That’s bad luck for someone, probably me.
Then more cracks appeared, jagged black lightning rents that divided the room into sections.
Could it be an earthquake? Do they have those in London?
The mirror cracked once, twice, a thousand times with a sound like automatic weapon fire. The cracks raced past the edges of the mirrors, streaking across the walls. Chevie finally moved when the lacquered floorboards beneath her sneakers began to splinter and fall in torn chunks through to the hallway below.
“What the hell . . . ?” she cried, picking a safe path to the door.
Overhead the lights flickered, then exploded, showering Chevie with glass and sparks. Through the window, she could see streetlamps exploding all along Bayley Street and around the square itself. Beyond the square the blackout rippled down toward Covent Garden and Soho as though some giant night creature was swallowing chunks of light.
What is happening to the power? Orange will know.
But Orange was out. She was the on-duty agent.
A bulletproof front-facing window cracked, allowing noise in from the outside world. Metal shrieked as cars collided on Tottenham Court Road, and the cry of panicked people rose up into the dark London clouds, which had lost their streetlight underglow.
Whatever is happening, it started here, Chevie realized.
She ran to the wall safe, punched in the code number, and pulled out her Glock 22 in the shoulder holster she wore with an extra strap to pull it tight to her left side for a smooth cross draw. She expertly donned the holster and drew her weapon.
Chevie held the gun straight-armed in a two-handed grip, staring fixedly through the green tritium contrast points of her night sight, hoping that nothing would pop up and force her to shoot.
I don’t even know what the guy looks like who might come out of the pod. If I shoot the witness, they will never let me back into California.
Chevie ran down the upper landing, sticking close to the wall. Around her, bricks grated and plaster fell in chunks.
That chunk looks like Texas, thought Chevie, because you can’t control what the mind throws up.
Emergency lighting blisters flickered on, bathing the interior in industrial yellow light.
Good, thought Chevie. I can see whatever happens, which will hopefully be nothing.
Something else occurred to her.
Agent Orange. He’s probably going to blame me for this.
Chevie rattled her gun and told herself to focus, pulling a tight turn into the stairwell. She made her way carefully down the two flights of stairs. The basement steps before her were relatively intact, but the door had buckled and the central panel seemed to have melted.
What could melt a steel door? wondered Special Agent Savano, and this unspoken question was answered when a bolt of lightning sizzled through the glowing edges of the melt hole and took a good-sized lump out of the wall.
Lightning. Okay.
Chevie realized that she had squatted on her hunkers with her weapon aimed at the door.
That’s right, Agent. You can shoot the lightning.
She gave it a few minutes, until it seemed as though the indoor lightning bolts were over and done with, then hurried down the remaining narrow steps.
There was nothing left of the basement door but its frame; the melted edges had already solidified.
In a move that would have made Cord Vallicose, her Quantico instructor, proud, Chevie dived through the frame, rolled, and came up with her gun pointed down the corridor. She would later realize that the sharp edges of the door had scraped her all down one side, but at that moment she didn’t even feel the scratches.
There was no obvious threat beyond the ruined door, just dust and devastation. The WARP pod itself had broken free of its brackets and was pointing nose-first down the basement corridor. It looked for all the world like a small spacecraft had crashed into the house.
Which would make about as much sense as what is actually happening: a big machine is sucking the juice out of central London.
Chevie swore to herself that when Orange arrived, she was going to hold him at gunpoint until he told her exactly what this 1970s-style pod had to do with witness protection.
The pod usually reminded Chevie of a science museum exhibit, with its retro design and faded metallic finish, but now the machine seemed alive and totally functional, whatever its function might be. The thick power cables at its base hummed and crackled like electric eels, and a dozen light clusters flashed complicated patterns in total unison.
This must be the day the important man comes out of the pod, which is impossible.
“You there, in the . . . er . . . pod,” she called, feeling more than a little silly. “Come out with your hands up.”
No one emerged from the metal pyramid, but a hatch vented gas, then dropped with a loud clang to the floor. Ghostly sheets of steam floated from the interior.
Well, that’s new, thought Chevie, checking with her thumb that the safety on her gun was off.
Inside the pod, orange light flickered, casting weird, shifting shadows on the wall.
There’s something alive in there, Chevie realized.
Riley felt every molecule in his body coalesce, compacting until his senses returned. I am alive, he rejoiced, until the bitter cold settled upon him, and his teeth chattered with a violence that cracked a molar.
His hand still gripped the murder weapon, which was even now lodged in the chest of the murdered old geezer.
> I cannot let go, he realized. My fingers are locked.
Riley tried to take stock of his surroundings, as Garrick had taught him.
He was contained in a metal tank with numerous fairy lights a-flashing on the cold walls.
I have brought this magical gent back to his people with a blade in his body and my hand on the blade. They will see me swing for this.
Escape, his instincts told him. Escape before you are in the dock for murder or, worse, Garrick finds a way to find you.
But the cold held him like a boulder strapped to his back; and Riley knew that, like thousands of street urchins every winter, soon he would sleep and then he would die.
Chevie rose on her haunches, then moved stealthily toward the hatch, keeping her gaze pointed through the gun sights. “Come out with your hands up,” she ordered once more, but again nothing emerged from the pod.
It may have taken three seconds to reach the hatch, but to Chevie it felt like an age. Everything slowed down as adrenaline coursed through her system, stimulating her heart rate, dilating her blood vessels and air passages. She saw sparks tumbling slowly from the conduits and steam clouds seemed to stand still in the air.
Keep your focus, Special Agent, she told herself. There is someone in that pod.
She could hear scrabblings inside.
Was it a dog? An animal?
How do I warn an animal?
Suddenly time sped up again, and Chevie found herself in front of the hatch. Cold radiated through the opening and orange sparks moved unnaturally toward one another, coalescing into something solid.
Am I aiming my gun at a ghost?
But there was something else inside, huddled shivering in the cramped interior.
“Don’t move!” shouted Chevie, using her most serious FBI voice. “Freeze, or I will shoot.”
A weak voice came from somewhere inside the orange cloud. “I am freezing, miss. My word on it.”