AI - Alpha Part 39

"I'm sorry," he said softly.

"Thomas?" Alpha asked.

His voice caught. "Forgive me."

Then he changed course again.

* * * They reached the airport at three in the morning, in a pounding storm that had closed facilities all along the Eastern Seaboard. In the end, with their fuel too low to offer any leeway, Thomas had to land at the Baltimore-Was.h.i.+ngton International Airport. After tense-and fast-negotiations between the port authorities and Thomas and the Pentagon, they let him land, though he was arriving in one of the deadliest fighters ever created, fully armed, with no ID anyone recognized, during the worst storm in decades. They told him a doctor and ambulance were waiting. Thomas said he didn't need either. Maybe he was fooling himself, but no medical help could change how abysmal he felt. After he landed, an airport crew wheeled a sleeve through the slas.h.i.+ng rain, up to the jet. The sleeve was a mobile corridor that expanded and contracted like an accordion, and rose up to the height of the Banshee's canopy. It couldn't make a seal with the c.o.c.kpit, so they brought a stair-bot to serve as a bridge. As Thomas clambered out of the jet and onto the bot, rain blasted across him. He got a good dousing in the few second it took for the stair-bot to swing him over to the sleeve. Just inside the mobile corridor, he stopped. Too many people were crowded in here, at least five security guards and even more gate personnel. Two men in overalls stepped onto the stair-bot to cross to the Banshee. Normally a larger ground crew looked after a jet, but they couldn't follow the usual procedures. Although the port had a cadre of workers cleared to serve military craft, Thomas doubted they had ever expected a jet like this, especially at three in the morning. The Pentagon was in the process of rousing an Air Force team from their sleep and dispatching them to guard the fighter until they could refuel and

move it to a base, but until then the Banshee would make do with an airport crew.

One of the security guards came forward, a man in black trousers, a white s.h.i.+rt, a dark tie, and a badge.

"General, welcome to BWI." He motioned to a nearby wheelchair. "We have a chair-bot if you need it."

In the same instant that he spoke, another man farther up the sleeve whistled, staring at the Banshee.

"My G.o.d, that's gorgeous."

Distracted, Thomas spoke to the guard, "Thanks. But I don't need a chair."

A dark-haired woman was making her way forward. She wore what looked like a manager's badge on her blue suit, but Thomas couldn't see well enough to be certain. Four guards and three other people blocked his view. The trio, two men and a woman, were trying to get past the guards as they called out questions to Thomas. The guards were apparently trying to verify their ident.i.ties. Although the trio wore no press badges, they looked like reporters to Thomas. It made no sense. The Pentagon had insisted the port clear this area and beef up security. Thomas had landed only minutes after he broke radio silence, however, and it had left neither the night s.h.i.+ft nor the military time to prepare. No one from the Air Force had yet arrived, and right now everything was confused. He was disoriented, worn out, and feeling

guilty as h.e.l.l. The tumult of so many people was too much. To escape, he turned toward the jet-in time to see Alpha climb out of the c.o.c.kpit.

His pulse hammered in his chest. If an EI could hate-and he had no doubt she was an EI-she must

loathe him. As the stair-bot swung her over, through the storm, she never took her gaze off him. The wind tossed her hair wildly, and her black eyes were filled with a dark, angry fire that no downpour could douse.

She stepped into the sleeve next to him. Rain had plastered her s.h.i.+rt to her skin, outlining her nipples, and he had a very primitive, very male urge to cover her up so no one would see what belonged to him.

Except she belonged to no one-and he had given up any nebulous claim he might have had to her affections the moment he changed course back to Was.h.i.+ngton.

As Alpha looked past him to the crowd in the sleeve, her face s.h.i.+fted into a scowl, as if she were ready to crack them all over her knee for making noise. Despite the nerve-wracking situation, Thomas smiled, though he felt regret more than anything else, for he might never see that indomitable stare of hers again.

She armored her vulnerability with her implacable mask, but he saw beyond it now to the struggling, incipient sentience within her.

Light flared behind him. With an angry start, he swung around, stumbling on his splinted leg. One of the d.a.m.n reporters had swept out a hidden camera and was making images.

"General," the man called. "What is your fighter? An F-42?"

"Why is it armed?" the woman asked.

"Who is your backseater?" the other man asked, staring at Alpha with undisguised fascination. Thomas wanted to punch him. He looked for the manager, to insist she get rid of the reporters and ask why the blazes they were here. The manager was trying to reach him, but the four guards were inadvertently blocking her as they herded the reporters away from Thomas and Alpha.

