Authors: Christopher Farnsworth
S
IMON TRIED TO
tamp down his anger again as he left the conference room, and failed.
He’d lost track of the alphabet soup of agencies that swept into the city and demanded his time: FBI, DHS, NSA, DEA . . . He wondered if they got a group discount on their hotel rooms. There was already talk of a civil action as well, a possible congressional investigation.
For his part, he hid behind his lawyers’ fine suits and eight-hundred-dollar-an-hour manners, and claimed ignorance of everything except his own name.
For all their questions, he knew the real answer behind all of this: betrayal. It was something he knew quite well, and the rage it inspired seemed to grow stronger the longer he lived.
First, there was Max’s idiotic move, shooting David. He could bleat and moan all he wanted about how it was meant to protect Simon, about how he was trying to save him, but it was still a betrayal. He’d given his orders. David was not to be touched until Simon said so, until the replacement for the Water was completely ready. Max had overstepped his bounds. Simon would have to find some way to punish him for that.
Next came the question of how Shako had gotten past his security. This was more housekeeping than an actual matter of pride. She’d always managed to find a way to get close to him, no matter what defenses he might have in place. But he needed to know where the hole in the wall was before he could fix it. He set Max and Peter to the task of questioning the security personnel away from the police and the federal agents, under the guise of “getting the story straight.” In fact, he wanted to know who had helped her. One of them had to have been bought by her; she should not have gotten through the front door.
Finally, there was the only betrayal that really mattered: David.
She had been with him. He had been holding her hand, and they moved together with an ease he still recognized and envied after almost five hundred years.
He was hers. And she was his. He wanted to believe David was her pawn, but he knew in his heart it was more than that.
She would have left a pawn behind to die. Instead, she saved him.
He had to admit he considered David more than a pawn as well. Never an equal, really, because he didn’t think anyone with less than a century of life could approach him as an equal. But he respected David. Respected his morality, and his intellect, and his idealism. He believed the boy had wanted to change the world for the better. Simon was not above using that, but he respected it. He’d been willing to make him one of the Council. Simon had been prepared to call David a brother and a friend.
And David had been fucking Shako the entire time.
He realized he was grinding his teeth again. With a conscious effort, he put that aside. He willed himself to be calm.
Max waited for him when the elevator doors opened. Max looked weary and beaten. The hangdog expression on his face only irritated Simon even more.
“Any word from the scientists?”
“Some,” Max said.
“What do they say?”
“What do you think?” Max shrugged. “No help.”
“Of course not. The only man who can help us is with her now. Thanks to you.”
Max said nothing. Simon would not have that. He wouldn’t have silence now, after so many years of unwanted advice. “What?”
“It seemed to me he was with her long before that.”
“Are you trying to be funny?”
“Believe me, Simon. Nothing about this is funny.”
“Have you found her yet?”
“We have our contacts in the FBI and the NSA. They’re looking. Along with every policeman in the state. But she’s had a lot of experience hiding from us.”
“Look harder.”
“You always seemed to know where she was before.”
Simon stopped in the hallway and stared at Max for a moment. Was he trying to enrage him? Where was this coming from?
“You are trying my patience, Max.”
Max looked even more exhausted. “For that you have my sincere apologies, Simon.”
“If you are looking for someone to blame for our current situation, perhaps you should start with the mirror. Or do I have to remind you that you put a bullet into our only chance of survival—”
“Simon, please,” Max hissed.
Simon realized he was almost shouting. There were employees nearby, people in their cubicles and offices, all listening to the boss on his rampage.
Simon got himself under control.
“Perhaps the boardroom is a better place to continue this discussion,” Max said quietly.
Simon scowled but nodded. They took the elevator to the top floor and opened the heavy, locked doors.
Simon entered and then froze in place.
Peter and Sebastian were seated at the table in their usual places.
But there was someone in Simon’s chair.
Aznar smiled at him.
“Hello, Simon,” he said. “It’s so good to see you again.”
BERLIN, GERMANY
1945
A
ZNAR WAS CADAVER
thin when the soldiers brought him out of his cell. His POW uniform hung on him like a scarecrow’s rags, and his face showed fresh bruises and welts.
For all of that, he walked proudly, his head up high. The two Allied soldiers who escorted him held his arms gingerly, as though they were touching a soiled rag.
Simon rose from the chair where he’d been waiting. It had taken many, many favors to get him into the provisional offices of the Allied command. In one pocket, he held all the passes signed by different generals he’d used to reach Berlin. He wondered again if it was truly worth the effort to do this face-to-face.
Simon had spent most of the war in Spain, and like Spain, the Council was officially neutral but sided with the Nazis in every way that mattered. Still, Simon and the others had never given up on any of their investments in the United States. They weren’t alone in that. Many of the biggest German industrial firms maintained strong ties with America even as their soldiers were killing Americans on the battlefield.
Simon had lived too long to put all his money on one fighter.
