Ellie felt like a fraud as she added her dirt to Patrick’s. She had hardly known Hank, having made little effort during their journey. She’d been grateful for his calming effect on Max, but she knew almost nothing about him despite spending a couple of weeks together. “He was a good man,” she said. She remembered her promise and wondered whether she could possibly keep it. She could only do her best. So, she told him that.
She had barely noticed, but she’d started crying and, as Hank disappeared beneath the earth, her shoulders heaved and she got onto her haunches, her face buried in her hands.
She was grieving for the man whose life story had come to an end so abruptly. She was racked with guilt because it was a life story she knew nothing of. And, beneath all of that, she felt a rage smoldering. Rage, not just against their captor who stood stony-faced with Max at his feet, but also against a world that was entirely unrecognizable from just a few weeks ago. She hadn’t even thought about calling the police, even though there was a police department in Oklahoma City. She’d been exposed to the corruption behind the current city leadership and knew there was no hope of justice there. So, she would have to take care of it herself.
They spent an uncomfortable night, hands bound by cable-ties, watched by Jager who showed no signs of the exhaustion that Ellie herself felt.
The next day, they were on I-40 heading west for Amarillo before the long journey north toward Denver and away from the straight road to Maria.
#
Helmut Jager sat beside a rock, keeping his eyes on the Prius as dawn rose over a landscape of browns and greens, punctuated by scrubby bushes and trees hugging the ground as if to keep out of the chill wind.
“I have woken you? Gut,” he said, smiling into his satellite phone.
The voice on the other end of the line was tired and tetchy. “What do you want, Helmut? You are expected later today, are you not?”
“Ja.”
“Then why do you wake me?”
Helmut chuckled quietly. He liked Frederick Rath well enough, but he was as soft as a goose-feather comforter. “Because I wish to speak in private before we arrive. My captives are asleep, I believe, and so is Professor Lundberg, I suspect. Is this line secure?”
“Supposedly, but I cannot be certain. But, then, our security man is off on a mission to the south, so how would I know?”
Rath’s sarcasm amused Helmut. He liked to think that security fell apart when he was on a mission, but he knew better than that. After all, he had ambitious subordinates.
“You received my report?”
“Ja.”
“It is unfortunate that one of my targets was lost.”
“Und a matter of personal regret I am sure.”
“Perhaps,” Jager said, though in truth, Hank’s death had been more a loss of professional pride than anything. “However, I believe he had no intelligence not also possessed by the others. I am confident that the location revealed by the woman is accurate. She seems to have no love for Baxter and her location correlates with our original triangulation.”
“The boy?”
“Der Junge? He seems to be…how would you say? Katatonisch?”
“Catatonic.”
“Ja. But I do not have the means to interrogate properly until I return. I am certain that he hacked into our systems and it was this that confused us. What he learned, I do not know.”
“Little, I hope. For his sake.”
Helmut grunted acknowledgement. “My recommendations? In the report.”
“Lundberg tells me that she will await your return.”
“And I will lead the extraction team to retrieve Baxter?”
There was a pause.
“Frederick?” Jager said, confused. Had someone else been promoted in his absence? If so, they would pay.”
“I had hoped to deal with this on your return,” Rath said.
“Deal with what?”
There was an audible sigh. “Nein. You will not lead the extraction team. It will not be necessary.”
“Why?” Helmut hissed.
“Because, my friend, Baxter has been apprehended. Our…friends in the federal government found him before we did. I suggest you make haste to return or, I fear, your entire mission will have been wasted.”
Chapter 19
Rath
“Ellie!”
She turned, loosening the grip of the guard leading her, and saw Patrick straining against his own captor.
“Thank God you’re alright!”
She smiled, wondering how many times he’d thought of her while lying on the floor of the converted office that had been his prison cell.
To her surprise, the guards allowed them to get close and, finally, to touch. They’d been at the Denver headquarters of SaPIEnT for two full days now, and she’d seen and heard nothing of her companions in that time. She’d been fed and allowed to use the bathroom, but their guards had remained silent. Almost as silent as Jager on the long drive here. He’d handcuffed Ellie and Patrick together on the back seat, and set Max in the front, cuffed to the door.
“Have you seen Max?” Patrick asked.
She shook her head. Max was the reason they were here, after all, and she wondered if he’d spent the whole of the intervening time being questioned.
“Move along,” the guard behind her said.
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
They had no option other than to keep walking along the squeaky, polished floor. They soon entered parts of the building that were more familiar as offices and laboratories, with lab-coated scientists scuttling out of the way when they heard the heavy, echoing boots of the guards.
Finally, they stopped outside a door and one of the guards knocked.
The door opened and Ellie followed Patrick inside. The room was empty except for a desk, behind which sat a tall, thin man in a gray suit.
“Please, sit. My name is Doctor Frederick Rath and you are Ellen Fischer and, of course, the famous Patrick Reid.”
Ellie glanced at Patrick, who sat stony faced and unresponsive, rubbing at his black eye.
“That’s us. Now, by what authority are you holding us?”
