Black Sun

Behind them one of the technicians pried the front off a huge coffinlike crate. It fell with a bang. Inside were similar contraptions to the one attached to Kang’s arm: two legs, another arm, and a torso unit, all with hydraulic actuators, bundled wires, and racks of G4 lithium batteries.

Kang’s face flushed with pleasure. Choi’s flashed confusion and then fear.

“For many years I have relied on you,” Kang said to Choi. “I have tolerated your failures and your thefts and your scorn. But I need not do so anymore.”

Kang’s hand was hovering above a large screwdriver. In the blink of an eye, the hydraulics on his fingers snapped shut. Kang’s hand grasped the tool and pulled it back. And then the arm extended, firing forward with a speed and force that stu

The screwdriver drove into him, and Choi fell backward. The chair he sat on clattered to the floor and Choi landed flat on the concrete behind it. He put a hand to his chest, clutching at the impaling weapon but unable to pull it out.

His breathing came in spurts. He looked up toward Kang, eyes searching his master. “I am loyal,” he managed to say. “I would punish them … for … you.”

“When I find them,” Kang said to his dying lieutenant, “I will punish them myself.”

CHAPTER 39

It was daytime. Yuri liked the day. There was less sharpness in the day, more in the dark. In the day most of the things were asleep, though not all of them.

From where he sat on the floor, he watched one that was awake; the light around it seemed to shimmer, floating like a ghost amid the moving blades of the ceiling fan. The wind came down from the fan but the light stayed near the hub, twirling around it. The pattern changed, shifting and bending, bulging slightly at times. But Yuri found that he liked it. It was soft and quiet, the colors pale and smooth.

Across the room the darker man sat at the table, working. This man was important; he knew things, things the other two didn’t know. And he saw things and heard things. Yuri didn’t see them or hear them, but the important man did. Sometimes he wondered and sometimes he seemed to be sure. Sometimes he even spoke to them.

Yuri liked him. The important man was kind. When he spoke, his voice was heavy. He liked paper and pencil, not the machine that he was working with, pressing keys and swearing at.

He could see that the machine was hot. Maybe it was burning him. Certainly it burned Yuri’s eyes when he looked at it. Yuri decided that he didn’t like it any more than the important man did. He wished it would go. That would be best. It should just go away, to somewhere else.

The door to the room opened and he saw the woman come in. He heard them talking but he didn’t understand them. Their words were not like his.

“Any luck?” she said.

“Not so far,” the man replied. “But I’ll keep at it.”

The woman came over to check on Yuri. Her face was warm; she brought warmth to them. He wasn’t sure how; she just did. When the woman touched him, Yuri was not afraid. Others who touched him made him hurt, made him afraid, but this woman helped make others feel better.

She and the important man were trying to find something, looking for something that was lost. She was nervous, afraid that they might not find it. He was not; he was certain; he expected to find it. So much difference. Yuri thought maybe they were not looking for the same thing.

Out through the glass door, in the sunlight, stood the other man. He was different than the other two. He didn’t want to find what they were looking for, but he helped anyway and he watched for things. The man outside was always looking; his eyes were always moving. He didn’t see the lights or the colors like Yuri did, and he didn’t hear the words like the important man, but he looked and looked as if he knew something was coming.

That was it, Yuri thought. The other two were looking for something and this man was helping them, but he was looking in a different way. They were expecting to find things and this man was watching for something that might find them.

The woman spoke again. She was trying to help the important man.

“What if we contact the embassy, have them reach out to some of your colleagues?”

“I don’t think it would help,” he said. “And what if it gives us away?”

“All right,” she said, opening a plastic bag she’d brought with her.

She pulled out several bottles. Yuri knew those kind of bottles; they had medicines in them. Sometimes the others had given him medicines. Not this woman, but the ones who spoke like he did. Some of the medicines made the lights darker, until he couldn’t see them dancing.

He didn’t know why, but sometimes he liked that, and sometimes they were too bright. But other times he didn’t like the medicines at all. They made him feel sick to his stomach and hurt his head. And besides, he didn’t want the lights to go away.

She took two tablets out of each bottle. “Take these,” she said.

“What are they?”

“New antibiotics.”

“Your fever is almost gone and this should knock out the infection for good. We might almost get you back to normal.”

He held out his hand and she dropped the pills into it.

“Thanks,” he said.

She nodded to him, then turned and walked away.

The important man reached for a glass of water and then stopped. He looked at the medicines and then he slipped his hand into his pocket and brought it out without the tablets. The woman didn’t see. She didn’t know. And then he took a drink of water anyway, and turned back to the hot machine.

The medicines made things go away, Yuri knew that, and the important man wanted the things he’d seen to come back.

CHAPTER 40

After a brief trip to the infirmary at the Groom Lake base, Arnold Moore returned to Yucca Mountain, riding shotgun in an air force Humvee as it rumbled toward the gaping entrance of the massive tu

Off to the right lay the giant tu

The Humvee rolled past it and through the huge blast doors that fronted the tu

“You ever get used to this?” Moore asked, looking around.

“After a while,” the driver said. “We check the mountain three times a day. And we’re always here when science guys like you drop in. Not usually with this much firepower, though.”

Moore guessed he was referring to the machine-gun-toting Humvees that had been stationed near the entrance, the squads of armed men, and the hourly Black Hawk reco

Moore turned his attention to the tu

“What happens if the walls cave in?”

He hadn’t meant the question seriously, but the driver answered anyway.

“There are a series of escape vents that go up to the surface. You have to climb a couple hundred feet of ladder but they pop you out topside.”

“Huh,” Moore grunted, not knowing which was worse: getting quickly crushed in a cave-in or climbing a hundred feet of ladder. “No elevator?”