Aznar was the Council’s official representative to the Nazi leadership. He’d even been given a uniform and his own personal escort. At the time, Simon had assumed it was because the Nazis appreciated the financial help the Council had given them during Hitler’s march to power.
Then, as the war ground on to the Nazis’ inevitable defeat, a friendly colonel on Eisenhower’s staff had given Simon some of the photos taken as the Germans retreated farther and farther back. Photos from places named Treblinka, Auschwitz, and Dachau.
Simon, who thought he’d become untouchable over the years, looked at them and felt his stomach turn. In that instant, he knew what Aznar had been doing while serving the Nazis. He withdrew all financial support from the Nazis and their related regimes. He pressed his contacts in Spain’s fascist government to do the same. It didn’t take much effort. Everyone saw the writing on the wall. The war was almost over; the Thousand-Year Reich ended up lasting five.
The Americans got Aznar just before the Russians stormed Berlin, and a good thing for him, too. The Soviets would have tortured him, and eventually Aznar would have bargained for his life with the only asset he had remaining: the secret of the Water. (The Council had no real connection with the Soviets, which was an oversight Simon would have to correct. He never expected the Bolshevik revolution to last, or that the starving Russian peasants would become one of the victors in the bloodiest war the world had seen yet.) The Americans beat Aznar and starved him, but the Council, with its influence, was able to keep him alive.
Which is to say, Simon kept him alive. Again.
He suddenly felt very heavy, as if all those deaths Aznar had caused were suddenly heaped on his shoulders.
Aznar seemed just as happy as the last time Simon had seen him. If he knew how close he’d come to real death, he didn’t show it.
The American soldiers removed Aznar’s shackles and handed him over to Simon. They did not ask for any paperwork. There was to be no record of this.
“You can go,” Simon said. They seemed only too happy to oblige.
Aznar gave Simon his usual beatific smile. “I don’t suppose you have anything to drink?”
It was too much for Simon. He backhanded Aznar halfway across the room.
Aznar knocked over a chair and came to rest against the wall. He struggled to stand for a long time, and then finally remained on the floor.
It wasn’t from weakness. He couldn’t rise because he was laughing too hard.
“You think this is a joke?” Simon demanded.
“You don’t?” Aznar replied, wiping the blood from his split lip.
“I know what you did. The camps. The experiments.”
“I saw a chance to expand our knowledge, perhaps even duplicate the Water. If I’d succeeded you’d be kissing my feet now.” He looked at Simon, saw the rage there. “Well, no, never that. You have never given me my due respect. That would be too much to ask.”
Simon felt the urge to beat him again, to beat him to death this time, to throttle the life from him. He clenched his fists and forced himself to stand where he was. “Those were not soldiers. They were civilians.”
Aznar shrugged. “What of it?”
“ ‘What of it?’ ” Simon spat back. “You slaughtered women and children.”
“And not for the first time, either. You’ve grown so squeamish over the years, Simon. We once caught babies on our swords. ”
“No. I never did. There are limits, even in war.”
“There are no limits. Not in war, not anywhere on this planet. We are free to do whatever we want, Simon, without the fear of death. There is nothing holding us back.”
“What are you?” Simon asked. “This was inhuman.”
“Inhuman? You’re right,” Aznar said, finally getting to his feet. “I am not human. And neither are you. Humans are here to amuse us, to serve us, and to die for us. We left humanity behind a long time ago. It’s time for you to stop lying to yourself.”
Simon looked at Aznar’s face. Suddenly, he was sick of it.
He opened his coat and took out a wallet filled with cash. He threw it on the floor at Aznar’s feet.
“This is the last thing you will ever receive from us. The Council is done with you.”
That finally cracked Aznar’s good humor. “What?”
“You heard me. I have tolerated you for too long. We’ve lost far better men than you. It’s time for you to join them.”
To his credit, Aznar did not beg. He sounded almost regal when he said, “You cannot do this. The others have a say.”
“The others have already decided. They left it to me.”
“We live and die together. That was our oath.”
“What does an oath mean to someone who’s not human?” Simon said. “You believe you’ve gone beyond morality, beyond limits? Then go. Be on your way. See how far you get without the Water.”
Aznar’s face twisted into the ugliest mask of rage and hatred Simon had ever seen. For a moment, Simon thought he would be foolish enough to attack, to give Simon the excuse to put him down once and for all.
But then the trembling stopped and the smile returned. “You should have done it. You should have killed me here and now. But you can’t, Simon. You are still clinging to the illusion of humanity.”
“Good-bye, Juan. We will not meet again.”
Simon turned his back on Aznar and walked to the door. He was done.
“You’re wrong, Simon,” Aznar called after him. “I will see you in Hell, if not before.”
“You don’t believe in Hell,” Simon called over his shoulder.
“No,” Aznar agreed. “But you will.”
TAMPA, FLORIDA
NOW
S
IMON MIGHT HAVE
fought them, but he hesitated for a split second. That was all they needed to take the choice away from him.
Peter and Sebastian were over the table in a heartbeat. They pinned Simon’s arms. Aznar disabled him with a single punch to the gut that felt as though it touched his spine.