The guard who had greeted Thomas said, "I'm sorry about the confusion. We were caught by surprise, I'm afraid."

"Where did those reporters come from?" Thomas asked.

"I'm not sure."

The guards were escorting the protesting trio away, back toward the gate. Thomas pressed his fingers against his temples. His head ached and he knew he needed the wheelchair, but his pride kept him on his feet. He didn't want to leave until the reporters were gone, but rain was gusting across the end of the sleeve and dampening his face. At least the flight jacket kept his torso dry. Alpha's gift. He felt like a cretin wearing it.

"Thomas," Alpha said.

He turned to her. "We'll go as soon as they clear the area."

She spoke in a low voice. "I need to talk to you."

The security guard spoke. "I can keep everyone back."

"Thank you," Thomas said to him. "If you hear anything-you didn't."

"I understand." The guard moved away a few steps and stopped the manager, who was approaching. She

didn't look happy, but she stayed put, out of hearing range.

Thomas spoke softly to Alpha. "I'm sorry."

"This may be the last time I see you before they take me."

"I won't betray you," he said. But he had already done that.

She wiped her palm across her face, pus.h.i.+ng wet hair out of her eyes. "Your General Chang might. Lie,

get me to talk, then let the mech-techs take me apart."

"If they try that, they have to deal with me."

"And if they tell you to back off?"

Thomas knew what she was asking; how far would he go to protect her? "I won't do it."

"Listen, Thomas. On the island, Charon checked in with his people. He put a stop to the rumors of his

death."It didn't surprise him. "But now he's dead." Again.She spoke with difficulty, as if she had to push her words past a barrier. "His corporations are legal."The area was quieter now, and Thomas could no longer hear the reporters arguing with the security guards. The drumming of rain on the sleeve covered Alpha's voice, but several guards and the manager were still in the sleeve, standing back, waiting. Soon the military would arrive. He and Alpha couldn't stay here long.

"I don't understand what you're trying to say," he said.

"His corporate workers are legally employed," she replied.

"I know." The NIA had been investigating Charon's corporations ever since they had discovered he

existed."His human employees."She was struggling to tell him something, and he had a guess as to why she was having trouble: it probably required she go against Charon. She had killed him, the ultimate act of defiance, but she was still breaking the mental chains he had inflicted on her. As much as Thomas wanted to give her time, they were running out of it fast.

"You're trying to tell me he has more constructs," he said. "Androids? Robots?"

"Only the one android. But yes, many robots." She was finally showing emotion when she spoke of Charon-hatred and anger and perhaps even a sort of love-and her face and body reflected her battle to

topple the barriers of her programming. "He has an EI that knows the criminal side of his empire."

"General Chang needs to know how to find it."

"If she gives me asylum," Alpha said flatly, "I'll tell her."

"It's a good bargaining tool, yes." He couldn't see why she was bringing it up now, though.

"Thomas-"

"Tell me," he said gently.

"I think Charon left his EI a message." She bit out the words. "If you show up alive, Charon must be

dead."

A gust of wind splattered Thomas with rain, and he s.h.i.+vered. "It's a logical a.s.sumption, given the situation on the island."

Her face contorted with her effort to speak. "If the EI decides Charon is dead, it will take over his

operations." She touched his cheek, the barest trace of her fingertip on his skin. "You know too much.

I'm sure he told the EI to have you killed if you turn up alive, especially with me or the Banshee."

Thomas let out a long breath. "I see." It would be Charon's final vengeance against the man who had stolen the one thing Charon couldn't control, the "perfect" woman he had created, a warrior Galeta to his inhuman Pygmalion. He spoke quietly. "Thank you."

She folded her arms and rubbed her palms up and down them as if she were cold, though she could easily handle temperature extremes that debilitated humans. "For what? Saying you're going to die?"

"For warning me."

She took his arm gently. "Come on. Let's get this over with."

As he limped forward with Alpha, the manager came to meet them, a slim Asian woman of about thirty.

"h.e.l.lo, General Wharington."

Thomas nodded his greeting. "Thanks for getting rid of all the people."

She looked apologetic. "They were here for the arrival of a football team. The athletes only had a stopover, so we let the reporters come to the gate for interviews. The airplane was diverted because of

weather, and then you showed up. We just had a skeleton crew and only minutes to clear the terminal.

They slipped past us by posing as airport staff."