“You stole from us, and we have the right to conduct a thorough investigation.”
“By abducting us?”
Rath looked up at the ceiling and then focused on her. “These are unique times, Ms. Fischer. We are compelled to, as you would say, take the law into our own hands.”
“Yeah, well, your hired thug killed our friend,” Patrick spat.
Rath’s eyes flicked to Reid. “That was regrettable.”
“Damn right. Will he face justice?”
Ellie could see the answer in Rath’s face.
“I have not brought you here to discuss the merits of our actions, but to offer you an opportunity to help.”
“Help you? Why would we do that?”
“Because unless you do, your young friend is likely to find himself facing some very unpleasant questioning.”
“Where is Max?” Patrick asked.
Rath again directed his attention at the actor. “He is nearby. But he has not been cooperative.”
“Good on him.”
Shaking his head, Rath said quietly, “No, it is not good. Not for him, not for you, not for us.”
Rath sighed and leaned back in his chair, running his hand over his forehead. “Look, I take no pleasure in the boy’s distress, but he must answer our questions or I will be forced to administer chemicals. I do not wish to do that.”
She looked into his eyes, and saw regret there. He looked so sad, she almost felt that he was as trapped as she was. Almost.
“What do you need to know?”
Rath blinked, as if surprised. “We simply want to know what he knows.”
“But you’ve got the laptop!”
“Yes, and we can see that he has accessed our servers illegally, posing a threat to us. That would be problematic enough, but there is a fold
er on the laptop that he has encrypted. We need to know what it contains.”
Ellie glanced across at Patrick, who was maintaining his poker face and didn’t return her gaze. “How do you know it’s anything to do with you?”
“Because the folder’s name is Buzz Research. Buzz is, I understand, the familiar name used by Doctor Baxter. We wish to access that research. We need to access it.”
Suddenly, like a mannequin coming to life, Patrick stirred. “If we get him to open up the folder, will you let him go?”
Rath turned back to Reid. “I will do my best to ensure his continued safety.”
“Not good enough, dammit!” Reid snapped, banging the table with his fists. “He’s a kid!”
“Who broke into our systems and retrieved valuable data. In normal times this would be enough to ensure a lengthy prison term.”
Reid leaned forward and jabbed a finger at Rath. “These are not normal times, as you’ve already told us. Now, you strike me as a man of integrity and I need your word that you will not allow a young man to come to harm once you have obtained the data from that folder. Do I have your word?”
Rath looked into Reid’s eyes, and Ellie had the sense that he was making a calculation. Finally, he nodded. “Ja. You have my word.”
They found Max lying on the floor of the tiny room that had obviously been his prison. The room stank of urine, and Patrick strode immediately over to the corner and picked up the bucket before handing it to one of the guards waiting outside.
Ellie watched as he kneeled beside the boy who was rolled up in the fetal position on a makeshift mattress made up of pieces of foam packaging. “Max? It’s Patrick.”
Patrick gently prized Max’s arm down from over his head, but the boy remained rigid and otherwise unresponsive.
“Max. Would you like something to eat? Something to drink?”
No response. Ellie wondered at the gentle patience in Patrick she’d never imagined existed.
He looked back at her and held out his hand. “I’ve got some Mountain Dew.”
Nothing.
“Come on, son. You must be thirsty. Just have a little drink. It’s just us here.”
Nothing.
“Well, if you’re not going to have it, I will,” Ellie said, taking the bottle and beginning to unscrew the lid.
Patrick snapped around. “Ellie!”
“Pitch black?” Max asked in a whisper.
“What?”
“Is it Mountain Dew, Pitch Black?”
Ellie looked at the label. “Yes, it is. Looks delicious.”
In one move, Max sat up and put his hand out. Ellie gave it to him and smirked at the open-mouthed Patrick.
They watched as Max gulped down the drink and then burped. When he’d finished, he sat back against the wall and looked at first one, then the other. “I miss Hank,” he said, before collapsing into uncontrollable sobs.
#
Frederick Rath leaned forward and turned the laptop around to face Elsa Lundberg, who sat in his chair behind his desk.
She looked at it briefly, before glancing at Rath and then the man sitting beside him. “I don’t have time to go through this, Rath. What is your report? Was it worth abducting three people and killing another for?”
Rath put a hand up to stop Helmut Jager speaking. Things were already bad enough without making them worse. “It contains files relating to a series of experiments conducted by Baxter.”
“To what end?” Lundberg responded, unable to hide her eagerness.
“He has been attempting to design a new organism, one that will outcompete ours.”
She banged the desk. “I knew it! To what purpose?”
Rath rubbed his jaw. “It is impossible to know for sure. We have here merely the results.”
“Don’t be a fool, Rath. You are the foremost expert in this field, or so you tell me. I cannot believe that you have no opinion on a series of experiments run by one of your juniors.”
The more time he spent in this woman’s company, the more he hated her. To be honest, he hadn’t spent much time in the company of many women, but he’d never met one like her. She was the most ambitious, power-hungry person he’d ever met outside of the upper circles of politics. She made Angela Merkel seem like Shirley Temple.
