The Omicron Legion (22 page)

“So sorry, miss, so sorry,” the Brazilian bellhop was saying in a mixture of English and Portuguese, reaching down to assist her.

Patty accepted his help, saying, “I was just on my way out, actually.”

“Then let me help you to the door.”

“I’m fine, really.”

“Can I get you a cab? I’m so sorry.”

“It was my fault. I wasn’t looking. I’m fine.”

Patty’s eyes swept the area around her and saw four of the Japanese men mixed among the crowd. They seemed unsure as to what their next move should be. Clearly she had complicated their task, hopefully buying the time she needed to get safely out of the hotel.

She backed her way out of the open hotel doors, colliding with a group of arriving guests. At least four of the Japanese were coming her way. There was a long line of guests waiting for taxis. She would have to get away on foot.

But the Sheraton’s isolated location left her with little maneuverability. There was just the Vidigal slum rising up the nearby mountain, and that was no answer.

She turned toward the lobby again to search out the Japanese and ended up colliding with an arriving guest. They knocked into each other with such force she almost fell.

“Easy does it, ma’am,” he said in English. He was big! And he was American!

“It’s about time,” Patty snapped, reaching down to pick up the cane the man had dropped when they’d collided.

“Time?” he echoed, stupified.

“Where the Christ have you been?” she demanded.

Patty grasped his arm on the pretext of regaining her balance, which allowed her to draw close enough to him to speak softly.

“Help me,” she whispered, and for just an instant their eyes met—the same instant the Japanese men came out of the hotel doors.

“I’m sick and tired of all this,” she continued, her loud ranting beginning to draw the crowd she sought.

“I’m…sorry,” the man forced himself to say.

“Let’s just get out of here. Now!” she demanded.

He seemed to notice the Japanese men. “Listen, it couldn’t be helped. It—”

“Now!”

“Fine. All right.”

He took her arm with his free hand and aimed her toward a jeep an attendant had been about to park. She climbed in ahead of him, and he pulled himself inside, grimacing with the effort it took. He pulled his cane in after him and closed the door.

“Thank you,” Patty said, with a sigh.

It was then she saw the pistol the man held low by his hip.

“Give me one reason not to shoot you,” he said.

Chapter 22

“YOU’D BE DOING
their job for them.”

“
Whose job
?”

Patty turned to look back toward the entrance. The Japanese were gone. The rest of the crowd had dissipated.

“Just drive.
Please.
”

“That bad?”

“Worse.”

The man stowed the gun beneath the seat and extended his hand. “Name’s John Lynnford.”

Patty accepted it gratefully. “Patty Hunsecker.”

He gunned the engine and looked back in the same direction her eyes had taken. “What’s this all about?”

“You’re rescuing a damsel in distress.”

John Lynnford’s stiff leg worked the accelerator as he pulled the jeep into traffic. “Distress from what?”

“Not what—whom. Did you see those Japanese back there?”

“Can’t say that I did.”

“They were after me.”

“What’d you do, buy an American car back home?”

“No, I’m Emperor Hirohito’s illegitimate daughter.”

Lynnford regarded her briefly. He was a heavyset, thick-boned man with unevenly styled blond hair, and blue eyes that made him look younger than he probably was. She instinctively trusted him, even though she had no good reason for doing so.

“The Japanese were waiting in the lobby,” she explained.

“For you?”

“For anyone who approached the front desk and asked the right question.”

“Which was?”

“Has to do with a friend of mine that I’ve got to find.”

The jeep glided to a halt at a red light, and John Lynnford looked at her again. “You want to get out?”

“Not really. You want me to?”

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“Your willingness to work my show.”

“Your
what
?”

“Show. You’re looking at the sole owner of the Orlando Orfei Traveling Circus and Carnival. We’re setting up for a run in Barra da Tijuca.”

“Always wanted to join the circus,” said Patty.

The Orlando Orfei Circus was setting up shop in a muddy field in Rio’s most modern shopping district. Located amid the Casa shopping complex and Carrefour Mall in Barra da Tijuca, the location could not have been better when it came to drawing crowds.

