The 13 th tribe if-1 Page 9

  “Creed took the chip.”

  Ben instantly looked sick, which told her more than words could.

  She said, “He can convince authorities of our intentions with it, can’t he?” She went to Sebastian and leaned over him. “Sebastian!” She slapped him.

  Jordan grabbed her arm, and Alexa said, “Don’t! He’s hurt!”

  Nevaeh shook her arm free and slapped him again. Sebastian moaned. His eyelids rose a bit.

  “Sebastian!” She held the top of the can toward him. “Creed took the chip!”

  His lids fluttered and stayed open. He put his hand to his forehead and pulled off the cloth. “What happened?”

  “Creed clobbered you,” she said. “He took the chip and left. How bad is it?”

  He moaned again. “I woke up, and he was at the workbench. I said something and he rushed me. That’s all I remember. Headache, but I’m okay.”

  “Not you,” Nevaeh said. “How bad is his taking the chip? What does it mean to us?” She snapped her head around to address Ben. “Even if he doesn’t use it to alert the authorities, we’re down one drone. Sebastian’s simulation says we need them all.”

  “No,” Sebastian said, his voice barely audible. “Without even a single chip, we’re dead in the water. They talk to each other, like a net over the entire fleet. It’s a safeguard to prevent hijacking one. Nobody has the resources to grab the whole lot… that’s the thinking, anyway.”

  “So it’s either all or none?” Ben said.

  Sebastian nodded.

  Nevaeh leaned a knee against the edge of the cot and hung her head. “Does Creed know that?” she said.

  “He was in here yesterday, asking about how it all works.”

  “And you told him?”

  He stared at her as though a third eye had just appeared in her forehead. He said, “We’re… family.”

  She straightened and turned to Ben. “I’m not letting go,” she said. “It’s our only chance to do this. We were made to do this. What if this is it? Our ticket home? We have to go after him.” She looked at the others.

  Phin and Toby nodded. Elias was Elias: leaning back against a wall, one leg cocked up and his foot on the wall. He was rolling a cigarette, licking the paper and pushing it down. He stuck it in his mouth and lit it, then squinted at her through a cloud of smoke and nodded. All eyes turned to Ben.

  Ben looked at each of them in turn, then at the floor for a long time. Finally he nodded. “Creed wants to stop us. Not once, but forever. It’s not just this project…”

  “Not-” Nevaeh started, intending to reiterate the importance of this one strike and how long they’d been planning.

  But Ben held up a hand to stop her. “With that chip, he can raise an army-quite literally, an army-to stop us, to find us. It’ll be the end, and not the way we had hoped.” He turned away and seemed to speak to himself. “Hoped… for so long, so long.”

  “Okay, then,” Nevaeh said. “Where’s he heading? How do we find him?”

  Ben paced back past the workbench, running his hand over its surface. “He’ll seek help,” he said. “Sean, maybe.”

  At the name, Nevaeh’s stomach cramped. She’d spent years forgetting him, and now she wanted to deny Ben’s logic. But she couldn’t; he was right.

  “Sean?” Phin said. “Why?”

  “They’re allies now,” Nevaeh said. “On the same side. Sean will know how to best use the chip and Creed’s knowledge against us.”

  “But how can Creed reach him?” Toby said. “ We don’t know how.”

  “One of the Keepers,” Ben said. “They’d know. Plus, they’d give him shelter.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Phin said, pointing at Ben. “A Haven.”

  Set up millennia ago, Havens were safe houses designed to give them shelter from anyone wishing them harm. Anyone, including their own kind. Originally, they were established as part of a truce between the Tribe and a group of former Tribe members-a group their leader, once called Gehazi but now known as Bale, half jokingly called the Clan. Bale disagreed with the Tribe’s targeting of only “sinners,” people who abused the privilege of life by hurting others; he was bent on causing destruction, of taking his pain and anguish out on everyone.

