Salvation.

SESSION DATE: 2128.04.09.

LOCATION: Inst.i.tute of Psionics Research.

CLEARANCE ID: Dr. Amy Bennett.

SUBJECT: 2581.

FILE NUMBER: 308.

"You broke it," Aisling says as she tugs on the short sleeve of her yellow dress. A wire is caught in the fabric and she frees it with careful fingers. She kicks her feet where they dangle in the air.

"We didn't break anything," the doctor replies, not looking up from the datapads on the table.

"Tell that to the people of Rio Gallegos."

The doctor's head snaps up, face turned toward the two-way mirror near the door. She makes a gesture with one hand, one she has made before.

"Too late," Aisling sighs. "You're always too late. Bombs away."

The doctor slams her hand against the table, shaking it. "We wouldn't still be in this situation if you helped us!"

"If I could help you, I would, but you would still be in this situation." The girl slides a little in her chair, her small head tilting back. She stares at the ceiling, with its bright lights, and doesn't blink. "Please don't be mad. I'm trying to fix this."

"How? How are you trying? You're not giving us the information we need."

"I'm sorry, but you wouldn't understand."

THIRTY.

SEPTEMBER 2379.

TORONTO, CANADA.

The Strykers Syndicate was pared down to a skeleton crew over the course of hours. Every Stryker was ordered into the field to deal with the escalating riots, including those who were still recovering from wounds incurred in Buffalo or elsewhere. To stay behind meant dereliction of duty and the promise of instant termination. That was the order of the World Court, and Ciari heeded the warning. Their absence meant Lucas's small group had far fewer people to run into and risk tipping off the government.

They gathered in a debriefing room, standing around a large conference table that had the small carrying cases stacked neatly across it. Everyone's attention was on the vidscreen embedded in the wall.

"This isn't going to trip an alarm, is it?" Jael asked.

"I know government code and I learned a few new tricks while on the run," Jason said, never taking his eyes off the vidscreen. "They won't know we're hooked up where we're not supposed to be."

"Will it last?"

"Longer than the measures you've got running in Ciari's office to hide your activities."

The vidscreen showed a view none of them had ever before seen. A hazy, ethereal blue glow seemed to smudge the center, dividing black from a curve of gray-blue. The cloud formations were gray and thin over a murky blue ocean. The darkening shape of a continent moving into night seen from s.p.a.ce was unfamiliar. The old satellite they were using didn't have the best focus capabilities after decades of floating through s.p.a.ce without upgrades. Still, Lucas knew what was happening when he saw it.

"There," Lucas said, leaning forward, eyes on the grainy picture.

A tiny, brightly glowing dot was lifting off the planet, rising into s.p.a.ce. It grew larger, the satellite bringing the shape into focus. It was a s.p.a.ce shuttle, the first of many, and no one could look away as it left Earth behind and disappeared offscreen. More s.p.a.ce shuttles followed the first.

"That's the start of it," Lucas said. "We'll only have so much time left now. A few days at the most."

"With the amount of people they need to move, I'd think it would be longer," Keiko said.

"The launch site was built to house s.p.a.ce shuttles, not people. It's a bottleneck in terms of movement. It's why the government wanted to do this over the course of weeks, not in the middle of a panic. They can't hope to s.h.i.+p thousands and thousands of people into s.p.a.ce, then put them all into cryo on the colony s.h.i.+p quickly. Cryo is complicated and there are only so many doctors on board the Ark who can oversee the process."

"Which means a lot of people won't make it," Ciari said, staring at the vidscreen.

"If a registered human misses their shuttle to Paris, then there's no chance for them."

"And the ones in s.p.a.ce?" Threnody said.

Lucas shrugged. "I've seen the schematics of the Ark. It's mostly storage s.p.a.ce, bays and bays of cold boxes for cryo sleep and storage units for supplies. Easier to pack bodies in as cargo than as pa.s.sengers. You use up less s.p.a.ce if you don't have to factor in living quarters for anyone but the crew."

"Will that s.h.i.+p make it to Mars in one piece?"

"It's survived over two hundred and fifty years cold-docked in s.p.a.ce. It'll survive a few more."

Ciari stared across the table at him. "You don't want it to."

"I thought we could let them go, let them fly to some uncertain future." Lucas ran a hand through his hair, nails scratching against his scalp. "We'd have Earth, which is all I ever wanted, but they would return."

"Are there Warhounds on the s.p.a.ce shuttles launching right now?" Quinton wanted to know.

"There will be Warhounds on every single one until Nathan has transferred them all."

It went unsaid that when the Ark returned from a failed colonization on another world, it would arrive bearing humans and psions beholden to Nathan, who would fight for his rightful place in society. The world didn't need another war.

"What now?" Kerr said. "You want to stop the launch? How do we do that and save the Strykers as well?"

"Distributing the virus has priority. We're going to need everyone free to help fight, because we won't be enough on our own, even merged," Lucas said.

"Can you be sure they won't run away?" Samantha said, not looking at her brother. She hadn't looked him in the eye since letting Gideon go free. "If I was a Stryker and no longer had a neurotracker in my head, I'd go to ground in an instant."

"When I give an order, Strykers obey," Ciari said. "You weren't trained how we were. Don't believe all of us will abandon our posts. Freedom won't mean anything if we don't have a place to stay and live."

"Speaking of living," Keiko said. "The government only has half the supplies from the seed bank in the Arctic. I helped Nathan organize the transfer of everything left. If that's what they were using to replenish the SkyFarms over the years, we're going to need the rest of it. Where did you take it, Lucas?"

Lucas smiled at the question. "I see someone found my little message in the wall."

"Your d.a.m.n message got a Stryker killed. Where's the rest of the seed bank?"

"Safe. You don't need to know where."

