Unmanned

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Cole drove far too fast up the dirt lane, throwing gravel against the undercarriage like a hailstorm from below. He didn’t slow down until he reached the narrowest stretch, where branches raked the Honda’s sides like the claws of a raptor, screeching and groaning against the metal.

“Shit. Sorry, Steve.”

He let up on the gas and exhaled deeply. It would be highly uncharitable to ruin the man’s car, even though he was exasperated with all of them. He drove the ten miles into Easton and stopped at the first booze store he could find, where he gazed longingly at the amber rows of bourbon before proceeding to the glass refrigerator cases in the back. He picked up a six of Bud, paid in cash, and cracked open the first one while seated behind the wheel in the darkness of the parking lot, facing a sign on the wall of the store that said no drinking on premises.

A long, deep swallow and he felt better. Then a second. Better still. Although if a cop came along he was toast. One check of his fake ID and the whole operation would crash and burn. Or his part of it, anyway. Big fucking deal.

Christmas lights flashing from the eaves bathed him in a continuous cycle of red and green, making him look full of fury one moment, queasy the next.

Some Christmas.

Better than last year’s, though, out there alone in the chilly trailer where there was no Star of Bethlehem hanging among the firmament in a massive sky. No beasts at the manger, either. Just a couple of coyotes rummaging through the trash.

Then he leaped back another year, to the one before his collapse. Carol’s family had trooped out to Summerlin for the holidays, and they’d enjoyed themselves immensely. Golf on Christmas Eve, tennis every afternoon. An hour after dinner on the big day, everyone piled into the van to drive over to the Strip, where they watched the water show from the fountains at the Bellagio, booming cascades swaying to a soundtrack of Sinatra. Carol’s dad had won two hundred bucks on the blackjack table at Harrah’s, then treated everyone to steaks at Vic & Anthony’s in the Golden Nugget. The in-laws adapted to the idea of a Vegas Christmas quicker than he had, although Cole had gotten a kick out of seeing holiday lights strung from palms and cacti, not to mention the weirdness of Christmas tree lots sharing corners with pawnbrokers and nickel slots.

But that was ancient history. The kids were two years older now and living in another house, decorating someone else’s tree. Santa was some guy in a mall in Michigan. Cole didn’t even know what their school looked like, who their teachers were, or what kind of haircuts they had. If he were to burst through the door uninvited, would they even know him?

He asked himself why was he bothering with all of this shit. Why had he even come here, an awkward appendage to a trio of journalists, writers who probably saw the world in a completely different light from the way he did, and now with an oddball engineer thrown into the mix. He could leave this instant, he supposed. Drive away, either back to the desert beyond Vegas or, hell, maybe even take a wild chance by heading up to Saginaw. Arrive clean and sober and contrite, begging for forgiveness and throwing himself at the mercy of the in-laws. A Christmas miracle fit for the Hallmark Channel.

Wasn’t that his real goal in this, once you got to the bottom of all the baggage? Purge all his ghosts by figuring out what had really gone wrong, maybe while getting some payback along the way. Then he could finally move forward, an inch at a time, toward something that might resemble a workable future.

Saginaw. Cold and unwelcoming this time of year, and probably at least six hundred miles away.

He could drive Steve’s car to a bus station, mail him the keys. And then what? Phone Sharpe and the journalists later, from out on the road? Ask them what they’d found out, to see if there were yet any answers? Because he would definitely want to know.

So there it was, then. He still wanted—needed—answers. Without them, he would never move forward. And some degree of retribution was still necessary, just as it was for Sharpe, for Barb, maybe for all of them. Meaning there was work yet to be done, and his role was vital. It would be his most important mission in ages, perhaps ever. Is that what was scaring him?

“Fuck,” he said.

The beer was empty. So was a second one, and a third. He’d been sitting here drinking for more than an hour, maybe two. A wonder he hadn’t been arrested.

He crumpled the empties and stuffed them into the bag atop the rest of the six-pack. Then he opened the car door and set the package on the pavement, a gift to whoever pulled in next. He started the engine and pulled out of the lot, heading back in the direction he’d come from, toward Keira’s place.

Unfinished business was calling.

