Chapter 22
Up until that very moment, Alice was convinced she was about to die.
Kidnapped, put on a helicopter … blindfolded. She’d cried. Begged for her life. She lost any illusion she’d be brave in the face of certain death. She lost her Cathay Pacific meal and almost lost all bladder control.
She knew what was going to happen. She’d be tossed out, to land in a forest as a pulpy mess, unrecognizable. Or shot. Or disappeared into some far-flung prison. That was the best case.
Instead, she’d been brought here. She’d had no idea where “here” was. Only that it was very cold. Shivering from either cold or fear, she’d been led blindfolded into a building, then down some stairs.
A door had opened, and she could sense she was now in some huge open space. It was warmer. Echoey. She leaned forward, toward the voices. They were familiar.
“You’re talking about Liam Palmer. The man you murdered.”
“We didn’t kill him.”
“Then who did?”
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Pangu did. The thing you and I created. We now need to destroy it. Before it destroys us all.”
Alice tore off the blindfold.
In front of her were row upon row of Terracotta Warriors. She was in Xi’an, the very place she needed to get to.
But, incredibly, that was not the most incredible thing.
Alice looked past the armed guards to the man and woman sitting together at the edge of a pit.
“Vivien?”
They looked over, as startled as she was.
“Mom? Dad?”
Liu stood up so abruptly his chair toppled over and disappeared into the pit, to the sound of terracotta shattering.
“Alice?”
The whispered word should never have reached her, and yet it did. It was as though he’d spoken from inside her mind. Where she’d kept him safe for all these years.
In her head. Her heart. Her marrow. Her memories.
“Daddy?” As she took a step forward, a guard brought his rifle down to block her way.
“Let her pass!” Liu snarled.
The man immediately lifted his weapon. Now it was the guard’s turn to be terrified. He even bowed to her, then turned to her father and bowed to him. Deeply. Asking, begging, forgiveness.
What the fuck is happening? Her mind was racing. Trying to grasp so many enormous things all at once. Pangu? Her mother? Her father? Her father alive?
Her mind stopped there. She was in a state of shock, unable to think, to feel. To move.
Whaaat…?
Her mind was shrieking now.
“Alice.” Liu stepped toward her, and her heart, ignoring her head completely, went to him, dragging the rest of her with it.
She took a few tentative steps, then ran.
It was only when she felt his arms around her that Alice realized she hadn’t really felt safe since he’d left and taken this embrace with him.
But now here she was, deep in Communist China, kidnapped and surrounded by armed guards. And here she felt safe?
It was, her mind told her, fighting to override her heart, yet another illusion.
You’re in more danger now than ever. Including from this man. This ghost. Who created the very thing you need to stop.
He is not as he appears.
Alice pulled away and looked from her father to her mother.
Vivien stood stone-faced. She could have been one of the clay warriors ranged below them. Broken and pieced back together. Imperfectly.
“You’re alive? How? Why? What’s going on?”
“So that’s it then?” said President Pardington.
“I think so,” said the Prime Minister of Great Britain. “Invasion plans are being drawn up. Christ,” she exhaled. “I never thought I’d be saying that. How quickly things change.”
Like everyone else on the call, she looked grim. And exhausted. And frightened. To their staff, to the public, they had to appear strong, resolved, determined. Confident. Only in this company, with fellow leaders, could they show how they were really feeling.
Each of the heads of state, with their military and intelligence experts ranged behind them, looked drained. By personal loss. By worry. By the fear that they would be the ones who’d fuck it up and be held responsible for whatever catastrophe happened next.
“We need to find out how the hell the Chinese did it,” said the German Chancellor. “Until we do, we’re vulnerable.”
“We know Double Dragon has created an AI factory,” said the French President. “Alors, it must be coming from there.”
“But this wasn’t artificial,” snapped the Italian Prime Minister, who’d lost a sister in an elevator. “AI couldn’t do this. I wish…” He paused. “I wish it was all faked.”
“Mr. President.”
“What is it, Kathleen?”
His Chief of Staff was leaning down and whispering, “President Volkov is standing by.”
The President of Russia had not been invited to this party. Better if the two superpowers spoke separately. Privately.
“Volkov is ready,” Pardington said to the others. “I need to go.”