John Lynnford took the roads like he knew them, and they exchanged few words during the ride. As they approached the area, Patty heard the eerie whine of a calliope, along with the constant thud of stakes and studs being pounded into the ground. A number of men seemed to be issuing orders. To her right was the shell of a soon-to-be Ferris wheel. Just beyond it was a merry-go-round, and beyond that the midway was taking shape.

John Lynnford climbed out of the jeep ahead of her, easing his boots gingerly to the muddy ground, then retrieving his cane from the cab. Patty joined him.

“This way,” he said, and started off. “You can wait in my trailer while I send someone back into the city to apologize for my missing the meeting I had scheduled at the hotel.”

“Sorry.”

“If we end up opening a day late, you’ll have to do better than that.”

“I’ll make it up to you.”

“How?”

“Tell me how much you’ll lose, and I’ll make sure you’re reimbursed.”

John Lynnford leaned on his cane and regarded her sardonically. “Yeah, right.”

“I’m serious.”

“You were serious about a bunch of Japanese trying to kidnap you, too.”

“You don’t believe me?”

“Look, ma’am—”

“Patty. Please call me Patty.”

“Look, Patty. I’ve heard these kinds of stories before, but you really don’t fit the type.”

“What type?”

“Someone on the run, looking to hide. Look around you. That’s how plenty of these people got started. That’s how plenty of them will finish.”

“And you?”

“Uh-uh. You first.”

“Then let’s go to your trailer,” Patty said, taking him up on his suggestion. “This is gonna take a while. You’ll be more comfortable sitting down.”

John Lynnford didn’t question her during the tale, not even once. The only break in Patty’s monologue came when, without the use of the cane, he limped to a small refrigerator and took out a bottle of beer. He drained it in a single gulp and started on another without offering any to Patty.

“Wow,” was all John Lynnford could say before he swallowed the rest of his second beer. She had just finished her story.” Jeeze, forgive my manners,” he said, eyeing the bottle and beginning to pull himself up from the chair.

“Nothing to forgive. I’m not thirsty.”

“Go on, then.”

“There’s nothing more to tell.”

“Where’s this McCracken fellow?”

“I don’t know, and I haven’t got the slightest idea how to find out.”

“They could have gotten to him, you know. You mighta come all this way for nothing.”

“No,” Patty said. “You don’t know McCracken.”

“You’re right about that, and I’m thankful for it.”

“You’d like him, John.”

Lynnford rolled his eyes. “That’s what they told me about the last city controller who jacked up my show’s tariff.”

“You and McCracken would get along just fine.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Mavericks always get along.”

“Interesting analysis.”

“You denying it?”

“Let’s stick to the subject at hand, Patty.”

“Can I have that beer first?”

This time Lynnford used the cane to reach the refrigerator, he came back with a third bottle for himself as well.

“You need a glass?” he asked.

“Nope.”

“I always like a woman who drinks her beer straight up.”

“Men don’t have a monopoly on lips.” She took a hefty gulp of the beer. It was cold and wet and that was all that mattered. “You believe me now, don’t you?”

He sighed. “Everyone here has a story, Patty. When you’ve been with the circus long enough, you learn to tell the ones that are true from the ones that are made up.” He sipped his beer. “The difference is most of the stories I hear come from people who wanna stay here and hole up for a while. Not the case with you.”

“No.”

“So here you are, up the creek with a toothpick for a paddle, and it’s only a matter of time before somebody follows the current.”

“Meaning?…”

“Meaning the hounds chasing you probably won’t be paying customers—and having them nosing around the Orlando Orfei won’t do either of us any good.”

“I really don’t want to endanger anyone. If you want, I’ll—”

“Shut up, Patty. I said I wanted to help you, and I meant it. Lots of people who’ve moved to the midway’ve left skills behind. A few of those skills just might be what you need.”

“Part of their stories?”

“Almost surely.”

“Speaking of which,” Patty said, straightening up, “I haven’t heard yours yet.”

John started to raise the beer toward his lips, then stopped. “Not much to tell,” he said softly. “Not compared to you, anyway.”

“So bore me. I’m not going anywhere for a while.”