“As we suspected, he is working on a strain that will neutralize ours, but I believe he is not only looking to eliminate the original xenobot, but to replace it with one that will raise the melting point of ice.”
She looked triumphant, and it was all Rath could do to stop himself ordering Jager to break her neck there and then. No, that wasn’t true. He wished he were that ruthless, but if he had been, he’d be sitting where she was.
“I thought so!”
“But I do not believe he is close to finalizing his design,” Rath added, quickly.
Her eyebrows disappeared into her forehead. “Oh, really? Is that so?”
He didn’t like the way she said that. Not at all.
“Perhaps, then, you can explain why our contact in Hazelton tells me that the president is heading this way with our friend Doctor Baxter? “
“What?”
“Oh yes. She will arrive in the morning.”
“She’s coming here?” Rath felt as though the blood were draining from his body, sending him rigid.
Lundberg smiled like a cat toying with a mouse, poised to deliver the coup de grâce. “Indeed, it seems she wishes to use our delivery mechanism. She has a Minotaur ready to go and all it needs is Baxter’s payload and our cooperation.”
“What will you do?”
“Why, Professor Rath, I will help. I am a naturalized American, after all.”
“You’ll allow Baxter’s strain to be delivered?”
“Don’t be a fool!” she snapped. “For his plan to work, the new strain must be introduced at the magnetic South Pole, inducing a wave of reforming ice to replace the original ice sheet. We cannot permit that, as you well know. So, I’m afraid, the president’s rocket is going to meet with a mishap. Either that, or the delivery vial will fail. Which of those happens, I leave up to you. But you will ensure that I have control.”
“Me?” He was shaking now, as he saw, in his mind’s eye, how he was being lined up for the fall.
“Yes. This is your mess; you sort it out. You know the penalty for failure.”
His jaw dropped, but no words came out.
“And talking of mess,” she added, turning to Jager. “It is time to clean up yours. The three people you abducted know too much of our business. Dispose of them.”
Helmut Jager held her gaze for a moment. “Are you serious?”
“How long have we known each other, Helmut?”
He shrugged. “Five years.”
“And have you ever known me to joke about killing someone?”
“Nein.”
“Then do it. You know what is at stake here. Our…miscalculation has presented an opportunity for our partners. An opportunity to salvage something from utter catastrophe. If the president’s plan succeeds, then we return to the beginning with nothing to show for this disaster. And our partners will not be pleased. That is something none of us wishes—is this not correct?”
For a moment, Rath thought he might defy her but Helmut simply nodded. Rath couldn’t blame him. He’d imagined the powers that backed SaPIEnT had been destroyed, or at least subdued, by the deluge they had played their accidental part in unleashing. But no, like cockroaches they had crept out into the sunlight and proceeded to find a way to turn the situation to their advantage.
Millions of acres of prime oil fields were now underwater around the world.
But millions more had been opened up. Antarctica was now free of ice and the first test drills had already produced oil. One thing a recovering world needed above all else was energy, and no substance was easier to convert to energy than crude oil. Oil was power. Oil was wealth. Oil was control. Far from being a fuel of the past, it was the key to the future. No one,
not even the president of the United States, could be allowed to get in the way.
“You have your assignments,” Lundberg was saying. “Do not fail me, either of you. The future is made by moments like this, my friends.”
She got up, forced a smile that wasn’t reflected in her eyes, and left the room. Rath exhaled heavily and slumped into the leather chair, a little surprised by the warmth left behind by Lundberg’s backside—he’d have bet she was coldblooded.
“What do we do about this, my friend?”
Helmut shrugged. “We do our jobs.”
“Seriously? You are just following orders, is that it? Some of our ancestors used that excuse for the inexcusable. Are we to commit the same crime?”
“It is above—how do the Americans say it?—ah, yes: it is above my pay grade. I do not pretend to understand everything. That is why I am a security agent, and she is the chief of SaPIEnT.” He absentmindedly began scribbling on a piece of scrap paper on Rath’s desk.
“Helmut, pay attention!” Rath said, leaning forward and snatching the scrap away. “And don’t play dumb with me. You are no fool. And you know right from wrong.” He unfolded the paper. It said, in a hurried scribble: Sie hört zu. Überall.
Rath scanned the entire office, looking for bugs. “She is listening. Everywhere.”
Helmut got to his feet, the chair scraping across the floor. “I have business to take care of. You also, I think. If you need my help, you know where to find me.”
Rath watched Helmut leave. The big man had been a rock since they’d met when both joined Lundberg’s entourage. He wondered whether Jager would have signed up if he’d known where it would lead him. Rath himself was childless, but Jager had kids back in Hamburg, which would now be under three hundred yards of water. Rath had seen no recognizable change in his friend since then, but he must have been affected. Unless he was suppressing his grief while he had a job to do. What would happen when it caught up with him? Rath didn’t know, but he suspected he would be of little help when it did. There was no drug to administer, no hope to offer, no comfort to give.
Survivors: Deluge Book 3: (A Thrilling Post-Apocalyptic Survival Story) Page 16