She felt her face flaming. "How the hell did you know about that?"

"Jack trashed the Genesis Project's database and mainframe when he left; backups too. But they had mikes and cameras all over the school, and they kept a separate archive of the recordings. They've been using them as part of their effort to reconstruct their files. When they find something pertinent to locating a runaway, it goes to Operations, and that's how I gained access." She paused. "It's a very imprecise method, and quite disorganized. A lot of the individuals in the pictures go unidentified without some cross-reference or clue from the audio. Sarah Rainmaker backing little Caitlin Fairchild up against her locker for a kiss was just ten seconds in a crowded hallway scene, but I recognized you both."

She was suddenly aware of a traffic light going from yellow to red, directly in front of her. She stamped on the brakes, and the big car stopped abruptly without a squeal. "I don't know what came over us. I'd just got one of those weird letters from home, and I was down about how … cold and impersonal it seemed. I turned seventeen at the Project, and the 'Happy Birthday' greeting I got from my folks sounded like something from Hallmark. I sort of boo-hooed to Sarah about it. I thought she was just being friendly and sympathetic, and then… It never happened again, and we never talk about it."

"To me, it looked rather more sweet than lusty. I thought it was one of Sarah's rare displays of affection. Regardless, only the three of us know, and if anybody else finds out, it won't be from me."

The light changed, and they took off, and she noted that the road was becoming busy again, with numerous drives branching off. "Okay. Point taken. I don't want to know everything you've got locked up in your head, and I'll just have to trust you to tell me what I need to know." She turned to fix her with a stare. "Whether you want to or not."

Anna nodded. "Agreed. I won't keep something from you without a better reason than personal discomfort. Not mine, at least; I've never done that. But sometimes I feel like you're already burdened enough, Kat."

She shook her head. "I have to be the one who decides that, Anna."

"Okay." Anna looked through the glass. "There's a second video archive, separate from the first, and much more secure."

She felt her stomach knot. "From the cells?"

"Yes," Anna answered quietly. "All those mirrors were one-way, you know that. But there was a camera behind each, running nonstop. They recorded everything."

Softly she said, "Oh. Those bastards." She felt sick, and deeply angry. "Who are these people, that they think they can do anything they want and get away with it?" She heard her voice tremble. "Who gave them the right? A government that would do that … doesn't deserve allegiance."

Anna laid a hand over hers where it gripped the wheel. "Easy, Che. I think I told you before. The government doesn't know what IO's up to."

"Then why isn't somebody watching them? Where's the oversight?"

"Same as with any other U.S. intelligence agency. Congress makes them submit a line-item budget, so nothing gets funded that they don't know about. If a project is too 'black' to expose to public scrutiny, it goes first to a special congressional committee with the security clearance to oversee it, and they recommend approval – or they don't. The President and select people in the Executive Branch get regular briefings on what they need to know."

The road veered left towards the interstate, and began to rise; it looked like they were going to cross over it. "That's how it's supposed to work, anyway. Sometimes officials in the agencies lie about what they're asking money for; if they get caught, they go to jail. Sometimes they move money out of an approved project into an unapproved one; if they get caught, they go to jail." The tree cover fell away and the sky opened up above them as the highway rose over the interstate; she felt exposed to numberless observers. "IO is different. The money it gets from Congress is less than one percent of their real operating budget. What they tell the Intelligence Subcommittee is pure smokescreen, and if any of its members find out something they shouldn't, well, IO has ways of dealing with that."

"Such as?"

"First, with money; IO is fabulously well-funded, and they can buy a lot of cooperation. Then there's fear; a lot of their intelligence-gathering turns up nasty secrets that they can use to persuade people, and if they can't be persuaded … an outfit like IO doesn't have any trouble making people disappear."

She thought of the police in La Jolla. How much money and … whatever … does it take to shoulder a modern city police department out of your way, so you can commit any crime you like? Why wasn't yesterday's melee all over the front page and the nightly news? How do you silence the media, and all the casual witnesses? Has our society really become so fearful that they can be persuaded to turn their heads and forget everything they saw?

"The President thinks that IO is just one of a half-dozen obscure little specialized intelligence agencies, like the Threat Analysis Section of the DHS. But he loves it, because it seems to work miracles with its miniscule budget.

"That's how it got started, you know. Back in the early Sixties, when it looked like the Soviets were going to land a man on the moon first and people all over the US thought their country was falling behind in the technology race, the government created a small intelligence agency with a mandate to ferret out dangerous technological secrets anywhere in the world. They called it International Operations; a sort of cover name, like Universal Exports, or the Hidalgo Trading Company." She must have looked blank, because Anna continued, "Famous front organizations for secret agencies.

