Circuit Of Heaven (26 page)

“Don’t turn around,” someone said behind him, and he stiffened. The voice was Gabriel’s.

“What the hell do
you
want?” Nemo asked, keeping his eyes on Wendy. He was glad she was there.

“I have a proposition for you.”

“I’m not interested.”

“You haven’t heard it yet.”

“Well, make it fast. When the train pulls in, I’m gone. I’m already late.”

“I know. I’ll make this brief. As you’ve experienced recently in quite a vivid manner, the Bin saps our life away. It steals the best from us and leaves the world to wither and die. As long as it is there, a gateway into Hell, we are doomed. Do you, perhaps, sympathize with these sentiments?”

Nemo’d heard it all before. Until a few days ago, he would’ve agreed. But not coming from Gabriel. You could hear the venom dripping from each vowel and consonant. The words didn’t matter. Gabriel’s truth was whatever bomb he was itching to throw. “I sympathize with a wide variety of sentiments; it’s a talent of mine. I don’t necessarily share them. Why don’t you give me a tract, and I’ll read it on the train.”

Wendy had apparently discovered a defective circuitboard and pulled it out. She opened up a case full of parts and stowed it, hunted for a replacement. When she found what she was looking for and turned her attention back to the panel, Gabriel spoke again, but more quietly. “I am proposing that you help me sever the connection between the real world and the Bin.”

Nemo thought that Wendy had stolen a glance at them, but he couldn’t be sure in this light. “Why don’t you want the Construct to see you?”

“Didn’t you hear what I just said?”

Nemo sighed. He was getting tired of this. Where in the hell was the train? “Of course I did. Am I supposed to be impressed? You’re nuts, Gabriel. The Bin could take a direct hit from a nuclear missile.”

“What you call the Bin isn’t actually the Bin itself.
ALMA
is in high orbit, quite unassailable. The Pentagon is merely a relay station, an interface, if you will. And it’s quite unnecessary to blow it up. We have designed a virus that will render it inoperable. We only need a means to convey it into the Bin.”

Of course, Nemo thought. That would be the way to do it. “You mean me.”

“Precisely.”

In spite of himself, Nemo was curious. “And how would I do that?”

“By uploading yourself with the virus implanted in your identity.”

Nemo grunted his opinion. “You want me to go into the Bin, then cut it off with some virus. Mind telling me how I’d get back, or is this a one-way trip—turn off the lights when you go?”

“You underestimate me. We would make a copy of your identity, give you an antitode for the lethal injection, recover your body, and restore your identity. You would be yourself again in a matter of hours—in a world reborn.”

“You’re totally nuts.”

“Perhaps.”

“Well, let’s just say you have the technical ability to pull that off—which I seriously doubt. Why don’t you ‘convey it’?”

He laughed humorlessly. “I am known, as are my followers. They would scan any of us too thoroughly. You, on the other hand, are a senator’s nephew, with no ties to any subversive organizations. You have stayed out, a rebellious youth, but now you have a perfectly plausible cause for your change of heart—you’ve fallen in love. No one will give it a thought. They will welcome you with open arms.”

A chill went up Nemo’s spine as Gabriel wrapped his tongue around the word
love
, stretching out the vowel as if on a rack. “How do you know about Justine?”

“I have sources.”

“Tell your sources to keep out of my business.”

“Your business, as you call it, is of no concern to me. I do the will of God.”

Ah, of course. There it was. The familiar trump. “You can tell Him to stay out of my business, too.”

Wendy closed the panel and locked it. The echo clattered from the concrete walls. Gabriel’s voice dropped to a raspy whisper. “One more thing, Nemo. Your girlfriend—she is not what she seems.”

“What’re you talking about?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. When you learn the truth, believe me, you’ll come looking for me.”

Wendy had packed up her tools and was walking briskly toward them. Nemo smiled and nodded as she passed, and she smiled back. When her footsteps faded away, Nemo turned around, but there was no one there. The train pulled into the station, the doors opened, and the warning bell sounded. He searched the shadows one more time for Gabriel, then jumped onto the train just as the doors slid closed. He stood, hanging onto the pole by the door.