The main house was dark, and he parked by the pool house so the noise of the car wouldn’t wake anyone. Stepping into the night, he looked up through the trees at the stars. Now he wished he’d kept the rest of the beer, because he didn’t yet feel like sleeping. Maybe a walk would help. Down the lane and back, a two-mile round trip, or perhaps that was a stupid idea out here in the cold and the dark.

He was still trying to decide when he heard the first scream, a woman’s cry of terror emanating from the house.

Cole broke into a run, covering the ground in seconds, only to find the door locked. There was another scream, and a light went on upstairs, illuminating the porch as Cole fumbled for the key. He heard Steve now, or some strung-out version of Steve.

“What the hell is happening?”

The fear of God, indeed. What was Sharpe doing to them, and where was he?

Cole unlocked the door and stepped inside. The first thing he heard was buzzing — thrumming, to be more precise, like the sound hummingbirds make as they dart and weave among themselves, competing for nectar. He reached for a light switch as Steve came lunging toward him from the kitchen doorway, a chef’s knife in his hand.

“It’s me!” Cole shouted.

Steve stopped in the sudden glare, barefoot and waving the knife at something as it buzzed past his head. Barb was coming down the stairs two at a time, flapping her hands around her head as if plagued by a cloud of gnats. A second buzzing object, then a third, did a quick revolution around her before whizzing down the stairs ahead of her. They joined the one that had harassed Steve, and then, like a squadron of UFOs in some demented sci-fi movie, they flew in formation toward the living room, where three more were already hovering. Barb, Steve, and Cole eased through the doorway and watched in stunned silence as the six tiny craft formed into a V, the way geese did in migration. Steve raised the knife and went for them like a madman, shouting as he hacked at the air. But they were too nimble for him, dispersing in all directions and then re-forming along the back of the couch before making a beeline toward the fireplace on the far side of the room. They cleared the top of the screen, then disappeared one after the other up the black tunnel of the chimney.

Keira had now joined them, wearing only a T-shirt, hair in disarray, her eyes like full moons. They all looked at each other. Steve gently laid the knife on a side table and exhaled, muttering under his breath. None of them seemed to believe what had just happened.

The front door opened. It was Sharpe, his bony head in profile against the depth of the night. He stepped into the light of the foyer, grinning, holding an iPad in one hand and one of the dainty little drones in the other.

Steve opened his mouth to shout something, but Cole silenced him with an upraised hand. Barb just shook her head. Sharpe, holding the floor, began his remarks with the air of an orator addressing the well of the Senate. It was a snatch of seasonal poetry, a famed bit of verse, and as Sharpe declaimed he raised the little drone on high.

“To the top of the porch! To the top of the wall! Now dash away, dash away, dash away all!”

Then, in a quieter voice, and with an admiring gaze at the little drone, he concluded: “And away they all flew, like the down of a thistle.”

Barb was the first to recover from the shock of it.

“Merry Christmas, asshole. Was this really your idea of a sales job?”

“That was just the sound and light show,” Sharpe said. “The warm-up act. The sales job is just beginning.”

“Fuck you,” Steve said. “You’re done here.”

Sharpe looked toward Keira as if appealing the verdict. When she spoke, her voice was hoarse but steady.

“What is it you want to show us?”

“All of the reasons you can’t possibly quit now.”

Sharpe’s tone was now deeply earnest, almost humble. The change seemed to have an effect. Keira nodded and backed away, as if to clear room for his approach. Barb looked at Steve, who shook his head but surrendered, at least for the moment, although there was still fury in his eyes. Cole followed them to the couch, where they continued to stand while Sharpe set his iPad on the coffee table and activated a video.

It was shot in infrared and appeared on three split screens at once, starring all of them in their respective bedrooms, green blobs sleeping beneath the sheets. Keira reached for the tablet, and Sharpe had to snatch it away.

“We’ll take your word for it that you caught us all unawares. I thought you had a point to make. But if voyeurism is your whole message, then we get it.”

“Actually, you don’t,” Sharpe said. “Not yet. The video’s just for show, sort of like the buzz job by my tidy little armada.”

