“Really? You’re the secret agent woman. You fire the guns. You should have been driving today. I’ll just get in the way.”
“You did a hell of a lot better than most would today.” She looked down at the ground. “Francisco, I appreciate your confidence in me. But not everything is strategic, either.” He eyed her with confusion. “Some things are emotional, Francisco. I need you there.”
Startled, he didn’t know what to say. She continued. “I need someone there, okay? You might think of me as some super-agent. I’m not. Right now, I’m really damn tired, and I’m feeling anything but super. I’ve lost people I loved. My career is over, and to send it off in style, I’m about to break into my own government building and steal information. I could end up in jail until I’m old and gray. You’re the brother of someone I cared for deeply, and you want to find justice for him as much as I do. Besides you, I’ve got no one. You’re coming.”
Lopez nodded in accord, but he was again surprised. Her vulnerability seemed to lurk inside of a shell of adamant and catch him unprepared.
“Okay, Sara, but what happens when this system sees I’m not supposed to be there?”
“All hell breaks loose.” She pointed to the building plans. “The doors lock so that no ID will get them open until an external command code is given.”
“Great.”
“Even better. They electrify. Lethal voltage. No lock picking or control panel hacking. Touch anything around the door and you’re dead.”
Lopez just stared at her.
“Once the alarm triggers, security is called, as well. And, to make sure you’re docile when they deactivate things and enter, they gas the building.”
“Gas the building? Nerve gas? Poison?”
“Non-lethal incapacitating agent. Some derivative of BZ that has better clean up and more drowsiness.”
“BZ?”
“Ever heard of Agent 15? No? Well, Saddam Hussein used to love using that stuff. The walls of the building are filled with a much more sophisticated version.”
Lopez shook his head. “So they make it as hard to get out as to get in.”
“Maybe harder. They don’t think anyone is dumb enough to break in. But if they do, then they want to prevent anything getting out. No bodies out. No information, either — so once the alarms go off, Wi-Fi dies, extra-strong cellular jamming goes into effect. You’re gassed and left for pickup.”
“Sara, then we are back to me staying. This is crazy.”
“Or,” she said, interrupting, “you outwit it.”
“How?”
“We don’t have time for everything here. It’s already eight o’clock, and we need supplies. I’ll explain on the way. Besides, if I tell you now, you won’t come.”
That’s encouraging. It was suddenly too real. Talking and planning had a certain safe abstraction to it. Lopez watched Houston as she packed a duffle bag with numerous items. He noted that among these items were several firearms.
She paused staring at the weapons. “Don’t have time to train you with these, or I’d give you several.”
Give me several guns? He played over what was coming. Razored walls. Robotic machine guns. Intelligent buildings with electrified doors and spy-film knockout gas. A priest with guns.
She’s insane.
28
Houston parked next to a darkened light pole, the large parking lot of the discount warehouse shut down and empty. Although it was one in the morning, Lopez had never felt more awake in his life. He buzzed from some sort of electric charge running through him, the looming madness they were planning just a few steps away. Their ticket awaited in the trunk of her car.
“Help me get this out of here,” she grunted, pulling on the green canvas. The incredible weight of it shocked Lopez as he helped her heave it onto the asphalt. She began unlacing the sides. He shook his head. This was completely mad.
“Newest model of the Bervedine Cloud-hopper,” she smiled as the canvas dropped away. “We’ll need the inflation fan from the back seat. Julio could manage it; I can’t lift the thing by myself.” She eyed his frame mischievously. “But I bet you can, Francisco.”
As she set up the metal harness and propane tank, Lopez headed to the backseat. The inflation fan would sit outside of the nylon envelope, which when unfolded would be much larger. He glanced back toward Houston — she was unfolding it now. The fan was big and heavy, but he managed to extract it without too much trouble. Fortunately, it was built with an attached set of wheels. He lowered it with a grunt onto the ground and wheeled it forward. Soon he had the device alongside the burner.
“Julio had this one specially designed. He’s a big guy, as you saw.” She spoke through clenched teeth, pulling hard on the straps and ropes tying the envelope to the seat.
Lopez noticed that the gas-tank was bolted into the back of the makeshift chair. “Have you ever done this before?” he asked, expecting a negative.
“Of course!” she said, finishing off the assembly and firing the flame. The blast of air from the heat hit Lopez in the face, and he instinctively backed off. “Twice, for your information. Julio had several of us out once. The Agency loves to have everyone tightly knit. Friends, lovers. One big paranoid family.”
“Twice.”
“With one unassisted landing!” She positioned the fan behind the flame and started the engine. It sputtered once, then took, and a loud humming filled his ears, followed by the white noise of rushing air. The balloon slowly began to inflate. “These small one-man balloons are actually kind of fun. Better than parasailing, unless you like the greater risk of that. These guys are very maneuverable, relatively cheap, and, important for tonight, allow you to take off and land in very small areas.”
Lopez shook his head. “You know, after all this high-tech biometric auto-fire face-recognition spook-talk, you’d think you’d have a less primitive way to defeat their security.”
Houston laughed. “See, Francisco, that’s why it’s going to work. They planned for all kinds of brutal and sophisticated assaults on their security system. But it was all two-dimensional thinking. All we need is a tank of propane, a metal harness, a big patch of nylon, and a fan, and we’re in!” She smiled broadly. Lopez thought she looked like an excited little girl about to get on a roller coaster.
He took several steps back. The balloon was nearly inflated. Personal balloon or not, it was big. “We aren’t in there yet, Sara,” he said grimly, looking at the towering shape. He hoped no random police patrol car would pass by. “And you said one-man balloon — will it support one man and one woman?”
“Like I said,” she began, strapping herself into the harness and motioning Francisco over. “Julio had it made for him. Two hundred and seventy-five pounds of former linebacker, with over-design for safety. You’re about one hundred and eighty pounds, if I can guess. I’m one hundred forty. Should work.” That smile again.
Already she was beginning to lift off the ground. He stood next to her, and she strapped a second harness onto him. This was not going to be comfortable.
“The only issue is navigation with all this priest deadweight underneath me,” she said musingly as she fired the tank, driving hot air into the balloon. Lopez felt his weight lessen dramatically, and he rose up without effort on his toes. “And, of course, landing.”
Landing. Landing with him underneath. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this, Sara.”
Instead of replying, she burned the flame harder, and instantly his feet were no longer on the ground. The balloon gained altitude at a frightening rate, and within seconds the food warehouse and her car were small below them, twisting out of his field of vision as she piloted the cloud-hopper over the forest nearby. As they increased their altitude, Lopez gained a greater eye-line to the horizon, the orange necklaces of street lights radiating outward underneath them, a reflection of the full moon shining back at him from a small lake on his left. The wind rushed over his face.