidora."

"Shouldn't you wait until you know for sure? She's pretty antsy right now about whether or not—"

"She just needs something to focus on again, keep her busy." He called Isidora. "We may have work. It could be big."

"How big?"

He repeated the details of the message to her.

"How long is it for?"

"I haven't talked to him yet, have I?"

"Who is he?"

"Never heard of him."

"How did he get your name?"

"I'm in the book. I have a webpage as well as a Facebook and Twitter account."

"You don't, your business does, and all of those are useless if I'm not there. I'll give you the telephone book, it's anciently appropriate for you."

No big word that he could use against her would come to mind. "I told you something would come up."

"Ralph, I love you and Menno, you know that. I've been with you for six years now and it's been wonderful. But I want to start at New Mexico State next spring. I don't want to get bogged down with another job."

"Let's see what he has for us first."

"Ralph, it's time for me to move on. I've been accepted. Right now I have the money."

"Just let me see what he has. We'll talk more about it at dinner. I promise—"

"Do not start making promises. They just get you into trouble. And don't make decisions thinking I'm going to be here forever. And don't get me into anything I can't get out of." She hung up.

"Obstinate . . . dammit." He called the Mesilla Police Department next. "Hello, Maria, is Mike available?"

"Sure thing." She put him through.

Michael Plett, Mesilla's Police Chief, and also its biggest gossip, answered on the third ring. "Hey, Ralph, what's up?" His voice dropped. "It's not Menno again, is it?"

"He's behaving himself. Do you know Beltran Nunez?"

"We've crossed paths a few times, ceremonially speaking. Until recently, he was, unlike you, very involved in the social activities of our wonderful city. He used to take a lead role in organizing the Day of the Dead festival every year."

"Use to?"

"He still comes to it, and I think he's doing something with it this year, but he keeps mostly to himself now. He keeps his private live private. In that regard, you two could be identical twins. The only difference is Nunez is completely able to remain private. Menno every now and then makes it difficult for you to do the same. There has been some talk of his health being in decline, but no one really knows why he suddenly shut himself up in _el Hacienda de_ _Nunez_."

"What else do you know?"

"Why are you asking?"

"I have an offer of work from him. He said it might be too big for my company."

"He can certainly afford a big job. He's semi-retired now. He did that about the same time he stepped out of the public spotlight. He has a tenant managing his pecan farm. It's the biggest one in these parts. He used to have a complete staff of servants, but got rid of all but one of them a few years ago."

"How long has he lived here?"

"I don't know, maybe twenty years or more. He was here when I started as a patrolman." Plett coughed for close to a minute before he could speak again. "It could be a big job, Ralph. From what I heard, his house is huge but in quite a state of disrepair. Just another thing he's being neglecting, I suppose."

"I thought you gave up smoking."

"Don't you start on me; I get enough of that from Maria. Why are you checking up on Nunez?"

"I didn't want you to feel left out."

"Stupid bugger. Have a good one." He started laughing as he hung up, which led to another bout of coughing.

Ralph called Nunez.

A woman answered, " _Señor_ Nunez Gutierrez residence."

"This is Ralph Price calling from Price Renovations and Repairs. I received a message from Mr. Nunez and I am returning his call."

"One moment, _por favor_." The phone clicked.

A few seconds later, it clicked again.

"Hello, Mr. Price." That confident, dominating tone in his voice was clearer than it was on the message. His voice also sounded a bit breathless. "I did not expect this call."

"I will be there at eleven, Mr. Nunez, but I was hoping I could get some idea of the nature and scope of the job so I could pass it along to my employees."

"You are speaking of Isidora Ramos Olivarez and Menno Alfieri."

"You know about them?"

"I have investigated your company, Mr. Price." That breathlessness was gone. "Tell me about your two employees. Start with Isidora, if you would, please."

"She's my carpenter. She's been with me since graduating high school. Isy can frame anything; build anything, including custom cabinets. Mr. Nunez, she could build or rebuild your house from scratch if that's what you wanted."

"That is encouraging, Mr. Price, but it would be best if you did not exaggerate."

"I am not exaggerating. Isidora is brilliant. She wants to be a lawyer or a judge one day."

"I thought she wanted to be a criminologist or FBI agent." Had Nunez talked to Plett about him? "Tell me about Menno Alfieri. He concerns me."

