Chimera Code (Jake Dillon Adventure Thriller Series)

by Andrew Towning

  She inhaled slowly, trying to calm her breathing.

  Keep your wits about you: think how you are going to survive this nightmare.

  She looked up, as the air-con cut in. Hissing quietly.

  Claudia Dax went over to her desk and dragged a chair back to the shaft and, reaching up, used the bronze sculpture to dislodge the stainless steel grille. It was going to be a tight squeeze but - but then; did she really have a choice?

  She ran back into her bedroomrandomly pulled out clothes from her wardrobe, and scattered them across the floor and bed. Then she went to the kitchen and picked out a long handle floor brush from the utility cupboard. From the chair she could just about reach the rim of the shaft, which bit into the soft skin of her fingers, and hauled herself up into the narrow tight confines of the metallic shaft. With trembling fingers she manoeuvred the chair away from below with the brush handle, and then replaced the grille cover back into place, shifted her position just to the right of the grille and waited, her heart thumping in her ears.

  Three minutes passed.

  Claudia heard it; a tiny click. The front door to her apartment eased open. Two Assassins slid through the opening like ghosts; they moved silently from room to room. They were very thorough as they moved around her apartment, communicating only with hand signals. As quickly as they had arrived, they were gone again out into the corridor.

  “She is not here.” The voice was soft and feminine.

  “We will find her.”

  “Report back to the control room; we’ll come back in ten minutes and check again then.”

  They left the corridor.

  Claudia pushed herself backwards along the narrow shaft, deeper in, the cool draught making her shiver, her proximityto death made her shiver even more. I don’t believe it, she kept telling herself. I just don’t believe it.

  She moved on through the shaft, her mind pondering her current precarious situation. She had actually been lulled into believing that she was building Chimera to help in the fight against terrorism. Ezra had been the only one telling her the truth all along...

  And now?

  Now she was in the firing line.

  Claudia Dax shivered again, and started to weep into her hands.

  * * * It was nearing dawn.

  Kirill stood behind the parapet, watching the sun come up over some of the highest mountain peaks in Scotland, smoking a black Russian cigarette and enjoying the experience immensely. The freshly ground Columbian coffee, only adding to his pleasure.

  A breeze stirred, and powder snow blew over his shoes.

  He watched idly as black uniformed soldiers of Ramus’s personal security detail, supervised the loading of the facility’s hi-tech computer equipment into the cavernous belly of one of the Chinooks. The other helicopter was preparing to take-off, large rotors spinning, waiting to disappear to a secret location...

  The comm. buzzed.

  “Yes?”

  “Are you ready? Have you ensured that everything has been removed, the last two helicopters are waiting to leave?”

  “All technical items and Chimera related equipment have already been shipped to the mobile stealth facility. There is just the nuclear device to arm - I will send two Assassins to carry this out.” Tobacco stained teeth smiled in the glare of artificial lighting.

  “Good. After all, we don’t want to leave your former masters in Whitehall with anything to allow replication of our unique toy, eh, Kirill? I assume that the individuals, who did not wish to join us, have now been liquidated?”

  “All, except one employee; but I’ve got two of our best Assassins out tracking her down. But if they don’t find her, the explosion will.”

  “Okay, Kirill - but you make sure she is found and dealt with.”

  “I think the Scottish Government might be somewhat pissed off when we set off this nuclear device. It was considered a great compliment when the SAS chose to build their Arctic training centre here.”

  “Save your sentiment, Kirill. I could not care less about governments and what they think. They can all go to hell, as far as I’m concerned.”

  “Has there been any word of Dillon’s whereabouts?

  “Yes. You were quite right; he is heading straight for you. He really must be stopped, although we have no idea of his exact location. Maybe he’s come to find you, Kirill? Maybe he is still pissed off with you for pulling that gun on him in Cornwall? Maybe he wants to find out why you didn’t die? That would make for a very interesting conversation, don’t you think?” There was a twisted mocking humour in Ramus’s voice.