"In truth, it didn't have much to do. Despite propaganda to the contrary, the US led the world in almost all tech applications, and the Soviet lead on space technology was slipping away. For about six years, IO just bumped along, picking up the odd political hack and adding him to the payroll. Then, everything changed when a man named Miles Craven was appointed Director.

"By all accounts, Craven was a genius, a man who could have accomplished nearly anything he set out to do. He had an unbelievable knack for reading and handling people, and he was a superb manager. He would have been wildly successful in business or politics. But he was a patriot, of sorts, and a visionary. Not that you'd want to live in his vision of America. But he saw the coming technology boom, and got himself put in charge of a government agency whose charter put it on the cutting edge.

"He moved in, and cleaned house. The appointees were convinced to find retirement jobs elsewhere. The only people he kept were the ones who'd been doing the real work, slight as it was, and beating their heads against bureaucratic stone walls.

"IO's new head convinced his backers in Congress that the surest way to protect America from hostile nations with technological capability was to make sure the US was in the lead where it counted. He claimed that, instead of chasing every avenue of developing technology, we should determine which ones would likely develop into the next threats, and make sure the US was the front runner in their development.

"It was a risky proposition. Technology was branching out all over, and new discoveries were being made all the time. How could anybody choose what might be vital to US interests in five or ten years, or what avenue of research might lead to the next superweapon? But they gave him his budget and told him to show them what he could do.

"He started by picking a technology that he thought would prove crucial by the time they got something off the drawing board. Then he assembled a research team, choosing people with energy and fresh ideas. Craven did this by recruiting straight out of the tech colleges and hand-picking the best and brightest in his target technology, all his budget could handle, and setting them to work with a clearly stated goal and a minimum of oversight. They worked like sled dogs for him; he was a man who could inspire people. And the lack of political elbow-jiggling meant they could get more done with less money."

"You want to explain that?" They were back on a tree-lined two-lane, passing golf courses, small orchards, and neat little subdivisions, but the interstate now paralleled them on the right.

"You've never seen what a government bureaucracy can do to a science project? You've been following the supercollider debates, right?"

"Well, there's bound to be a controversy over something like that. Those things are expensive."

"Hon, the US military spends more money in a week, even in peacetime. The bill to install redesigned mile markers on the interstates will cost more. The controversy isn't about how much; it's over who gets it. After two years of fist fighting, they've settled on three possible sites – which happen to be in the home states of the chairmen of the three committees that need to sign off on the project. They're all members of the same party; the President, who's a member of a different party, is threatening to veto the bill authorizing the expense, despite a well-documented scientific need for more colliders. Not that the monster that's being proposed is what's really needed, but the bureaucrats need to feed the big businesses that write the campaign checks. The project will end up years behind schedule, billions over budget, unsuited to research requirements, and nearly obsolete by the time it's completed."

"It can't be that bad."

"It's worse. I did a little digging; the whole issue began with a research group appealing to the Science Committee to be bumped up the waiting list for a collider, because their research program was stalled until they could get a couple of weeks collecting data. There are quite a few colliders in this country, but they're all booked solid.

"But every project in the lineup is sponsored by somebody on the science committee, and nobody wanted to give up the slot. This led to a proposal to build another collider. Instantly you got a battle between rival committee members who'd like to see the billion-dollar project built in their district. And the plans for the project got bigger and bigger, as contractors with deep pockets for campaign contributions weighed in. Eventually, you got a Congressional debate over the siting and funding of a new supercollider, and the original request was long forgotten. Except by the committee members who want to know why the researchers aren't getting anything done. That research group got its funding cut, and most of the team members found work elsewhere. If they got their slot on the collider tomorrow, it wouldn't matter now; the program is gutted." She shook her head. "It's a miracle any research project produces anything useful once the government gets involved."

"What about Apollo?"

"A very different proposition. First and foremost was public involvement: it was presented as a task for the American people, not its government, and they'd been given a deadline. Meeting that challenge became a matter of national pride, and a tribute to a fallen President, one of the most popular in history. They wanted a man on the Moon before nineteen seventy, and they were in no mood for excuses; dragging your feet was a good way to get unelected or unappointed. Besides, the Apollo Project opened the national treasure chest and dumped it over for anybody to pick through; for once, there was plenty for everybody. With the politicians and their supporters fed and happy, the scientists and engineers were allowed to work without ignorant hands on their ankles and elbows, and they performed what appeared to be a technological miracle. If you want to see what business-as-usual in government can do to a space project, study the shuttle program.

"Back to IO and its research project. As it turns out, they needed two weeks with a collider too. Back in the early Seventies, there was less demand for particle research, but there were fewer colliders, so the backlog was about the same."

"So they pulled strings and got moved up the list."

