Fatal Error rj-13 Page 24

  "Meaning?"

  "Meaning they would cut off his forearms at the elbows and shove them into his armpits as a show of contempt."

  Jack stiffened and glanced at Weezy, only to find her staring at him.

  "Mister Boruff!" she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

  "Who?" Veilleur said.

  Jack turned back to him. "A corpse we stumbled on in the Pine Barrens when we were kids-on your property, in fact-turned out to be a member of the Order, and he'd been killed that way."

  "To mimic the form of a q'qr," Weezy added. "We never dreamed… no one had ever seen the Kicker Man back then."

  "Speaking of which," Jack said, "if the q'qrs were fashioned by the seven-crazy Otherness, why do they have only six limbs instead of seven?"

  Instead of answering, Veilleur turned to Weezy and pointed to the Compendium. "Do you think you could find the Order's sigil in there and trace it for me?"

  "I'll try." She opened the book and began flipping through it. "With the way the pages shift around, finding anything in here is a real challenge." But only a few seconds later she stopped. "Well, I'll be. Got one."

  She grabbed a pen and began tracing, then handed the sheet to him. Veilleur held it up for Jack to see.

  "Now," Veilleur said to Weezy, "may I have one of your markers?"

  Weezy handed him one of her ever-present Sharpies and he went to work on the tracing.

  "It's true that q'qrs do not have seven limbs, but their symbol, the one they left behind wherever they pillaged and slaughtered, the one Hank Thompson has misinterpreted as the Kicker Man, has seven points."

  He held up his handiwork.

  "And so, the rule of seven holds."

  Jack shook his head in wonder. "It fits right into the sigil. I never saw it, never guessed."

  "Everything is connected," Veilleur said. "Everything."

  "But we still don't know why the One is protecting this baby instead of disposing of it. Because if he wanted it gone, he wouldn't have waited for its birth; he'd have killed Dawn last year and been done with it. Someone's got plans for that baby."

  "Then those plans must include me," Weezy said. "Else why would he install the baby's mother across the hall?"

  Jack had been thinking along those same lines.

  Veilleur said, "What puzzles me more is the obviousness of the move. The One is devious. He's practiced at the art of misdirection. A blind man could see through this."

  "Maybe that's the point," Weezy said. "Maybe we're supposed to see through it. Maybe its real purpose is to cause us to spin our wheels in confusion while the plan to bring down the Internet"-she glanced at the Lady-"and you, goes forward."

  Jack shook his head. "Well, he's confusing me. Does he want us looking for Dawn's baby or not?"

  "Maybe he doesn't care," Weezy said. "Maybe he's so confident the Internet will fall that he feels we're irrelevant now, and he's just playing with our heads."

  Veilleur pushed himself up from the chair. "Weezy is right. If the assault on the Internet succeeds, these questions will be irrelevant. We must find a way to save the Internet."

  If I'd been allowed to find and take out Rasalom, Jack thought, this conversation would never have happened, because it would be irrelevant.

  "Yes, please," the Lady said. "I like it here. I don't want to leave you. I don't want you to suffer what will befall you if I am taken away."

  Veilleur stared at her a moment, seemingly appraising her, then turned to Jack.

  "May I ask you a couple of favors, Jack?"

  "Sure."

  "Would you drive me out to Queens tonight?"

  "Sure. When?"

  "Around midnight or so?"

  Jack frowned. "Where do you want to go at midnight?"

  "A graveyard. Would you be so kind as to bring along a two-gallon container of gasoline?"

  "Um… okay. Can I ask what you need it for?"

  "I'm going to help someone start a fire."

  "Well, as I always say, set a fire for a man and he's warm for a day; set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life."

  Weezy punched his arm. "Jack!"

  But Veilleur's expression was stricken. "How did you know?"

  SATURDAY

  1

  "Bayside?" Jack said as he headed for the Queensboro Bridge. "What's over there?"