  For hundreds of years, Bale had been content to let the Tribe go about its own business. Then, as some members of the Tribe began embracing the teachings of Christ, Bale’s hatred for them grew. In the fourth century he declared an all-out war on them, leading to bloody attacks that caused more pain than death on both sides. Neither Tribe nor Clan had been able to pursue its own mission, outside of planning against and attacking one another, and recovering from their wounds to start it all over again. They’d finally called a truce. The Tribe kept clear of the Clan, but witnessed their existence in random murders, hospital fires, school shootings… Ben was convinced that Bale and his Clan were instrumental in sowing the seeds of malice and insanity in many mass murderers.

  Keepers were mortals entrusted with their secret. Most were the monks and priests who maintained the Havens. Once the elders of their orders believed in the stability and faithfulness of younger acolytes, they’d pass the secret on to them… and so it went, in perpetuity. At any given time, a handful of other people around the world knew immortal beings walked the earth: some had been doctors who’d witnessed their miraculous healing, others had been spouses-the Immortals were not prohibited from marrying, but all of them had tried to abstain from falling in love; watching their loved ones age and die was simply too painful.

  That Creed would head to a Haven was all but assured.

  “But which one?” Phin said.

  “Want to make a wager over it?” Nevaeh asked.

  “I told you,” Phin said, “I’m done betting with you.” He rubbed his left pinky finger, which bent unnaturally at the first knuckle-the result of losing his last bet.

  Ignoring their banter, Ben said, “We’ll have to surveil all three.”

  “I’ll take Trongsa,” Nevaeh said. It was a town in the center of Bhutan. Getting there was time-consuming and treacherous, which made it perfect for Immortals who needed to lie low. A small Christian monastery had operated there, in the shadow of a monstrous Buddhist temple, for nearly a millennium. She headed for the door to get her ready-pack.

  “No,” Ben said. “I want you here. You need to be on the recovery team-you, me, and Phin.”

  She nodded. She and Phin were the most aggressive. They worked together well and got the job done. Elias was equally effective, but too laid back for a shock-and-awe raid on a monastery.

  Ben continued. “Sebastian, you stay here and make the arrangements for the others. We’ll need three charters. We’ll keep our own jet here so the rest of us can go as soon as Creed surfaces.”

  “I can watch for him,” Jordan said.

  Ben appeared uncertain.

  Nevaeh saw the hope on the boy’s face. He was always looking for ways to help, to contribute to the Tribe. And over the years they’d found he made an ideal sentry, thanks to his “youth” and ability to watch without appearing to do so. She told Ben, “It is his job.”

  Ben thought about it, then said, “Okay, yes, that works. Jordan, you have London. But if Creed shows up, let us know and do nothing more.”

  Jordan was smiling proudly at Toby.

  “Boy, you hear me?” Ben snapped.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And that goes for you two as well.” He pointed at Toby and Elias. “When we know where he is, we’ll get there as quickly as possible. Elias, you take Trongsa.”

  Elias blew out more smoke and nodded.

  “Have fun with that,” Toby said and laughed. “That’s a twelve-hour flight, dude. Then another ten on the ground.”

  Elias shrugged.

  Toby raised his eyebrows. “Hey, does that mean-?”

  Ben nodded. “You’re going back to where it all began. Mt. Sinai.”

  [23]

  Jagger was having the same dream he’d had at leas
t once a week for over a year, and he knew it. But knowing he was dreaming did not reduce the sheer terror he felt, or allow him to change anything about it.

  As if intentionally designed to compound the horror, the dream forced him to be in two places at once.

  Jagger the Observer stood under a starry Virginian sky, feeling the icy breath of approaching winter on his cheeks and hands. He waited in the grassy median between the westbound and eastbound lanes of State Highway 287, watching for the familiar SUV.

  Jagger the Participant rode in that SUV with the Bransfords. Beth had stayed home with Tyler, who’d been feverish and vomiting all day. She’d insisted that Jagger go to celebrate Cyndi Bransford’s birthday. After all, saying the Bransfords were like family underrepresented their closeness. Mark had been Jagger’s best friend all through college. They’d joined the army together, managed to transfer into intelligence at the same time, and jointly left military life for gigs in private security. Nothing weird about it: they thought alike, bounced ideas off each other, and what sounded good to one sounded good to the other.

