The Suns of Liberty (Book 2): Revolution (20 page)

“This is the
digi-sphere
,”
Lantern said, indicating the giant holograph they were all standing in. He was
still all business and clearly more interested in his toys than in the people
around him. “All-terrain, three-dimensional sonar.”

Ward just looked around in genuine
amazement. “I, uh, put people to sleep.”

Drum roll please
.

“I did find a more immediate concern,”
Lantern said, turning to the Revolution, completely ignoring Ward's joke.

“Oh no.” Ward tried again. “You’re
not going to play back a feed of me in the shower this morning, are you?
Because I can explain that...”

Still nothing
. His jokes
were dying right along with the right to privacy. Then Ward noticed Leslie’s
shoulders shaking as if she were suppressing a giggle. He could take some
solace in that, he supposed.

Lantern fiddled with the device,
and after a moment, a new, smaller holograph sizzled to life in front of them.
It was Boston Harbor. “Take a look.” The once majestic harbor was bare of
commercial or recreational ships, something that was commonplace since the
Resistance had come to Boston. He zoomed in on three large destroyers anchored
in the harbor. Ward marveled at the detail.

“I think that might be more fight
than we're looking for,” Revolution said.

“They’re not what they seem.” His
scan suddenly ghosted into one of the ships. They were inside it. This time,
the image was not as clear as it’d been in Ward’s apartment, but Lantern's
point was: this was no normal ship. It was full of nothing but high-tech
equipment. No crew inside, no mess hall, no compartments, just equipment. Lots
and lots of equipment.

“A massive surveillance system
disguised as the one thing no one would dare want to mess with,” Leslie
said. 

Revolution stepped into the
holograph. “Looking for us?”

Lantern shrugged. “No way to know
for certain, sir.” He zoomed back out to a view of the whole harbor.

Revolution placed his
titanium-gloved hand into one of the virtual destroyers as if it was resting in
his palm. “I think they just tipped their hand.”   

CHAPTER
34

NEW YORK CITY

A
newspaper spun across the large, ornate table and landed right in front of the
Chairman. The headline read:

FREEDOM COUNCIL STOCK DOWN 25%.

Ivan Prince, CEO of
General
Defense, Inc
., a heavyset man in his early sixties with a bulldog face, was
livid. His crisp British accent clipped every word. “Unacceptable! Twenty-five
percent decline! For this board? That's unprecedented!” He sat at the large
table in the large room with large and expensive art hanging everywhere. Solid
gold furnishings surrounded them. The finest of everything.

In a meeting room.

Across the table from him, a slightly
older and less heavy southerner named Sonny “Tex” Riley, the CEO of
Imperial
Petroleum,
shared Prince's anger. “And it's a lot worse in some industries.
Don't all have a monopoly, Mr. Media Corp,” he said in his thick southern
drawl.

The Chairman raised his hands
defensively. 

“I understand. But caution is
prudent. This Council exists because we exercise restraint. The days of the
Purge are over. Besides, this makes our shares larger than ever. Mostly, this
downturn has hurt the lower twenty-two. We can't lose our focus.” 

Prince slammed his fist down on
the table. “I've bloody well heard enough of your Velvet Glove talk. It's time
for the Iron Fist!” Sage fought hard not to roll his eyes. Prince brought this old,
tired debate out every time something went wrong. The Iron Fist would be good
business for General Defense, of course, but bad policy. Fortunately, the
Chairman knew himself to be a far superior negotiator. He'd anticipated their
rancor. 

“When's the weapon gonna be
ready?” Riley asked more calmly in his silky, menthol-laden drawl, giving
Prince an exasperated side glance. The Chairman was smooth, controlled in his
response. He slid copies of a spreadsheet over to the two men. It contained the
latest shares and voting power of the Freedom Council members.

  “Soon,” he said. “All this
has done is move our timetable up. We're still in control of events. And I want
you to look at this new list. I've called you in here, gentlemen, because we
three are now in a more advantageous position.”

Prince wasn't buying it. He knew
too many vice presidents at General Defense that  were angling for his
seat. And just waiting for his next misstep. “Well, if events don't start
moving in the right direction—namely up—I won't be in control of anything come
the next quarterly earnings report.”

“And what about the Banking
Consortium?” Riley asked.

“The banks are not a problem,”
Sage said.

