To Rule in Hell

by Blake Banner

  With that he left, taking his complacent smile with him, and we sat looking at each other. After a moment I said, “Abi, don’t be afraid to be honest. This isn’t everybody’s scene. It certainly wasn’t mine. I ran. I couldn’t have got much farther from it if I’d gone to Mars.”

  Her eyes were bright and she burst out laughing. “Are you kidding me? Lady of the manor? A butler and a cook?” She spread her hands, taking in the conservatory, the lawns outside, the house. “All of this! I love it! It’s like a fairy tale! And I’m the princess! Look what happened when I kissed the ugly toad!” She threw back her head and laughed out loud.

  I smiled through a mouthful of croissant. “You’ll be closer to Primrose, we can get a good school for Sean…”

  “You don’t need to sell it to me.” She got up, came around the table, put her arms around my neck and kissed me. “Honey, you can go back to Independence if you want to. I’m staying right here!”

  In the afternoon, after lunch, Abi phoned Primrose in Boston and arranged to go and see her and Sean the next day, and give them the news that we were moving to Weston. While she was talking to them I went into my study, which I still thought of as my father’s study, and stood staring around me.

  This had been, for years, the private office of Omega’s third in command. Now it was mine, and I was going to use it to plan their destruction. I sat at the desk and called the number Gibbons had given me to contact him. He answered in his inimitable style.

  “Where are you?”

  “Hello, Gibbons. Where are you?”

  “New York.”

  “I’m at home in Weston. Tomorrow I will be alone for the day and most of the next day. That would be a good time for you to visit. Get here for about ten.”

  I gave him the address and he hung up.

  Next day, Kenny drove Abi to Boston in my Dad’s old Bentley, which gave her a kick, and at ten fifteen I watched Gibbons roll up through my study window, in a rented VW. Marni was not with him. He climbed out, dressed in his green Harris tweed jacket, and strutted up to the door with the air of busy self-importance that he always wore, whatever his clothes.

  A few seconds later Kenny tapped on the door, opened it and Gibbons marched in. He dropped an attaché case on the floor beside one of the chesterfields by the fire and said, “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  I was standing with my back to the window, watching him. “That’s kind of you. Will you have coffee? Tea? Something stronger?”

  “No. Later perhaps. Let’s get down to business.”

  “Thank you, Kenny. That’s fine.”

  Kenny withdrew and Gibbons dropped into the chair. “Omega has left you alone since the UN because you’ve stayed off the radar, and they have had their hands very full. But returning to your father’s house, bringing a wife here. You must be insane.”

  “Maybe I am, Gibbons. But it seems to me that if after this long absence, I return home with a wife, adopt a high profile and make it clear, with your help and Cyndi’s, that I am breaking off my relations with you and Marni, the last thing they will expect me to do is raid their Richard John Erickson Institute.”

  He made a face that was doubtful. “There is that, but you are putting Abi at risk.”

  “She was already at risk. We both know that. If anything I can protect her better here.”

  He shrugged. “Well, it’s your business. Now, about the institute. I have some equipment for you.” He reached down and put the attaché case on his lap, flipped the catches and pulled out something that looked like a Velcro headband with a small lamp on the front. “This is a camera. It has a microphone attached and an ear piece so that we can stay in communication. When you switch it on, by touching this button here, it connects automatically with a dedicated laptop via a secure feed.”

  “How secure?”

  “As secure as is possible in this day and age. Very secure.”

  “Who will be viewing it?”

  “Me, a senior FBI agent, a District Attorney and a judge who shall remain anonymous.”

  “You’re going to cramp my style. I may have to kill somebody.”

  He shook his head. “The idea is to get in and out without being detected. However, if the worst comes to the worst, you can always switch it off if you need to. But, I do want to stress, the object is to get in and out without leaving any trace of your having been there. It would also be very useful to have a constant, uninterrupted stream of data, so that there is no question of our having tampered with it.”

  “I hear you, but if I need to I will use lethal force.”

  He handed me the camera and pulled out what looked like a small cell phone. “In addition I want you to take this high resolution digital camera. It has a vast memory and will obviously take both photographs and video. It is very simple to use. You set it to your thumb print, switch it on by placing your thumb on the ‘on’ button…”

  “I get it.”

  “So, what do I want you to photograph? The ground floor, what you would call the first floor, you are already familiar with. It houses only the dining room, the recreation room, a couple of classrooms, the pharmacy and the nurses’ room.”

  “There is also the director’s office.”

  “No, that’s been moved upstairs to the first floor. What you Americans would call the second floor. I need you to break into that office and systematically go through all the papers you can find there. We are looking for anything, anything at all, that proves that they are conducting illegal experiments on behalf of Omega, or that corroborates evidence to that effect. Photograph the documents and get out without leaving a trace. The rest of that floor is taken up with classrooms. The next floor up, the top floor, is the director’s residence and the dormitories for the live-in students…”

  “Live-in students will be the students who have been inducted into the program. People who are complicit.”

  “We must assume so.”

  “And the director’s quarters… So Ogden lives there.”

  “Yes. It is imperative you do not go to the upper floor. We do not under any circumstances want to raise the alarm.”