Anna smiled. "No. Getting his group put in front of all those other sacred cows would have been too conspicuous. Instead, Miles Craven shopped around the available colliders, talking to facility heads and technicians, and put his group on a list. Ten days later, that collider suffered a disastrous failure. The problem was fixed quickly, but most of the equipment needed recalibration to yield useful data, a couple weeks' work. As it turned out, Craven's people were about the only ones who could still use it. They got bumped to the front of the line and finished their research before the collider was fit for anyone else to use."

She swung out to pass a semi. As she was halfway past the lumbering rig, a car entered the two-lane road ahead from a drive on the left, without slowing and apparently without looking, and turned towards them. She stamped on the brakes; the car slowed so suddenly it seemed to have been yanked backward, and the truck shot by them. She jerked the wheel to the right and the beast stabbed back into the right lane just as the car jetted by.

"Woo hoo!" Anna shouted. "You did that like a pro!"

"It's incredible," she said. "Now I'm terrified." She watched her hands trembling on the wheel. "It's like the car knew what I wanted from it before I did." She drew a shaky breath and reached for her mug. "I think I'll just stay back here for a while. So, what kind of weapon were they building?"

"An economic one. Craven figured there were already enough people building bigger bombs and slicker weapons systems; he wanted to find out who the next bunch of troublemakers would be, and develop a technological trump card that would win the next war without a shot fired. You know anything about the Arab Oil Embargo?"

"Just a little from high school history. OPEC shut off the pumps in the early Seventies, trying to make the industrial West abandon its military support of Israel. Right?"

"Right. Do you remember what came of it?"

She shook her head. "All that sticks in my mind is pictures of long lines at gas stations."

"That's about all that did come of it. Eventually the Arabs declared we'd seen the light and turned the pumps back on. European nations softened their pro-Israel stance, but they'd only given Israel a fraction of its economic and military support anyway. The chief offender, the US, gave the oil producers a few empty promises and went back to doing as it pleased. Shortly thereafter, oil prices in the US dropped."

"IO had something to do with this?"

"Just before the embargo was lifted, the head of an obscure US intelligence agency begged an unofficial audience with the OPEC heads, on a matter vital to their nations' interests. When that meeting was over, so was the embargo. And no door at OPEC was ever closed to Miles Craven again."

"What did he tell them?"

"I don't know, but I think it may have been more what he showed them." The little housekeeper tapped her chest. "A portable, safe, easily mass-produced power source that ran on tap water. Oil is a useful raw material for all kinds of stuff, from plastics to fertilizers, but there are alternatives already on the market if oil becomes too expensive or hard to get, and recycling becomes cost-effective when prices go up, too. If people stopped burning millions of gallons of gas every hour, the income and political influence of almost every country in the Middle East would evaporate in a month; so would their economies, since many of them produce almost nothing else. It was a threat more potent than nuclear weapons. The sheiks decided the Palestinians didn't need a homeland that badly.

"That was the start of IO as an organization independent of the US government. Part of Craven's deal with the sheikhs was a 'royalty' on every barrel of oil they sold. Suddenly IO was rolling in cash they didn't have to beg from Congress; money, in fact, that Congress didn't even know about. Craven plowed it back into the organization and expanded his operation. He recruited more young geniuses from colleges all over the world and set them to work on a variety of projects. I don't know much about them, because almost everything the research teams develop or discover is locked away, suppressed."

"Heaven's sake, why?" The semi turned off, and the road ahead was open; she gave the throttle a little more gas, and the machine responded eagerly.

"Because Miles Craven clearly understood that all technological advance is a threat to the status quo. He felt that the only way to safeguard the US from the threat of new technology – IO's original charter – was to develop it first, lock it away, and use the knowledge he'd made about the path of discovery to make sure no one else developed it independently. His scheme to hire all the most talented researchers had two objectives: he was using them to staff the spearhead tech projects IO was developing. But he was also taking what he regarded as the most dangerous people on the planet and bringing them together where he could watch them and control their research. And he kept a very careful eye on research projects not under his control, and squashed them flat if they got too close to a sensitive discovery."

The road began to be lined with orchards again; the air was fragrant with citrus. She breathed it in and said idly, "If I were doing research for years and never getting a chance to publish my work, I'd leave." Then it hit her. "He doesn't give them a choice, does he?"

"Not really. Most of these kids come from colleges that do government research, so they know what it's like pushing a project through to completion on government money. When they're offered a nearly unlimited research budget with a minimum of interference and paperwork, plus a salary that lets them live like video game designers, they flock to the IO front organizations like lemmings to the sea." The little blonde looked at her. "You've been through it; you know how it's done. They make you an offer that's too good to be true, which turns out to be even better than they promised – at first. About the time you realize they left out a few important things, such as your freedom, you're helpless to do anything about it. If you make too much trouble … Miles Craven always believed in decisive action against threats to national security."

