The bullets tore into arms, legs and chests, but when the second magazine was exhausted, three of the original half dozen or so were still coming at her. When she reached the top of the stairs, she loaded the last magazine, aimed down at the last of them and fired into their heads until they stopped moving.
A cloud of smoke from the pistol surrounded her, and she felt as though her ears were stuffed with cotton from the repeated booming reports in the enclosed room. Peeking over the railing, she saw a line of dead Armenians leading back to the door.
Retreating to the bedroom, she ran to the window and peeked through the curtain at the grounds. “Goddamn it!”
The gunshots had attracted more villagers, who were running through the open gate and into the house. Finigian ran back to the bedroom door, closed it quietly and hit the keypad to lock it. Nothing short of a battering ram would be able to get in now.
The only problem was that she was now trapped in a room surrounded by a town whose inhabitants had apparently gone homicidally crazy. But how? Airborne virus? Contamination through the water system? It’s like a bad movie come to life, she thought, sliding the magazine out of her pistol to check her ammunition. Three bullets left.
Regardless of what was going on here, she had to escape, at least to warn people about what was happening. But how the hell was she going to get out of here?
Creeping back to the door, Finigian put her ear to it and listened. She didn’t hear anything on the other side, but when she tried the door, she also realized she didn’t know the code to open it. Sevan hadn’t trusted her enough to let her know what it was. She knew he had a wall safe next to his bed, but didn’t know how to open it, either. However, there was one other thing she could take from this room. Trotting to the nightstand on Sevan’s side of the bed, she grabbed the bottle of water and drained it. Opening the drawer revealed a stainless-steel dagger with an eight-inch blade in a black leather sheath. Finigian unbuckled her belt, threaded the knife onto it, and arranged it so that it hung at the small of her back.
The curtain blowing near the far window alerted her to the only possible way out. She walked over and pushed it aside, then stepped out onto the roof. The slate tiles were cold on her feet, but that was the least of her worries. In the distance she could hear shouts and screams, along with the occasional gunshot. Without checking the front, since it was probably overrun anyway, she headed to the back of the house, figuring she could climb the fence and get to an alley for cover. She just had to avoid being seen.
Reaching the edge of the roof, she peeked over at the ground, scanning left and right. The whole backyard was clear. It was about ten meters to the fence, and at the rear of the yard was a large flower garden with a small recirculating fountain ringer by large rocks. Sevan said it helped him relax from the stress of the day. What he hadn’t realized was that one of the rocks was tall enough for a person to stand on and probably be able to reach the top of the wall.
Probably...
It was her only chance. Checking both ways once more, Finigian tucked her pistol into her belt, swung her legs over and carefully began lowering herself to the ground. Once she was hanging by her fingertips—still a few feet above the grass—she let go, falling into a shoulder roll as she hit the ground.
Coming up into a crouch, she looked around to see if she had attracted any attention—right as a man walked around the corner, only a couple meters away. She saw him as his head began rising, and pushed off, charging at him as she drew the pistol.
He was already moving forward, as well, opening his mouth to scream when she brought the butt around in a roundhouse shot to his temple. The man collapsed as if poleaxed, limbs twitching as he fell to the ground. She immediately turned and ran for the rock garden as a loud shout pierced the air.
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw two from the other side of the house running at her. Turning back, she found herself at the rock garden and leaped onto the closest ones, scrambling for the tallest rock. She could hear her pursuers closing in, one apparently falling into the pond, judging by the loud splash. Finigian didn’t look, however, she just kept climbing. She had just reached the top of the tall rock when a hand grabbed her ankle, almost making her fall.
Still on her hands and knees, the policewoman put the gun between her legs and fired twice. The pull turned into a deadweight and she had to drop the pistol so she could hang on with both hands. Frantically she kicked the hand off before it dragged her down from the rock. Springing to her feet, she crouched and leaped at the fence wall, putting every bit of remaining strength she had into it.
She sailed through the air and caught the top edge of the wall with her fingertips, the rest of her body slamming painfully into it. She hung on, though, and began hoisting herself up.