Keiko opened her mouth to argue, but Ciari interrupted her with "That's all we need to know, Keiko. Leave it be."

Threnody spared a glance at Jael before saying, "If we want the Strykers to believe what we tell them about the virus, they'll need to hear the reason from an officer."

"That's why Keiko will be with Jason and Quinton to administer the virus," Lucas said. He cut off Quinton's protest with a look and a warning touch against the pyrokinetic's mental s.h.i.+elds. "I'm sending Threnody and Kerr on a different mission that requires their powers. Aidan will monitor Keiko's progress, and when she returns, I'll teach her the basics of merging."

"What about them?" Aidan said, pointing at Lucas's sisters.

The permanent smile on Kristen's face was half covered by one hand, which she used to prop up her chin. She was seated next to Samantha, tapping her fingers against the edge of the table. "We're going to the City of Lights."

"Where is that?" Jason said. "I've been to almost every city that's left in this world. I've never heard of that one."

"Paris," Samantha answered in a clipped voice. "We're getting Lucas a sitrep on security at the launch site. No one will question us Sercas being there if humans discover our presence."

"Is that safe with the amount of Warhounds that will be around? Not to mention the toxicity of the surrounding area."

"The radiation won't be as high as it was in the past, but it's still intolerable, especially if you're human." Samantha shrugged. "We need to know what's happening in Paris now that we no longer have people providing us inside information."

"It's been so long, you'd think the radiation would fade," Jael said. "But it doesn't. It just gets in your cells and lingers."

"Sounds like everything's been decided," Quinton said, turning his back on the room and the s.p.a.ce shuttles on the vidscreen that were still launching. "Come get me when it's time to go into the field."

He left, ignoring Threnody when she called out his name. Sighing in frustration, she shoved away from the conference table, calling over her shoulder to the room at large, "I'll be back."

Jason's careful, meticulous hack of the security system that spanned the Strykers Syndicate had been limited. Quinton couldn't go far. Threnody found him in a room that held rows of empty research terminals, the people who would have manned them currently rea.s.signed. Quinton didn't immediately look up at her arrival.

"Hey," Threnody said, putting her back against the door.

"You could have argued," he said after a moment, letting his hands rest on the edge of a terminal as he glared at her. "You could have done something other than accept everything that comes out of Lucas's mouth."

"Where would that have gotten us? This is the only course of action. If it means we have to work apart, then we work apart."

"You don't know if this is the only way."

"Yes," Threnody said quietly. "I do."

She had faith in a child that no one alive had ever met, that no one ever would except through saved encrypted files. Maybe Threnody didn't trust Lucas, but she trusted in his goal, and Quinton couldn't doubt that, because it meant he'd be doubting her. Quinton shook his head and tried to smile, but it came out wrong, crooked. She saw it for what he meant it to be.

"d.a.m.n it," he whispered. "Why can't I ever argue with you?"

Threnody shrugged. "Maybe you should have. I'm the reason why we got sent to the Slums in the first place, remember? Maybe if you reminded me to toe the line growing up, fulfill our contracts without arguing, and do as we were ordered, we wouldn't be here."

"It wasn't my place to tell you how to do your job, Thren. It was my place to follow where you led."

Threnody pushed away from the door and went to his side. She adjusted the flak jacket he wore, settling it more evenly on his broad shoulders. Threnody let her hands rest there, thumbs pressed against the bare skin of his neck. She could feel the electric pulse that ran through his body, a thing she knew just as intimately as she knew her own.

"I'm glad," Threnody said, "that they gave you to me as my partner, Quin. I don't regret that, and I don't regret everything that brought us here to do this. I just hope you won't either."

Quinton splayed one hand against the back of her head, fingers digging through her loose hair. He leaned down to press his forehead to hers, staring into her eyes. Conviction filled Threnody's voice, the same conviction that had gotten them through countless h.e.l.lish missions over the years. It was a belief that they could survive anything, that they could survive this, and Quinton wondered what he would do without her by his side, shoring him up.

"I don't regret you," he said.

She offered up a tired smile, some of the tension leaving her body. They were family, no matter how hard the government tried to beat that belief out of them. A few years shy of thirty, the two of them, and they had survived so much. Psions had long memories, and forgetting anything that happened in their lives was d.a.m.n near impossible. The neural pathways linking the intricate relations.h.i.+ps of memories meant a lifetime could be recalled with crystal clarity. In that lifetime, they would always have each other.

"Come on," she said, pulling away, eyes clear of everything except determination. "Let's get back to the others."

When they returned to the conference room, they found only Lucas and Kerr waiting for them. The vidscreen was running the satellite feed, but nothing of interest was happening. It seemed the launch was at a lull. Lucas focused his attention on Quinton once the other man stepped inside.

"I don't like disobedience," Lucas said.

"You're going to get a lot of it when you free the Strykers," Quinton said. "If you're hoping to grind us under your heel when this is over, you're not going to like what happens."

Lucas nodded at the door, ignoring the threat. "Go find Jason. He's with Keiko figuring out the best route for teleportation over the continents."

Quinton knew a dismissal when he heard one. He still hesitated, wondering if he could get away with remaining in the room. Threnody shook her head. "Go, Quinton. It'll be all right."

"Watch your back," Quinton said as he left. The door slid shut behind him.

Threnody eyed Lucas. "What now?"

"Everyone has their orders but you two," Lucas said. "I'll explain what needs to be done after we leave tomorrow."

"Why?" Kerr said.

"We need to pick up Novak. You need a hacker and Ciari can't spare one from the Stryker ranks."

"And you can't spare Jason," Threnody said. "When we get Novak tomorrow morning, where are you teleporting us? What do you want us to do?"

Lucas smiled, the expression an echo of Nathan's ruthlessness, Nathan's cruelty. "You're going to steal a bomb."