Retrieval

Chapter Five

The sound of voices, pitched low and nearby, drifted into Annie's consciousness before she was really awake. She lay still, listening to the sound but not the words, and putting together the pieces of where she was. Cold, uneven ground. No light to turn her eyelids red. A familiar voice – Auggie – and a less familiar one. Danger wasn't far away, but for the moment, she was safe.

"But we checked dental records, DNA." Through the lifting fog of sleep, she identified the voice as Duarte's. Mostly awake now, she kept her breathing even. There were still too many things she didn't understand, and maybe if she listened now, when they didn't know she could hear, she would find out some of the answers.

"Right." Auggie's voice. "And where are dental records and DNA information stored?"

"On compu-" Duarte trailed off. "Oh," he said. "Right."

A pause. Annie focussed on breathing like she was asleep. Breathe in. Breathe out.

"So whose body was it?" Duarte asked.

"Some poor bastard I found in the morgue," Auggie replied. "John Doe. Killed himself two days earlier."

"You stole a body?"

Auggie sighed. "I wanted it to look like I'd shot myself in the head. It was either steal a body or, you know, actually shoot myself in the head, and while I'm all for method acting, sometimes these things can go too far."

"What about Diane's monitoring device?" Duarte said. "It stopped registering the nanites right around the time of the fire. In fact, I think in the end that was the only thing that convinced her that you were really gone."

"That's the thing," Auggie said. "I figured out how to shut them down."

"Shut them down?" Annie could hear the frown in Duarte's voice. "I thought that was supposed to kill you?"

"Well, OK," Auggie said, "it's more like sending them dormant. They're still ticking over, but they're not performing any non-essential functions."

"Like stand-by on a computer."

"Right. Disadvantages: no more super-powers. Advantages: Diane can't track me, plus a bonus lack of crippling headaches." Auggie's tone was the way it always was – sarcastic, light, like he wasn't talking about what must have been one of the most important events of his life.

"But how? I mean, Diane never even mentioned that something like that could be possible. It'd be like putting your liver on standby."

Auggie snorted. "You know, sometimes I kinda wish I could do that," he said. "But I'm pretty sure Diane didn't know about it. Remember the upgrade to the nanites about two months before the fire?"

Silence.

"...OK, I guess you don't. Well, we thought it was stable, but apparently there was a section of code designed for high-stress situations that never got fully tested. I don't know for sure, but I think it was supposed to tell the nanites to stay away from parts of the body that are at risk of overloading them. Of course, what it actually does is make the nanites attack parts of the body that are causing them to overload. Not to mention, apparently the first time the code got flipped on it created some kind of recursive loop that means the nanites now react to pretty much every situation as if it was high-stress."

"Jesus," Duarte said. "That's why they blinded you."

"Right. And that's why if I use them for anything that requires a lot of processing power, it starts to feel like they're eating my brain. But the thing is, the code's set up to make it a two-way situation. The nanites can shut me down if they're at risk, but I can shut them down if they're causing me problems. It's supposed to be a failsafe."

"More like a clusterfuck," Duarte said. "When did you figure all this out?"

"It wasn't a bolt of lightning thing," Auggie said. "It took years of experimenting to put it all together. But I figured out the nanites were causing the headaches the first time I accidentally shut them down."

"And when was that?" Duarte asked.

Auggie hesitated. Not much, but enough, at least for someone who knew him as well as Annie did. "The day of the fire," he said.

A long pause. Annie focussed on breathing and didn't think about what it would be like if she came in to work one day and found out that Auggie would never be coming in again.

"You could have told us," Duarte said finally. "You know we would have done everything we could to help you."

"I know," Auggie said. "I was on my way to find you guys, and then – I realised this was a way out. Maybe the only way. Once I told Diane, I knew she'd find a way to reprogram the monitoring device so it could pick up the dormant nanites, and then I would probably never have another chance to just disappear. So I went to the morgue instead."