  So maybe it wasn’t so strange that when Beth started dating Jagger, her BFF Cyndi fell for Mark. Though a year younger, the Bransfords’ son, Robby, became Tyler’s best friend, naturally. When the Bransfords welcomed baby Brianna three years ago, everyone wondered when the Bairds would hurry up and produce her best friend. If Frank Capra were still around, he would have bought the film rights.

  Jagger and the Bransfords were heading home to Sunset Hills from the birthday dinner in Sterling Park. They’d eaten at the family’s favorite haunt, the creative-but uncreatively named-Dinner amp; a Show. The place was a converted theater in which the seats had been replaced by rows of tables, with chairs all facing a huge screen. Dinner was served to everyone at the same time, then the lights dimmed and a movie started-always an older film, available on DVD, but the novelty of the experience kept the restaurant packed. That evening’s entertainment was Return of the King, the extended, four-hour version. Before the show, the waitstaff had delivered a birthday cake and flowers to Cyndi, and all the patrons had sung “Happy Birthday.” Now it was late, they were almost home, and the Bransfords were happy and satisfied that they’d done Mom’s birthday right.

  Lights flashed over Jagger the Observer as cars passed, not as many as there would have been a few hours earlier, but in the end that didn’t matter. Goose bumps rose on his arms, a condition that had nothing to do with the temperature. The headlights of Mark’s Highlander had just come into view, less than two minutes from their Reston Parkway exit.

  Jagger the Participant rode shotgun beside Mark, who always drove with his hands at ten and two and observed the speed limit with maddening regularity. Jagger twisted around to laugh at Robby in the back, sandwiched between Brianna in a booster seat and Cyndi. The movie had acted like a jolt of cinematic caffeine on the boy, and the entire drive home he’d recited scenes-verbatim, as far as Jagger could tell.

  Jagger the Observer ran onto the highway, waving his arms.

  Robby was retelling the scene in which Eowyn slays the Witch-king.

  You fool. No man can kill me.

  I am no man!

  Cyndi and Brianna dozed, their heads canting toward the windows, away from Robby, as though avoiding his wildly swinging arms.

  Jagger the Observer spun, and his heart constricted. Coming the other direction, a van weaved between lanes. As he watched, it careened onto the right shoulder, skimmed a guardrail, and shot diagonally across the highway. It bounced into the median, churning up sod and dirt. Instead of stopping, it picked up speed and flew out of the median in a roar of revving engine, bottoming-out shocks, and protesting metal. Jagger signaled to the driver, as to a taxiing plane, to simply cross over these lanes as he had the others and sail into the field on the other side. But the van’s tires screeched and smoked and jittered as the driver aligned it with the highway. It zoomed past Jagger, heading the wrong direction, and crashed head-on into the Highlander.

  The sound pierced Jagger’s head, but it wasn’t crushing-tearing-colliding metal, shattering glass, or rupturing tires; it was screams, louder than physically possible, extending longer than the lives of the family producing them, melding with his own pointless Nooooo!

  They were gone. All of them. Just like that.

  Except for him. In the car, he was conscious. His left arm was smashed and pinned between the hard folds of the dashboard, which had accordioned as the front end crumpled into the passenger compartment. He was drenched in blood-not all of it, not even most of it, his own.

  Jagger the Observer blinked tears out of his eyes and stared at the demolished Highlander. Smoke and steam-lighted by a single burning headlamp, angled upward-roiled over the demolished front end. Tiny squares of glass glinted like jewels on the blacktop. Blood leaked from the car onto the road, mixing with oil, gasoline, radiator fluid.

  In reality, it had taken two hours and the Jaws of Life to extricate the van’s driver from the wreckage, and almost as long to remove Jagger as he drifted in and out of consciousness. Each time he revived he heard screaming, and prayed it was coming from the Bransfords.

  Scream, he thought. Scream because you’re alive.

  He’d learned later that the van’s driver had made all the noise, in agony from a shattered femur and cracked sternum.