Lynnford looked out the window at the work going on outside. “You’re looking at my life, Patty. And it’s been my life for as long as I can remember. Some of the family was into the business end of circuses and carnivals, others like me were performers. Three cousins, my brother, and I formed a trapeze act when all of us were barely out of puberty. Became a big attraction, a lead one even. It lasted six years, until I was twenty-two—’bout fifteen years ago. My cousin forgot to catch me on a routine swing, and the net did the same. Shattered my leg on impact. Not a bone left whole to this day. More steel than marrow, Pat. Guess I shouldn’t complain, though. I’m alive, right?”

“Alive here.”

“Ever so true. The family bought out the Orlando Orfei chain, and I saw myself as the perfect person to manage it.”

“I understand.”

“Not until you’ve been here awhile, you won’t. Nobody asks any questions. They accept you for what you are and leave it at that. Your life can begin fresh the day you walk in. You’re not the first person to come to us the way you did, and you won’t be the last.”

“Except I’m not staying.”

“But you’re not about to find your friend McCracken without a hint of where to start looking, either.”

“I have to try.”

“And I understand that. What you gotta understand is you’ve got to be ready to move fast if things take a turn for the worst. That’s where we come in.” Patty rolled the beer bottle between her palms. “We? As in the people here who are going to help me?”

Lynnford rose and tapped his cane toward the window. “They’re all working now. We’ll get the ball rolling as soon as they break for lunch.”

“Are you happy now, Benjamin?” asked Pierce, standing in the doorway of the room that would be the tall man’s home for the foreseeable future.

Benjamin stared at him for a time. “I won’t be happy until we’re all together, until all this is finished.”

“Which will be very soon,” said Nathan, who had come up behind Pierce. “He wants to see us.”

“Now?” Benjamin asked fearfully.

“He called us here for a reason,” Nathan answered. “It’s time. Or damn close to it.”

“Let’s go,” Pierce suggested.

“Yes,” Nathan agreed. “Let’s.”

And they waited for Benjamin who, shrugging his shoulders, joined them in the corridor. The bunker was located some ten stories beneath ground level, constructed at a cost of nearly a billion dollars over the course of the past decade. All the work had been overseen by the man who had at last summoned them here. As far as they knew, this bunker was one of several scattered strategically across the United States, safe and insulated from anything that occurs on the surface above.

As a result, the air in the bunker had a sterile, antiseptic scent to it. Overdry, it played hell with the sinuses, but the slightly larger oxygen content kept the men from noticing. The worst feature of all, each would have probably said, was the lack of windows. With no world beyond to relate to, there was nothing to provide life with scale. Nothing, that is, other than the plan that had brought them all down here.

Nathan led Pierce and Benjamin to an elevator, which they rode to the very bottom floor of the complex. It was lit in a dull red haze and was colder than all the others. The lack of light, coupled with the absence of windows, was maddening. Stomachs clenched, they passed through an archway and into an even darker conference hall. The hall’s ceiling lights were encased by drop-off coverings that spread the light sideways instead of down. Everything else in the room was pure, pristine white. Untouched, virginal. Pierce thought it looked a little like snow.

Three places had been set at the huge conference table.

“Sit,” came a command spoken from the darkened slab that was the front of the room. “Please, my children, sit.”

The voice echoed through the hall’s sprawling limits, emerging in a slightly garbled, watery tone. Only the outline of its bearer was visible; a shadow hunched in a chair. What little life there was in his voice came from the echo. Pierce, Nathan, and Benjamin did as they were told.

“My children,” the voice started, “I am happy to report that all is proceeding on schedule.”

With that the hall’s light dimmed even more and a map of the entire continental United States was projected on the wall behind the shadow’s voice. The map’s glow cast his frame in an eerie translucence, outline bathed in a spill of light that might have come from the heavens themselves. Slivers of the light glowed red when the next instant brought twelve red splotches to the map, scattered irregularly over the United States and focused amid the nation’s largest centers of population. Accordingly, by far the heaviest concentration was along the Eastern seaboard. Six red lights dotted New York through Miami, while the West Coast and Midwest showed only three each.