Duarte sighed. "Maybe Diane could've helped you get your sight back," he said. "If she'd understood about the bad code, maybe-"

"Maybe." The apology in Auggie's tone was laced with bitterness now. "But let's be honest, Kyle. The higher-ups barely tolerated me as a field agent when I was the six-million dollar man. Once I lost my sight, it was only a matter of time before they revoked my status. And we both know what that would've meant."

"Lou would've fought it," Duarte said. "You know she would never have abandoned you to be a lab rat."

"Lou's just one person," Auggie said. "Look, I know it must have sucked for you guys, OK? I get that. But I saw a way out and I took it, and I can't take it back now. I wouldn't, even if I could."

Annie didn't know if Auggie was expecting a response to that, but Duarte didn't reply, and after a moment there was the sound of someone shifting, moving closer to her. She willed herself to remain limp, wondering how much of what she'd found out so far Auggie would have said if he'd known she was conscious. There was a strange sensation of proximity, but no actual touch, and after a minute she realised Auggie was scanning her body with his hands again, looking for the other tracker.

"So, I heard Lou made full director," he said, tone just a little too casual.

Duarte didn't answer, and Auggie sighed.

"Kyle, I know you're mad at me, but-"

"I'm not mad," Duarte said, and Annie had the sense that Auggie's hands had paused in their movements.

"Yeah you are," he said.

Duarte let out a breath. "Yeah, OK, I am," he said. "I just... I don't get it. I mean, you say you just wanted to get out, but now here you are working for the CIA? How does that make any sense?"

Auggie's hands started to move again, pausing at Annie's hips and then moving over her stomach. "It doesn't, I guess. I don't know. I tried to be someone real, someone normal, I really did, but-" Auggie's hand brushes against Annie's injured thumb, and she swallows a cry "-it just, it didn't work out. I mean, at the end of the day, I'm a blind guy with several million dollars worth of government research inside of me and a whole bunch of experience in sneaking around stealing secrets. I just don't think I can be the tech support guy at Gigantocorp any more, you know?"

"So the CIA is somehow more moral than the NSA, is that what you're saying?" Duarte's tone hadn't changed, but there was something sharp under it now.

"No, God no." Auggie laughed, but he didn't really sound amused. "The only thing the CIA has over the NSA is that they have no idea what I am. As long as it stays that way, I can at least try to do something worthwhile."

"And is it?" Duarte asked, his words still sharp-edged. "Worthwhile?"

"Sometimes. Enough." Auggie's hands had moved to her shoulders now. Annie wondered if he could listen to her heart beating, tell that she was awake. "Listen, Kyle, I know this sucks, but you can't tell anyone, OK? Not even Diane."

"I wouldn't be able to even if I wanted to," Duarte said. "She left the Agency after the fire. She took it really hard, Jake."

Diane kinda sounded like someone Annie wanted to meet. She kinda sounded like maybe she had been to Jake what Annie was to Auggie, and Annie wasn't sure if she felt threatened or pleased by that. She didn't have much time to wonder about it, though, because suddenly there was a blinding pain in her head, white light flashing in front of her eyes, and for a second she was sure she'd somehow been shot, that it was all over, and she was sitting up, hands grabbing at her head, scrabbling, trying to make it go away oh God I'm dying this is it.

And then it was gone, and all there was were aftershocks throbbing in the centre of her skull and a weird red edge to everything she looked at. And the first thing she looked at – the first thing she saw when she opened her eyes – was Duarte's face, dimly-lit and shadowed, but still clear enough to see his expression. Apparently, she wasn't the only one who'd thought she might be dying.

"Are you all right?" Duarte's hands were on her shoulders, gentle. She blinked at him.

"What the hell was that?" she said. "Auggie?"

"Present." Auggie's hoarse voice came from off to her left, and she turned her head – wow, that hurt a lot more than she was comfortable with – and saw him sitting hunched over, knees drawn up to his chest, fingers pressing into the skin of his temples.

"You OK?" Duarte asked him, still keeping one hand on Annie's shoulder.

Auggie lifted his head towards them, blinking slowly. A trail of blood tracked down from one nostril. "Oh God," he said. "I can't see."