  “I thought you said you would take care of him?”

  “Oh, have no fear, Kirill. I’m working on it.”

  The comm. cut. Kirill stubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray with measured aggression. All of a sudden it tasted like the, foul, dogend that it was.

  Kirill spoke quickly into the Bluetooth headset attached to his right ear, his voice carried an edge as sharp a Samurai’s sword. His words direct and to the point, instructing the security guard at the other end. “Go and get the device.” The guard disconnected, and Kirill looked dispassionately around the room, gaze tracing the contours of the furniture. Something was troubling him, a nervousness that made him feel uneasy, even with trained Assassins and his personal security guards surrounding him. Dillon wouldn’t get within a hundred metres of him. Kirill laughed out loud, a deep hollow mocking laughter.

  Two guards appeared outside Kirill’s apartment. “Take the device down to level 8. Let me know when you are there, and I will join you to arm it. If you value your life - you will ensure that the maximum security is maintained at all times, do I make myself clear?” Both guards nodded their understanding.

  He pushed the button on the comm. A feminine voice at the other end answered.

  “Have you found her yet?”

  “No, sir,” came the smooth purring voice.

  “Well, put more people on it and damn well find her!” He failed to hide his irritation and the tinge of urgency that had crept in to his tone. He took a deep breath. The tension and acid re-flux, he was experiencing, was making him feel nauseous. “I was given to believe that Assassins were supposed to be the very best at seek and destroy?”

  “That is correct, sir.”

  Kirill cut the connection. He left his apartment, entering the cool depths of the facility, heart pounding, and perspiration rolling down his temples. Damn you to hell, Dillon, he thought.

  Damn you.

  * * * Claudia Dax lay flat on her back inside the air-conditioning shaft, a mass of multi-coloured wiring directly above her, a slender tablet computer in her hand. The tears had gone; her mind working at full throttle.

  She knew the facility’s surveillance systems like the back of her hand; after all, she had made it her business to familiarise herself with every aspect of their programming. And, like all hackers, she had found all of the weak spots, and had then written in her own private backdoor - coding that had escaped the close scrutiny of the fail-safe programmers and had allowed her access to... everything.

  On the tablet’s screen, she looked out at the Chinooks, their rotors idling, pilots awaiting their orders. She saw Kirill stub out his cigarette, and she watched with tired and strained eyes as he spoke on the comm and then leave his apartment to disappear back into the facility. The tension was consuming her. And she knew: Knew that she was waiting to die and there was no way that she would be able to escape them - after all, where would she go? What would she do?

  She was in the middle of nowhere.

  Tears rolled down over her cheeks, flowing freely, and Claudia despised herself for being weak, and her self-loathing turned to selfpity and she cried and cried, and then everything was suddenlylooking out of control. And why was this happening to her?

  She stopped crying. Wiping away the moisture from her eyes with the sleeve of her pyjamas.

  How long did she have?

  Even if they were to realise that she had ente
red the air-con system, it would take them hours to search all the vents and shafts. After all, the facility was huge. And looking on the bright side, as she had watched on the monitor, the majority of the Assassins had already left on the earlier Chinooks.

  “Maybe they would give up and all leave?”

  Although she knew that was not an option.

  She also knew that they would hunt her to the end...

  Claudia closed her eyes for a moment, her mind in overdrive. How was she going to turn this situation on its head? From being a victim and the hunted, to being the predator and the hunter. But how the hell was she going to do that?

  And then it struck her.

  Claudia started to crawl carefully along the ventilation shaft.

  She suddenly had a purpose - a goal to attain...

  She needed an edge, something to negotiate with.

  And if she had copied the Chimera blueprints once, she could surely do it again.

  * * * Kirill moved with the agility of a man half his age, his hands working quickly and precisely, as he placed each explosive package around the core of the facility. He moved with care, alert, the automatic pistol he was carrying in his jacket pocket had the safety catch slid to off. A reassurance against any unwelcome visitors, such as, Jake Dillon...

