The Impossible Future: Complete set by Frank Kennedy (mini ebook reader .txt) 📕

“I served in the same battalion as one, but not on the same tour. I’m not sure he’d feel loyal to me.”

“But if he did, he could transmit on the Guard stream.” She addressed her pilot. “Adina, how far out are we?”

“Two hundred forty kilometers, Miss.”

Lucinda sighed. Sam leaned over to her.

“Every second matters. What do we have to lose?”

Malcolm nodded. “Since we agree that public dissemination of our evidence will fall under attack by the hardliners and probably exacerbate the civil war until an inquest is conducted, I say we take this chance. The rest we’ll discover inside the temperate zone.”

Ezekiel streamed to his contact. Sam listened as he changed his tone and became more transparent. Often over the next ten minutes, the conversation took heated turns. She gathered from Ezekiel that the officer in question had been drinking steadily for hours. Then, Ezekiel asked the questions she suspected would seal the deal: How many years of reserve brontinium extract does your family have? What would you give for another generation’s worth?

Ezekiel held a stoic pose, even as he double-blinked and delivered the data on the Artemis Refinery Explosion. When the conversation ended, Ezekiel shook his head.

“I don’t know,” he said, preempting their obvious question. “Most mid-level officers place their Guard standing above their descendancies. Let’s hope he’s not one of them.”

They couldn’t do much more over the next ten minutes of the flight except push for solidarity among more Presidiums. Once they flew inside the temperate zone, their contact with the outside world might be shut down. Two minutes before they reached the ten-kilometer window, Sam tapped her amp.

First, she dropped a simple audio message on Michael’s admin stack, but timed it to notify him later, in case she failed. Lucinda held her hand tight throughout the message.

Second, she streamed David Ellstrom, who left the Moss estate shortly after Sam.

“Any word from Finnegan?”

She heard it in his voice. She caught him in a moment of panic.

“I don’t understand what I’m seeing, Samantha.”

“Tell me. Hurry, David.”

“I am receiving Finnegan’s entire admin stack. Private, business, family. Everything. If I don’t offload some of this data, my own stack will shut down.”

“The entire stack? David, how is that possible? Why would …”

“He wouldn’t, unless he programmed it to do so in the event of his death. I’m sorry, Samantha. I think she killed him.”

Sam tried to keep her poise. She was not speaking to a cube, so the others didn’t hear David. If they thought Finnegan was dead at Celia’s hand, would they consider retreat? Celia Marsche scared the hell out of every otherwise arrogant, imperial Chancellor on the planet. If Sam’s friends thought she was on to their strategy, would they make a choice to fight another day?

“It’s probably not what you think, David. Perhaps there’s something … useful … in there. Yes? David?”

She heard breathing on the other end, but he didn’t respond at first, as if he assumed the connection had broken. Or perhaps he was calculating how soon before his own stack would shut down.

“Wait.” He uttered it like a whisper. “What is this? No, this isn’t possible. Samantha, I don’t understand. Why would Celia …?”

The stream dropped. The holocubes containing their circastream allies also failed. The pilot, Adina, announced they crossed inside the temperate zone.

“We’re in it now,” Ezekiel said. “Guarantee they know we’re coming. We won’t make it there without a greeting party.”

Lucinda leaned over to Sam. “What’s happening with Finnegan?”

“I don’t think he can help us anymore.”

“I see. He’s already done an outstanding job. Above and beyond. When we finish this business …”

Lucinda must have seen a pall cast over Sam. She grabbed Sam by the chin and turned her. Sam couldn’t hold back a tear.

Lucinda saw the truth. She cursed.

“Someone should have murdered that creature years ago.”

Sam was paralyzed. What was David trying to tell her?

“Is this how it ends, Lucinda? Does she just kill us all?”

“I will not give my life to Celia Marsche. Neither will you, dear.”

That possibility turned moot for the moment, as their Scram and the other two on approach with them intercepted the anticipated gauntlet of Guard Scramjets.

“Attention, civilian vessels,” a stern voice broadcast through the navigation cylinder. “You are hereby ordered by the Admiralty to retreat at once from this airspace. Failure to do so will be considered an act of insurrection. You have one minute to comply.”

Lucinda’s pilot turned to her three passengers. They didn’t need to say a word. Forward was the only option.

66

Harrisboro Prefecture

M ICHAEL NEVER SAW A ROOFTOP ESCAPE scene finish well in the movies, so he figured this was a bad idea. Hans Bricker insisted they couldn’t descend the Sanctum tower without being intercepted at the ground (assuming they made it that far). How about stairs? Michael asked. Hans winced at the idea. Why would the building have stairs when the lifts were infallible? Michael mentioned fire code, but Hans never heard such a fantastical concept. So, they ascended in a lift with Maya Fontaine, their blast rifles ready in case the enemy came at them from both directions.

“This will work,” Hans said. “Oliver will be here in minutes.”

Though Hans spoke confidently of his brother, who was an uplift pilot, Michael heard the hesitation in his brand new friend’s voice. Maya, normally stoic, checked her weapons with an urgency that said trouble was about to greet them.

As they arrived at the rooftop, Hans froze the door controls.

“We’ll be stepping out into the service and security terminal,” he told them. “The security checkpoint will be empty at this hour, but we’ll trigger the automatic sensors and notify every DayWatch vehicle in this part of the city.”

“And anyone they’re linked in with.” Michael nodded. “Great.”

“I’ve