  He'd pulled up in front of Veilleur's building in his big black Crown Vic at about 12:10 and found him waiting at the curb. The old guy had given him the destination as he'd settled into the roomy front seat.

  "A cemetery."

  Jack felt his gut clench. "That wouldn't be Saint Ann's, would it?"

  "Yes. How did you know?"

  "I'm familiar with it. My… daughter is buried there."

  "Oh, yes. You mentioned her. Emma, correct?"

  Jack nodded, his throat thick. She'd never been born, never officially lived, but she was far enough along in gestation and might have survived if not for the trauma Gia had suffered.

  "I'm sorry," Veilleur said. "Had I known, I would have asked someone else."

  He found his voice. "No, it's fine. Gia and I go out there every so often and visit her grave."

  Veilleur shook his head. "Terrible thing to have to bury a child."

  "Have you-? Never mind. Of course you have."

  Over the span of the millennia he'd lived, Veilleur must have buried many children. Then Jack realized with a start that he'd lived long enough to bury all his children.

  "Too many times. It wasn't so hard with the old ones-the sons and daughters who had lived a full life and eventually became sickly and decrepit with age. But the children who die as little ones… no matter how often you go through it, that ordeal does not get a bit easier."

  They drove in silence for a while, with Jack wondering how many children Veilleur had sired through the ages.

  "Do you remember them? All of them?"

  A sigh. "All of them. They ran the gamut from the saintly to the downright evil."

  "Evil? You had an evil child?"

  He nodded. "A number of them. Some people are simply born bad. They grow up bad. There's no accounting for it. A couple of them, well, I had to end their lives myself."

  Jack swallowed. "Kill your own child?"

  "Twice, yes. They weren't children, they were grown men, and they were killers. This was in times without much in the way of civilization, no 'authorities' who could arrest them, no medications to treat them, no jails to lock them up. But they had to be stopped. They couldn't be allowed to go on raping and killing whenever they felt an urge in their loins or became angry. So it fell to their father to stop them."

  Jack tried to imagine…

  "There was no one else?"

  "How could I let someone else kill one of my sons? I'd brought him into the world. He was my responsibility." He rolled his shoulders. "Can we talk about something else?"

  "Yeah. Sure."

  Gladly.

  Jack said nothing for a while, too dazed by the thought of having to kill your own child. What kind of world had it been between civilizations? Rule by brute force… survival of the fittest…

  Veilleur-Glaeken-had survived all that. The stories this man could tell…

  In an effort to break the silence and change the subject, he said, "I'm pretty sure you won't be able to get in Saint Ann's at this hour."

  "I won't need to."

  He remembered the two-gallon can sitting behind his seat.

  "I brought the gas."

  "I know. I can smell it. Thank you."

  "Mind telling me what this trip is all about?"

  "I'd be glad to if I could, but I'm not sure myself. All I can say is that someone does not rest easy in the soil of Saint Ann's."

  " 'Not easy'… we're not talking a vampire or anything like that, are we?"

  Veilleur made an amused sound, not quite a laugh. "No, nothing so prosaic, I'm afraid. The inhabitant of this unmarked grave is human, or was, but somehow, in some way,
it has been infused with the Otherness."

  "You mean oDNA?"

  "No. It's something from without. This is the One's doing."

  Remembering something from one of his trips to St. Ann's, Jack said, "There's a patch of ground there where nothing will grow. I got that from a very frustrated groundskeeper. No matter what he does, nothing will germinate or survive on this oblong patch."

  Veilleur was nodding. "That's the grave. I visit it every so often, trying to decipher its purpose, what it means."

  "And…?"

  "I remain baffled. But I have a feeling a few of my questions may be answered tonight."

  "How do these 'feelings' work?"

  He shrugged. "I'm not sure. After millennia of being connected to the Ally and fighting the One, I suppose I became sensitized. No doubt I lost some of that sensitivity along with my immortality, but enough remains to sense singularities and incongruities, and sometimes a coalescing and intersecting of forces. That's what I sense happening at Saint Ann's."

