19 - Sam
T HE TRAFFIC LINES WERE ALL RED on Sam’s laptop map.
He looked up at Nico from where he’d set the computer on his tan Globe-Trotter Riviera Centenary men’s holdall, like Craig-Bond had in No Time To Die .
“I called a car but it’s still forty minutes away.
Traffic into Manhattan is a mess. It’s going to take longer to get into the city than it did flying here from Vegas. ”
“We’re meeting everyone at the hotel?” Nico asked.
“No. I told Ari before we left to gather the troops at our condo. We’re going to need easier access to Midtown.” Sam frowned at the map. “But we still have to figure out how we’re going to get there.”
Nico spotted a pilot getting out of a red-and-yellow helicopter marked L IFEGUARD .
“Give me a minute.” He shouldered the backpack Byron had given him with the bee drones that had been made so far and headed over.
Sam watched Nico stride across the tarmac, all magical penis swagger, and thought, I’m so freaking lucky to be with him .
0543
When Sam caught up to him, Nico was holding out a credit card—platinum, Sam noticed—but the helicopter pilot with his blond mustache wasn’t interested.
“No way.” The pilot started walking away from them. “Aliens are going to be here any minute, and you want me to accept credit?”
“How about cash?” Sam offered. He still had about $1,200 left in his wallet.
The pilot turned with a snort. “What am I going to buy that I’m going to get in time?” And then his eyes lit on Sam’s Bond watch.
Barter it is. Sam unclasped it, no hesitation.
“Omega Seamaster 300M Co-Axial 2220.80.00, steel-blue face and bezel on a stainless steel bracelet.” He held it out. “Just like Daniel Craig wore in Casino Royale . Cost me four thousand and change. It’s yours if you fly us to Manhattan. Eighty-Seventh between First and Second Avenue.”
The pilot took the watch and fastened it on his own wrist. He paused a moment to admire it, then looked up at them. “I’ll just refuel and we’ll head out.”
0554
They lifted off in the predawn sky, heading toward the three-quarter-full moon on the other side of Manhattan.
Below them every road was jacked up with traffic.
Byron had said he’d follow with any new drones and Sam’s luggage in the car Sam had called, but it was clearly going to take him hours to join them.
As the helicopter crossed over the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the pilot spoke into their noise-canceling headphones.
“There aren’t any open private helipads.
And if I land on any official ones, like on the pier, police or military might confiscate my chopper.
And I can’t let that happen. We’re going to have to go back. ”
Nico noticed the rappel gear the lifeguards used for air/water rescues. “I’ve got another idea.”
0602
With the helicopter hovering thirty yards above the building roof, Sam and Nico rappelled down ropes side by side. The main wind was from the helicopter itself, and Sam felt like he was dropping down fast through a tornado.
Nico slid to the rooftop decking of Sam’s building in one smooth go, landing light on his feet, but Sam kept stopping himself, afraid to go too fast. Afraid to lose control and smash into the rooftop.
Or worse, miss the roof entirely. But in fits and starts he made it.
Nico had already unclipped and was right there to soften Sam’s landing, gathering him in a body hug. “Gotcha.”
He really does , Sam thought. Even though his own rappelling had been terrible. Not Bond-like at all. He wished he could do it again, but smoother this time. With magical penis swagger, like Nico.
But Nico didn’t seem to care, or judge him.
Keeping an arm around him, Nico unclipped Sam, then waved to the pilot that they were good. The helicopter arced back toward Central Park.
Sam would miss that watch. But it was all just stuff and could be replaced. Once they saved the world.
He led them into the glass rooftop pool atrium and then to the elevator lobby beyond.
In the elevator, Nico pressed 42 and then put his face right in front of Sam’s. “Down is fun, huh?”
Sam had to kiss that lopsided grin.
0610
“Elites are out and bucket-listers are in. Every Broadway show is sold out,” Ari was saying as Sam and Nico entered the condo.
“I get that,” Frida said. “If you have to go, going out onstage would be a great way to do it.”
“Which just proves actors want to act more than they want to do anything else,” Bec said.
As they turned the corner to the living room, Sam saw Bec take Frida’s hand as she said, “But how about we make sure you don’t go?”
Things between them had moved along quickly. Then again, they probably thought it was the end of the world. Everyone did.
“Hey!” Peter saw Sam and Nico first and darted across the room to give Nico a hug.
Nico looked kind of awkward.
Peter must have sensed something off and pulled away, and Sam took the opportunity to pull the kid into a hug.
“Good to see you,” Sam told Peter as he held him tight.
Sam felt the kid start to shake. “You okay?”
Fighting back tears, Peter gave a kind of choking laugh as he pulled away. “I don’t think any of us are.”
“Everything’s going to be fine,” Sam told him. Told all of them. “We’re all going to be fine.”
Peter’s voice cracked. “But the aliens!”
Nico clasped Peter’s arm in a way Sam could tell was supposed to be reassuring. “Did you all sleep here?” Nico asked. “It’s early.”
“Sam said to gather the troops,” Ari said, a touch defensively.
“You know what time it is?” Sam asked loudly, grabbing one of the art baskets above the kitchen cabinets and putting his two phones inside, then gesturing everyone else to do the same. “Breakfast smoothie time!”