What? Annie glanced at Duarte, but he looked as freaked as she felt.

"Kidding," Auggie said. "Guys, I'm kidding."

"Jesus, Jake." Duarte scrubbed a hand over his face.

"What? Poor taste?" Auggie half-winced, half-grinned. "My head feels like it's about to split open, if it makes you feel any better."

"You're bleeding," Duarte said, and Auggie's hand went to his nose.

"Great," he said. "Well, I guess we found the other tracker."

"You're kidding." Annie rubbed at her temples, trying to push away the nagging after-image of pain. "That was the tracker?"

Auggie nodded. "I guess Dumont must have rigged it so it would send out feedback if anyone tried to interfere with it. You get a headache which discourages you from trying again, and whatever device you're using to deactivate it gets fried." He grimaced. "Which in this case is me."

"Well, at least we know where it is now," Annie said. "Can't you just cut it out?"

"Annie, I am many things, but a brain surgeon is not one of them." Auggie ran his hands through his hair. "Dumont must have really wanted to keep tabs on you."

"So you're saying we're stuck down here," Duarte said.

"Not necessarily." Auggie's face was thoughtful. "Annie's stuck down here, but I didn't find anything when I checked you for other devices."

"I'm not going to just leave you here," Duarte said.

"Kyle, I'm pretty sure the only way we're going to make it out of this situation is if we do it really fast." Auggie leaned forward. "We're gonna need a plane."

"A plane?" Duarte shook his head. "I can't fly a plane."

"But Annie can, right Annie?" Auggie grinned over at her.

"I did a couple simulations at the Farm." Annie tried to sound more confident than she felt. "I mean, I'm not exactly Amelia Earhart."

"Well, that's lucky, seeing as she went missing flying a plane," Duarte muttered, and Annie felt her eyes narrow.

"So I guess your amazing plan is for us to sit around here till Dumont finds us?" she said. Duarte met her glare for glare, but Auggie raised his hands.

"Girls, girls, you're both pretty," he said. "Well, I know Kyle is for sure, anyway. Look, Dumont's bound to have some kind of quick getaway transport around here somewhere. We just need to know exactly where it is so we can plan the quickest route to get there. Kyle, you go out and find it, Annie and I'll sit tight here. Don't get lost."

"Auggie, are you sure that's a good idea?" Annie said, keeping her face as blank as possible. She hadn't wanted Duarte with them in the first place, but having him here was a damn sight better than letting him go out there with detailed knowledge of where they were.

"Why wouldn't it be?" Auggie asked, and Duarte cleared his throat.

"She doesn't trust me," he said. "Remember?"

Auggie rolled his eyes. "Kyle, go. Annie, we need to talk."

Annie frowned. Not only had she failed to hide her subtext from Duarte, now Auggie was acting like she was some teenager that needed to be straightened out. OK, sure, so she was less experienced in the field than either of them, but she was a grown woman and she had good instincts and something was up with Duarte. She watched him go, and then turned back to Auggie.

"Look, I know you have a lot of history with Duarte," she started before Auggie could launch into whatever lecture he had planned. "I know you were friends, but-"

"Are," said Auggie. "We are friends."

"Right." Annie felt thrown off-balance by the interruption. Duarte had been friends with Jake. Auggie was something different, someone different. A residual spike of pain pierced her thoughts, leaving them muddy.

"Annie." Auggie said, reaching forward and finding her shoulders with his hands. "You heard something, I get that. You thought it was Dumont talking to Kyle, but it wasn't."

"How do you know?" Annie shook her head. "You weren't there."

"I know because I know Kyle," Auggie said. "And more importantly, I know Dumont. He's pushing your buttons, Annie, it's what he does."

"Come on," Annie said. "I know you and Duarte think Dumont's like, this crazy criminal mastermind or whatever, but I've met the guy. He's just a nerd who thinks he's Neo and has a God complex. How would he even know what buttons to push?"