  Where was that annoying bastard? He mused.

  He pushed the thought from his mind. Ten, one kilo packs of hi-explosive, each with a detonator linked wirelessly to the mother of all bombs. A small nuclear device - capable of vaporising the entire facility and everything in it. The ten much smaller charges were there merely for good measure.

  Claudia Dax would wish the day that she had taken a bullet to the head in preference to what was to come...

  Kirill stood in the corridor and glanced down at the tablet computer in his hand and the plan of the facility on the bright screen. The complex had been dug out of the mountain and designed to be impenetrable from attack by air or from the valley far below. He attached one of the hi-explosive packages to an overhead beam, and then moved on to the next location.

  Finally, Kirill found himself in the main programming suites. The power had been cut and all defence systems inoperable. The mainframes and all systems were silent, cold and dead.

  Kirill sighed.

  The thought of Dillon niggled away at the back of his mind. Ramus had underestimated the former army intelligence officer. He had thought it an easy task to kill him, even with his Assassins doing the dirty work. How wrong he had got that...

  Moving to the main console, Kirill flicked a few switches. A panel moved back silently on the side of the mainframe case; there were no markings to show that the Chimera Programme was stored on the now exposed hardrive. The slender black box slid free, was presented to him, dull, totally unimpressive. He lifted it carefully, noting how it made the tiny hairs on the back of his neck stand up and bristle. He placed it gently into the inside breast pocket of his jacket…

  Then, Kirill placed the smallest and final hi-explosive inside the mainframe. It locked in place and then blinked blue at him. He pulled the tablet computer from the bottom of the case he was carrying. He tapped in a series of digits on the screen; the menu opened up immediately as Kirill tapped one of the icons. The screen turned into a continuous waterfall of binary code, a never ending script, the final detonation command sequence. Once delivered up to the mainframe, the nuclear device would automatically count-down and no one could stop it...

  “Have you checked that everything is in place?”

  “Yes, Professor Kirill. Everything is now ready, sir.”

  He tapped the enter button, and synchronised all of the hiexplosive packs with the nuke. Confirmation was instantaneous.

  Kirill nodded, placing the tablet computer back into his bag and turning his back on the Chimera project suite. Turning his back on the place he had worked and virtually lived and called home for the last four years.

  He patted his jacket pocket, saying out loud. “You will soon be released from your black hole to roam free through every computer on the planet. Soon, you will create a new world. A world where politicians, the military, and even bankers will have no choice than to answer to us.” Kirill’s top lip curled into a viscous condescending snarl.

  He met the two Assassins outside. Only one small six-seater helicopter remained, that would be used to transport him and the Assassins. He looked around nervously; checking that every last thing was in place.

  Soon.

  Soon the sun would rise.

  And with it, the top of the mountain.

  “Any sign of her?”

  “No. We think she is in the air-conditioning shafts. Should we go and search them?”

  “One of you go - take another look. But we don’t have much time left. If you can’t locate her, we’ll have to let the explosion do the job for us.”

  Kirill swore, scratching the side of his unshaven face. His gaze scanned the horizon and he calmed himself, slowed his heart-beat. That Dax woman, was now holding him up; he should have been gone by now, enjoying a glass of his favourite Champagne, served at just the right temperature as the helicopter powered him away from danger to Ramus’s stealth command ship.

  The Assassin chosen to go and find Claudia Dax disappeared back into the facility.

  The rotors began to spin above his head as the helicopter fired up. He climbed inside the cabin and nodded to the pilot.

  “We will leave…” He checked his gold Rolex watch; “…in exactly seven minutes, unless that woman is found sooner.”

  The pilot nodded, and then went back to carrying out his preflight checks.

  Chapter 18

  Dillon opened his eyes and lay staring at the canopy of vivid green above him. Even though he had only had a few hours of much needed sleep. He felt refreshed and rejuvenated.

