“We weren’t going to get anywhere. Not like that.”
“Like what then? Look at it. The mountain we’re sitting on is a match to the engraving. The old man had the knife. The knife is a direct link to the Nazis and the Horten and whatever else went on here during World War II. An American that looked a lot like you went through there three months ago. Three months would have been February. Everything, and I mean everything, adds up. Hell, if we can get that old man to talk it might just be a road map directly to your father.”
“You think I don’t know all this?”
“Then what?” Kate got off the bike, addressing Michael head on. “It’s time we pushed. Maybe the old man won’t say anything. But the woman might. Or the kid. We just need to be persuasive.”
“And the best way to do that,” Michael said, “is to learn more. They made it clear they don’t want us asking questions. If we’re going to get anywhere with these people, we need to know who they are and what they want. We need an in before we try again.”
“If we even have time to try again.”
Michael looked directly at Kate. “What does that mean?”
Kate pulled the stray strands of hair away from her face. It was a habit Michael had made note of. She did it when she was nervous or anxious. Michael guessed that she also did it when she was about to come clean.
“Last night, while you were sleeping, I made a call.”
“Please tell me you used a payphone.”
Kate nodded. “I talked to my handler in London. He only spoke a few words before getting off the line, but it was enough.”
“What did he say?”
“The bird’s gone south.”
Michael was silent.
“Like everything else, the Chinese are looking for supremacy in space. Three days ago they launched a satellite incorporating a new version of the Horten’s cold fusion reactor as its power source. About fourteen hours after that they lost communication with that satellite. Subsequently its orbit began to degrade. If its orbit continues to degrade at its current rate, its most likely reentry point is somewhere above Southern California. Exactly what will happen when it reenters the atmosphere is unknown. What we do know is that a breach of the reactor core will result in an explosion on an order of magnitude the world has seldom seen. And even if by some miracle the breach from the primary reactor isn’t catastrophic, prevailing winds will ensure that the radioactive fallout from its secondary coil will be worldwide.” Kate met Michael’s eyes. “If this thing comes down a whole lot of people are going to die, Michael.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this before?”
“You’re a civilian. I didn’t want you to have a complete meltdown.”
“I wouldn’t exactly call myself a civilian.” The truth was Michael hadn’t considered himself a civilian since he was seventeen. Not since that fateful day when his kidnappers had given up. Despite holding him for three days, his father had not come. That meant that Michael was no longer of any use. They said they would kill him. But they weren’t that kind. Instead of killing him, they locked him in a narrow mine shaft — no food, no water, and no way out. Michael didn’t know how long he had waited there before help came. But he knew he was no longer a civilian. After that he’d never be a civilian again.
“What would you call yourself then?” Kate said.
“A realist.”
“Good. Then understand this. That satellite is the equivalent of a very large bomb. To make that bomb the Chinese reverse engineered their reactor design including all of its communications protocols from the damaged Horten they found. If we can locate the second Horten and plug it into that green box we found, if the boys in tech can find a clear-code that will reboot its systems, there’s a chance we can keep that bomb from blowing.”
“Just a chance?”
“A chance is the best we’ve got.”
Michael stared down at the low clouds hanging over the valley. Regardless of the belated manner in which Kate had shared this information, he knew in the pit of his gut that she was right. The stakes were too high to beat around the bush. They needed to talk to the old man. But something material had to change. They needed a reason for him to trust them. Instead they got a clap of thunder. A gunshot echoed up from the valley below. It sounded like a twelve gauge, but Michael guessed it could have come from any large caliber weapon. It was followed quickly by a second shot, this one seemingly louder than the first and in that moment Michael knew that the luxury of decision was no longer his. The second shot still reverberating through the hills, he kicked the bike to life, Kate hopping on behind him.
***
They heard the screaming before Michael even killed the engine. The boy stood wailing in the middle of the path, tears streaming down his face. The old woman then stepped out of the hut and one look at her told Michael that the man with the knife had been her husband and he was dead. She ignored Michael and hunched over on the ground, knees in the dirt. Others appeared, hurrying down hidden trails onto the main footpath of the village, and soon the wailing was everywhere. One of their own had fallen.
Michael dropped the bike in the soft dirt and headed into the hut where the old man had been cooking. He only needed to poke his head in the doorway for a second before looking away. It wasn’t like an automobile accident seen from afar, it was more visceral than that. And despite everything Michael thought he knew about being born from the earth and going right back to it, he felt an overpowering urge to sink to his hands and knees and vomit. The old man’s head, or what was left of it, was slumped to the side of his neck at an unnatural angle. A second shot had taken out most of his face, reducing what had been a person to what looked like a bloody rump roast hanging from a stump of flesh. Michael grasped his gut and dry heaved. Kate, who had entered the hut cautiously behind Michael, looked momentarily stunned, a faraway look in her eye. Michael left the hut.
“Who did this?” Michael asked two of the villagers. “Who did this?”
The villagers ignored him. Michael’s only response was the low moan of the old woman, the boy now seated against the stone wall of a nearby hut dropping a pebble repeatedly into the mud as though caught in an infinite loop of disbelief.
Kate echoed Michael’s question in Mandarin. The stray villagers who had come down from the hillside looked up at her, but quickly redirected their attention to the old woman. Kate, undeterred, continued forward, repeating the question. The villagers only shook their heads. Looking at them, still breathing hard from their run from the fields, it was unlikely that there would have been any witnesses except for the kid and the old woman. No, it was obvious to Michael that if he wanted answers he was going to have to go straight to the source. But Kate beat him to it. She knelt down in the dirt before the old woman, taking her by the hands.
Kate spoke in soft Mandarin but the woman didn’t reply to her. She just looked directly through Kate as though whatever these foreigners might do or say from this moment on didn’t matter. Her husband was after all sitting not ten feet away, dead as Mao, his head hanging off his neck like so many pounds of raw meat. But Michael was now convinced there would be more death if they didn’t press on.
“Your husband. He had a knife.”
The old woman looked up at Michael and wailed the long low moan of the emotionally dead. The moan didn’t end, it just went on and on echoing through the hills until finally Michael stood, taking Kate by the shoulder. Even if this was the only way forward, Michael reasoned they had to give it time, if only a little. But then, as Michael raised Kate to her feet, the old woman looked up from the dirt and met Michael’s eye. She held the look for a long moment. Then she muttered something, barely audible at first. To Michael’s unpracticed ear it sounded like a single syllable, maybe two.