“These are the biggest banks in
the world, Tom,” Riley said. “It’s not like they’re gonna just keep rolling
over for us. They got plenty of other places to take their money.”  

“I’m not so sure about that—”
Prince tried to say.

“I know exactly who they are,”
Sage snapped, momentarily losing his cool. But it came back to him like a swift
breeze. “I made the Consortium. It was my idea, and they know that. They owe
me, more than we owe them.”

“Just be careful,” Prince said.
“The IOUs
they
hand out have interest rates. And let’s not forget the
Europeans have turned away from the Consortium. China and India are all they
have left besides us. They may be rich countries now, but their financial
sectors still haven’t recovered either. I’m not sure they can sustain that
degree of leverage. And that’s just more bad news for us. Bad news drives
stocks down and our interest rates up.”

The Chairman pitched forward in
his chair, a twinkle in his eye. “Well, I say we invest in a little good news
then. These Suns of Liberty groups. It's time they make a bad mistake. As the
largest shareholders, we three now have the votes to pass anything we want. The
lower twenty-two have always lacked vision, lacked fortitude, lacked the will
to do what was needed. We’ve got more than a fifty-percent control of the
voting share of this Council now, gentlemen. I say we not waste any time in
using that control.”  The Chairman slid another document across the table
to both men. It was all black type. A scenario of some sorts. “Here, read
this.”

The men read it.

Smiles eased across their faces,
and they looked up. “I propose we cut off power to South Boston with quarantine
and curfew. Let them taste what it's like to reap what they sow. First, we'll
slow them down. Then we'll end them.”

The Chairman leaned back with a
self-satisfied grin. He knew he had them. “All in favor?” All three raised
their hands.

CHAPTER
35

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA

CHINATOWN

T
wo
Council Guardsmen slipped through light fog and banged on the door of a small
shop. The sun would be setting within the hour. The dimming light danced off
the petite windows. Inside, the shop owners—an elderly couple—huddled in the
dark, trying not to be seen. The old man adjusted a bandage that clung to his
badly bruised eye. His assailants were back demanding more cash in exchange for
protection
.

“Open the fucking door!” the
bigger of the two spat at them. As the ranking Guardsman, he was clearly in
charge.

There was no response from inside.

“They probably don’t even speak
English,” his partner sneered.

“I'll kick the
goddamn
thing—”
The ranking Guard’s words were cut short by a dark figure that blinked into his
peripheral vision. Someone concealed in shadow, hands on hips, one hundred feet
away. Just looking at them, not moving. A defiant silhouette.

People knew better than to hang
around and watch Council Guard at work. The days of shooting a cell phone video
of the Guard were long since over. Unless you didn’t mind getting your nose
kicked in.

“Hey, you!” the big one yelled to
the figure.

“Yeah, come over here,” the other
said.

But the stranger disappeared
around the corner.

“Might as well come out. If we
have to come get you, it won't be pleasant.”

Suddenly the stranger reappeared.
This time they could see the figure clearly. It was a woman. She wore a shiny,
rounded, black glider's helmet that came to a point in the back; the face
shield was bright blue. She began to walk toward the two with a confidence that
unnerved them both.

“Hey! Stop right there!  Put
your hands out where we can see 'em,” the ranking Guard said.

What happened next took them
completely by surprise.

The girl stopped. A thunderous
blue energy erupted from below her. She launched off her feet. Rocketed
straight at them. The blast knocked them backwards. Seismologists at San
Francisco State, some twelve miles away, would register her launch as a minor
seismic event on the Richter scale. The two men fought to regain their footing.
They did so and looked up. She came into the light from the streetlamps as
bright-blue bracelets she wore on her arms lit up. A brilliant beam of sapphire
energy exploded out of each set of rings. Both men took a blast to the chest
that slammed them to the ground.

That was the last thing they saw.

Sophia Linh eased up on her boot
“propulsors” by simply thinking about it—neural transmitters really were
cool—and landed ten yards beyond the two sprawled Guardsmen. Thirty-two years
old, a former head engineer and astronaut at NASA. She was slim,
Asian-American, and dressed in a black leather reinforced flight suit. The
helmet's bullet and crash-proof blue face shield not only smartly matched the
color of her energy ring bracelets, it also concealed her identity like a
one-way mirror. Only her mouth and chin were visible. She thought it was a
pretty cool disguise. She was a local legend that had risen to fame in the wake
of the Revolution. Part of the hero movement.