Was Nunez trying to catch him in a lie? And if so, why? They were only entering into a renovation contract. If he knew something of Menno's past, though, it would not be unreasonable to have concerns.

"Perhaps we could discuss my employees further while we go over what work you want done."

"That will be satisfactory, Mr. Price. Be advised, however, that I will not be put off vetting all three of you. I will see you at eleven."

# Chapter 3

The blow to the back of his head hadn't hurt him, but Garcia Ortiz and his guests, particularly General Alonzo Palido and his men, needed to believe it had.

Frank grunted and dropped to his left side. He lay on the blue and white tiles of the patio listening to Garcia Ortiz bark out orders in Spanish too quickly for him to process.

Someone came up from behind and kicked him in the back.

Alonzo Palido said, " _Usted debe darle de comer sus propias bolas antes de matar a est hijo_." You should feed him his own balls before killing this fucker.

Frank rocked forward, grunted again and took a quick glance at the pool. There were still no women, either in bikinis or completely naked, anywhere to be seen. The serious business these men were conducting hadn't been concluded yet.

Garcia Ortiz growled a few more unintelligible orders before two of his bigger men picked Frank up by his arms. Rather than drag him away, they held him up and frisked him. One of the men grabbed his head and pulled it up as the other one handed the three magazines for his Glock to Garcia Ortiz.

He groaned and opened his eyes.

Garcia Ortiz, Alonzo Palido and his two aides, the only ones in uniform, stood in front of him.

The two Chinese men, the two Europeans and two Mexicans that he hadn't seen from his perch, stood back in the shadows under a trellis festooned with vines. A third Chinese man, much younger, taller and thinner than the other two, stood further back from that group under a palm tree.

Garcia aimed the Glock at his chest. "Thank you for killing my guard. He was stupid and lazy."

"It's what I do."

One of the men holding him up pressed the end of his HM-3 under Frank's chin.

"You say you've been hired to assassinate me and that whoever hired you is in here with me now. If that is true, we have, as you were about to tell me, both been betrayed."

Frank nodded toward the six men standing in the shadows. "I can't make any of them out."

General Alonzo Palido and his two men already had their guns out. They spread out to surround the six guests. Three of Garcia Ortiz's men reinforced them.

Garcia said to his guests, "Please, gentlemen, a moment in this sunshine is all that is required. Then we can dispose of this _puto bastardo de nigger_."

At least one of the Chinese men spoke English. "He is your problem _Señor_ Garcia. We are not involved with this lie in any way. We will remain where we are."

Garcia Ortiz started to aim the gun at the man who had just spoken, but quickly lowered it. He held out his hands palms up in a placating gesture. Whatever these men were here for, it was a situation too delicate to answer such a challenge with the usual Mexican macho intolerance. Garcia Ortiz didn't seem concerned about reprisals, which would be consistent for him. He just didn't want whatever deal they were negotiating to fail.

"Please, gentlemen, this puts me in a very awkward position. What we all hope to achieved here has to come from mutual trust. I am asking little, I assure you. It is my belief that this man is lying. His lie will be revealed the moment he cannot identify any of you."

Frank said, "You know how this works. He's the type who keeps more than just an arm's length distance between himself and the required wet work. He is one of those backroom warriors. He doesn't get his hands bloody. Anonymity is the key to people like him. The question for you, Hector, is which one of your guests is that kind of man?"

Garcia Ortiz spun around and struck him on the cheek with the barrel of the Glock. "You will not insult my guests again." He smoothed his shirt. "You see, gentlemen, he is bluffing." He raised the Glock and cocked the hammer. "I need to kill this man, but I need all I can get from him first. Any danger to me could be a danger to all of us."

The other Chinese man said, "It is too hot out here. We are going inside to cool off."

"That's him," Frank said. "He made one mistake while negotiating. He called on the last communication to personally confirm the job. I recognize his voice because he didn't think to conceal it. He's from Hong Kong. His English is too good to be from anywhere else in China."

The man cursed in Cantonese a series of words that had likely targeted the assassin, Garcia Ortiz and probably Alonzo Palido and his aides as well.

Furious, Garcia Ortiz aimed the gun at Frank's face and stepped close enough to bring it within a few inches of his eyes.

"Just shoot him and be done with this," the first Chinese man said.

Incensed as he was that no one was cooperating with him—showing him the respect he deserved—he was still able to talk like the gracious host he was trying to be. "It will only take a few seconds then we can conclude our negotiations and get on with the fun."