He figured Gabriel as totally insane.
Call me Gabriel
. Gabriel, get it? His real name was probably Barney or Newman. Nemo had heard the theory that the real Bin was in high orbit, but that was the only thing he said that wasn’t nuts. What Nemo couldn’t figure was why Gabriel thought he would be crazy enough to sign up for this fruitcake mission. Even if a wacko like Gabriel could get his hands on the kind of equipment needed to pull it off—which he couldn’t—the chances of uploading even a harmless virus into the Bin were nil. He didn’t want to think what would happen to somebody who got caught trying it. Even if they pulled it off, who in their right mind would trust Gabriel to raise them from the dead when it was over?

And what was that nonsense about Justine? If he’s been hassling her, too, he thought, I’ll break his scrawny neck for him. His hand tightened around the pole. Probably have to stand in line for that duty. He bent over and looked out the window, searching the horizon for D.C., wishing the damn train would hurry up.

He put Gabriel out of his mind. No reason to get so upset, he thought. Let somebody else deal with Gabriel. Tomorrow, I’ll be leaving him and his bullshit behind for good.

WHEN
NEMO
GOT
TO
THE
CLUB
,
JUSTINE
WAS
NEARLY
through her first set. He spotted Uncle Winston first. His silver helmet of hair stood out in the crowd. The woman beside him had spectacular flame-red hair flowing down her back. He remembered her from last Christmas. She’d hardly said three words, but then Nemo wasn’t too talkative himself. Her name was L-something. Laurie, Linda, Lisa. Lila. He could just see the tops of his parents’ heads. They were right in front, their chairs turned toward the low stage, looking up at Justine singing. They probably suspected what his big news was. There wasn’t much else it could be. He used to report disasters from outside—
The Jefferson Hotel burned down—The
RMA
bridge fell into the James
—just to watch them squirm, but he was a lot younger then.

With the lights in her eyes, Nemo didn’t figure Justine could see him at all. He stood at the periphery watching her. She was right. He didn’t really know her. Not in the usual way. Three days ago, he didn’t even know she existed. Now, he couldn’t imagine living without her. He used to wish God would come into his life like that and transform it. Maybe he had. Loving Justine, he felt closer to faith than he ever had. It made him happy just to look at her.

When she finished her song, he wound his way through the applauding crowd, checking out the band’s equipment as he approached the stage. He liked their vintage mikes and amps and instruments—impossible to find outside. But they had all this beautiful twentieth-century equipment plugged into a late-model Soundman computer. The computer had her mixed pretty much the same in every song. She was better than that, more complicated. They needed a real soundman for her vocals. He’d kick up the midrange here and there, strip away some of the effects. The lead guitar was too much out front on all but the hardest edged tunes. He imagined himself sitting at an old-fashioned board, hundreds of knobs and slide switches on a sloping plane of flat black, nurturing each song. He’d love it.

He took the empty chair by his mom, right in front of Justine’s mike, mouthed greetings to his folks, then looked up at Justine, saving that for last, expecting to see her smiling at him, her eyes full of love. Instead she started, as if she were afraid of him, and quickly looked away. He had that same falling sensation you get coming into the Bin, going from one world to another. Something wasn’t right. Something had happened.

He looked around the table. Had his mom and dad said something to her? They didn’t look like anything was wrong. Winston seemed a little nervous, but Nemo always had that effect on him. Lila was looking right at Nemo, as if she’d been watching the silent exchange between him and Justine. She looked sympathetic, but sympathetic about what?

He looked back at the stage. Justine had her back turned to the audience, conferring with her band. The bass player softly played a riff from “Coming Up Close,” as Justine argued with the lead player. Her voice rose, and Nemo heard her say, “I’m not singing that song tonight, so forget it.”

They did a song Nemo had never heard before, but he didn’t listen to it. He just watched Justine, waited for her to look at him. She sang the whole song, waited out the applause, and said the band was taking a break. Then she finally looked his way. There was something else in her eyes now besides fear. Defiance, he would guess. Determination. She’s going to dump me, he thought. So sorry, big mistake.

She tossed her head toward the side of the stage to indicate he should meet her there, and he excused himself. Nobody at the table asked him where he was going. They were all watching now. He pushed through the crowd to the doorway where Justine stood waiting.

