Killswitch Read Free Page B

me.”
    “Chase, that crazy.” Mel’s eyes narrowed. “The exoself is a computer. You’re the one who tells it what to do.”
    “Maybe that’s the way it started.” Chase touched the display and rotated the main building. “But I think, in order to protect itself, it will do whatever it has to do to make sure I’m safe.” He glanced at his mom. Worry lines marked her gentle face. The people here called her Birdie, because she liked to sing. She wasn’t singing now.
    He looked at the screen. “I couldn’t do all this before I got to Atlanta. It started when I unlocked your code, Mel. And it’s getting better, faster.”
    Mel put her hands on either side of her head. “OK, we’ll talk about this later. Right now we need to figure out if there is any way we can get our people out of this place.”
    “I can dissolve the walls on this image. Do you want to know what’s going on inside?”
    Mel’s eyes widened. “You can see through walls?”
    “Not exactly. I can see through a satellite image of a wall because that’s what the satellite can do.”
    “And you can do this with my code?”
    “Same one—safe travel.” Chase pulled the code again and the image changed, slower this time, to reveal the rooms inside the main building.
    The five detainees lined up before a man wearing WR police garb. No sound. By the way the man pointed and waved his right hand in his captives’ faces, he must be yelling.
    Molly stood in the middle, a tall man and young woman on her right, two teen boys on her left. None of them moved. Their mouths remained shut. Their hands were behind their backs.
    “Chase, what do you think will happen to them?” his mother asked.
    “If anything gets entered into the database at the compound, I can intercept it. For now we can only watch.”
    Mel touched the little building in the back and pulled it forward. “What’s in here? Why can’t we see into it?”
    Something inside him told Chase not to look. But he pulled the code and the walls faded.
    Groans sounded behind him.
    “That’s enough, Chase.” Amos touched the top right corner of the display and it went black.
    “I had a bad feeling,” Chase said, “but I wasn’t expecting this.”

4
    Monitors sparked to life as people got to work on different tasks. Some calculated the average time a detainee was held in a center when there were no formal charges. Others mapped various routes to the location holding the five believers. Chase continued to read the communication passing between the WR henchmen who’d intruded on the little town above his head. Nobody said a word about the device in the outer building.
    Mel had left the room. Chase tracked her location to a computer in her private quarters. Mom was gone too. A few people moved about on the far side of the complex. Only Amos and Chase were left in the center.
    “I don’t think they’ll be released.” Amos shook his head.” At least not any time soon.”
    “I know. A week ago they might have been. But now—”
    “Now they’re taking these things more seriously.”
    Chase put his elbows on the desk and rubbed his forehead. “Now they’re looking for me.”
    “I didn’t say that.” The leader of the underground sat next to Chase. “I didn’t even think it. If the authorities thought they’d make contact with you, they’d let them go.”
    Chase leaned back in the chair. “It started a few days ago—Christians being detained like this. Even when I was in Atlanta, the cops let a girl go the same day they took her in. But the data shows that hasn’t been the norm recently.”
    “How many arrests have you tracked since you left Atlanta?”
    “Over 200. Just three of those have been released.”
    “Heaven help us,” Amos said. “What was so special about the three who were released?”
    “I only know what gets put in the reports—names and locations. At least I can tell you where they got arrested. By now, could be they’ve gone underground.”
    Amos