  Checking his watch, it was about half an hour to full sunrise. Tatiana, who was just stirring, opened her eyes and saw Dillon looking at her. “What?”

  “Time to leave. That’s what.”

  * * * They had been cruising on the quad-bike for fifteen minutes, heavy tyres thumping over rough tracks and twisting winding trails like the hardiest off-roader. They had passed small herds of deer and seen vistas of heather carpeting vast areas of land.

  Dillon’s gaze, behind his goggles, fixed on the horizon ahead; they were approaching the location of Kirill’s facility as indicated on the map that the Priest had sent to him. He slowed his speed, the stealth engine dying to just above a whisper.

  Dillon rubbed thoughtfully at the stubble on his chin. “What I want to find out is where the hell do the Assassins fit into this puzzle? Where did they come from originally? What is it, which makes them the way they are? And is it Kirill, or someone else, controlling them?”

  Tatiana shrugged. “They are highly trained killers, that’s certain. And I have no doubt whatsoever, that the security services know far more than they’re letting on.”

  “There’s something very wrong here. They just don’t fit into the picture, at all.”

  Tatiana had taken off the black balaclava, was running her hands through her hair, she nodded and said. “Perhaps they were part of the plan; maybe the Assassins - and whoever gives the orders to them - were simply trying to manipulate, youonly. Not kill you, as we’ve been thinking. Perhaps they knew that by pushing the right buttons, you would respond and lead them to Ezra?”

  “Perhaps,” said Dillon bitterly. Then he saw the tears in her eyes. He twisted round on the quad-bikes saddle and gently wiped away a tear from her cheek. “You know, Tats. He could still be alive you know. Nothing is for certain.”

  “I think we’re just kidding ourselves, don’t you?”

  Dillon shrugged, and then said. “Come on, we’re nearly there. We have to focus and I need you one hundred percent with me.”

  “I wish we could have approached this place from the air,” she sighed, glancing up through a seemingly endless valley that stretched out in front of them.
/>
  “Well, it would have been a damn sight quicker to get here, that’s for sure,” grumbled Dillon, kicking the quad into gear and spinning all four tyres on the powerful machine away up the track.

  Five minutes later and as they came to a halt on a high ridge, they had their first sight of Kirill’s facility, or what was exposed of it, from across the valley they had a clear view of the mountain opposite.

  * * *

  “It’s up there.” Dillon pointed. The sun was starting its morning climb up into a foreboding sky, through clouds the colour of coal, heavy and turbulent, with the promise of much rain.

  There was no hint of breeze at ground level, just the cold; but at least is was partly bearable during the day. Dillon ignored the tingling in his finger tips and concentrated on putting the sniper rifle together. The scope clicked into place and Dillon went through the relatively straightforward procedure of sighting it, making a few minor adjustments to the setting dials.

  Tatiana squinted through the gloom. Behind them, hidden under an overhang of rock, sat the quad bike, engine clicking softly.

  “What do you see, Dillon?”

  “From here, I have a clear shot into the helicopter landing areas.” The AMSD OM 50 Nemesis 12.7mm sniper rifle was located on its steadying tripod. Dillon’s hands worked smoothly and efficiently, slotting the large caliber bullets into the magazine. “But, the facility is huge. That much is evident. There’s three Chinooks up there all with their rotors spinning, and I’d say that they were just about to leave. I’m just sweeping the area for any external guards.”

  “You think we’ll be able to get up there?”

  “What I’m thinking Tats, is that I very much doubt if the Chimera Programme is still up there. And, that fortress has been specifically designed to repel all marauders - without exception. That’s what I’m thinking!”

  Dillon slotted the magazine into the weapon and returned his attention to the telescopic sight. Tatiana handed him a small square box that he attached to the side of the scope, which he then checked carefully with the practiced eye of someone who has been around weapons for a long time. “This little gizmo enhances the long range image by cleaning it up and sharpening before it reaches my eye. A bit like a photo-editing programme.”