Auggie closed his eyes for a second. "OK, there's two things you need to know about Dumont. First, he's frighteningly intelligent. And second, he's a complete sociopath. He's wanted the nanites ever since he first found out about them back in oh-three. I mean, he's probably the best hacker in the world, and we're about something that'll not only let him interface directly with computers, but also make him faster and stronger than any of the guys who ever made his life a misery. It's basically the geek holy grail."

"So he's obsessive," Annie said. "That doesn't make him a genius."

"Annie, Dumont should be rotting in a Russian prison right now," said Auggie. "Instead, he's here in the woods with his own little empire, right back on the trail of the nanites. Hell, he's even still in the same country that's supposed to have him incarcerated! What does that tell you?"

Annie shrugged, trying to sound nonchalant. "I guess Russian security isn't what it used to be."

"God." Auggie took his hands off her shoulders, rubbing them over his face with a noise of frustration. "He brought you here. He knows you have something to do with the nanites, which means he must have hacked into every government intelligence server as soon as he broke out of jail. You can be damn sure he knows as much about you as the CIA does, probably more than you know about yourself, and he will do anything, anything to get his hands on what he thinks is inside of you. Don't underestimate him, Annie. You can't afford to."

"Right," Annie said. "Well, if he's so smart, how come he didn't figure out that I don't have any freaking nanites in me?"

Auggie shook his head. "Everybody has one thing they can't be objectively rational about. For Dumont, it's the nanites. He found out everything he could about you, put it all together, and convinced himself that it meant that you were the next generation of the program. It's plausible from what he knew, and more importantly, he wanted it to be true, because if the program was really defunct, it would mean he had no chance of ever becoming the Nietzschean übermensch he believes he deserves to be."

Annie stared. "Did you just say Nietzschean übermensch?"

"Annie, please." Auggie reached for her again, but Annie pulled back, standing up and taking a step away. All this sitting around talking was making her antsy. That, and the fact that she was being hunted by a crazy guy and she was starting to wonder if maybe the guys on her side weren't kinda crazy as well.

"No, listen," she said, and Auggie got to his feet, too, facing her and wearing what she thought of as his you can tell me anything face, which right now kinda made her want to punch him. "It doesn't make sense. You can tell me Dumont's the smartest guy in the world till you're blue in the face, but the fact is, I'm on this mission because I spilled coffee on Joan's dress. So unless you're about to tell me that Dumont somehow used his amazing hacking skills to knock over that cup, what we're looking at here is a guy who fixated on the first person he saw because he is crazy."

"You're not here because of coffee," Auggie said, and the you can tell me anything face was gone now, and hey, Annie was beginning to wonder if Auggie didn't maybe want to punch her, too.

"So why. Come on, Auggie, amaze me." Annie waited, but Auggie just shook his head and looked away. "That's what I thought," she said, and turned away. "You know, I think you were right," she said. "I think everyone does have one thing they can't be rational about. And this is yours."

She started walking, not really thinking about where she might go, just wanting to get some space, some distance, even if it was only the length of the rock chamber. She'd only taken three steps, though, when Auggie called to her.

"Annie," he said.

"I'm done talking right now," she said, not looking back.

"You weren't pulled off the Farm because of your linguistic skills," Auggie said, and that was enough to stop Annie cold. She turned, shining the flashlight back. Auggie's face was pale, the smudge of blood under his nose seeming almost black. There was no anger on his face, only resignation.

"What?" she said.

Auggie took a breath. "When I read your file... I found something."

Annie felt the back of her throat go dry, and she turned all the way around. "What?" she said, suddenly feeling how cold the rocky ground was under her bare feet. "Auggie, what?"

"The man you met in Sri Lanka," Auggie said. "Ben Mercer."

Annie shook her head, heart thumping. "That wasn't his name."

"Yeah, Annie, it was." Auggie's hands flexed at his sides like he wanted to hold something, but he didn't reach for her, and she wasn't close enough for him to have touched her if he tried. "He wasn't just another guy. He was a rogue agent."

Annie actually felt the words slide into her brain. They felt sharp, like needles. "No," she said. "Come on, that's ridiculous." She knew it was her saying it – it was her voice, her mouth moving – but the words seemed disconnected from her somehow.