The Chinese man under the palm tree, as gracious and calm in return said, " _Señor_ Garcia Ortiz, we did not come here to participate in a bloody police line-up. Do what you must with that man and let us indeed get back to business."

Frank recognized that voice. It came from Oxford. "I could have been mistaken. It might be that one."

Garcia Ortiz squeezed back on the trigger as the man holding him jammed his gun harder under his chin, pushing his head farther back.

" _Puto bastardo de nigger_." He growled, spit, stepped back and set the safety. "You are fortunate that we know who you are, Frank, or you would already be dead. Take him downstairs and show him what he came here for. Then lock him in the one beside them." He handed the Glock to the other guard holding Frank.

Alonzo Palido said, "He is too dangerous to keep alive."

"In a few hours, he will be the doctor's problem. They all will."

Frank could hear Garcia Ortiz's gracious, apologetic attempts to restart negotiations with his Chinese guests as the two men holding him took him down a set of concrete steps leading from the patio. Two other men came down behind them.

At the bottom of the stairs, one of the men unlocked a metal door with a swipe of his card. He opened it and pushed Frank through onto another set of stairs, these ones made out of wrought-iron. Lights came on automatically as they neared the bottom of this much longer set.

They stood in a chamber carved out of the stone facing three tunnels. One went straight ahead. The two on either side of it headed off at thirty degree angles from it.

One of the other pair of men closed and secured the door they had come through before trotting down the twenty-eight steps to catch up to them.

The instant he stepped off the bottom stair, Frank twisted to his left and head-butted the man who had his Glock as he brought his right hand up to deflect the gun away from under his chin. Holding firm to the man's wrist, he kicked out into his left hip, grabbed the man he had just head-butted and swung him into the two men trailing them.

Those three men tumbled into a pile on the stone floor.

Frank twisted the man he was holding to put him face to face and punched him in the chest, shattering his breast bone, before tossing him on top of the three men trying to untangle themselves. He picked up the dropped Glock and shot each man in the head.

Shooting started up on the patio. It had taken about as long as expected for the distrust to escalate to gunplay. The only question was who would be the last man standing?

The door at the top of the stairs opened. One man slammed it shut, locked it and came down the staircase hard enough to make the wrought iron creak and rattle.

Frank backed into the shadows and away from the pile of dead men.

Garcia Ortiz, a gun in each hand, leapt down the last three stairs and sprinted into the tunnel running straight ahead. He hadn't noticed the bodies.

Frank went after him, matching footfall with footfall.

The tunnel proceeded for close to sixty yards before ending at another chamber carved out of the mountain. Garcia stood before three secured iron doors—solid prison cell doors with barred windows—for only a second or two before going to the one to his right and looking inside it. He didn't find what he expected to find.

He called out to his men, but quickly realized they weren't going to respond.

"Drop the gun, Hector." Frank came out of the end of the tunnel. "Where are they?"

Garcia Ortiz's eyes shifted to his right before he started to raise both guns.

It was all the delay Frank needed. He shot him with the last three rounds in the Glock. Every shot hit Garcia Ortiz in the chest. Frank ejected the empty magazine, recovered the other three from Garcia Ortiz and reloaded as he walked to the iron door to his left. He withdrew a small LED flashlight from his lower right pants pocket and shone it through the barred opening.

They were all there. One of the women was holding her hand over the mouth of one of the other ones. None of the six women moved.

" _¿Alguno de vosotros habla a Inglés_?"

The woman keeping the other one quite said, "I speak English."

"I'm here to get you out, but first I must find out what happened up there." He pointed. "Do you understand?"

The woman, probably in her late teens, her dark hair matted with filth, her dark cheeks stained with dirty tear tracks, her dark eyes fierce, nodded. She let go of the other woman, who gasped and started crying, and came to the door. Two of the other women reached for her and implored her to stay where she was but none of them tried to stop her.

"What's your name?"

"Evelyn." She was one of the ones still pregnant.

Three of the women held newborn infants to their breasts.

"Evelyn, my name is Frank Gillett. I'm going to go back up to make sure the way is clear. Then I will return and take you all out. Can any of you handle a gun?"

"I can."

"I will be right back." He retrieved two HM-3's from the dead men. There was no more shooting at the patio level when he paused at the bottom of the stairs to listen.

