The Cyclops Initiative (15 page)

“Damn,” Julia said. “I loved that car.”

“Switching cars here makes sense, too,” Angel went on. “When they find your car here, they'll know we headed south from New York. But they won't be able to tell if we were headed for Pennsylvania or Maryland or Delaware.”

Chapel tried another handle. Locked.

“Where are we headed?”

Chapel answered her. “Pennsylvania. I have a friend who lives south of Pittsburgh. He'll take us in, for a while anyway.”

The next car was locked, too.

“You're sure about this friend? Wouldn't it be safer just to keep moving?”

“I am absolutely sure that my friend won't turn us in,” Chapel said. He wasn't prepared to make any promises beyond that. “And, anyway, we need a place to sleep, and a base of operations so we can start fighting back. Running is just putting off the inevitable. We need to figure out who was behind the drone hijacking and everything else if we're going to have a chance of clearing our names.”

“I can help there,” Angel said. “I mean. I could.” She tapped her hard drive with her fingernail. “There's data on here that might tell me who was behind the drone attacks.”

Chapel nodded. “That's fantastic, Angel. That's the best news I've heard all day.” He tried another car and found it locked. Of course. Who would leave their car unlocked in a rest stop in New Jersey? He tried another car. Again, locked.

“You're smiling. You found one?” Julia whispered.

“No. But for the first time since this all started, I feel like I might have a plan. I feel like there's something we can actually do, instead of just running away. And the first thing we need for that plan is—­”

A car handle yielded under his fingers. The door popped open on its hinges.

“And of course, you know how to hot-­wire a car,” Julia said.

Chapel's smile got bigger. “I do.”

IN TRANSIT: MARCH 22, 03:56

“Give me another one of those energy shots,” Chapel said.

Angel frowned. “You know these are terrible for your heart, right? They're just pure caffeine. They won't even keep you awake much longer. You're going to crash no matter how many of them you drink. You should pull over and take a rest.”

Chapel glanced into the backseat. Julia was sprawled out back there, her plum-­colored coat pulled tight across her shoulders. He had always loved to watch her sleep. It meant she felt safe.

“In a bit,” he said.

Angel flipped off the top of the little plastic bottle. It wasn't a brand he recognized, just some knockoff they'd sold back at the rest stop. He had no idea what was in it. Chapel knocked it back anyway, grimacing at the foul taste. Back when he was in Afghanistan, when he pulled long duty, he used to chug cans of energy drink, carbonated lizard spit laced with all kinds of herbal nonsense. They'd tasted like watered-­down, sweetened battery acid. These energy shots went down a lot faster, but somehow they still managed to taste worse.

Almost at once, though, he felt his vision tighten up, felt his focus come back. For a long time now he'd been staring at the double yellow line on the road, pretty much the only thing his headlights could pick up. It got dark in Pennsylvania. A lot darker than it even got in New York, or Virginia for that matter. Maybe it was all the trees.

Talking helped him stay awake, too. And talking to Angel had always made him feel like things were going to be okay. Especially now, in the dark, when he couldn't really see her. It almost felt like the old days, when she was watching over him from somewhere far away, able to see everything on her screens, always ready with good advice. When she was just a voice in his ear.

“You really think you can do something with that hard drive?” he asked her.

“Maybe, sugar. Maybe. Whoever hacked me and made it look like I was piloting that drone, they were good. So good I wasn't even aware it was happening. But they must have left tracks behind. If I can get a really good look at the activity logs on the drive, maybe I can find something. Something we can follow back to where the attack really came from. If I can figure that out—­”

“Then we can find them. And at the very least we can find some proof that can clear our names. And this'll be over.”

“Possibly,” Angel said. “But it's not going to be easy.”

“My friend, the one we're going to stay with. He'll have a computer. You can log in there.”

Angel sighed. “I'm going to need more processor power than you get in just some commercial laptop. More speed. What I have in mind is risky. The NSA tracked me down once—­when I go online again, there'll be nothing stopping them from finding me again. If we do this, if we try to track the data, they'll know where we are.”