  "You think the One's got a plan going?"

  "I'm certain he has a number of plans running congruently. That's been the pattern of our struggle down the millennia: We both adhered to the practice of having a backup plan already in motion in case the current strategy fails. But I have a feeling-and I can't say why-that this has nothing to do with opening the way for the Otherness. I sense this is somehow personal."

  Jack remembered something Mack had said.

  "Guy I talked to yesterday says the One's been involved in something 'down south,' but didn't know much beyond that." He glanced at Veilleur. "What's your plan B?"

  "I don't even have plan A. I'm out of this, Jack. I'm old and I'm tired. I can no longer lead. I can serve only in an advisory capacity."

  Swell. But Jack had known that.

  "And what do you advise?"

  "Stay away from that baby. Other than that…" He shrugged.

  Jack pounded his fist on the steering wheel. "What? How do we fight back without going after the One or the Order? It's like punching smoke."

  Especially frustrating since Rasalom was no longer smoke. The realization that he had been living for the last ten months-at least-right across Central Park from Rasalom had gnawed at Jack since he'd seen that name on the tenants list. He'd been right there. And if he could be located, he could be followed. And if he could be followed, a routine could be established. And if a routine could be established, a trap could be set. And if a trap could be set, one with a big enough payload…

  The One becomes the None.

  And then it's: Okay, Otherness… now what?

  They drove the rest of the way in silence.

  Eventually Jack stopped before the cemetery's locked gates. He expected to wait with Veilleur but the old guy surprised him by opening his door and getting out.

  "Wait. Where are you going?"

  "They should be along soon."

  "Who?"

  "That's what I'm here to find out. May I have the gasoline?"

  A cold breeze sliced at Jack as he got out and retrieved the can from behind his seat.

  "You're gonna freeze your butt off."

  Veilleur took the can. "I'll be fine. I've endured much colder."

  Jack noted his heavy topcoat, scarf, homburg, and leather gloves. Yeah, he'd come prepared.

  "You're sure you don't want me to wait?"

  "Positive. I think this will work better if I am alone. Can I call you if I need a ride back?"

  "Sure."

  Veilleur waved with his cane and walked off, following the sidewalk that ran along the cemetery's high wall. Jack watched him for a moment, then slid back into the car and headed back to the city.

  He turned on the radio and the Stones' "Miss You" was playing. Loved this song. Usually when it came on he'd empty his head and just follow the bass line. But tonight it made him think of Gia. He wished he was heading to her place instead of his.

  2

  What are the chances? Kewan wondered as he spliced the wires from the garage door opener receiver to the wires from the two blasting caps. Had to be one in a zillion, but still a chance.

  He'd spent the past two days hooking up receivers to the Semtex and C4 he'd positioned earlier in the week. Kewan would have preferred using cell phones, but the high-ups were expecting transmissions to be iffy when kablooie time came, so these were better. Better for the high-ups maybe. Kewan didn't want to be anywhere near this stuff when it went off. Not that the explosions would cause much damage above ground-maybe a little flying pavement, maybe the world's worst potholes-but someone might see him and connect him. The cell would be so much easier and safer. He could sit in a bar on the other side of the world and trigger these things.

  At least it was only moderately cold down here. Not like topside where the wind screamed across the fields and scoured the pavement.

  Okay. The wires were all twisted up inside their splice caps. Now the weird part-powering up the receiver.

  Yeah-yeah-yeah. He knew it was crazy, but what if someone driving nearby just happened to press his garage door opener transmitter at the very moment Kewan installed the batteries, and that transmitter just happened to send the same signal programmed into this receiver?

  Kablooie.

  But he'd done a shitload of these and it hadn't happened yet. So he took a breath and powered it up. Still holding that breath, he duct-taped the receiver to the fiber optic cable, then headed for the manhole.

  Only a couple more left, then he'd go on standby, waiting for the signal to start activating these receivers.

