The Gates of Winter - Mark Anthony [64]
Whatever the reason, the city had hired Duratek Corporation and their technology to assist the police in maintaining security. And while that might have made the people of Denver feel safer, no doubt that security came with a price beyond mere dollars. Travis could not bring himself to believe the well-being of Denver's citizens was truly Duratek's primary concern.
After that, he had thought about getting out of Denver as quickly as possible. His goal was to find the gate Duratek was using to send its agents across the Void to Eldh. Just where the gate was located, Travis didn't know. Duratek was a multinational conglomerate; it could be anywhere in the world. All he knew was that, somehow, he would find it—and then he would destroy it, along with any hopes they might have of creating another.
A grand plan began to form in his mind. He would seek out their corporate headquarters, he would blast open the polished doors of their boardroom with the power of the Great Stones, and Duratek's highest executives would cower before him. They would tell him where the gate was located, or they would suffer the wrath of his runes.
There was just one problem with the plan: It was utterly hopeless.
When Travis ventured into the bus terminal, he saw sleek Duratek computer systems poised on the ticketing counter. It was the same at the train station, and no doubt at the airport as well. They were monitoring all ways out of the city, keeping watch. Keeping watch for him and Grace.
Not that it made a difference. After the robbery at the motel, he didn't have the money for a cab ride, let alone a trip on a bus or airplane. Nor was getting a job to earn more money an option. Thanks to the new security contract, every business in Denver was required to screen new employees using Duratek's systems.
The plan crumbled in Travis's mind. Wracking his brain, he tried to concoct an alternative, but he came up with nothing. He couldn't use the Stones to destroy the gate if he couldn't get to it. And tempting as the thought was, he couldn't use the Imsari to return to Eldh, because that would only make it easier for the Pale King to gain them and surrender them to Mohg.
As the days passed, it grew increasingly difficult to think about how to destroy the gate and stop Duratek, and his thoughts became occupied instead with more basic concerns, like keeping warm, and wondering how he could get some food in his aching stomach, and where he could find shelter when blue night fell over the city. Duratek wasn't his only enemy now. So were cold, and hunger, and the danger of living on the street.
And those enemies were winning.
Inside the restaurant, the technician pulled a stylus from the tablet and began writing on its screen as he spoke to the clerk behind the counter. There would be no going into the burger place now. The technician wouldn't be so caught up in his work that he wouldn't notice a homeless man come in, and Travis had no doubt his photo and description—as well as Grace's—had been distributed to every employee who worked for Duratek Corporation. Much as he wanted to, he couldn't believe they had given up searching for him. What would they do if they found him and the two Stones in his pocket?
Travis had no desire to find out. Despite his growling stomach, he turned and hurried away down the street.
17.
Half an hour later, cold and stiff from walking, Travis pushed through the door of a bar in an industrial neighborhood just far enough from downtown to have rebuffed any encroaching gentrification. The air was sour with smoke and disinfectant, and the decor was not so much cozy as claustrophobic. However, the establishment had one compelling feature; on the bar, rather than a sleek computer unit, was a cash register that looked like it hadn't been wiped off once in its decade-spanning history. This bar didn't use Duratek systems, and that was why Travis came here from