The other band members had followed her off the stage. “Could we have some privacy?” she asked them as Nemo walked up.

The lead player smiled. “Aren’t you going to introduce us, Justine?”

“Nemo, this is Rick, John, and Ian,” she said, her head down, her hand on the doorknob. “Now, please leave us alone.”

“Pleased to meet you, Nemo,” Rick said, laughing. “Have fun.”

Justine opened the door and pulled Nemo inside, closing the door behind her and locking it. It was a tiny room with a couple of sofas and a cluttered coffee table. Instrument cases were lying on the floor.

She stood apart, her arms wrapped around herself. “Have you told them?”

“Of course not. I just got here. I was waiting for you.”

“You can’t tell them yet, okay? Not yet.”

“What’s happened, Justine? Did my parents say something to you? Whatever’s going on, it doesn’t matter.”

“It
does
matter, Nemo. It does. It’s not your parents, it’s me. Just wait, please.”

He felt a lump forming in his throat. “Wait to tell them, or wait to come in?”

She hung her head, staring at the floor. “Both,” she said.

“Why?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Look, Justine, if you don’t love me, I’d rather you just told me now and got it over with.”

She closed her eyes and shook her head, balling up her fists. “Don’t even say that. If I
didn’t
love you, I’d say come on in and don’t look back, but I can’t do that. I just can’t!”

She’s hemmed in, he thought, trapped by something that wasn’t just about the two of them. Some kind of trouble. He remembered Gabriel’s raspy whisper in his ear—
Your girlfriend—she is not what she seems
. Maybe she’d been in the underground, and now they were trying to blackmail her somehow, punish her for going in. Maybe they’d even screwed with her upload, distorted her memory. “Justine, whatever’s going on, maybe I can help.”

“Please just let me do this. I have to find out some things. I have to figure some things out.”

“Does this have anything to do with Gabriel?”

Her face was a blank. Either she was a great actress, or she didn’t have a clue.

“Gabriel. The underground.” Nothing. “This guy who calls himself Gabriel. A real nutcase. He’s been spying on us. He told me you’re not what you seem. What’s going on? What did he mean?”

She shook her head. None of that mattered to her. “I don’t know, but I’m going to find out.”

“Justine, let me help you. There’s nothing you could find out that would make any difference to me.”

She winced as he said that, then spoke so quietly he almost couldn’t hear her. “I hope you’re right.”

He took a step toward her, reached for her, but she stepped back. “Why don’t we go someplace after the show and talk this out? We can’t just leave it like this. Please.”

She held her head up, drew back her shoulders. “I’m leaving after the show. I have to go to New York.”

“Will you at least come back to the table with me? My parents have to be wondering where in the hell we are.”

“You promise not to tell them?”

“There’s nothing to tell now. If you want me to stay out, I’ll stay out. I’ll have to dream up some kind of bullshit to tell them. I’m supposed to have ‘great news’ after all. But I guess that’s not your problem.”

He walked out of the room, leaving the door open behind him. She could follow him if she wanted to. He didn’t know whether to yell and scream or break down in tears, though he wasn’t about to do either one. They wouldn’t get him what he wanted—to go back just an hour ago when everything seemed perfect.

When he got to the table, he looked over his shoulder, and Justine was standing behind him. He wanted to take her in his arms and never let her go, but instead he held her chair and sat down next to her. As he’d expected, it took his dad about thirty seconds to ask him what his news was, and Nemo had to tell him.

Nemo sounded to himself like some jovial idiot from a sitcom as he psychobabbled his way toward some meaningful revelation he was making up as he went along. Something that would leave Justine out of it altogether. Finally, he concluded—“So, Mom and Dad, I’ve decided I should visit more often in the future. Like tonight. We can see more of each other. Isn’t that great?”

“That’s wonderful, dear,” his mom said, but her heart wasn’t in it.

Nemo’s wasn’t either. He didn’t want to leave Justine out of it. He didn’t want to let her go. He put his arm around her shoulders, half expecting her to pull away, but she didn’t. “How about we come for dinner tomorrow night,” he said to his mom. “Just me and Justine.”