1

Barely visible under the pitch-black sky, two young men stood a few feet apart in a park, well away from the nearest lamppost.

"Yo, man, you got the stuff?"

Jay contemplated the question before he answered, "Yeah, man, do you?"

"Do I what?" the other guy asked. His name was Blaze, or so he told Jay in their first meeting.

"Do you have the stuff?" Jay asked.

"Why would I got the stuff?" Blaze shook his head. "You're the one who's supposed to got the stuff. Not me. Shit, bro. Do you got the stuff or not?"

"Depends what kind of stuff you're talking about."

"The stuff, man, the stuff. The stuff we talked about, man. Jesus Christ. The equipment. The bomb stuff, man, jeeze."

"You're asking if I have the bomb stuff, Blaze?"

"Yes, Jay. What the fuck, man. Do you got it or not, 'cause if you don't got it then we got nothing to discuss, man. Shit."

"Oh, that stuff. Yeah, I got the stuff. I got it right here..." Jay lifted the backpack he held in his right hand. Little did Blaze know, Jay wore a wire. The cops were on their way.

"Then give it here, man. Fuckin' right. The stuff, man. Yeah." Unzipping the bag, Blaze peered inside, then felt around with his other hand. "Daaaamn, man. Man, this is gonna be off the fuckin' chain, man. Those bozos won't know what hit 'em, man." He glanced around. "Watch the TV tomorrow, man. It gonna be on all the stations." Slinging the backpack over his shoulders, he added, "Well, see ya, dude—" He made to leave, but stopped.

The hum of green-powered engines could be heard. Whining as they drew near.

"What the fuck!" Blaze tried to run. Didn't get far, though.

A motorbike crashed over a ramp and landed on the grass ten feet behind him. "Stop. Put your hands up," boomed The Authority through the megaphone.

Blaze kept running.

A net shot out from the bike's barrel under the right handlebar. It wrapped around its target, sent him crashing to the ground, and delivered an electric shock.

"Shit," Blaze groaned, prone on the grass. Then twitched and foamed at the mouth when he was jolted again.

Jay watched more police arrive. They got off their bikes and shackled Blaze, then hitched him to the rears of the various bikes.

"Nice work," one of the policemen said to Jay. "The Authority will be pleased. You've done an admirable job, citizen. Another would-be terrorist attack averted." The police mounted his bike and he and the others drove off, with Blaze—still shackled and trapped in the net—rolling around between them.

"I'll fucking kill you, Jay!" Blaze screamed, the thin ropes digging into his drooling face. "You're gonna die, bro!"

With a grin, Jay removed the wire, tossed it into the grass and started walking home. He was just glad this mess was all sorted out.

2

So Jay was surprised when he turned on the TV the next morning and saw at the top of every channel:

BREAKING NEWS ANTI-ENVIROM TERRORISTS BOMB PARLIAMENT, PRIME MINISTER KILLED

He switched to ENN and watched the talking heads, shock still on their faces, discuss what they knew and what they didn't. In the upper-right corner: a drone flew above the diesel-bombed building, which smoked and burned and bubbled with hot, impurity-laden black diesel.

"Just in," said one, pressing a finger to their earpiece, "DiesNuts has claimed responsibility for the attack."

"Oh god," Jay said, collapsing into the couch. He massaged his temples. DiesNuts was Blaze's group. How had they bombed the Parliament building? He thought the sting operation had thwarted such a plan. Unless... Maybe they were making deals with multiple people, and at least one of them pulled through and got them the equipment. It was possible. The Authority couldn't be everywhere at once.

"Police have a suspect," the other anchor said. "Apparently a high-ranking member in the DiesNuts terrorist syndicate."

Jay raised his head to look, raking his fingers across his face as he did it.

"Jay Winslow. Of 1182—"

"What the fuck!" He shot up from the couch, spun around in circles. His mind was going too fast. Heart pounding. He saw his face on the TV. His face. He needed to get out. Now.

Jay raced to the door and threw it open. Stuck his head out, looked both ways. Coast seemed clear so he tugged up his collar, kept his head low and headed out.