Evelyn took both submachine guns without hesitation and felt their weight. "Still fully loaded." She came to the bars and looked out at as much of the chamber as she could. "Hector?"

"He's over there with three bullets in his heart."

She spit through the opening. " _Puto monstruo_. _Pueden perros se alimentan de él en el infierno para siempre_." Fucking monster. May dogs feed on him in hell forever. She reached out through the bars. "Frank, we can trust you, yes?" Tears ran down her cheeks but her voice remained firm.

He took hold of her hand. "I am here with friends. You can trust all of us. I promise. Is everyone with you able to walk?"

"We can fly if we have to, and I will kill any bastard who gets in our way."

"Just be patient a little while longer and then you will all be free."

She gave his hand a hard squeeze before letting go, returning to the other women and telling them what was going to happen.

Ragged sighs, gasps and weeping followed him into the tunnel. He could still hear harsh sobbing when he exited at the other end. At the top of the stairs, the iron door had been secured on his side by a simple set of levered bars that Garcia Ortiz had slid into slots chiselled into the walls.

He unlocked and opened the door, slipped forward and listened at the bottom of the concrete steps. He heard nothing. He could see the haze and smell the gunpowder aftermath of an intense gunfight.

"Frank," Li Chu Yan called down, "is that you?"

"Garcia Ortiz and his men are all dead."

"Same up here, Frank. You're not going to shoot me, are you?"

"Not if I don't have to."

Li appeared at the top of the stairs and held up his left hand with his gun in it. "That's good, because I'm out of fucking bullets."

Frank didn't believe that for a second.

"Come on up so you can explain to me why you tried to get me killed. I thought we were on the same bloody side this time."

Two steps up the stairs gunfire started, Li vanished. Bullets struck the wrought-iron railing at the top of the stairs.

Frank ducked back and aimed the Glock.

Li fired a number of rounds from an HM-3 then called down, "Sorry, Frank, there are a couple of assholes on the wall who still think they have something to fight for. I could use your help."

"What have you got?"

"I snagged a couple of bloody half-empty subs."

More bullets hit at the top of the stairs. Li fired back with a couple of short bursts and cursed in Cantonese.

Frank called up, "I'll be right back." He ran down the long staircase and recovered the two remaining HM-3's from the guards. At the bottom of the patio stairs, he called to Li, "Still with me?"

"I need a fucking bazooka!"

"Give me a spot."

"Forty-five degrees to your left when your head pops up and just under thirty degrees from there to the top of the wall; the idiots are about six feet apart. One is kneeling. He'll be to your right. The other shithead, true to his Mexican macho heritage, is standing straight up, but he has the assault rifle."

"Can you see the stairs?"

"The top three, yeah, I can."

Another round of fire peppered the top of the stairs. Li returned fire.

"Give me some cover fire as soon as you see me."

"Shit, Frank, let's do this. I'm getting hungry. Garcia was a bloody awful host."

Frank charged up the stairs. Li opened fire with both submachine guns. The guards on the wall fired back; so much for cover fire. The instant he cleared the stairs, he cut to his left and opened fire as he sprinted for the wall.

The man standing shifted his aim, but Frank just pointed both HM-3's at him. None of the shots hit him because they were aimed at the concrete at his feet. The chips flying up from the wall forced him to take a step back.

Frank aimed a few shots at the kneeling man before tossing the guns away. Six steps from the wall, he jumped up as hard as he could.

Li was yelling and cheering him on.

The standing shooter had just returned to the edge of the wall when Frank reached the top of it. With an extended hand, Frank took hold of the assault rifle as he landed, swung a backhand into the man's face and tossed him over the railing.

The kneeling man hesitated after what he had just seen. Frank aimed and fired the Glock. Once he had confirmed that man was dead, he looked down at the man on the patio.

Li walked over from his cover under the trellis and fired two bullets into the man's forehead. He then looked up and smiled with a row of exceptionally white teeth.

Frank dropped back to the patio.

"Bloody hell, you really can do all that shit. I thought our reports on you were just secret service bureaucratic fear mongering. It's had our scientists working under the whip for the last six years."

"Any luck?"

