Perfect Gravity (Wanted and Wired #2)(74)

Did he just reduce Yoink to a message relay service? Oh no, he did not. Sure, he might not have any reason to know better, but that characterization of her sweet kitty chafed. She didn’t take too well to Mari being described alternately as an abomination and an impetus, either.

“Heron’s known all over for blowing up firewalls,” Kellen said, pride in his friend lacing his voice. “And I know you two go way back. You could’ve just asked him.”

Vallejo put a finger to the side of his nose in a gesture that eerily echoed something Mari had done back at the Pentarc. “Yes indeed, he is, and I could have, but I think you’re wrong about him ever agreeing to help me. The appropriate idiom for such an eventuality references blizzards and hell. Mrs. Neko, wherever did you get this one? Potential is strong, but he wants training.”

“Mustaqbal, and he’s fucking brilliant. But you’re still an asshole,” Angela said, drawing the focus back. “By ‘proper impetus,’ I assume you mean kidnapping the woman Farad loves.”

“The thing rather, but essentially, yes.”

“And that was your only motivation?”

“And they said you were bright.”

Damn it, he wouldn’t be caught in a you-said trap. Cagey old slimeball, was Vallejo.

“What tech does she have that they want?” she prodded.

His face went very still, like he was weighing truth against a lie. The words appeared to hurt when he did finally speak. That, more than anything, lent them the weight of truth. “Mari underwent a brain-replication process, transferring consciousness one slice of neural connection at a time from a battered and dying body to a fresh new clone. Imperfect process, flawed process, abhorrent process, but, I suppose, valuable to some.”

“You’re talking about immortality. Athanatos.”

Kellen’s words were pincers at the base of her skull. How did he know? How could he?

“I am indeed.” Vallejo nodded, turned to Angela. “I gather it’s one of the several research avenues they are pursuing, so that a certain group of people can achieve unending life spans. But you’re Medina’s protégée, so you know more about these things than I. Now, are you going to help me escape this tin can or what?”

Words erupted from her mouth before she could stop them. “Wait, what does Zeke have to do with…” But she bit the sentence off. She couldn’t finish it. Because she knew.

Oh. God.

What he’s always been planning.

Athanatos.

She hadn’t seen that one coming. Again. Twice now, blindsided by the stupid little bouffant fuckernibble in boots, but this reveal cut deep. The poison of truth bled along its edge.

Of course Zeke was obsessed with immortality. Daniel had been, too. It was the thing they all talked about, all those consortium assholes, when they’d get together for drinks. For policy wonking. For training. For…

For kidnapping rebel scientists and torturing them until they gave up their research?

God. She wouldn’t put it past creeps like Limontour or Daniel, but Zeke? She’d never thought of him as assholish, never like the others. He’d been kind to her; he’d been her mentor. He’d arranged her admission into the MIST, had planned her career trajectory, her famous marriage. He had accompanied her on the single worst trip of her life, and he’d been there for her through the storm.

“What does Medina have to do with my imprisonment?” Vallejo finished her sentence. “Surely you jest. He plucked me out of the UNAN detainment personally. He mined me for research, made me build unholy things for the last eight years. I’m sure there are worse devils holding his leash, but he’s the face, the jailer they send when they need me to do a trick.”

“That makes no sense,” Kellen interjected. “You’re Texas; President Medina’s UNAN. Y’all’s governments sort of hate each other.”

But Vallejo’s right. This isn’t about governments. It’s bigger.

Angela couldn’t form the words to tell him no, it made perfect sense. All the grooves fit; all the cogs rolled. On the surface, sure, Zeke and Vallejo were enemies, on opposing sides of a thing that was conflagrating into war even as she sat here. But…what if they weren’t?

What if Zeke had been claiming that Vallejo, and by extension Texas, was behind all the drone attacks to give a face to the enemy, to make the people believe? That scenario suited all that Zeke had told her in private, about wanting a war to boost the economy and his personal popularity. To get her into a cabinet position, though it hadn’t been about her at all, had it?

None of it had. From the beginning, she’d been played.

“There is no government in Texas, boy,” Vallejo said. “The scar that you call Texas contains a raggedy few unhappy people, and a lot of dead ones.”

“Then all these drone attacks…”

“We did it,” Angela said in a whisper. “The UNAN, I mean. My government. My mentor. My fault.” She had thought she was luring Texas into doing something unforgivable, into attacking, into justifying the use of military force to defend the homeland. Into war. But in reality, her government had initiated the violence. Zeke had. And he’d let her blame someone else for his sins.

She had done the unforgiveable. Again.

“Now wait one minute,” Kellen said. “Don’t you go taking responsibility for everything shitty in the world. Damon Vallejo is a liar. And I don’t mean white tinies, neither. His word’s about as reliable as a hot owl fart. He fucking tried to kill you with his death-bot back at the Pentarc.”