  “Is Ogden one of the Omega elite? Has he got a letter?”

  “We believe he is the new Gamma. He takes over your father’s position. My sources tell me he was appointed shortly after the UN fracas.”

  “So Ben finally gave up on me.”

  “It would seem so. Now, before you go to the office and photograph the documents, we want you to take the lift—that is the elevator—down to the basement…”

  I shook my head. “Without even looking at it I can tell you that if they are conducting illegal experiments there, that floor will be locked. I’ll need a special key to get down there.”

  He reached in his case and pulled out a weird-looking key with a bulbous head.

  “Insert this, it will override the security system and take you down. We have no idea what you will find down there, but if past experience of Omega is anything to go by, they will be conducting advanced experiments in the manipulation of consciousness. Whatever you film or photograph down there will be of crucial importance. And once you have logged and recorded what is there, then you will go and look for documents in the office upstairs, to corroborate what you have filmed in the basement. Does that make sense?”

  “Of course.”

  He nodded and sighed. “Lacklan, it is really of the utmost importance that you do not kill anyone, break anybody’s bones or blow anything up. Just go in like a ninja, gather information, and leave without leaving a trace. Marni assures me you can do that.”

  “Yes, I can do that. Philip, tell me something, do you know who Alpha, Beta and the others are?”

  He shook his head. “Only Alpha, Beta and Gamma know who Alpha and Beta are. Gamma is their mouthpiece. Some of the others are known, but not many.”

  “What about Cyndi’s husband, Michael Donnelly? Is he in the club?”

  He thought about it. “He might be. It is
difficult information to get hold of. If you can find it there, that would be very useful. A comprehensive list of the 24 members of Omega could give us an edge. Who knows? We might be able to turn some of them.”

  I nodded. “OK, noted. Have you a particular day when you want me to go in?”

  “No, not really. The sooner the better, obviously, and no later than the next seven days.”

  I thought for a moment. “I need a day to make some preparations, so I’ll go in tomorrow night. Have you got a friendly pilot?”

  He studied me a moment. He looked surprised. “Yes. You’re going to drop in by parachute?”

  “They’ve got about four hundred acres of wild land up there. Dropping in at night is the best way to avoid detection. What about the alarm system? You any intel on that?”

  He nodded. “Right, we can help you a little bit here. This…” He pulled out a black metal box about the size of an A4 piece of paper, four inches deep. It had on it two buttons, one red, one green, and a folded antenna. “This is an EMP device. It is remarkably powerful. You raise the antenna, press the red button, and it will disable the alarm system, and all other electronics, in the whole building.”

  “That’s useful.”

  “Indeed. However, it is obviously advisable to go in as late as possible, preferably in the small hours, when there is no risk of people using televisions or computers. Their sudden, collective failure could arouse suspicion. When you set it off, remember to keep your cameras protected. Once you are in, switch it off before putting on your camera.”

  “What about guards? They didn’t have any when I was there last, but they may have corrected that error. If they have guards I’ll have to take them out.”

  He gave a small laugh. “Believe it or not, there are no guards at the institute. We believe the material there is so sensitive that the guards themselves would pose a security risk. They rely exclusively on the alarm system and the secure lock in the lift—elevator. Plus the scientists themselves are on site, on the top floor.”

  I shook my head. “No, that’s wrong, Gibbons. I don’t believe that. This is their most valuable research, I have seriously damaged it twice, and I broke out of that facility. I don’t buy that they have no security.”

  “That is the intelligence I have.”

  I thought about it a moment, then shook my head again. “Then you have flawed intelligence. Be prepared. I can get in there and I can probably get out with the material you want. But I guarantee you that at some point I am going to have to take out some guards.”

  He spread his hands. “So be it. Ideally you get in and out without being detected. But if you have to take out some guards, well, that is a good second best, as long as the intelligence, and the evidence, is intact.”

  “Good, understood. OK, now, what about your pilot?”

  He stood, pulled his cell from his pocket and opened my French doors. He stepped outside, closed the doors behind him and made a call. I watched him walk up and down a few times, talking in his abrupt, peremptory manner, then hang up and step back inside.

  “He’ll meet you tomorrow night at one AM. There is a small airfield near here, Stow…”

  “I know it.”

  “He’ll meet you there. Apparently there is a café, Nancy’s Café. Obviously at that time of night it will be closed. It is doubtful there will be anyone there at all. However, the airfield is operational twenty four hours a day, and he will meet you at the door of Nancy’s Café, at one AM. I will not tell you his name, but you can call him John. If he speaks to you, he will call you Mr. Smith.”

  “How much will he know?”

  “Nothing. Just his flight plan and that you will jump. I know him well and I trust him as much as I trust anybody.”

  We discussed a few more minor details and after half an hour he left, got in his car and drove away. When he’d gone I called Kenny, and after a few minutes he knocked and opened the door.

  “Sir?”

  “You have the key to the wine cellar?”

  A cloud seemed to pass over his face. “Yes, sir, of course.”

  He took a bunch of keys from his pocket and selected one. He took it off the ring and handed it over. I took it and looked him in the eye.