Li laughed as he looked around at the bodies. "I've heard we just ended up with one anorexic panda addicted to video games and a bunch of angry pot bellied pigs." He looked Frank over. "So, you're the golem. That's funny, Frank. Is it true you can shoot laser beams out your eyes?" He burst into another loud moment of laughter and flashing teeth and waved Frank off when he stepped closer. "Okay, okay, I'm just kidding. But it was in the report." He took a deep breath and stifled any further laughter. "I'm afraid I've been corrupted by too much exposure to all your Western decadence. Can I at least see the scales? They're real, right?"

"No one can shoot laser beams out of their eyes. Weinberg doesn't work like that, or else he can't yet."

"You're bloody shitting me. There are more like you?"

Frank took a look at the bodies strewn about the patio.

"Come on, Frank, give me something. My boss is going to chew my ass off after I got my guys killed . . . after _you_ got my guys killed, not to mention almost getting yours truly shot full of bloody holes, too."

"Who were your guys?"

Li pointed with his empty handgun toward the trellis. "That fat asshole was Zhang Jian Chao, a businessman from Hong Kong with links to Shanghai, Bangkok, Agra and them. That huge blob lying next to him is his younger brother, Jiao-Long Hong. I was assigned to find out who their contacts over here were. This was my first trip to Mexico with them, but they'd been dealing with Garcia and his people for over a year."

"What were they here for?"

"My take is they were still in the early stages of negotiations. Those Euro-dudes and the two Mexicans are new. The offer and acceptance hadn't been established yet. Now it never will. Why are you here?"

"I came for the women."

Li looked around the patio again. "Yeah, so did I. Where the bloody hell are they?"

He pointed to the stairs. "Two flights down. They are the other ones."

"I heard something about similar stuff in India or Pakistan or Cambodia or North Korea, but I just thought all of that was bullshit, too. How many are there?"

"Six. Three have just given birth. The other three are close."

"And those kids, they can . . . you know, do that stuff?" Li pointed to the wall he'd jumped up on.

"That's what those women will either confirm or dismiss. If you want something for your ass-cannibal boss, tell him to start looking for the six that are supposed to be somewhere in China or Tibet or Nepal or Mongolia."

"My boss isn't a man, Frank. It is Yao Ng Qiao."

"Madam Ng?"

"We call her _Ng_ _xiāojiĕ_."

"Little older sister Ng."

"Older sister isn't exactly what we mean when we say it."

"You have my sympathy."

"How much do you know about her?"

"She's in her late-thirties, is married to Ng Zhong, a high-ranking member of your External Security out of Hong Kong. But most think she is the real power of the two."

"Ng disappeared about six months ago, Frank. A week later, _xiāojiĕ_ has his immediate superior over for this special dinner. The rumor is they ate Ng together. Then, after an evening of intense negotiations involving perverted sex, threats and coercion on her part—turns out she really was the one in charge and _knows_ everything—they pick her to replace her missing husband. It's all about appearance and stability."

"When isn't it?" Frank started for the stairs.

"How do you know about all this when we only have rumors?"

"We don't know where they are. We don't know if they've been impregnated yet." It wasn't an accurate term, but it was good enough for what he was selling Li. "Start with missing person reports."

"In China? You have to be kidding me. If I did that, I'd end up missing."

"Tell _Ng_ _xiāojiĕ_ to focus on young women in their late teens. They would most likely come from small, isolated villages that do not have easy access to communications infrastructure."

"Look for missing girls in the most populace nation in the world. You aren't giving me much, Frank."

"That's all I have."

"You must get a deal on broomsticks, Frank; otherwise you wouldn't shove so many of them up your bloody arse at one time."

"Our investigation indicates caches of six women each have been stashed in those nations you already mentioned plus China, Russia, here, and some in South American and African nations that we haven't identified yet. We hope to get more information soon."

Li ran his fingers through his stubbly hair. "All this Hollywood blockbuster movie stuff would be laughable if it weren't true."

"You're right, you have been corrupted. What did you major in at Oxford?"

"What do you think?"

Li walked over to the stairs and looked down. He then shook his head. "Sorry, man, I'd love to help, but I need to get as far away as possible and report in. I just hope I can go back after this fiasco." He shook his head again. "He really is a slimy bloody fucker, isn't he?"

"The slimiest."

"And speaking of being corrupted, do you mind if I take one of the Mercedes? They have navigation systems so I can find my way out of this shithole."

"Be my guest."

"You will take care of everything else, right?"

"I will."

"You're soaking wet, Frank." Li proffered a handkerchief. "Did you catch something?"

He didn't take it. "Just a fever."