  It didn’t go down that way in Jagger’s dream. In this realm the man pushed open his door and stepped out. He saw Jagger and smiled-the same smile he had tried to hide from the cameras as he left the courtroom three months after the crash, a free man. A nurse had botched the blood test, using an alcohol-based swab to clean his skin before inserting the syringe. State law required a nonalcohol-based swab, in the mistaken assumption that the wrong swab would produce inaccurate results. Despite having a blood-alcohol level of. 17-more than twice the legal limit-the D.A. had no choice but to dismiss the charges.

  “Do it,” a gravelly voice said beside Jagger.

  He turned to see Mark standing there. Half of his face was gone, and glass peppered the other side like freckles. Smoke coiled out of a hole in his skull. One shoulder drooped as though his arm started at the base of his neck. His chest was caved in, his shirt pushed in with it, clinging to broken ribs. The crater was the size and shape of a steering wheel. At the bottom, over his breastbone, blood seeped through the material. It formed the Toyota logo, then spread into an indistinguishable mass. He glared at Jagger, then rolled a lidless eye toward the drunk driver. “Do it,” he repeated.

  Jagger felt weight in his hands and realized he was holding an M240 belt-fed machine gun, the pride of the Rangers in Iraq. He looked up at the driver, who was facing him now, holding his palms up as if to say, Whatcha gonna do?

  “Shoot him,” Mark’s corpse said. “For me, for Cyndi, for Robby, for Brianna.” He nudged Jagger’s shoulder with bloody fingers.

  Jagger hefted the weapon and took aim.

  “Come on, man, you know he deserves it,” the corpse said and nudged him again and again, making it impossible for Jagger to lock onto the drunk. Over the gun’s wavering sights the guy started laughing. Then he broke up and disappeared.

  Jagger’s eyes snapped open. A spear of light cut across the ceiling over his head. He groaned and squeezed his eyes tight. Always the same nightmare… leaving him grieved and angry and frustrated.

  Mark’s corpse nudged him again, and he jumped, rolling in bed to face the monster come to life.

  Tyler was hunched beside the bed, shaking him. His lips formed the word Dad?

  Jagger reached to his ear and pulled out a bullet-shaped wedge of foam. The loud clanging of a woden scmantron in the monastery’s bell tower rushed in, waking him as surely as a splash of cold water. There was no need to look at the clock; the tolling sounded every morning at 4:15, calling the monks to matins, the first service of the day.

  “Tyler,” he said, “what is it?”

  “The gonging woke me.”

  Jagger craned to se
e Beth. She shifted and murmured quietly, but remained asleep. He rolled back and put his hand on his son’s shoulder. “Where are your earplugs?”

  “I can’t sleep with them. All I hear is my heartbeat, filling my head.”

  “Better than waking up this early.”

  Tyler frowned. The boy had something on his mind.

  Jagger propped himself up on an elbow. “What are you thinking, son?”

  [24]

  Although it was the dominant building within the monastery walls, the Church of the Transfiguration was small by modern standards. Built between 542 and 551, it was designed as a place of worship for the monks, not the public. Within, its marble, gold, and rare art could buy Trump Tower with a few million to spare.

  Jagger quietly pulled open one of the heavy cypress doors, which had hung at the basilica’s entrance since it was new. He held it for Tyler, who stopped to gaze up at the inscription overhead. It was too dark to see the Greek words; still, Tyler recited from memory: “This is the gate to the Lord; the righteous shall enter into it.” As rambunctious as he was, the boy accorded the monastery a deference Jagger found hard to muster. It may have come from talking to the monks, or from his mother’s awe of the place’s venerable traditions and sites, but Jagger didn’t think so. He suspected it came from someplace more primal, someplace at the heart of Christ’s admonition to “become like little children.”

  The righteous shall enter.

  He almost said, Maybe I should wait outside, but he didn’t think his son would appreciate the joke.

  Tyler smiled at him and stepped inside. Jagger followed and eased the door closed. The service had started. Across the nave’s floor of intricately patterned tiles, a monk stood at a lectern, chanting a prayer. The language was lost on Jagger-Byzantine Greek, he had learned-but its singsongy cadence and the reverence in which it was delivered instantly calmed the remnants of the nightmare’s emotions.