"I'm sorry," Auggie said. "I'm so sorry. Mercer has secrets that could bring down some powerful people, and when they found out you'd had contact with him, they drew you in. They're hoping that you'll bring him out, that if you get in trouble in the field, he'll-" He stopped, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. "I'm so sorry," he said again.

"You're sorry?" Annie felt like her legs were going to buckle. Concentrate. Stay smart, stay strong. "You're sorry? How long have you known about this?"

"That's not what's important right now," Auggie said. "Annie, two days before the retrieval mission came up, the highest levels at the CIA received information that Mercer was in Helsinki and that the NSA was planning a mission there. We don't care about whatever intel was supposed to be in that briefcase, but you got sent anyway. Tell me that's a coincidence."

"He's in Helsinki?" Annie thought fast, trying to see all the tangled threads that Auggie was holding out to her.

"No, no, I don't think he is. I think Dumont sent that intel, just like he sent intel to Duarte. He knew the CIA wouldn't be able to resist sending you. He pushed their buttons, just like he's been pushing yours."

"Right. And which of my buttons is he pushing?" Annie asked. "The one that makes me instinctively suspicious of everyone? Because you're doing a pretty good job of pushing that one all by yourself."

Auggie swallowed, and it was dark, it might have been her imagination, but his eyes were oddly bright in the faint glow from the flashlight. "I didn't want you to find out this way," he said.

Annie felt a coldness spread through her, like she was stepping away from herself. "Did you want me to find out at all?" she asked.

Auggie raised his eyes to the ceiling. "It's not simple. It's not that simple."

"From where I'm standing, it looks pretty clear," Annie said. "I guess you were right all along. You can't trust anyone. Ever."

Auggie reached out a hand toward her, but she backed away, then turned, headed for the other side of the chamber. Auggie didn't follow – maybe Auggie couldn't follow, with the sound of her movement reduced to a whispering of bare feet on rock. Annie didn't care to look back and find out. She knew she couldn't go far – no matter how angry she was at Auggie right now, he was the closest thing she had to an ally out here – but she needed, needed to get away, just to be alone for long enough to get her head straight.

Although as it turned out, she didn't get long at all.

At first, the sound was right on the edge of Annie's hearing, and sporadic enough that she thought it must be her brain playing tricks on her. She'd been having trouble with red-fringed vision and phantom pain ever since Auggie had tried to deactivate the tracker in her head, and it was quiet in the mine, no trickling water or falling rocks, no talking now that she and Auggie were sitting on opposite sides of the chamber, so quiet that the silence had started pressing in on her, so quiet that it wasn't really much of a stretch to think that she might have started imagining noises just for something to listen to.

It didn't take long, though – barely any time at all, not enough time to be prepared, to be ready – before the sound got louder, and if Annie had still been wondering whether she was imagining things, it only took one glance at Auggie, already on his feet, head up, listening, to make it clear that she wasn't.

The sound got louder still.

Footsteps.

Annie shut the flashlight off and stepped back, slipping into the passageway she'd been sitting in the mouth of. She wanted to call to Auggie, let him know she'd heard the steps, that she was hiding, but she couldn't risk it, couldn't risk giving away their position. She had to just hope that he'd trust her instincts, even though trust was in serious short supply around here right now. She had to hope he'd find a way to hide himself, even though there was no-one to guide him. Then again, maybe she'd had a rug or two pulled out from under her in the last hour, but Auggie was still Auggie, and helpless wasn't really in his vocabulary.

A faint light swept across part of the chamber once, then again, like some kind of bizarre underground lighthouse. A few seconds later, it was back, stronger. Two lights. Voices. Annie slipped a little further back in the passageway, trying to remember how it had looked before she shut the flashlight off. She had an image of rubble strewn across the floor, and a sinking suspicion that there was a long straight section to negotiate before there were any turns.

A narrow beam of white light passed over the entrance to the passage, and Annie pressed herself back against the wall as it passed, then peered out. The light kept sweeping around the chamber, and Annie saw it was another flashlight, held by a small, stocky man who had just stepped into the chamber from a passage fifty feet to her left.