Before anyone could answer or, more likely, protest, he’d stabbed at the icon and the screens went to black; then another weary face appeared. Huge. Taking up almost the entire wall. It was as though he were a god. Or Oz.
“Mr. President,” said Pardington, trying not to look shaken by this sudden overwhelming presence. He gestured to his tech person, who understood and worked to bring the Russian President down to size.
“Mr. President,” said Volkov. His head suddenly shrank. Though now Pardington wondered if the other hadn’t been better. At least then, he could clearly see every nook, cranny, each slight change of expression on the stoic Russian’s face.
Surprisingly young, Volkov had taken over after the former President of Russia had died of a heart attack. One McAllister was convinced had not been entirely natural.
Before him on the screen was an impatient young man. And a worried one. He had reason to worry, Pardington knew. His people, his army, his ministers, not totally sure of him yet, were beginning to turn. This attack could push it, and Volkov’s presidency, over the edge.
“Twenty-three thousand Russians have been killed in elevators,” McAllister had reported in an earlier briefing.
“That’s a disconcertingly round number,” said Pardington, and saw McAllister nod.
“The best our agents can do, sir. As you know, Russia is growing more and more opaque by the day.”
“Do you think they had anything to do with what happened?”
“It’s possible. If the Chinese leadership falls, there’d be chaos. Russia is in the best position to take advantage of that.”
“How?”
“An invasion.”
“But that would be a logistical, a bureaucratic, nightmare. Even if it was possible, how would Russia govern?”
“How did the Caesars, how did Alexander govern? How did the British, with such immense, far-flung territories?” asked McAllister.
“And back then, it was even more difficult, without easy communication or travel. No, Volkov could do it. All he’d have to do, at least at first, is put in a puppet regime. One friendly to Russia.”
“Friendlier than the current one?”
“We all know they are allies of convenience. There’s no love lost. And this attack hasn’t helped.”
That was the briefing an hour earlier. Now President Pardington found himself face-to-face with the Russian President.
There were two routes he could take. Be friendly, sympathetic, appeal to Volkov as a friend. Or—
“What the fuck are you up to, Volkov?”
“I’m sorry?” he said through a translator, though none was necessary to read the surprise on his face.
“We’ve formed a coalition of nations—”
“A coalition? Without Russia?”
Pardington thought this young man had almost said, Mother Russia. Despite his age, Volkov was a throwback. A man who wanted to re-create a hypernationalism, and with it a sort of monarchy. With himself as Tsar.
This shift to the far right wasn’t limited to Moscow.
It was increasingly common internationally, as allegiances strained, as trade deals collapsed, as immigrants flooded in, changing the culture, the demographics.
Nations began pulling in on themselves. Began to appeal to the worst part of human nature.
The forensic psychologists in the CIA, in profiling the new President, said his Achilles’ heel was his ego. It was fragile, brittle. And that made him breakable. But they did warn that there was no telling what he would do if broken.
Pardington was determined to find out.
“We don’t trust you.” The bluntness of the American President’s reply shocked the young leader, who stared back gape-mouthed. “In fact, we hold you equally responsible for the attacks.”
“But that’s absurd.”
“There’re three possibilities.” Pardington plowed ahead as though the Russian leader hadn’t spoken.
“One, that you did not know about it, which makes you ignorant. Two, that you did know about it, which makes you a collaborator.” Volkov went to speak, but Pardington talked right over him.
“Or, three, that it’s not China at all, but Russia that’s behind the attacks.
That you want China and Chen blamed and destabilized.
” As he spoke, he watched Volkov, who looked thunderous.
“Though my colleagues on the coalition favor yet another possibility. That you are a complete fool. Being played by Chen. Being set up to take the fall. That he sees you as weak, incompetent, without support domestically or friends internationally. Your Russia First policy has become Russia Alone. The attacks are Chen’s audacious strategy to take over Russia, and form not just a superpower, but the apex power.
Why do you think the attacks happened now?
Because he needed some weak leader, some delusional leader, as President of Mother Russia. ”
This all came at Volkov like a shotgun blast. He stared back, trying to take it in.
“Well,” demanded Pardington. “Which is it? Collaborator? Fool? Terrorist? Patsy? We all know another attack is coming. If you don’t stop it, we will be in a race with China to take over your country. And no one will object or come to your rescue. You will have destroyed Russia in record time.”