Simon dropped to the floor, gasping and heaving.
Aznar kneeled down beside him and said, “There has been a change in management, my old friend. You’ve been retired.”
Simon glared at him from the floor. “You’re going to die for this, Juan.”
Aznar tsked at him. “Stop. You were never a very good villain, Simon. Your heart simply wasn’t in it. Believe me, I’m much more suited to the job.”
“Stay down, Simon,” Peter warned. “If you want to live, stay down.”
“Traitors,” Simon spat.
Sebastian kicked Simon in the ribs. “Traitors? You call us traitors?” He had to be restrained by Peter from kicking Simon again. “We know how much Water is left. What were you planning on doing, Simon? Were you going to let us die?”
Simon didn’t answer, but turned his eyes on Max. Max sat there, unmoving, watching, as he had the whole time. He didn’t look away from Simon’s accusing glare.
There was no point. He was guilty. He had betrayed his best, his oldest, friend. A man he would’ve died for a hundred times. More important, a man he had lived for.
And he would do it again in a heartbeat.
MAX HAD RECEIVED AZNAR’S
call late at night, and found him hiding behind a Dumpster outside a convenience store at 3:00
A.M.
Half of Aznar’s body looked caved in, and he was bleeding freely. He’d fallen nearly six stories, something that might have been fatal without their enhanced durability and strength. He did not have to explain, beyond her name: “Shako.”
Max considered letting him die right there, but he did not believe Aznar had outlived his usefulness yet. Especially if Shako was this close to them. Max gave him his emergency flask. Aznar emptied it completely.
Aznar lived, but it presented Max with a serious question. How was he supposed to tell Simon that Shako was in Florida again without revealing Aznar’s involvement?
In the end, he’d decided to keep the secret hidden and rely on the security they already had. It had kept them safe for years, after all.
The slaughter in the ballroom showed him how grievous his error had been. He did not suffer much guilt for it, however. He’d made mistakes that cost lives before. He could live with that, as long as he believed it was another turn, no matter how twisted, on the way to a greater good.
But then Simon showed him the vault, and the nearly empty, final barrel of the Water.
At that point, he realized he’d been doing the same thing he counseled Simon against: he was deluding himself.
Simon had taken them all down the wrong path. Max had let himself think it didn’t matter how long the journey took, because they were functionally immortal.
Only when he saw how little Water remained did he remember that “functionally” immortal was not the same thing as actually living forever. There were no guarantees. Any one of them could die at any moment, despite the great gift they had been given. They had all wasted so much of their time.
Simon had wasted so much of their time.
So Max went to the cheap motel where he’d hidden Aznar and told him the truth. Then he and Aznar went to the others and told them as well.
Things moved rapidly from there.
They went to the basement and divided up the last of the barrel. (Did Simon think Max really wouldn’t notice the combination on the vault? Another insult.) Aznar drank his share of the Water immediately. He said he’d need all his strength for this.
Sebastian and Peter looked to Max to lead them at first, but he was too heartsick. He stayed quiet and meek, and Aznar shouldered him aside to fill the empty space.
That was fine with Max. He realized that some part of him must have been planning for this all along. Max kept Aznar alive all these years because, in his heart, he knew he did not have the strength to do what must be done: to push Simon aside if things ever got dire enough.
Aznar was not really strong enough to lead, but he was cruel and hateful enough to take Simon’s place anyway. He would act out of revenge and spite and malice.
Max would have to live with that because Simon could not be allowed to continue on this course. Suicide was one thing. That was a personal choice, and as repugnant as Max found it, he would not have stood in Simon’s way if he’d chosen it. But he was deciding on death for all of them. He was murdering them all as surely as if he held a gun to their heads and pulled the trigger. It was painful to admit, but there was no longer any time for self-delusion. Max had trusted Simon for half a millennium. He had waited patiently for Simon’s great plans to come to fruition. He had believed that Simon would find a way to solve any problem.
Now he knew he’d been wrong for centuries.
Simon had gambled and lost. There was no longer any time. They should have chained Robinton to a stool in the lab and forced him to work. They should have killed Shako years ago. They should have searched harder for a new source of the Water. There were so, so many things that should have been done.
They were facing a very final deadline, and they were left with only one option: recover David and force his formula from him. Max knew he still loved Simon too much to be the man who would knock him from his throne. He would not let Aznar kill him, no matter what else happened. But neither would he let Simon fail them all again.
They were simply out of time.
THEY TOOK SIMON OUT
of the room, chained hand and foot. Simon wasn’t struggling anymore, but they knew better than to trust him. They would bundle him down an empty corridor, to a waiting elevator, where a well-paid team of discreet security professionals would take over.
Max sat alone in the boardroom for a moment.
“You should have told me how much Water was left, Simon,” he said to the empty room. “You should have trusted me.”
Then he got up and went to join the others.
The time for regrets was over. And so was Simon’s reign.
The Council of the Immortals was under new management, starting now.