Dumont.

"This is where it came from," he said, and the two heavies from earlier stepped into the chamber behind him. "Check out all these corridors."

Heavy #1 started in Annie's direction, shining his light down the first passage. Annie swallowed and tried to remember exactly where Auggie had been. Would they find him first, or her? She was pretty sure he'd been almost directly opposite her, which meant she was a lot closer to Dumont's search pattern than he was. There wasn't much chance of getting away without them becoming aware of her – even if she could run down a rubble-choked passage in the dark without breaking an ankle, she'd be sure to make enough noise to alert them – but maybe she could draw them away, leaving Auggie in the clear. Hell, with any luck, they didn't even know to look for him. Either way, she had to move, or she was as good as caught.

She edged back up the passageway, trying to move as fast as she could without making a lot of noise. Her bare foot smacked against a sharp piece of rock, and she bit the inside of her cheek to keep from crying out. Still, it wasn't as difficult as she'd thought. If she could just-

"Dumont," came a voice from the chamber, and Annie froze, and then reversed her trajectory, half-stumbling back to the entranceway because she couldn't believe- She couldn't believe-

Oh, Christ.

Auggie was standing in the open, full in the beam of Dumont's flashlight. He looked relaxed, like he'd just strolled out to say hello to an old friend. Dumont, on the other hand, looked like someone had just smacked him in the face. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking on Annie's part.

"Jake Foley." Dumont shook his head slowly, the look of shock slowly transforming into a delighted smirk. "Well, I gotta say, I didn't see that coming."

"You want me to take him down?" Heavy #1 asked, and Dumont snorted.

"I'd like to see you try," he said.

Heavy #1 took a step toward Auggie, and Dumont raised a hand. "That wasn't an order, idiot," he said. "Do you even speak English at all?"

Heavy #1 shrugged and stepped back again, and Annie felt her tensed muscles relax a little. She ought to go, to run – she knew that was why Auggie had given himself up in the first place, to give her that chance – but she couldn't leave him. And then again, she was pretty sure she knew what the outcome of a fight would be. She could maybe take down one of the heavies – maybe – but two, both armed? Not a chance. So here she was, couldn't stay, couldn't leave, couldn't do anything to stop what was happening. That was pretty much a metaphor for her entire life, actually.

"It's good to see you again, Jake," Dumont said, taking a step closer to Auggie.

Auggie tilted his head slightly. "I wish I could say the same," he said. "Oh, no, wait. I don't. In fact, not being able to see you again might be the only good thing about being blind."

"About... what?" Dumont frowned.

"Blind. You know, that thing where you can't see?" Auggie smirked, and wow, actually his smirk was almost a match for Dumont's. "Do you even speak English at all?"

"I see being dead has improved your sense of sarcasm," Dumont said, face cold now.

"Oh, it has," Auggie said. "But that wasn't sarcasm. Your precious nanites aren't as user-friendly as you think." His grin broadened, and he spread his arms. "Still want to inject them into your body?"

"No." Dumont shook his head. "You're lying. The nanites would have repaired any damage. I read the files. I know their capabilities better than anyone."

Auggie shrugged. "I guess you're not as great at this hacking game as you thought. Maybe you should take a refresher course. Oh, hey, you know where they have courses like that? In jail."

"You're funny." Dumont pulled something small and black out from under his jacket. "You know, in a boring way," he added, and pointed the object at Auggie.

White flowers bloomed in front of Annie's eyes, and she felt herself falling, felt the impact of her shoulder against the rock wall like it was something happening to someone else five miles away. Pain flared, reaching into the core of her brain, but she forced herself to keep her eyes open, and somewhere, elsewhere, there was an Annie who wasn't affected by the pain, an Annie who was watching, helpless, as Auggie crumpled to the ground on the other side of the chamber.

And then that Annie was overwhelmed, and there was nothing but the Annie who was losing consciousness, and later, the Annie who regained consciousness to find that Duarte was standing over her and Auggie was gone.