Quantico. Greg Bear
At this angle and that distance, the lip-reading software on the computer wasn’t much good.
‘They look nervous,’ Benson observed.
‘Chambers starts out charming but in the end he rules by force,’ Levine said. ‘He picks women who want nothing but guidance and routine, but that doesn’t mean he makes them happy. Though he does provide, in his way, and he loves his kids. In his way.’
‘They’re all his?’ Rebecca asked.
‘Chambers has never shared his harem,’ Levine said. ‘He teaches his sons to be crack shots but forbids his wives or daughters to use guns, ever. When are you planning to make a raid?’
Griff winced at the word ‘raid’ but he did not answer in the negative. Something would have to be done and he would likely be at the tip of the spear going in. ‘Not until we know all there is to know,’ he said.
‘There could be an opportune moment,’ Levine said. ‘That is, if what the guys in town have found out is true—about them being Tombers.’
‘Do tell,’ Griff said.
‘It is likely the women and children will all go to Easter services at the church, and that could be a good time to find Chambers home alone, or at most with his eldest son in attendance. He insists on piety but I’ve never heard of his entering a church, not since he was a kid. He needs to be top dog wherever he stands, and that includes before God.’
‘No way we’re going in at Easter,’ Griff said. ‘Besides, people in town are alerted. We can’t afford to wait.’
Levine smiled. ‘You’re in luck. Tombers are Julians. They believe Easter comes before the date commonly observed by you goyim. They’re eleven days off. The Gregorian calendar is the work of the devil, you know.’
‘Scout’s honor?’ Griff asked. He was looking through the scope now. A Coleman lantern had been slung on a beam inside the porch overhang and the two women were setting up folding chairs.
‘For them, Good Friday is tomorrow.’
Then, down in the valley, the old man finally came out and stood watching the twilight. His face was clear in the bright white glow of the lantern: an aquiline, craggy profile. The old man appeared thoughtful. For a moment, Griff thought he might be watching them.
Rebecca folded her arms. ‘Just the kind of fellow to need a microbial incubator.’
Griff set the digital cameras humming and backed away. ‘Is that him?’ he asked Levine.
Levine peered. ‘I hope I look that good when I’m his age.’
‘Whenever you’re sure, Jacob.’
Levine spent a few more seconds on the binoculars. ‘It’s him,’ he said.
William Griffin jogged across the lawn to join the group of nine students standing in front of the Biograph theater, on the edge of Hogantown and just across Hoover Road from the towering dorms and walkways and the squat tan bulk of the Academy.
‘All right, listen up,’ Pete Farrow called out. The recruits—two women and seven men: two blacks, one Asian, one Middle-Eastern, five shades of white—stopped talking and assumed parade rest. Compared to the instructor they were a motley bunch, spread over the range of physical specimens: plump and skinny, tall and short, dark-haired and light.
Farrow walked along the loose line. ‘All right, agents, this is it. Today, you will be using equipment worth about two hundred thousand dollars. Try not to break it. Only about twenty percent of our field offices have all this stuff. It is rare. It is valuable. But it is the future—and you will get used to it.
‘If you are a sadist, you are shit out of luck. Some of this new stuff threatens to turn you bloody-minded SOBs into kinder, gentler peace officers.’ Farrow winked in the general direction of William Griffin. ‘Out on the street, if you do this right, nobody has to die. Though I do expect a few sprained ankles and wrenched necks, and we have been known to break arms and even legs. Understood?’
The class nodded in unison.
Three men in gray suits passed behind the students and entered the Bank of Hogantown. They were carrying bagged sandwiches from the Pastime Deli. One turned and said, ‘Farrow’s litter. What do you think? Blood in the gutters?’ The others flashed evil smiles and pushed through the swinging glass doors.
William watched Jane Rowland scratch her ribs under her suit coat and the white FBI Academy golf-style shirt. His underwear itched, too. Something about the diagnostic sensors embedded in the bulletproof weave or the fluid piping that smoothly wrapped around the torso.
Medium-sized piles of equipment lay at their feet. They would soon put on masks and special network jackets. More weight, more wires.
In their holsters they carried blue-handled revolvers filled with paint ball rounds. The Academy cars were equipped with pump-action shotguns with blue stocks that discharged a nasty, smelly pink spray, and mock H&K MP5 9mm carbines that fired nothing but made a horrible racket—all networked training weapons. Everything they did with these guns showed up on monitors somewhere in the recesses of Hogantown.
‘You have made your case,’ Farrow said. ‘You are now about to arrest four suspects who are transporting an illegal substance for sale. This is no longer the good old days of cocaine or heroin. Neuraminoline tartrate, known on the street as Tart, is colorless, odorless, and tasteless—but it is the most dangerous and destructive GM drug on the market today. Loser users tell themselves that Tart is a harmless organic performance enhancer. It produces long-lasting feelings of angelic well-being. But in five percent of its devotees, Tart leads to a degenerative neuromuscular disease called Kepler’s Syndrome. You end up in a wheelchair, drooling, unable to control your bowels and in constant pain. But that’s not the end of Tart’s charms. In an estimated seven percent of users, Tart binds to chromosomes in sex cells— eggs and sperm. It causes distortions that can be passed on to future offspring, who, if they survive beyond the age of two, will suffer the agonies of the damned. Tart makes babies into monsters.’ Farrow slipped on his grid-linked gogs—short for goggles, but actually more like a thick-framed pair of glasses. ‘If that doesn’t psych you for this bust nothing will. Remember—if you screw up, your classmates could get hurt. I do not like to have my heart flutter. I do not want to grieve for lost ducklings. Stay tactical. Use all the skills we’ve taught you. Ready?’
‘Ready!’ they shouted.
‘Suit up and get your Lynxes on the grid. Today we’re all top code, to keep the bad guys from knowing who and where you are, so line up and get your numbers.’ He began handing out strips of paper.
William Griffin put on his gogs and field jacket, labeled with a strip of silver tape with his name on it. He ran his index finger along the bumps and ridges on the forearm Lynx keyboard, logging on to the team server and inputting his number and five fake numbers and positions that his node would disperse like chaff, should someone hack in. The others did the same. They all stood clutching their paintball masks, clear visors with plastic headbands. Cheeks, temples, and ears were no longer protected—hadn’t been for years. Pain was a teacher, a tool.
They then clipped health stats boxes to their belts and arranged their shoulder-mounted holsters. Farrow checked them over, as solicitous as a mother hen.
‘Keep boxy stuff away from your mid-back. Clip everything to the side. If you fall backward on a hard surface, you could injure your spine.’
They sheepishly readjusted. This was basic stuff and already they were screwing up.
Farrow checked his slate. ‘Mr. Al-Husam, you’re not on the grid. Get your numbers.’
Fouad Al-Husam, a small man with beautiful black eyes and a round, almost feminine face, touched