Hearing a low growl from behind her, Finigian grabbed on to the iron bars and kept pulling, trying to get a leg up before—
The impact hit her back like a freight train, the villager’s hands grabbing her legs and holding on tight. Finigian was in tremendous shape, but the extra seventy-five kilograms felt as it they were going to tear her arms from their sockets. She could feel the crazed person trying to bite through her pants, pressing the sheath of the dagger there into her back—
The dagger! Knowing she would have only a few seconds to do it, she let go with one hand. Whipping it behind her, she grabbed the dagger handle, drew it and stabbed blindly toward the face of her attacker. She connected once, twice, the blade skittering off a bone, then felt the point pierce skin and sink deep into something before she was released, tearing the knife out of her hand. And just in time, for the remaining arm holding her up had been about to give way. Getting her other hand up there, Finigian slowly pulled herself onto the top of the wall and looked down.
Two villagers were there. One unmoving, with a bloody hole where his eye would normally be, the second thrashing on the ground and making odd gobbling noises, the hilt of the dagger sticking at an odd angle out of his head.
Although exhausted, she knew she couldn’t stay there. Every second in the open risked discovery by more of these—people. Checking the empty street on the other side, she began climbing over the spikes and making her way down to the rough stones.
When her bruised, bloody feet touched down, she looked both ways again and then ran for the nearest alley, trying to watch everywhere at once as she moved deeper into the town now apparently populated by the insane.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Dr. Gerhardt Richter’s cell phone chirped while he was overseeing a CAT scan of one of his latest test subjects. “Dr. Richter, please come to laboratory two immediately. There’s activity at the test site.”
“Gerry, take over here, would you?” Richter strode out of the laboratory, heading next door. He hit the double doors to the lab several meters down the hall and came up behind the video tech, an A/V whiz named Elden Clay, sitting at the bank of flat-screen monitors. “What’s going on?”
“The place is turning into a madhouse. See for yourself.” The drone, a lightweight, jet-black automated model that could be programmed to “fly-and-forget” had been launched and set to loiter by Firke before leaving. It had been transmitting high-definition images from the town via satellite for the past two hours.
Richter watched the devastation slowly take over the town. From isolated incidents—such as what looked to be a hooker killing two men in an alley to entire infected families emerging from their homes to spread the virus to others—the process was swift and exponential. Richter estimated from first contact, more than sixty percent of the population had been either exposed or killed in the first three hours. “I should be there observing this first-hand. Perhaps we can conduct further experiments on an isolated village nearby. I’ll have security conduct some sweeps to locate a likely target. What’s that?”
Richter pointed at one of the main streets. Clay zoomed
in on a black SUV lying on its side in a street in front of the hotel where Firke and his team had spiked the water.
The resolution on the small cameras mounted on the rooftops was clear enough for Richter to notice what looked like dents on part of the car and even a smear of crimson across the chromed letters on the hood. “What caused the damage?”
“That’s even more interesting,” Clay replied, his fingers flying over the keyboard. “Watch monitor two.”
Richter stared at the footage of the Range Rover speeding down the street with villagers running out to attack it, only to be thrown aside. Even so, every one tried to get up and resume their hunt, either limping or even crawling after the SUV or wandering off in a different direction in search of new prey.
“Fascinating,” he said. “We haven’t had the chance to experiment with subjects attempting to perform learned skills yet, although from what we’ve observed, they haven’t proved capable of much beyond relatively mindless destruction. Therefore, I must assume that the driver is uninfected. Apparently they do not need to be within close contact to tell when another person is not infected.”
“Yeah, then watch this.” Clay switched to a new perspective on the street. “This happened while the subjects on the street were trying to attack the vehicle as it was moving.”
Richter watched the man in black on top of the SUV as he moved to the back door, which opened to admit him. “Now who is that? He looks like he would be one of Mr. Firke’s employees. But I’m sure no one was left behind...” Richter paused as a thought struck him. “Perhaps a bodyguard or fellow soldier with the driver?”
“Maybe, although he didn’t seem inclined to want to stop and let him in,” Clay replied. “Plus, the SUV swerves here, and overturns, all without hitting anything, indicating that there may have been a struggle for control right before the crash.”
“Keep an eye on it. It will be interesting to see what reaction the subjects have if there are any survivors inside.”
“Yes, sir.” The long, narrow fingers of one Clay’s hands danced over his keyboard while the other manipulated a trackball with unconscious ease. “Hold on, what’s this?” He glanced at another monitor. “One of the cameras has picked up what sounds like several loud reports. If I had to guess, it seems to be about a kilometer away.”
“Gunfire?” Richter mused. “Maybe police?”
“Could be,” Clay said. “But it seems like the virus hasn’t gotten all of them.”
Richter pulled out his cell phone and speed dialed a number. “Possibly,” he replied as the connection was made. “Mr. Firke?”
