Marcus Sakey - Brilliance

Cooper hesitated.

“Who can convince, or force, seven independent networks to bury a story? Could a rogue group do it? A terrorist?”

“No.”

“No. Only someone in the system. Only the system itself.”

“Drew Peters again.”

“Maybe.” Smith shrugged. “I don’t know exactly. All I know is, when they didn’t air that video, when I saw that the government wasn’t evacuating, I realized what would happen if those bombs went off. And so I activated my contingency plan.”

“Shannon.”

“Shannon.”

Cooper thought back to that moment six month ago, him running down the hall at her, Shannon looking up, telling him to wait, that he didn’t understand. Jesus.

Would she have succeeded in stopping the bombs if he hadn’t caught her? Was this one more load on his creaking conscience?

“So who benefits from something like this, Cooper? Who benefits from the Exchange blowing up?”

“You asked your question.”

“Call this a follow-up.”

He knew the answer, both the one Smith wanted to hear and the larger truth behind it. Yesterday, he couldn’t have imagined admitting it. But this morning, as the first sharp rays of the sun split the horizon, he just said what his gift told him. “People who want a war.”

“That’s right. People who want a war. People who believe that it will make them richer, or more powerful. A few, even, who might truly believe that a war is necessary. But while there have been a handful of times in history when war truly was necessary, never, not once, has a war against our own children been justified. No, the people who want to start this war, they want to benefit from it.”

“How did the bombs go off if you didn’t trigger them?”

“Is that your question?”

“Call it a follow-up.”

Smith laughed. “All five had a radio trigger with a specific code frequency. No one but me knew the code.”

“So how—”

“Because I warned them.”

He stopped talking, let Cooper work it out. “Your message gave someone enough time to find the bombs and break the code.”

“Again, I didn’t realize just how ruthless my enemy was. I knew they hated me, knew they wanted a war. But even I never believed they would blow up their own building, kill a thousand people, just to foster it.”

“But…why?”

“Men will always find a reason.”

Cooper thought about that. Thought that it was probably true. “Next question. What about the rest?”

“The rest?”

“The other things you’ve done. Assassinations. Explosions. Viral attacks. All of it.”

A long silence. The sun broke the horizon, spilling bloody light across the east. As if on cue, Cooper heard birdsong, though he couldn’t see any birds.

Finally Smith said, “Are you asking if my hands are clean? They’re filthy. I’m sorry, but you wanted truth.”

“You are a terrorist.”

“I’m fighting a war. I’m fighting for my human rights, and the rights of people like me. I’m fighting for you, and Shannon, and the other million of us. Like your daughter.”

Cooper found himself on his feet before he realized he’d moved. “Be careful, John. Be very careful.”

“Oh, come off it.” Smith looked up at him mildly. “You want to kill me? You can. I’m no match for you in a fight. I knew you could last night, and I knew you could when I brought you up here. You don’t want me to talk about Kate? Fine. But I’m not the one who wants to put her in an academy.”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Why? Because you throw me off this rock?”

“Because…” Drew Peters’s voice in his head. Your daughter will never be tested. Whatever happens, I’ll take care of your family.

He sank to his knees. No more. Please. Enough. Not them, too.

I’ll take care of your family.

“No one has clean hands,” Smith said. “Not me, not Shannon, not you. But the system is the bloodiest. The new world is being forged one gear at a time, and those gears drip blood. My turn. What kind of world do you want for your abnorm daughter, Cooper? And while we’re at it, what kind of world do you want for you normal son?”

He fought for breath. I’ll take care of your family. In his effort to protect them, in his blindness, he’d left them under the protection of the most dangerous man imaginable. To protect his children, he’d let a lion into their bedroom.

No.

“This evidence,” Cooper said. “Shannon said you had evidence. Of the things you’re claiming.”

“That’s a longer story.”

“I’ve got time.”

“After I met Senator Hemner at the Monocle, I headed home. Never made it. I saw police all along my block, my apartment lit up with floodlights. I didn’t know what was going on, but I knew enough to run. Which was what Peters wanted. What’s the point of creating a myth like John Smith if you catch him right away? Better to let him run. To let him lurk out there in the darkness, a national boogeyman. More funding in it.” He laughed without humor.

“So I ran, and I transformed myself from an activist into a soldier. I started building an army. And then I went digging. I wanted to know who my enemy was.

“It didn’t take long to figure out that it was Equitable Services. Your agency benefited more than any other. But that wasn’t proof. I had the why, and the who. So I went after the how.”

“The how?”

“Someone had orchestrated the massacre. That same person had faked the footage of it. That was exceptional work. It had to be perfect, or as near as possible. That meant a gifted. A man who can do with image and media what I can do with a chessboard or what Shannon can do with a crowded room. That was all I needed to know to find him.”

“What happened?”

“I asked him questions,” Smith said dryly.

“You tortured him.”

“No clean hands, remember? This man ruined my life and threatened the existence of my whole race. So yes, I asked firmly. He came clean about the forgery quickly enough.”

The sun was moving fast now, the air warming every moment. Cooper stared into it, said, “If you had proof the Monocle was fake, why not release it?”

“What proof? The word of a twist to a terrorist, given under torture? Who would believe it? Would you? No one would have paid attention. I needed something more.” Smith put his hands down and spun to face Cooper. “And I got it. This man, he also said that your director knew that if the truth about the Monocle ever came out, he’d hang. So Peters made sure he had protection.”

“What kind of protection?”

Smith sighed. “That’s the frustrating part. I don’t really know. Video of some kind, that much is obvious. Something that he could use if the situation ever got dire enough. The forger claimed to have rigged the setup for Peters, but said that he never knew what the content was.”

“And you believe him?”

“My questioning was… thorough.”

I’ll bet. Cooper put aside the thoughts of torture, focused on what Smith was telling him. Forced himself to be dispassionate, to work it like a problem. To let his gift run free. “So you know this proof is out there, but you don’t know where, and even if you did, you don’t think you can get to it. Not directly. You want me to do it for you.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t have any idea where to start.”

“You’ll figure it out. That’s what you do. The same way you could find Alex Vasquez. And think how much better you know Drew Peters.”

He was right, Cooper knew. Already he could feel himself patterning. It wouldn’t be at DAR headquarters, or at Peters’s house. Both places could be locked down if things went wrong. Peters would have put it somewhere safe, somewhere he could get to it in the kind of dire times he would need it. “Next question.”