Max Collins - Before the Dawn

“Look at those eyes,” Kendra said.

“Shhhh,” Max said.

“He can hack my cable any ol’ time...”

“Quiet, Kendra.”

“This bulletin contains graphic violence, and we are broadcasting at this hour to avoid young viewers. This footage — banned from the media in Los Angeles where the slaughter occurred two days ago — is sobering evidence of what happens to people who stand up for freedom.”

Max’s eyes widened in dread as she saw the handheld footage of the outside of the Chinese Theatre.

“Official documents indicate that the gangster group the Brood was responsible,” the electronically altered voice continued, “but the media clampdown — and reports of black-uniformed, heavily armed soldiers at the scene — indicate government involvement, even collusion.”

The camera moved closer to the theater and revealed four bodies sprawled on the patio in postures of bullet-riddled death. Max’s fingers clutched the cloth of the couch.

“The Chinese Clan, freedom fighters in the Los Angeles area...”

Freedom fighters? Max thought bitterly. Not hardly...

The camera moved into the lobby where more bodies were flung, some of them Brood members, and she wondered if Moody’s crew had been able to fight back, to hold off the onslaught, to limit the carnage...

“... were gunned down by the Brood in a dispute, allegedly over stolen goods.”

And Max saw Fresca, in his worn Dodgers jacket, lying in rubble next to a headless girl... Niner? Fresca’s jacket, originally Dodger blue, was now an ugly, blood-soaked purple.

“None of this group of freedom fighters escaped the wrath of the Brood.”

The handheld was in the auditorium now. Bodies lay strewn about like abandoned, broken toys.

“Gross,” Kendra said; but her eyes were glued to the screen.

Again Max felt warm wetness trailing down her cheeks, but she otherwise remained passive, simply sitting watching the video footage of her dead Clan family.

“Eyes Only sources indicate the Brood may be expanding into Seattle,” the voice continued. “If this criminal gang truly has government sanction, our city will be further enslaved.”

The camera swung around in the theater’s auditorium for the image Eyes Only had chosen to make his final point: Moody’s head impaled on a spike. On spikes on either side of him were the heads of Tippett and Gabriel...

“Shut it off!” Max gasped, and turned away.

Kendra used the remote, but the bulletin was already over, SNN back on; the tears on Max’s cheeks surprised her roommate into sobriety.

“What’s wrong, Max? You’re not the squeamish type.”

“I know them... knew them.”

“What?”

“I was one of them... the Chinese Clan. They were... family. Like family...”

Kendra slipped an arm around Max’s shoulders. “Oh, God, Max, I’m so sorry. What can I do to help?”

Max shut the grief off, as if she’d thrown a switch. “You can help me find Eyes Only, I’ve got to talk to him. I’ve got to find out more about what happened at that theater.”

Kendra’s eyes were big, and she was shaking her head. “Honey, I don’t know anything about him — nobody does. He comes on the tube at will, he does his thing, he splits.”

Max shook her head. “There’s got to be more to it than that — there must be an underground movement in this city.”

“Well, if so, I don’t know anything about it. And I don’t know anybody who knows anything about Eyes Only... you gonna be all right?”

Nodding, Max said, “I’m fine.”

“No you’re not. You’re holding it in — that’s not healthy. If you don’t let it out...”

“There’s nothing to be done for them now.”

Kendra frowned in concern. “You sure you don’t want to talk it out?”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“Well...” Max’s roommate rose, yawned, and said, “I guess I better catch some z’s... that is, if you’re sure —”

“Kendra, go ahead and crash... I’ll be fine.”

After Kendra stumbled off to bed, Max went to her own room, where she took from its hiding place the black velvet bag with the necklace.

This stone had cost Moody and the others their lives... and she hadn’t been there for them...

She wept, quietly, her face in a hand, for several minutes; then the thoughts, the questions, began to crystallize.

Eyes Only, Seth, this necklace, the Brood, the art collector Jared Sterling, and maybe even Manticore and Lydecker himself were interwoven in the tragedy that had befallen the Clan.

But how?

She knew where to start. Not Eyes Only — his whereabouts, like his identity, were a mystery. Seth had given up no leads since the brawl with the boys in blue; and the necklace was a mute witness. The Brood was in LA, and Lydecker was at Manticore.

That left one option.

The ten-man security team would be ready for her next time, but she could see no other choice: Max would have to return to the scene of the crime.

Even in the post-Pulse world, the ringing of a doorbell was, generally, an innocuous thing.

Right now, with midnight approaching, the doorbell in Logan Cale’s condominium was trilling the hello of an unannounced guest. The building was secure, and the lobby guard would normally call and check before sending anyone through.

But there had been no call — just the ringing of the bell.

And in the life of Logan Cale, answering a doorbell could mean his last act on earth.

First, there was the risk that someone with the government — or some “civic-minded” citizen looking for reward money — would enter and discover the not-terribly-secret home studio from which Logan broadcast the cyberbulletins of his very secret alter ego, Eyes Only.

Second, Logan was one of a long line of Americans born to wealth who developed a sense of shame — even guilt — for his life of privilege, a sentiment that had blossomed into genuine social concern. And, while his underground identity as Eyes Only seemed secure, his reputation as an aboveground left-leaning journalist was well known.

This of course did not prevent Logan from being perceived as just another fat-cat target. The Cale family had the kind of affluence that had easily weathered the Pulse and its various upheavals and problems... one of which was kidnapping the rich for ransom.

As in the Great Twentieth-Century Depression, this left-handed entrepreneurial pursuit had become the “racket of choice” of many criminals, from down-on-their-outers to sophisticated career criminals. And as in the Lindbergh era of “snatches,” the victims usually turned up dead, even after full payment had been made.

So... if this caller wasn’t who Logan thought it was, he just might never get to open the door again.

Logan could ignore the bell. His two-hundred-fifty-pound ex-cop bodyguard, Peter, had the night off, and — unless this was a full-scale raid, in which the door would be battered down, anyway — Logan could just continue with his research and wait for whoever-it-was to go away.

But if this caller was who Logan suspected it might be, he would prefer to take the meeting during Peter’s absence. If this was someone else, well, that was why Peter very seldom got a night off, and on the rare occasions when Logan did answer his own door, he did so in the company of a shotgun.

The bell rang again.

Paranoia runs deep, Logan thought with a wry little smile, quoting a very old song as he rose from his massive array of racked computer gear — including half a dozen monitors and a networked laptop — and strode from his work space with an easy grace suggesting an acceptance of whatever might befall him in his quixotic but so-necessary crusade.