“We'll worry about that when it happens. And we'll find you some good hardware, something to work with. Okay?”

“Sure,” Angel said, though she didn't sound convinced. “Chapel—­did I do the right thing?”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“Running away. Maybe—­maybe I should have just turned myself in. Then you wouldn't be in trouble like this. And then I ran to Julia's place, and now she's in it, too.”

“You're innocent, Angel. You didn't do anything wrong.”

“But if I did turn myself in, if I let them question me, then—­then they'd see I wasn't guilty, right?”

He thought about Angel being shoved in some fetid cell. Being interrogated by men shouting questions at her while they made her walk in circles until she couldn't stand up anymore. He imagined her being waterboarded.

He knew what happened to ­people who were accused of being terrorists. Whether they were innocent or not.

“No, Angel. The right place for you is here in this car. With me.”

“You never even asked me if I did it. If I hijacked that drone. The thought didn't cross your mind, did it?”

“Not for a second,” he told her.

SOUTH HILLS, PA: MARCH 22, 05:44

The sun had yet to rise, but streetlamps illuminated the suburban lane well enough. It was a long street lined with big houses set well back on spacious yards—­the kind of street Chapel thought had disappeared after the housing boom. The lawns were all mowed down to stubble and bordered by privacy fences so that each house stood on its own discreet lot, each with its own stand of trees, a paved driveway, and a quaint brick or stone walkway to its porch. Each house had its own tasteful mailbox with flags pinned back like the ears of a faithful hound. Each house had wooden siding painted a different shade of off-­white and a door painted dark red or dark green, to give the house character. It was probably the tidiest little neighborhood Chapel had ever seen. It looked like the ­people who owned those houses periodically came out and dusted their own curbs.

Only one thing spoiled the effect. An old man in a green cloth jacket was crawling along the gutter, his straggly beard touching the pavement.

Chapel switched off the car and jumped out. That green jacket spoke to him. He rushed over and squatted down next to the crawling man. “Excuse me,” he said. “You look like you could use a hand.”

“No, no,” the man said. His eyes were bright red as if he'd been weeping, but he smiled for Chapel. He lay down in the road and propped himself up on his elbows. “I'll admit, my method of locomotion may appear unorthodox. But I assure you I'm making excellent progress, good sir.”

The man stank of cheap liquor—­not the juniper smell of gin or the sweet stink of rum but more like the acrid bite of pure rubbing alcohol.

Julia came and knelt down next to the crawling man. She checked his pulse—­he did not resist—­and frowned. “He's not in good shape,” she said, “though maybe that was kind of obvious.”

“Sir,” Chapel said, “you're wearing an army jacket. Are you a veteran?”

“I have that honor,” the man said. “Though my coat is but a loaner. First Battalion, Third Marines. A pleasure to make your acquaintance, young man. And you, my dear—­simply a pleasure to be in your pulchritudinous presence.”

Chapel tried to remember the last time anyone had called him “young man.” He shook his head and told the man, “I really think we should help you here.”

“Third Marines,” Julia said. “Why does that sound familiar? Wait a minute. Rudy? Is your name Rudy?” She looked up at Chapel. “Do you remember Atlanta? When that CIA guy tried to kill me?”

“You're kidding me,” Chapel said. But now she mentioned it—­yeah, it was definitely the same guy. Rudy had been wandering around an underground mall in Atlanta and he'd asked them for money. He'd ended up helping to save Julia's life.

In way of thanks, Chapel had given him a phone number to call, a way to reach out to somebody who might help him get his life back on track. Help him stop drinking. Judging by what street he was currently crawling across, it looked like he had called that number—­but it hadn't been enough.

“I will never forget that lovely red hair,” Rudy said. “Though I can't quite make out your face. I seem to have misplaced my glasses, dear. Do you see them anywhere?”

Julia glanced around. “No, sorry.”

“Ah, well. Perhaps you'll give me a kiss, then.”

She laughed. “It's definitely Rudy,” she said.