  He stuck his little periscope through one of the holes in the manhole cover. All clear, so he pushed up and crawled out.

  As he trotted for the shadows where the car hid, his heart rate kicked up. Not from exertion but excitement. Not long now before everything started falling apart. And he'd be partly responsible for the breakdown.

  As he drove away he fought the temptation to shove some batteries into the transmitter and press the button. That would guarantee him the honor of firing the first shot. But it also guaranteed him a shitload of trouble if it tipped off the cops and ATF and all the powers that be that trouble was coming.

  No, he'd be patient.

  3

  The phone woke Jack.

  As he thumbed the TALK button he realized with a start that it was morning and he hadn't heard from Veilleur about a ride back from the cemetery. Had he caught a cab? Not an easy task in Bayside in the wee hours of the morning. He hoped the old guy hadn't frozen out there. Maybe this was him.

  "Yeah?"

  "Jack, this is Munir."

  Uh-oh.

  "Trouble?"

  "Yes. But not personal. I think I know what the Jihad virus intends to do."

  "What?"

  "I will need to show you. Can you come over?"

  "Sure. On my way."

  Great, he thought as he pulled on some clothes. The first step toward stopping it is figuring out what it's gonna do.

  He hurried out into the cold, grabbed a coffee from a cart on Amsterdam, and hopped into a cab for Munir's. On the way to Turtle Bay he called Veilleur.

  "Yes, I'm fine, Jack. Thanks for your concern. I met two fellows who gave me a ride home. In fact they're here right now. I'm making them breakfast. Care to join us?"

  "Gotta see Munir. He might have figured out something on the virus."

  "Interesting. Keep me informed."

  Met two guys… brought them home… making them breakfast? Was Veilleur losing a few marbles?

  At the Habib apartment, Munir pressed a finger to his lips as he opened the door.

  "Barbara and Robby are still asleep."

  He led Jack to his study with the multiple computers and monitors, then began tapping on one of the keyboards.

  "I've isolated the stolen game code in the virus."

  "So they're going to make everyone play World of Warcraft? Or maybe World of Jihadcraft?"

  He said it facetiously but the humo
r-scant and dubious, he'd admit-was lost on Munir.

  "I told you, I do not believe followers of Islam would countenance what was done to me. It must be someone else."

  Might as well tell him.

  "It is. The Septimus Order is behind it."

  He frowned. "Septimus Order… I've heard of them. Aren't they like the Elks or the Moose Lodge? Or Masons?"

  "They love you to think that."

  The frown edged into a faint smile. "Are you going to tell me that they're a globe-spanning secret society like the Illuminati, plotting to take over the world?"

  "If only."

  Munir stared at him. "You're serious."

  "Deadly-as in Russ, as in Valez. As you said: Well organized, well financed."

  Munir sat silent for a while, then, "I dismissed you when you said they wanted to bring down the Internet. I thought they wanted to use it for their own purposes, control it rather than destroy it. Mainly because I didn't think it possible to bring down the Internet. Now…"

  This was what Jack had come for.

  "Now what?"

  He shrugged. "If the botnet created by Jihad four/twenty is anywhere near as extensive as theorized, I think they can do it. As a matter of fact, I'm sure they can do it."

  Jack had suspected this had been the purpose of the virus all along, but to hear it confirmed by a man whose stolen code had been spliced into it… chilling.

  "How?"

  "I've been baffled from the start as to how an online gaming enhancement program could be of use to hackers. Then I realized they'd utilized only my video transfer protocol and scrapped the rest."

  "I'm not sure what that means."

  "I developed a way of rapidly transferring video between a player's computer and an online game server. It uses a lot of bandwidth while running, but the beauty of it is it doesn't run for long. Russ loved it, called it the 'primo feature' of the package. Thinking about it now, I'm sure that was what he must have talked about to his fellow hackers. The wrong person overheard, and now… he's dead and my family's life is changed forever."