Then Feng slammed his booted foot down on the avatar bot with an audible crunch. The hologram crackled into nothingness.

Who are you? Kade felt Lotus’s question in his mind. But he only shook his head. He turned, took in the wreckage all around him, revelers fallen to the ground – some unconscious, some wounded, some dead. The brunette Kade had seen so often was crumpled on the floor, her chest softly rising and falling. The Vietnamese boy who’d been ridden from London was next to her, his neck bent at an unnatural angle, motionless. Kade shook his head. He was so very very tired of this.

“Jeep,” Feng said as he ripped weapons off the fallen men. Pain ground through him from a bullet in his arm, from the massive impact of the vehicle when it had burst through the wall and struck him head on. “I drive.”

The woman named Lotus lay prone on the stage, her mind reaching out to Kade’s, and watched with open eyes as they fled.

Chapter 42: Convergence

42

CONVERGENCE

Saturday October 27th

Breece and the Nigerian followed Ava back to the garage. They left the cars outside. Ava led Miranda Shepherd in through the door, and Breece and the Nigerian followed.

Hiroshi closed the door behind them, began to reconnect the mesh panels, resealing the Faraday cage.

“Status?” Breece asked, as Ava led Miranda Shepherd to the chair in the middle of the room.

“Nominal,” Ava answered. “I administered the scopolamine in the car. Memory formation’s blocked. She’s been cooperative.”

Miranda Shepherd sat down in the chair, docilely.

“Hiroshi,” Breece said. “It’s your show.”

They had an hour to turn Miranda Shepherd into their mule. They’d practiced the process, stripped it down to its bare essentials.

Hiroshi slid the syringe into a vein between her toes, then slowly depressed the plunger. The silvery fluid pumped, bit by bit, into the woman’s bloodstream. They left her sitting there while the modified Nexus 5 took hold.

“The phone?” Hiroshi asked.

Breece handed it over in its Faraday cage bag. Hiroshi took it out with gloved hands, plugged it into the slate that would load it with new software.

By then Miranda Shepherd was coming up. Hiroshi left the phone, pulled up a seat next to Miranda’s, closed his eyes, and went Inside. Ava pulled the styling hood down over Miranda’s hair, and let it do its work.

Feng threw the jeep into reverse as Kade buckled in. He sent them careening back over rubble and through the hole in the wall it had left on the way in. Then they were out into the night. The crowds had gone, dispersed by explosions and gunfire and wild vehicles. Another jeep was embedded in the building across the street, flames licking up from it.

Feng spun the jeep around, then threw it in forward and accelerated.

“You’re hurt,” Kade said. There was blood everywhere.

“I’ll live,” Feng said.