Caitlin thought about Joel, Melanie's brother and her first lab partner at MacArthur. He'd been a brilliant researcher, and totally mercenary; he'd have been a perfect recruit of the sort Anna was describing. He'd left school just short of graduating, and taken a job offer he couldn't talk about that nevertheless left him breathless. Then he'd promptly dropped off the face of the earth, despite promises to stay in touch. Even his sister scarcely heard from him.

Her companion turned back to face the windshield. "Some of the oldest ones are being allowed to retire, once IO is sure there are no innovative ideas left in them. They leave IO wealthy and watched. A few have failed to keep their mouths shut, and were ruthlessly discredited. It's easy to get them dismissed as quacks; they lack the respect and credentials that a career full of published articles would give them. To the scientific community, they're people who dropped out of sight after college and reappeared thirty years later, spouting outlandish theories. Then they get a really bad tax audit, or a DEA raid uncovers homemade psychedelics in their basement, and no one will give them the time of day. Most of IO's retired researchers live very quiet lives."

"So IO controls tech development all over the world? That's not possible."

"They control more of it than you'd believe, and it gets easier every year, as IO's influence over government and industry grows. There have been instances where Craven guessed wrong, or simply couldn't hijack the research; the telecom revolution was the one that stands out. I'm sure he would have crushed the Internet, if it had been possible, but it was being developed by too many independent sources. Instead, he introduced refinements that made the U.S preeminent in its development – and made it susceptible to manipulation, if you had IO's proscribed technology. You see some of that every time you show one of Jack's forged IDs. As for the rest… Did you ever watch Star Trek? The first series?"

"I'm no Trekkie. I never watched any of the spin-off shows like Next Generation or Deep Space Nine either. The first series was over twenty years before I was born. I caught a couple of episodes on the Sci Fi Channel, is all."

"Good enough. Remember their communicators? In nineteen sixty-three, a small handheld communication device seemed so far beyond current technology, they put them two hundred years in the future." She dipped into her purse and produced her cell phone. "And Captain Kirk's little gadget couldn't take and transmit pictures and record audio and video clips; it didn't have a calendar, phone directory or calculator; it couldn't give you your position anywhere on earth and display a map and directions to anywhere you want to go. Come to think of it, back then a four-function calculator small enough to fit in your hand would have seemed farfetched.

"That's the kind of technological advance you get when IO's hand on the development is light. Look at what the futurists of the Sixties predicted for the twenty-first century: limitless power, flying cars, orbital stations with permanent residents, cities on the Moon, interplanetary commerce, soldiers armed with ray guns instead of rifles." She grinned. "Robots all over the place, doing everyone's work for them." Serious again, she said, "The technology for all of that is locked away in IO's vaults. Plus a lot of stuff the popular visionaries never dreamed of." Her nostrils twitched. "There's probably a cancer cure in there somewhere."

"Please tell me you're joking. Why would IO suppress it?"

"Because IO's not a philanthropic organization. The oil deal was just the first of a lot of arrangements with governments and big business. IO's chief source of income stems from making revolutionary discoveries, then finding a reverse market for it: someone with deep pockets and a vested interest in keeping that new technology from seeing the light of day. I don't know details, but IO's getting payments from energy companies, pharmaceutical cartels, heavy manufacturing, the insurance industry, and a lot of companies with 'dot-com' in their names."

"So we're up against some combination of Microsoft and the CIA, with a private army thrown in. I knew IO was rich, just not that rich."

Anna shook her head. "Think bigger. Way bigger. Hon, IO could buy Microsoft, just with their annual R&D budget. They have more income than most UN members, and no debt. A lot of power comes with that kind of money. Government leaders worldwide figure IO approval into their plans; they don't dare not. IO can collapse economies, buy elections, uncover the darkest secrets. Even despots who live inside palace walls and don't care if their people starve know better than to cross this mysterious organization that pulls so many strings; too many of them have found out how little protection they have against IO's X-teams."

"'What they don't own, they control; what they don't control, they influence. What they don't own, control, or influence, they neutralize,'" Kat said. "I read that in a pamphlet a guy handed me on a street corner once. It had a drawing of a black helicopter on the front."

"The New World Order is real, hon. It's just not quite the way the alarmists picture it."

"How do we beat something like that?"

"Just the way we're doing it. We run when we have to, hide when we can, turn suddenly and snap our teeth if our pursuers get too close. We survive and stay free. We outlast them."

"But… they're getting stronger. It's taking everything we've got to stay ahead of them now."