A trio of police officers came around the corner just then, too focused on their conversation to notice him. Jay doubled back into his apartment, shut the door, locked it, threw the chain on. Needed another exit. Either down the fire escape or up to the roof and down the stairwell.

A thudding fist at his door made him jump.

"Jay Winslow, open the door, please. You are under arrest for terrorism charges, the bombing of Parliament and the murder of the Prime Minister. If you do not comply, we are free to use as much force as necessary. The Authority demands it."

Running to the window, Jay threw it open and climbed through. Looking down at how far the street was, he made an impulse decision and went up instead, climbing rung after rung.

Though normally he appreciated the look of the city, what with its solar panel–covered windmills and greenhouses, flowers and vines and trees as far as the eye could see, today he didn't feel so warmly about his native land. The air was clean but something felt dirty and rotten and not right about his predicament. He wasn't a terrorist. He'd never set foot inside Parliament, let alone blown it up. So why was he wanted? It reeked of some kind of set-up. He was the fall boy for some kind of conspiracy.

Maybe Blaze had really been with the cops and it had been a reverse sting—though Jay didn't know how the hell that would work.

Just as the police broke into his apartment five storeys below, Jay clambered over the ledge and onto the roof. He made for the stairwell door.

It opened as he drew near, and a woman with a shotgun appeared from within.

"Jay Winslow, come with me if you want to live."

3

How could he refuse? She was the one with the gun.

In handcuffs, Jay walked out of the apartment building's front doors, with Tina—that was the woman's name—marching behind him, the barrel of her shotgun digging into his spine.

"Just keep your eyes forward and keep walking," she whispered. "This is only for appearances."

He stopped at her car, a solar-powered very-much-marked police cruiser. She opened the rear passenger door and shoved him in rather roughly. Slammed the door shut. Got in the driver's seat and started the car. It hummed. She started driving.

"Was it necessary to shove me?" Jay asked her through the mesh separating the cruiser's front and back sections.

"For appearances."

"Can you remove the cuffs?"

"Not yet."

They drove through the city, and Jay spent the time in silence, looking out the window or observing Tina. She was a black woman, maybe in her late twenties, and pretty. Her dark skin seemed to glisten. The shotgun was back in its in-car holster, aimed up at the roof.

"When can you remove the cuffs?" he asked her.

She stopped the car, parked it and twisted around to look at him. "Right now. Look out the window, Jay. Tell me what you see."

He looked left, but saw nothing. Recognizing the area, it dawned on him where they were. He turned to the right.

And there it was.

The Parliament building.

But fuck. How?

It was still there, pristine-looking. Not at all blown up. Not in the slightest.

"The hell is going on?" he asked. "I thought it was gone. I thought the Prime Minister was dead."

"Keep looking." Tina raised a remote and hit the button.

The Parliament building flickered for a moment—like a video-card glitch in a game—and then it was destroyed once again, pouring black smoke through the top, smouldering, bubbling toxic waste. The roof of it had been blown off. Dried smears of blood and burnt body parts littered the area. Hot diesel choked the trees, the grass, made them grey and dead. It was like how he'd seen it on the TV. Around the immediate area, yellow crime-scene tape had been placed.

"What—? How?"

She hit the button again. Back to normal. Then she got out of the car and opened his door, helped him out. As soon as his head bobbed above the roof of the car, the building was in ruins once more.

"It's a fake, Jay," Tina told him as she undid his handcuffs. "A hologram. I've got special glass in the car—all of us police do. It lets you see through illusions like that. It's actually quite common. Remember 9/11? That was a hologram, too."

"But how?" he asked, trembling. "Why? Why me?"

"Everybody needs an enemy, Jay, even—no; especially—the people in power. I don't know why they picked you. I just know that they did. Because they need to save face, they need a face to parade around, a face of The Enemy. To show that they're doing something about it. And they're gonna put you away, Jay. For a long time. Unless you do something about it."

"What? What do I do? How do I stop this? How can I be a free man?"

"It's simple, Jay." Tina smiled and looked at Parliament for a moment. "Blow it up. For real."

