System Seven (50 page)

A little kingdom I possess, where thoughts and feelings
dwell;

And very hard the task I find of governing it well.
- Louisa May Alcott, 1832-1888, American Author

At the northern edge
of Velletri against the forests at the base of Mount Artemisio, the last of a
worn road led to the house of Martin Moretti. At one time a modest Italian
estate, years of neglect lent the property an almost disreputable air.

On the weed-lined lane
leading up from the road, a gray canvas wrap covered a concession trailer used
for making food at regional festivals. The two-story home’s stucco and stone
exterior needed paint and its tile roof was patched in several places. The
porch was overrun by potted plants, many browned with neglect. Parked out front
was an aging Fiat Spider with faded orange paint.

Past the house the
lane became dirt and curved amidst dense stands of juniper and cypress trees.
In a clearing beyond, a workshop stood with an oversized barn tucked away in
the far corner, half hidden by branches. Most of the workshop’s windows were
boarded up and weeds grew knee-high all around the yard.

Austin and Johan
emerged from a side door of the barn into the early evening dusk. Together they
walked to the corner of the workshop.

“You don’t trust
them.” Johan said.

He’d left the remote
and the ship in the hands of the scientists and engineers. “It’s not that,
exactly. I just want to be sure I get to come back to it.”

Johan clicked his
tongue. “Of course you will.”

“You said Cathbad’s
not happy with us.”

“I said problems are
making him unhappy.”

A voice called out
from behind them. They waited while an old man caught up. Martin Moretti’s sons
had helped cover Johan since his departure to look for Kaiya and Ryota. If his
choice and all its consequences bothered him, he didn’t let on.

He came alongside and
joined them on the walk back to the house.

“You’ve been in touch
with Cathbad? Then you know it has started. Three airliners down in the last
five hours. Half a dozen bombings around the world, including the U.S.”

Austin hadn’t been
told yet. “Nukes?”

“Conventional. Big
ones.”

“Where in the U.S.?”

Martin shared a look
with Johan. “I’ll tell you over dinner. Anki’s making baccalà with Giani.”

Austin didn’t like
being excluded from the flow of information. Mistrust and concern colored his
vibe. That he spoke next about his father was no surprise.

“I want Soldado to use
Booty to find out about my dad. And Kaiya’s mom, too.”

They had rounded the
curve and were greeted by an old Labrador. Martin petted its head and again
shared a look with Johan.

“I’m not sure that’s a
good idea,” Johan said.

Defenses rose. “And
why the hell not? What do you know?”

“Relax, Austin.”

A sudden wind brushed
the leaves overhead. “Don’t tell me to relax. Tell me what you know.”

Johan shook his head.
“I only know about Kaiya’s mother. Nothing at all about your father.”

The porch screen door
opened and Anki appeared.

“Nice of you to
mention it,” Austin said. “Where is she?”

Johan returned Anki’s
wave and looked at Austin. “Passed on, best we know.”

Calming Austin proved
difficult, even with Anki’s and Giani’s help.

The revelation of
finding Yuni’s body immediately led to suspicion that his father’s fate was
also being withheld. He even began to doubt his encounter with Kaiya. Worst was
the feeling that Johan was not trustworthy either. So much erosion of trust at
once left him angry and volatile.

It was Anki that
finally pointed out that he hadn’t slept since before arriving at Cullstone,
some thirty hours prior.

“Think of all he’s
been through. He needs sleep badly.”

He took dinner on the
back patio alone. His assigned bràthair stayed distant to allow him room,
though Johan knew others monitored him more closely. It was clear the Runa
Korda intended to protect its interests and agenda.

From the dayroom,
Johan watched Austin out on the back porch, drinking wine and fostering an
angry mood, largely focused on himself. Deeper in, fear curled around his core,
birthing the anger and selfishness. Withdrawing offered a buffer against the
realities beyond his control. It was an improper and imbalanced response,
despite being natural. The concern was where it might lead him.

You need to calm down.

Austin shook his head
at the message.
I killed Kaiya’s mom.

No, the Comannda killed her. Don’t let her
death give them what they want. Don’t help them win. Step up. Move forward.

Thoughts of his father
emerged in a stream of guilt.
So easy to
say.
It isn’t your girlfriend’s mom
who’s dead, or your dad’s life on the line.

My dad’s life....?
The assassin’s long barrel pointed from the
darkness.

Austin’s unraveling
was understandable but it was time for some harsh perspective. Without warning,
Johan ripped his rathad free and slammed him into a dream construct.

Austin fell in a blue
sky filled with debris and the nauseating smell of jet fuel. A seat twirled by.
A small girl strapped to it screamed into the wind, blinded by blood from her
torn cheek. The earth below grew, a slowly rising patchwork of color and texture.
What should have been a woman cart-wheeled freely, her head and left shoulder
missing. Tattered shreds of a blue polka-dotted dress clung to the torso.

“Don’t pull this shit
with me! I know!
I know
what you’re
doing!”

A spiraling chunk of
burning fuselage arched towards him and grazed his fuel-drenched shirt. It
ignited.

“You fucking
–
”

Shift.

Charred and flattened
debris stretched out half a mile in all directions. What had been homes and
people living in them were now only ash and scattered chunks of blackened
bricks. Not a living thing remained, not even the memories. Farther out, part
of the skyline burned unattended. Normally white high-rises stood sickly gray,
their windows knocked out by the radioactive blast. Smoke edged the horizon in
columns as if the ocean breeze refused to blow over a place of such death and
sorrow.