Chapel tried to get hold of the drunk vet's arm, to help him sit up, but Rudy shrugged him off with surprising strength. He tried again, but stopped this time because the door of the nearest house banged open and a woman came storming out to scowl at them.

“You leave him alone,” she said. She was a hair under five feet tall and might weigh a hundred pounds if she put on heavy work boots. Her hair was tucked up inside a satin cap but despite the hour she was already dressed in a conservative pantsuit. “He's gonna drink like that, hey? He's gonna crawl his way back to bed. Maybe you think you're doing him a favor. You think you're doing him a favor?”

“Dolores, hi, I—­”

“Did I just ask you a question? Did you answer it?”

“No, I—­no,” Chapel stammered.

“No, I, no, exactly,” she mimicked. “I know you, don't I? But don't ask me to remember where from.”

“Your wedding,” Chapel said.

She snorted in derision. “Like there weren't two hundred ­people there. I made the guest list, so I ought to know. You a friend of Top?”

“I'm one of his boys, actually,” Chapel said.

Dolores's face didn't change, but she shifted her weight from one foot to the other. It was clear that Chapel had produced the right password or given the right sign. She glanced at Julia and then over at the stolen car, where Angel still waited. She made a gesture for Angel to come over. “You'd better come inside. I'll make you some breakfast—­don't expect croissants, though. Pancakes are easier.”

“Thank you,” Chapel said.

Dolores shrugged and headed back into the house. Chapel followed her. Julia waited for Angel to catch up before she went in.

“Do you understand what's going on here?” she asked.

“Maybe twenty-­five percent,” Angel said. Then she looked back at Rudy, who had managed to crawl his way into the driveway. “Maybe fifteen.”

SOUTH HILLS, PA: MARCH 22, 05:52

The inside of the house was not exactly what Chapel had expected. The furniture was cheap, mostly pressboard covered in chipped veneer. The upholstery had split in places and was held together with duct tape. There was a television in the living room, but it was an old-­fashioned box type, not a flat-screen. The walls were bare of decoration.

As run-­down as it looked, the room was spotless. The duct tape on the cushions looked like it had just been applied. The carpet showed the tracks of recent vacuuming.

He found it all strangely comforting.
This is the kind of place a soldier might live,
he thought. The neatness, the lack of ornament or pretension—­

“It's a shithole,” Dolores said, “but it's paid for.”

Chapel kept his mouth shut. He'd only met Dolores once before, but he knew better than to try to make pleasantries or—­far worse—­disagree with her.

She headed through the house, toward the kitchen, but Chapel stopped in the living room and looked up the stairs. He could hear ­people moving around up there, and now some of them appeared—­two men and a woman, all dressed in T-­shirts and jeans. They all had the same crew cut—­including the woman. And all of them were wounded.

One of the men was missing both legs below the knee. He had a pair of replacements that were little more than metal poles that ended in tennis shoes. The other man was hairless and all of his exposed skin was pink and rough and Chapel knew he must have been in a fire. The woman had a trim, athletic body but she had an inch-­wide scar running from her forehead down into the collar of her shirt.

Another man came onto the stairs while Chapel stood there, this one with a white plastic hand.

All four of them stared at Chapel with a look he knew pretty well. It was the look he wore on his own face when ­people he didn't know saw him with his arm off. A wary expression, because you just didn't know how they would react.

Chapel nodded to the four of them, then nearly jumped when he heard something bounding toward him. It turned out to be a dog, a big mutt with scars on his head and only three legs. A pair of actual dog tags jangled at his collar.

The dog ignored Chapel and ran straight to Julia, who erupted in laughter and excitement. “Hey there, fella, hey there,” she said and bent down so the dog could lick her chin.

Chapel left her and Angel to the dog and followed Dolores into the kitchen. “I wasn't expecting to see so many ­people here,” he said. “I thought it was just you and Top. And I guess Rudy.”

“I wasn't expecting visitors while it was still dark out,” she told him. “I figure we'll both find a way to cope.”