He set down the drone on the coffee table, and they couldn’t help but stare at it. Smaller than a butterfly, or even a hummingbird. Like one of those Matchbox toys Cole had played with as a kid, except more delicate and insectlike. The wings looked as if they folded in on themselves. There were two tiny rotors on top, and an even smaller one on the front. The whole thing was no more than two inches long.

“My own design,” Sharpe said. “Not theirs.” Presumably he meant the Pentagon. And maybe also IntelPro, or private industry in general. “But it will be theirs soon enough, in one form or another, which is why we have to pursue every tool at our disposal, before these things proliferate beyond our control, or at least without public knowledge.”

“Big fucking deal,” Steve said. “So you flew a bunch of robotic bumblebees down our chimney, which, I might add, you were only able to do by opening the damper when no one was looking. Then you shot some video and scared us out of our fucking wits.”

“I also did this.”

Sharpe reached into his pants pocket and pulled out three thumb drives. He scattered them on the table.

“Those six drones you saw were only the second wave. The first group, which I’m not even going to show you, because that’s how proprietary I feel about their capabilities, were able to insert these thumb drives into your personal laptops.”

“And stole our shit?” Barb asked.

“Copied it. While you slept. Then returned the copies to me, which I’m now returning to you. As a courtesy, of course. A gesture of trust. I haven’t even had time to inspect the contents, and don’t wish to. I’m only interested in finding out what’s over there.” He nodded vaguely toward the west, and IntelPro. “Seven miles as the crow flies.”

“My point still stands,” Steve said. “You don’t really know how they’ll react if they find out what we’re up to. And all this shit you want to do — and did already, right here in this house — is probably damned illegal. And we could all go to jail for it.”

Sharpe stepped around the coffee table and got right up into Steve’s face.

“Legality is no longer the point. The point, in case you haven’t been paying attention, is that Captain Cole and I will do this whether it happens from here or from some other empty field within range of their facility. And once we’ve acquired God knows what sort of richness of material from our work, you’ll want access to our findings. Except then we’ll just be sources, and you won’t have to trouble your delicate sensibilities over how we acquired our information. That, I believe, is the point here. We’re doing it, and you’ll want the results. The only remaining question, then, is whether you’ll actually be here to watch us do our work.”

“So you’re saying there are no rules anymore?”

“Not in this field of endeavor. Not when everyone’s airspace is wide open. And not on a single page of the PATRIOT Act. The advantages for your profession, and for this particular project of yours, would seem to be painfully obvious. Information. It’s there for the taking, and we’re going to go and get it. And we’ll do it just as we did it tonight, without leaving a single fingerprint — yours, mine, or anyone else’s. So shall I help you, or shall I go? Because if you ask me to leave, whatever I learn will go to some other more deserving party in the Fourth Estate.”

Steve sagged, defeated. Then he looked over at Barb, as if deferring to her judgment.

Her expression was somber but resolute.

“How soon were you hoping to get started?” she asked.

“Sunrise. Catch them while they’re sleeping, figuratively speaking.”

Barb then looked at Keira, who nodded.

It was unanimous. It was done.

Cole, watching from behind an armchair, said nothing. But if he was going to be piloting this thing, then he’d better get some sleep. He headed for the door without saying a word.

Hours later, but still well before sunrise, Cole awakened.

A noise had done it. A gunshot, or that’s what it had sounded like. But now it was dark and quiet, probably the middle of the night. So maybe it was something else. Sharpe again? Another goddamn demonstration of his powers, of his almighty ego? Surely he wasn’t that stupid. And this noise had been too loud for any of his stealthy handiwork.

Cole lay on his back for several seconds more, blinking into the darkness, seeing nothing, hearing nothing. Just as he was beginning to wonder if he’d dreamed the whole thing, there it was again, unmistakable this time — a gunshot, sharp and loud, and echoing through the trees.

Had it come from the woods, or from the house?

He stood to dress, heart beating fast. Pants, a shirt. He picked up his socks, then tossed them aside and pulled on his shoes, not bothering to lace them. Before bolting out the door, he turned just long enough to glance at the bedside clock, which froze him in place with its message.

It was 3:50 a.m. The hour of death.