Pratt emerges from the shadows and gloats about how Augur's computer security couldn't stop an "amoralist," whatever that is. He then removes a telescoping sword from his coat and smashes a defenseless viewscreen, all the while singing the praises of the ceramic blade and how it fails to set off metal detectors.
He turns the blade on Augur, who recognizes him as "Max."
Presumably unaware of all this, Liam and Renee have been flying around New York looking for a signal. They eventually find it and leave their Taelon shuttle, then pass a tight security check and proceed into a shadowy room.
A dozen figures emerge, one of which Liam greets as Haley Simmons, a Resistance leader believed killed when Volunteers raided a safehouse in Charlotte. Liam tells her of similar raids throughout the South. He suspects that someone in the Atlanta Resistance cell betrayed the movement.
Renee proposes insulating Resistance cells from each other to increase security. To that end, Liam announces that Resistance communication is now a one-way affair, with Liam passing information directly to the cell leaders via a new "trapdoor cipher."
Cell leaders will be given rolling authentication codes that they can use to receive messages from Liam, but they will have no communication with other cells.
Doctor, doctor, give me the news
An unconscious Sandoval has been brought into Bethesda's National Naval Medical Center, where Dr. Curzon examines him. When he awakens, the doctor tells him his CVI is functioning properly, but a genetic defect has brought on a blood disorder, causing his metabolism to collapse.
Sandoval has also lost 3.1 hours of short-term memory, but still wants to leave the hospital before anyone discovers that he's there.
Back at Augur's, Pratt and Augur get down to business. It turns out that Pratt was once Augur's partner, but spent six years in a sensory-deprivation prison after Augur testified against him. Upon his release from prison, Pratt became a mercenary "amoralist" with no fixed allegiances.
Augur attempts to appeal to his old friend's respect for the rules of the game, to no avail.
As it turns out, Pratt says he was commissioned to obtain Resistance "security protocols and communications data." At first, Augur refuses to sell out the Resistance, but Pratt tells him that unless he complies, "Liam Kincaid is a dead man."
Faced with no other choice, Augur begins to prove the required information, but Pratt proves impatient and demands to be given a place in the Resistance communications network.
Got it bad
In the hospital, Sandoval orders Liam to cover his schedule while the agent is in for testing. Liam asks about the nature of the tests, but Sandoval doesn't feel like sharing, and instead orders Liam to carry out his new duties just as Sandoval himself would.
Liam leaves the room to ask Dr. Curzon about her patient's condition, but Sandoval collapses again, complaining of blurred vision.
After Liam leaves, Dr. Curzon informs Sandoval he only has weeks or even days to live unless he receives a transfusion of "undamaged hemalogic factor" from a parent or child.
Unfortunately, Sandoval's parents are deceased and he has no children. Bowed but unbroken, he orders a global DNA search for a first-degree relative.
Pratt returns to the rendezvous point in Hamburg to give Da'an a disc containing data on the Resistance. However, when Da'an returns to Washington, he finds a group of Taelon-friendly Volunteers led by Zo'or searching his office.
Zo'or accuses Da'an of being in possession of "subversive data" about the Resistance. Da'an protests that he planned to bring the information before the Synod, but Zo'or doubts that the Synod "will have any confidence in your future loyalty."
Betrayed!
Back at the FBI training facility in Arlington, Virginia, Liam practices fencing against a holographic opponent done up to look like a French musketeer.
After he wins the mock battle, he receives an encrypted message that appears to be from himself declaring an emergency meeting of Resistance cell leaders. A trap!
He attempts to send a counter-message canceling the bogus meeting, but the computer informs him that the cipher key has since been destroyed, making it impossible for Liam to transmit any messages to the Resistance.
Liam blames Augur for this and goes to confront him. However, all Augur can say to defend himself is that his past "finally caught up" with him. He explains about Pratt and how he turned on the Resistance to save Liam's life.
Augur then goes to Renee, who berates him for betraying the Resistance. However, Liam wonders why nobody has come after himself and Renee, whose files were both included in the data dump.
Augur suggests that perhaps Pratt was paid with "smart money," currency containing microchips linked to global positioning satellites. Perhaps the Resistance can use these chips to trace Pratt back to his employers.
About the mothership, Da'an and Zo'or become friends again, but the cooperative feeling fades quickly after Pratt beams a transmission up to tell Zo'or that he now knows who the leader of the Resistance is.
Sympathy for the devil
Meanwhile, time is running out for Sandoval, who looks distracted, then indulges in a melodramatic fit while Liam asks for a higher security clearance.
Late that night, Liam meets Augur and Renee at the Flat Planet. Augur has set up a meeting between Liam and Pratt, but warns his co-conspirators that Liam's name came up in Sandoval's "routine" DNA search for a hemalogic donor.
Renee doesn't shed any tears at the thought of Sandoval's demise, but Liam tells her that he is actually the FBI agent's half-alien son. Augur corroborates the story.
In a fit of sudden filial loyalty, Liam notes that no batter how Sandoval might be, he feels an obligation to save him. He then sends a cooler containing his own blood to the hospital as an anonymous donation.
Fight scenes and secrets
Having satisfied his higher moral impulses, Liam then goes to have his obligatory fight scene with Pratt. A true wary mercenary type, Pratt allows Liam in without a search because an introductory scan shows him to be unarmed.
As it turns out, Pratt will reveal who hired him, but as he notes there is a waiting list for his services. Zo'or has already offered $100 million to "reveal" that Liam is the leader of the Resistance. The two men then fight with ceramic blades but Liam soon learns he is tilting at holograms.
The real Pratt emerges, amused by the spectacle, and easily disarms his opponent by retracting his ceramic sword. He has Liam helpless on the floor and raises his own blade, but then Liam, thinking fast, kicks Pratt and re-extends his sword, killing the mercenary.
After going through Pratt's wallet and scanning the money for smart tracking, he learns that Da'an is the guilty party who betrayed him and the Resistance.
He confronts the Taelon with this, but Da'an only hides behind yet another ineffable Taelon mystery. Liam isn't satisfied with this answer, so Da'an actually explains himself, saying he betrayed the Resistance to regain Zo'or's trust.
Da'an also attempts to ease Liam's fears over having been used as bait in a Taelon scheme, but Liam storms out anyway, understandably upset.
Sandoval, meanwhile, has gotten his transfusion, but is perplexed to find out that he has a son out there somewhere.
advertisement