  “This is the last one, Kenny. After this, we lock the room and we don’t open it again unless we are under direct threat.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  The door down to the wine cellar was in the hall. It was always unlocked. I went through and closed it behind me. The steps were granite and lit by a single fifty watt bulb. I followed them down to a stone-flagged room, probably forty to fifty feet across in both directions. Wine was one of those things my father loved, and there were many racks and several hundred bottles stored down there. There was also another door, a bullet-proof metal one, that required a key and a code punched into a pad to open it.

  I slipped in the key, punched in the code, turned the key and the handle simultaneously, and the door swung open. It was the gun room. It was my gun room, and, according to my instructions, Kenny had kept it well stocked, with a lot more than guns. There was a cabinet with half a dozen assault rifles, another with a good selection of sniper rifles. There were small machine pistols, like the 9 mm Uzi, the Mauser C96 and the Pistolula Dracula, and others. There were also RPGs, a selection of bazookas and four ground to air rocket launchers. There were other weapons too, bows, crossbows, axes, knives and swords. It was a testament, a memorial, to a life devoted to killing.

  Kenny had a table and a couple of chairs there. I could see from the cloths and the stains that he spent time down in that room, cleaning and oiling the weapons, keeping them in good working order for me.

  I sat and looked around, thinking about what I would need. Gibbons wanted me to insert and extract without being detected, without killing anybody. He was dreaming. I knew that was going to be impossible and I wasn’t even going to try. I was going to go in, I was going to collect all the evidence he needed and I was going to get the information that I wanted. Then I was going to kill everybody I had decided to kill; and after that, when I was done, I was going to come home.

  Home.

  FIFTEEN

  The Cessna 182 was small and noisy. We had been flying southwest for almost an hour, and had left the lights of Springfield behind us about half an hour ago. The windows were dark. There was nothing to be seen, except for a ghostly half moon and a couple of flickering pinpricks of light in a formless ocean of black. According to the instruments we were over the Catskills, one and a half miles north of Black Dome Mountain. I felt a small, hot twist in my belly. We were coming up on the target.

  Kenny had driven me to the airfield in the Zombie. I had put on a black ski mask in the car, and the pilot and I had exchanged no words. Now he pointed to the door. I slid it open. He looked at me and held one finger, two, a third, then he gave me the thumbs up. I jumped into the void, counted slowly to ten and pulled the cord. A jerk and a thud, and I was floating.

  The darkness below was almost impenetrable. It was a bad night for an aerial insertion, but we didn’t have the luxury of choice. My calculations had been minutely detailed, and theory had it I was descending toward a clearing in the forest, seven hundred yards east of the Institute. But when you’re suspended in midair from a delicate piece of silk, in the darkness of night, theory is just that: theory.

  Slowly, as I descended, the ground beneath me began to take shape by the tenuous light of the moon. I was slightly due south of the clearing, dropping toward dense pinewoods. I adjusted my trajectory and descended easily into the broad, grassy clearing, as close to the tree line as I could get without impaling myself.

  I gathered up the chute, ran into the forest and buried it in a shallow hole, beneath leaves and pine needles. I then took two minutes to fit my night vision goggles and check my equipment. I had my Sig Sauer p226, but I had also brought a Maxim 9, because it has a built-in suppressor, it’s quiet and fits snugly into a holster. I also had the new HK 433
, four flashbangs, my knife and three pounds of C4 with a selection of detonators; because you never know when you’re going to need to blow something up. I smiled briefly at the thought of Gibbons’s face if he could see me now.

  I’m not a ninja. I’m a barbarian.

  I moved quickly through the forest and soon came to the edge of the woods. There I lay flat on my belly and scanned the area. I could see the institute up ahead, thirty yards away: an ugly, concrete, rectangular dog-leg, slightly luminous in the failing moonlight, with three rows of dead, black windows. There was a tree-lined drive up to a large porch that led away to the main road, about a mile distant.

  The first sign I had that I was right and things were wrong was when my suspicions were confirmed and a figure came out from behind the building, walking at a steady pace, carrying an automatic rifle. Gibbons had received bad information, as I had suspected from the start. There were guards. Which meant Omega had some idea at least, either that we were coming, or we might be planning to come. So I now had a completely unknown quantity to deal with: how much did they know? Did they know I was coming that night? Or were they just being careful? How many guards did they have? How many on the outside and how many on the inside?

  They were all questions I needed answered if I was going to pull this off the way Gibbons wanted. They were also questions I had no way of answering. So Gibbons could go to hell.

  I lay motionless for twenty minutes in the shadow of the trees. What I saw answered two of my questions. During those twenty minutes, two guards patrolled past, twice. Which meant that each side of the building was left unguarded for about five minutes at a time. That, in turn, meant that though they were being careful, they had not been alerted to the fact that somebody was coming that night—and they didn’t know it was me. If they had known either of those two facts, the place would have been swarming with guards armed to their teeth.

  I watched the guard disappear under the porch, headed for the far end of the building, and sprinted across the sward to the corner where I knew the next guard would appear in five minutes. There was no cover. He was going to see me before he died. So it had to be quick, precise and silent.