Austin stared, his
earlier anger awash in the reality of the place. In the next moment hills
appeared, the sky darkened nearly to dusk, and he stood before a huge crater in
the ground. Distant smoke rose from fires burning out of control. Another of
the four killing zones. The sheer loss of life hung in the air, connected to a
wailing sense of misery and sadness – families and loved ones grieving for
their dead.

“Enough, already. Damn
it!”

Between blinks, Austin
stood at the bottom of an enormous silo, at the base of a snow white missile
seven stories tall. The next shift took him to a situation room full of angry
Israeli generals. Knowledge flowed like spoiled wine until Austin knew the
world’s problems were further wrapped in tensions known only to the politicos
and ultimately controlled by Comannda. A possible nuclear apocalypse still lay
in the future.

Austin closed his
eyes, finally submitting. “Alright, alright.” He exhaled heavily. “I get it.”

Someone softly sobbed.
He stood in a hallway looking in on a small boy crying over a woman shot and
bleeding on the floor. Johan stood next to Austin.

“That’s... that’s
you.”

The boy Johan lifted a
block and placed it over one of the bullet wounds. The imaginary block of
medicine had no effect.

“Ah man.” He turned
away only to see a man lying on the floor nearby, also dead. “Jesus.
Okay
. I’m sorry. I’m no good at this,
alright? Yeah, I’m scared and angry and you know it. My dad... and Yuni. She
didn’t deserve to die. No one did. And I don’t care what you say, I know which
of my choices led to this. I carry my portion of the blame and I’m going to
have to live with it. I know people want to protect me, but if you know
something about my dad, you need to let me know.”

The scene faded. Johan
stood with Austin on the porch.

“I don’t know
anything. We’ll find out about him, I promise. Just not right now. For the
record, I disagree with you. It’s not your fault. It’s bigger than you. It’s
bigger than both of us, has been for a long time. We didn’t set this up, the
Comannda did. They have to pay and they will. But to get to that point, the
Korda needs us. It’s our time to fight. We only get one chance at this.”

Austin nodded. “I
know. It’s just that... it’s a nightmare. It keeps getting more strange and I
can’t wake up.”

“That’s a big part of
your problem. You need to sleep. Really sleep. You’ll lose your mind if you
don’t. Ask Giani for help with that, I’m sure she’ll come up with something.
First, though, we need to have a little meeting.”

“Cathbad’s plans?”

Martin had shared
details of the ultimatums from both the Comannda and Padrig of the Borcelli
family. Cathbad ordered the search for Ryota’s body and Austin’s father to be
left to lesser Korda. He insisted that without the right focus by the Change,
the trackways would surely lead to a darker future. It wasn’t hard to
understand the truth of it now.

“Yes. After that you
sleep. I’ll ask Soldado to see what he can find out about your dad.”

Austin stood. “Thanks,
hacker. I guess I owe you again.”

“Damn straight you
do,” he answered.

Johan spent the next
two hours lurking, creating, covering, imitating, and disappearing in Saoghal.
He absorbed and expanded throughout, gathering information and concepts, tying
together the operational intelligence required for Cathbad’s plan.

The High Comannda
drove the machine, twelve elite meta bodies hidden somewhere in the endless sea
of Saoghal, guarded by an army of korjé. Their invincibility had at its roots
many factors but the most basic was the fact that they were simply unreachable.
It didn’t help that some bràthair believed they hid on a higher, as yet
undiscovered and more complex level of Saoghal.

The search was worse
than finding a needle in a haystack because this haystack shifted and convulsed
constantly. Without some starting point, there could be no hope of tracking
down even one of the twelve.

Luckily for Johan,
they only needed one and Steffan had a scent to offer. The scent of a woman.

• • •

Austin brought his
plate to the kitchen and rinsed it before joining Anki outside on the front
porch with a glass of orange juice. She leaned against a column in the morning
sun.

“Well, I bet someone
feels better. A solid eight hours.”

He leaned against the
other column. The old Lab lay at the foot of the stairs. “Was that the team I
heard drive in?”

“Yes. They’re setting
up now.”

“Hm.” He looked out
over the suburbs of Velletri to a mountain range beyond. Clouds floated in caravans
across the sky. “I’m guessing you’re a bit nervous.”

“More nervous for
Clare, I think. Still, yes.”

“Cathbad’s sure about
this?”

She met his glance.
“He said it’s been done but only with fellow Korda. In principle it should work
with anyone.”

“Principle doesn’t
protect rathad.”

“No it doesn’t.” She
shrugged. “Anyway, it’s time.”

They entered the barn
through the side door and saw cables running from a van into the open hatch of
the ship. Two armed guards stood to the side.

Martin and Johan sat
in the command chairs of the craft, talking. At Austin and Anki’s arrival,
Johan pulled the remote from his pocket and tossed it to him. “About time you
woke up.”

“Good morning to you,
too.”

Johan looked to Anki.
“Are you ready?”

She nodded. “We both
are.”

Austin leaned against
the open door of the van and watched a technician make final adjustments.

“Vitals are all coming
through,” he said. “Shùils are synched up. I’m ready on this end.”

Visible through the
ship’s hatch was Johan and Anki, laying on the bunk bed with sensors hooked to
their forehead, chest, and arms. Martin sat next to them on a small stool. The
pair’s journey would be through Saoghal and on to the target.

Johan briefly
connected with him.
Wish us luck.

Are you sure about this?

Johan shrugged.
I’ve got a way in, as far as I can tell. If
it goes bad, we back out and go for a ride. If it goes real bad, they pull the
plug and we make for heaven’s gate. Beats an eternity under someone else’s
control any day.

Austin sensed a bit of
false bravado but not much.
What if
they’ve figured out your tricks? The infinite loop, for example? You could find
yourself trapped.