He got weird looks, but Sam grabbed frozen strawberries and mango from the freezer drawer and tossed them in the Vitamix. He poured in some oat milk, turned it on, and cranked the dial to 10. Then he flipped on the T URBO switch. It was louder than the helicopter. Perfect.
Sam recorded forty-five seconds of blender noise on his burner phone like a song.
Hit play, infinity loop, and cranked the volume.
He carried all their phones (everyone had one but Ari) along with his to the laundry closet by his dad’s studio, and they all watched him put the basket inside the dryer.
The metal drum bounced the sound around, echoing horribly.
With a satisfied grin, Sam closed the dryer door and the laundry closet door, and led the group back to the living room.
“That takes care of whoever was listening,” Sam said. “Here’s the headline: there are no aliens.”
“The whole thing is a fake,” Nico added.
“Oh, God.” Peter dropped to the couch with a relieved sob.
“How do you know?” Ari asked.
0618
After Sam and Nico had caught everyone up, Frida started pacing as she worked out an idea.
“You know, Julian Eltinge was one of the most famous female impersonators ever—they named a movie theater in Times Square after Julian in 1912, and you can still see this huge mural of them as three muses—all Julian in flawless drag!”
Sam didn’t get the connection. “Besides being cool, and it’s very cool, why the history lesson?”
Frida made a don’t make me smack you face. “In Julian’s nightclub act, they’d perform the whole thing as a chic 1890s woman—and then, at the last instant, rip off their wig to reveal the illusion.”
“I saw that in Victor/Victoria !” Bec said, all excited.
Frida shrugged. “It had to come from somewhere.”
Sam connected the dots. “So you’re saying we just need to—”
Nico finished the sentence. “Figure out what’s holding the wig in place?”
Frida rang an invisible bell in the air like a teacher adding a point for a good answer. “What’s the alien fake-out equivalent of bobby pins and wig tape?”
“We need to see the data they altered to know how they did it,” Ari said.
Nico fished something from his pocket and handed Ari a thumb drive.
“Is this…?” Ari asked.
“A copy of the data stream from the James Webb Telescope,” Nico confirmed. “They messed with it somehow.”
Ari plugged it into their laptop, fingers flying.
Peter raised a hand.
“You don’t need to raise your hand, Peter,” Sam said. “What’s up?”
“Why didn’t you just get rid of your phones, if they’re bugged?” Peter asked. “Why did we have to go through that whole blender-in-the-laundry thing?”
“If we get rid of them,” Sam explained, “Keahilani and Noble One and everyone on the thirteenth floor will know we’re on to them.”
Nico added, “And right now their not knowing is an advantage.”
“So it’s the six of us?” Frida asked.
“Seven, with Byron,” Nico said. “But it’ll be hours before he can get here.”
Sam thought of Godeane, and wanted to say eight, but they couldn’t count on that. She’d been out of touch since going into Greenbrier, which was supposed to be decommissioned but clearly wasn’t.
Ari’s fingers tap-danced on their laptop. “I’ll figure out how they’re faking a dead spot in space.”
“Good,” Sam agreed. “Once you have that, how do we spread the word?”
Frida grabbed Bec’s hand. “Leave that to us. A friend works at a cable headend facility in Bushwick. From there, we can get it on every station.”
“And the whole Freedom Party can stream it on socials,” Bec added.
Peter fished his Leica Q2 out of his messenger bag. “Maybe I can help with photo evidence?”
“Great idea,” Sam said. “You’ll help us document it all.” And watching Peter’s face light up made him kind of want to take care of the kid. For him and Nico to be there for Peter. Not like parents, but maybe like big brothers.
“What about us?” Nico asked Sam.
And it hit Sam how weird it was that they were all asking what he thought. Was he sort of the leader? Damn, that felt scary. But he did have an idea of how they might pull this off. And there was a world they had to save.
He turned to Nico, not sure his guy would love this part. It was why they’d met at their condo and not on Staten Island. “When everyone’s ready, you and I have to go to the thirteenth floor. Confront Keahilani and Noble One with the evidence. And pull the wig off this whole thing.”
1029
Sam took a moment by himself in his bedroom. He closed the door behind him, then headed over to his desk. He pressed the hidden button under the lip to pop open the smooth wood side panel the top rested on. He’d been so stoked when his parents got the secret compartment done for him.
Inside, on the small shelf above his journal, behind his cufflinks, was the watch box he got for his bar mitzvah.
He took out the Seiko 6923-8080 Quartz SPD094 watch and tried it on.
With its gold face and bezel, and two-tone steel-and-gold bracelet with the gold stripe in the middle, it was a match for the one Roger Moore wore as James Bond in A View to a Kill .
It felt too flashy, but he guessed that was the style back in 1985. It was still a Bond watch.
Looking at it shine on his wrist, Sam was suddenly worried that Nico was just going to think it was another stupid-expensive thing in Sam’s life. It looked like it could be, but this one was only a couple hundred bucks. And yet, for Nico, maybe even that was stupid-expensive.
Should he put it back?
But Sam wanted to wear a watch and he had this one. He didn’t want to pretend he didn’t have something when he did. He didn’t want to hide parts of who he was, not from Nico.
And Nico loved him, right? Even with the stupid-expensive watches. Even with everything.
No more secrets. They’d agreed.
Sam closed the hidden compartment. He checked his computer for the time, and set the watch on his wrist to 10:32.