Ex-Patriots Read Free

pick it up and drop it in my pocket.
“Have you seen the ones about the electrical man up in Boston?” I
asked him.
    His eyes lit up like a child. “I have. What
do you think of them?”
    “I’m intrigued, of course, but until I see
more concrete proof than a headline in the Post or some
grainy photos on a blog, it’s not going to occupy a lot of my
time.”
    “But you’ve had your students saving news
stories for you.” His smile came back.
    “What are you getting at, Mr. Smith?”
    He avoided my eyes and looked around the lab.
“I hate to sound suspicious, Professor Sorensen, but... well, some
folks at DARPA have been wondering if you’ve had some success with
your human enhancement research that you haven’t told us
about.”
    I felt a twinge of panic. Maybe Mary’s
paranoia wasn’t that misplaced after all. “You think I had
something to do with these people?”
    Smith shrugged. “To be honest,” he said, “I
think they’d be thrilled if you had. It’d put the United States far
ahead in the superpowers race.”
    “The what?”
    “They’re not just here, doctor,” he said.
“People with superhuman abilities are appearing all over the world.
Did you see Vladimir Putin on the cover of Time last month?”
Smith shook his head.
    “I saw the picture,” I said with a nod.
They’d titled it ‘Superman of the Year.’ Putin had been
bare-chested in front of the Kremlin, holding a car one-handed over
his head. “I thought it was Photoshop propaganda.”
    “Most people did. Thank the CIA for that. But
superhumans are popping up everywhere.” Smith slid some more photos
from the file folder. “England’s got the Green Knight and the
Scarecrow. Japan’s got a whole team of super-samurais. There’s two
guys in Iran calling themselves Gilgamesh and Marduk. Hell, we got
satellite footage of a dragon flying over Baghdad this morning.
Wings, horns, tail, everything.”
    “A dragon?”
    He shrugged. “Some of the agency folks think
it might be some kind of metamorphosis or something.” His tongue
tripped over the word. “That something, maybe someone, changed
into—”
    “I know what metamorphosis means.”
    “Right, sorry. Anyway, don’t you see,
professor? That’s why we need to get you back on Project Krypton.
No more consults, no more outside evaluations. We want you working
full time with us on this. And you don’t want to miss out on a
chance like this, do you?”
    “No,” I found myself saying. I knew Smith was
right. Eva and Madelyn were going to be angry with me. I’d promised
them I wouldn’t take on extra projects this year. “I thought
Krypton was done for good?”
    “The Secretary of Defense likes it. He
brought it back two years ago, but it’s been kept pretty quiet. The
Future Force Warrior project gets most of the headlines on Wired , anyway.”
    “Then why bring back Krypton?”
    “Well, Future Force is doing well,” he said,
“and they’re also hoping to have that new exoskeleton project in
the public eye in the next seven or eight months. But when it comes
down to it, the Vice President, the Secretary, and the Joint Chiefs
want to see the real deal in our corner and they think you’re the
man to do it.”
    I furrowed my brow. It’s a bad habit. Eva
says it’s giving me wrinkles. “Our corner? I’m not sure I
understand.”
    He gestured at the papers and images on the
table. “All of these other superhumans are answering to their
country’s government,” he explained. “Almost every one of them.
Some are even on payroll. I mean, think about it, doctor. There’s
no point in having superheroes in the United States if the
government doesn’t control them.”
     
     

Chapter 2
     
    NOW
     
    There were at least three dozen more people in the
shop than needed to be. A rumble of conversation echoed through the
warehouse-sized room. The rolling tables and racks had been wheeled
away. In their place, a single chair sat centered under the
cleanest skylight.
    St.