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"Down there," said Laney.
Matt nodded and pushed in the fan levers. They dropped toward a medium-sized dwelling that at first glance looked like a large, flat haystack. There were windows in the haystack, and on one side was a porchlike platform. Under the porch was an oddly curved swimming pool. Lights showed at the windows, and the swimming pool area blazed with light. The water itself was lit from underneath. There was no rooftop landing-zone, but on the other side of the house were two cars.
"I'd have picked an empty house, myself." Matt was commenting, not criticizing. He'd decided hours ago that Laney was the expert in rebellion.
"Then what? Even if you found a car, where would you get the keys? I picked this one because most of them will be out in plain sight by the pool. There, see them? Hover the car and I'll see how many I can pick off."
They'd flown east along the void, flying blind in the fog, staying far from the edge, so that even the sound of their fans would not carry. Finally, miles east of the Parlette mansion, they'd turned inland. Matt flew with the gun balanced beside him on the seat. He'd never owned anything with such power in it. It gave him a warm feeling of security and invulnerability.
Laney was in the back seat, where she could fire from either window. Matt couldn't tell how many people were down around the swimming pool. But the guns had telescopic sights.
There were pops like balloons exploding. "One," said Laney. "Two. Oop, here comes another ... Three, and out. Okay, Matt, drop her fast. Yeee! Not that fast, Matt."
"Listen, did I get us down or didn't I?"
But she was out and ru
From the pool area the house still looked like a haystack, but with more normal solid structures showing through the grassy yellow sides. Inside it was vastly different from Geoffrey Eustace Pariette's house; the walls were all curved, and a conical false fireplace occupied the center of the living room. But there, was the same air of luxury.
Matt heard a pop like a balloon exploding, and he ran.
He rounded a door jamb as he heard the second pop. A man stood behind a polished table dialing a handphone. He was begi
"Try the upstairs," said Laney. She was reloading the gun. "We'll have to find where they changed. If you find a pair of pants, search the pockets for keys. Hurry; we can't stay here long."
He came down a few minutes later with a bunch of keys dangling from his finger. "They were in the bedroom," he said.
"Good. Throw'em away."
"Was that a fu
"I found these." She too had a key ring. "Think it through. Those clothes upstairs must belong to the owner of the house. If we take his car, Implementation can trace it back here. It may not matter; I can't think of any way they could trace us from here back to Parlette's. But if we take a visitors car, they can't trace us anywhere. So these are the ones we want. You can ditch yours."
They went back to the pool area for Parlette's car. Laney opened the dash and fiddled inside. "I don't dare send it back," she muttered. "Harry'll have to use the other one. Ah... So I'll just send it ten miles up and tell it to head south forever. Okay, Matt, let's go."
They found a key to fit one of the cars on the roof. Matt flew, east and north, directly toward the Hospital.
The fog had not been abnormally thick on the ground, but at this height it was the edge of Creation. Matt flew for an hour before he saw a faint yellow blur to the left.
"The Hospital." Laney agreed. They turned.
A faint yellow blur on the left... and white lights forming and clarifying all around them.
Matt dropped the car instantly.
They came down hard on water. As the car bobbed to the surface, they dived out opposite doors. Matt came up gasping with the cold. The fans washed spray over him, and he turned his face to avoid it. Ducks quacked in panic.
The white lights were dropping toward them. Matt called, "Where are we?"
"Parlette Park, I think."
Matt stood up in the water, waist deep, holding his gun high. The car skidded across the duck pond, hesitated at the edge, and then continued on until it nudged into a hedge. The fog was turning yellowish gray as car lights dropped toward the pond.
A thought struck him. "Laney. Got your gun?"
"Yah."
"Test it."
He heard it puff. "Good," he said, and pitched his own gun away. He heard it splash.
Car lights were settling all around them. Matt swam toward the sound of Laney's shot until he bumped into her. He took her arm and whispered, "Stay close." They waded toward shore. He could feel her shivering. The water was cold, but when they stood up, the wind was colder.
"What happened to your gun?"
"I threw it away. My whole purpose in life is being scared, isn't it? Well, I can't get scared with a gun in my hand."
They stumbled onto the grass. White lights surrounded them at ground level, faintly blurred by the lifting mist. Others hovered overhead, spotlights casting a universal glow over the park. In that light men showed as ru
"Put me through to the Head," said Major Chin. He rested at ease in the back seat of his car. The car sat a foot above the water on a small duck pond in Parlette Park, supported on its ground-effect air cushion. In such a position it was nearly invulnerable to attack.
"Sir? ... We've caught a stolen car... Yes, sir, it must have been stolen; it landed the moment we flew over to investigate. Went down like a falling elevator... It was flying straight toward the Hospital. I imagine we're about two miles southwest of you. They must have abandoned the car immediately after landing it on a duck pond. ...Yes, sir, very professional. The car ran into a hedge and just stayed there, trying to butt its way through on autopilot... License number B-R-G-Y... No, sir, nobody in it, but we've surrounded the area. They won't get through... No, sir, nobody's seen them yet. They may be in the trees. But we'll smoke them out."
A puzzled expression chased itself across his smooth round face. "Yes, sir," he said, and signed off. He thought about directing the search by beltphone, but he had no further orders to give. All around him were the lights of police cars. The search pattern was fixed. When someone found something, he'd call.
But what had the Head meant by that last remark? "Don't be surprised if you don't find anyone."
His eyes narrowed. The car a decoy, on autopilot? But what would that accomplish?
Another car flying in above him. This empty car to hold his attention while the other got through.
He used the beltphone. "Carson, you there? Lift your car out of there. Up to a thousand feet. Turn on your lights and hover and see what you can pick up on infrared. Stay there until we call off the search." It was some time before he found out how badly he'd missed the mark.