Elliot shook his head. “Not that it makes any difference. They’re probably long gone by now.”
“Then what were you calling us about?”
“I could ask you the same question.”
“Let’s not fence,” Guerdon said. “I suspect we both want the same thing.” He turned to Chin. “Major?”
Chin punched a series of codes into his computer station for a few moments. A document with FBI imprimatur appeared on each of their displays. “This was on the thirty-second roll of microfilm you gave us,” he told Lorimer. “Examine it carefully, both of you.”
On the display document—titled “For Further Investigation”—were hundreds of names, neatly printed out in alphabetical order. Elliot recognized many as belonging to students and faculty associated with Ansonia Preparatory School and 204
Alongside Night
sometimes their families.
Further down on the display was a somewhat shorter list marked “For Immediate Disposition.” Among the names he recognized were his own—and those of his parents and sister—Phillip Gross, and his uncle, Benjamin Harper, and Ansonia’s headmistress, Dr. Maureen Fischer.
“This is a partial list,” Guerdon explained, “of those secretly to be arrested this past weekend and sent to the FBI prison code-named Utopia. Major?” Chin punched a new series in; another document, dated February 24, was displayed. “This one Ms. Powers obviously couldn’t have brought us. We intercepted it through normal channels.”
The document was a top-secret FBI dispatch to all field offices, informing them that Deanne Powers was to be arrested without warrant and transported to Utopia for interrogation. It was signed by Lawrence Powers.
Guerdon looked at Lorimer sympathetically. She shrugged and replied, “I’m not at all surprised.”
“That first arrest list,” Elliot asked. “What happened to them?”
“We managed to notify many …and got them safely underground.”
“Phillip Gross and his uncle?”
Guerdon shook his head sadly.
“They’re both in Utopia?”
“Phillip is imprisoned there. Morris Gross is dead.”
His second-worst fears about Phillip confirmed, Elliot was deeply saddened to have his worst confirmed about the vibrantly alive man who had befriended him. “They killed him?”
“He suicided.” Guerdon paused an instant, then added, “As my TacStrike chief of staff, General Gross simply knew too much to allow himself to be captured.”
“I see.” Elliot stared down at his coffee for a few seconds, then looked up at Chin. “Why bring us here, now? The last Alongside Night
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you told me, you people were claiming a raid on that prison wasn’t possible.”
“‘Removal not now possible,’ I believe the phrase was,” said Chin. “I programmed that myself last Saturday. But that was before we’d had a chance to inspect fully the microfilm Lorimer brought us.”
Chin typed in still new codes. A moving sequence of documents—floor plans, written descriptions, and schematic diagrams—appeared on their displays. “This was on the fortythird roll of FBI microfilm,” he continued. “The complete layout, specifications, codes, and operating procedures of the FBI prison.”
“We are now ready to raid Utopia,” said Guerdon. “We need the two of you to help us.”
Elliot was slightly taken aback. Though he had fantasized the possibility of heroically rescuing his family from that prison, he had never taken the possibility of a chance seriously. Lorimer took the announcement completely in her stride.
“Us?” asked Elliot. “Sure, I’d love a crack at it, but we’re grass green, both of us. You must have better trained—”
“If it were merely a military operation,” Guerdon interrupted, “we could have moved against the prison months ago. But a raid-in-force is precisely what Utopia is designed against. We need two people whose names are on the arrest list …who are not already captured …or dead …who are allied with us
…who are not carrying secrets we can’t afford to lose …and who are unlikely to crack under fire.”
“It all sounds great,” Elliot said, “except for that last part.”
“Don’t run yourself down, son. I have seen psychometric profiles for each of you. Do you help us, or not?”
Elliot thought about it. Even if his mother and sister were to be freed anyway—a point he did not trust Powers on at all, and his main reason for calling the Cadre—Phillip was in there. Phillip, who, when asked for help, had simply said, “Of course. 206