4

He walked in wearing a special uniform—the letters said FEMEPA on the back, in bold yellow—which Tina had gotten for him from the trunk of her car. He carried a leather bag, containing the stuff needed to blow the place sky-high. As Jay walked the halls, people rushing past him, he instinctively looked away, studied the walls, scratched his cheek. Anything to try and make it so nobody recognized him, though he did wear a hat pulled low over his eyes, so he was probably okay.

But people didn't notice him. Maybe they were too busy trying to appear busy. Or they were actors. He didn't understand it. The inside of the building looked perfectly normal, strong, sturdy, not at all the site of a disastrous terrorist strike, and yet people looked so shocked, so scared.

Quickly checking behind him, Jay slid through a door and closed it. He'd found the spot Tina had told him about: the energy grid, which was a series of computers and turbines running in parallel. The whirr of computer fans, the click-clack of gears and the thumping pistons. It was a place where you could barely hear yourself think.

And can't hear someone walk in, he realized.

Crouching down and removing the bomb supplies from the bag, Jay hesitated.

Is this right?

—They framed you. They say you bombed the place, but you didn't! Nobody did!

Maybe I should fight it in court, then.

—Oh, like that will work. You'd be more likely to wind up swinging from the light fixture in your holding cell. Dead of a "suicide."

They did frame me. What's to stop them from killing me?

—Exactly. Now bomb the shit out of this place. Get your revenge.

Jay snapped the parts together. All that was left was the tube of sloshing black diesel, apparently more impure than The Authority itself. Just had to connect the hoses into the—

"I... wouldn't... do that, if I were you," said a man behind him.

Jay turned. The Vice Minister and two armed agents stood near the door. "Why not?" he asked them. "Is this how you treat your citizens? Framing them! Calling them terrorists! You forced me to do this... I was going to be imprisoned! Nothing even happened to this place! No attack! You've got a hologram up!"

"Hands away from the bomb," said the Vice Minister. His normally stern face seemed frightened. "I think you've been tricked, young lad. If you will step away, I will help you." He spoke calmly. His eyes seemed full of sympathy.

Jay nodded, sighed, and set the bomb down. Stood and backed away.

The agents started to rush forwards.

"That won't be necessary." The Vice Minister, holding his hand out, said, "You've been implanted. Your neck." He reached slowly, plucked something from the base of Jay's skull.

Eyes closed, Jay shuddered, felt like he'd had a bucket of ice-cold water dumped over his head. "What the hell was that?"

"Made you see what they wanted you to see, Jay. Come out into the hall." The Vice Minister led the way out. "Because, you see, there was a terrorist attack, and no you did not do it."

"Holy shit. Oh my—" Jay stared at the carnage, the destruction. Dismembered bodies were being zipped away into corpse bags and dragged through the halls. "How? Who?"

"Horrible, isn't it? The terrorist group. DiesNuts. Awful name. We believe it was done by someone named Tina Nightingale, possibly an alias. Do you know anyone by that name?"

Jay collapsed against the wall, slid down to the floor. His eyes flooded with tears. "Someone named Tina got me out of my apartment when the police came. She said this whole thing was a hologram like 9/11, that the government needs enemies, even if they're manufactured. I don't get it... She was a cop."

"I'm afraid not. She was impersonating one. One officer failed to respond and was later found dead with their torso blown to smithereens. Shotgun. We believe this 'Tina' person killed them."

"But how? She showed me her car's special glass... Pushed a button to turn the hologram on and off..."

"No such thing. The implant was what she activated and deactivated. Someone must have bugged you at some point. Maybe while you slept. But we knew. Because we have someone on the inside. And with this"—he carefully handed the implant to one of the agents and sent him away—"we can backtrace it all the way to the top. Put a stop to DiesNuts once and for all. You see, Jay, you were never a suspect. We just needed to take you in so we could get the implant and then get the bad guys."

"So..."

"So we're still the good guys, Jay," the Vice Minister said, smiling. There were tears in his eyes. He held his hand out.

Jay shook it.