"I don't get sick days either. Later, Frank, and don't forget, you bloody well owe me."

"I owe you."

Li waved and disappeared into the passage that would take him out of the compound. He revved the sedan's engine a few times before racing away.

Frank returned to the women. The lock on the cell door was electronically controlled. It had illuminated buttons on the keypad, but each button displayed an ancient Aztec symbol on it rather than a number.

Evelyn came to the door and held up the HM-3. "Is it clear, Frank?"

"I just need to get the door open. Do any of you know . . . ?"

Evelyn smiled, which made Frank's heart flutter. That this young woman, given what she'd been through, could still smile just hadn't fit into his expectations for this mission. Sullen, defeated surrender and maybe catatonia had been his assumption of the day for what he would find.

Evelyn reached her hand out through the bars. "Come closer."

He stepped up to the door.

She stroked his cheek where Garcia Ortiz had struck it with the Glock. It didn't hurt. Tears flowed down her dirty cheeks again. "It's an old door, Frank, and we all know who you are." She touched the tips of her fingers to his lips and then backed up to stand with the other women.

He took hold of the bars and yanked as hard as he could. The hinges imbedded in the crumbling stone broke free and the door—heavy even for him—came away in his grasp.

The six women wasted no time getting free of their prison. Evelyn, still holding one of the submachine guns, stayed beside Frank as they made their way up to the patio. The woman Evelyn had kept silent, probably barely over sixteen, trailed the group holding the other HM-3.

Evelyn led the way out through the tunnel. Only once they were free of the compound did she drop her weapon. She leaned against the wall, held her swollen abdomen, looked up at the sky and took as many deep breaths as she could as the other women gathered around her. There were more tears as they hugged each other and chattered with a measured degree of hope again.

Frank retrieved his gear and put in the call. Twenty minutes later, Ferris's Bell 412, painted the blue, silver and red of his company, came over the mountain top to the north and landed on the gravel parking lot.

Frank and Evelyn made sure every woman and infant was on board and belted in. Evelyn boarded the Bell last after first kissing Frank. Her long, dark hair scattering in the downdraft, her big, brown eyes and her wide smile framed by full lips made his heart flutter again.

"You are a good man, Frank."

The pilot, Candace Lorimar, a former Navy helicopter pilot, turned around to look at her passengers and had to cover her mouth. Her eyes welled up. Ferris reached over to comfort her.

Evelyn said to her, "Don't worry, miss, we are all healthy. They took very good care of us."

Frank wiped sweat from his face.

Thomas Ferris asked, "How are you feeling?"

"This is all of them," he said.

"That is not correct," Evelyn said. "Six other Isabellas were taken away last week."

"Had any of them given birth?"

"No, but Anna and Pia were close."

Ferris asked, "Why do you call them Isabellas?"

"We are all Isabellas, daughters of the order. It's what _they_ call us." She touched one of the women holding a baby. "Why were they only pregnant for three months? The babies are perfect. How can that be?"

Ferris said, "I don't know. In the past, the process needed six months to complete."

Frank asked, "Where did they take the other Isabellas?"

"East, Frank. They have another compound in the Sierra Madre Oriental Mountains near the border. I do not know exactly where. It's older than this one. It's where _they_ did this to me, to all of us."

Frank glanced at Thomas.

"We only knew of this one."

Frank stared at him.

"I recognize that look, Frank. Just remember, I am not him, only a copy."

"Not only a copy."

Candace said, "Roger that." She turned back to them. "We've got incoming on the ground, Thomas."

"Get them out of here. I'll find the other ones."

Thomas said, "My jet is waiting at Hermosillo International. From there, we go to El Paso. They will get the best of care. Let us know when you have the others."

Candace asked, "Do you want me to come back?"

"Just be ready."

After the Bell was out of sight, Frank re-entered the compound, grabbed everything he thought he would need and lifted off in Garcia Ortiz's gunship helicopter. He strafed the patio using the minigun in the nose of the helo before firing two rockets at the wall. Then he headed east.

Look for the next book in the Proteus Group Series

# Shadow Caste

In the final Proteus Group book operation Strikeback's relentless and devastating attacks threaten to overwhelm the international effort to bring the Proteus Group to justice. Weinberg's rapidly spreading GMOs are close to triggering global famine and pestilence. The fate of the world depends entirely on three remarkable young women, but one of them has gone missing.

About the Author

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