“Yes?”
“You are in position?” Richter asked.
“Of course.”
Richter peered at the screen. “The test is well under way.”
“Then why are you calling me?”
“There are pockets of unaffected people still around. I’m just checking to ensure that you are ready to enact the contingency plan once it is activated.”
If the Englishman was annoyed by Richter’s questioning of his ability, it didn’t come through in his tone. “Rest assured everything will be handled as per our employer’s instructions.”
Richter leaned in over the monitor, watching an old man slowly approach the SUV. “Regardless, I want you and your team to remain on standby until I say otherwise. It is imperative that no one leave the area before it is cleansed.”
“Works for me.”
Richter hung up and straightened again, but didn’t take his eyes from the SUV, which was attracting more and more villagers. “Looks like we’re going to find out just how determined they can get. Be sure to get as much footage as you can on this. Notify me if anything else unusual occurs.” His phone vibrated and Richter looked down with distaste at the reminder: Phone conference in 10 minutes.
He stabbed another button. “Prepare backups of all the data we have and send them to headquarters. I’ll be in my office, dealing with lesser minds.”
* * *
DESPITE WHAT APPEARED to be initial success with the field test, Richter’s day went steadily downhill from there.
The preliminary test results on the latest run of the compound they had been using, including the batch that had gone to the Armenian village, revealed adverse affects on the surviving test subjects. The artificial adrenaline had apparently chemically lobotomized more than half of the survivors and Richter wasn’t sure why. Previous tests on their isolated subjects had not produced this result and he couldn’t explain the cause. His initial theory was that perhaps the dose had been too large, despite careful calculations of the proper amount for the village, which had caused overstimulation and damage of the lobes, but it would take more experiments to test and verify it.
But he wouldn’t be able to start that work right now as he was currently participating in a video conference call with the board members of his company, answering pointed questions about what they perceived as his lack of progress. This was the part of his job Richter hated—trying to explain the delicate processes of science to men in suits who were only concerned with the bottom line: how they were going to make money from it. For the thousandth time, he cursed the recent recession that had caused Stengrave to have to sell shares of the company to ensure its survival. Now he was beholden to these men, who didn’t understand anything of what he was trying to accomplish with his research, but were only interested in how they could best profit from it. He took a deep breath and pressed his hands flat on his desk to stop them from shaking before speaking.
“Gentlemen, please let me remind you that perfecting a process like this takes time and resources, and while we have some of each, we do not have unlimited access to both. The effects are not lasting as long as we had hoped. My point is that we have made tremendous strides in synthesizing our artificial adrenaline, but to achieve the results you are demanding will, quite simply, take at least one to three more years of rigorous testing and modification of the existing lines.”
“Doctor, no one here is disputing your tremendous discoveries while working on this project,” the chief executive officer, a forgettable man in a thousand-dollar suit that hid his paunch and with a hundred-dollar haircut over his bland face, said. “However, if we do not have a viable adrenaline serum to begin human tests on within the next six months, I don’t see how we can continue to fund this project. Our research—”
Corporate espionage, Richter thought.
“—shows that several other companies are also developing similar products and, although the current conflicts are still viable, we’re concerned that we will miss our window of opportunity to market the stimulant for greatest effect—”
You mean the greatest profit margin, Richter thought, but only nodded as the man continued. My people are already working fourteen hours a day as it is.
“—so what resources do you need to achieve this proposed timetable?”
Richter sighed. “This is not a matter that money or more personnel can solve. Tailoring a virus to ensure that it has the desired effect without side effects or the possibility of mutation involves painstaking trial and error, not to mention multiple dead ends. It’s like playing a biochemical lottery and trying to select the right numbers to hit the jackpot. Although you could have multiple experiment streams going at the same time, we would have to pull everyone off all of the other projects they’re working on, which, given the secrecy this project has been kept under, poses a risk that we cannot afford to take, particularly in light of the potential profits of the other product revenue streams for the firm.”
As much as he disliked this process, Richter also knew how to choose his words for maximum effect. “I’m afraid, gentlemen, that we simply need more time. You’ve seen the results when the most recent version of the serum was released.”
“Yes, and they’ve been very impressive.” This came fro
m Stengrave, who had been sitting at the end of the table in silence while Richter had sparred with the board members. Now he leaned forward, his deep, quiet voice demanding attention from everyone present. “I’ve been reviewing the doctor’s notes on his trials with great interest, and think that perhaps we may be looking at this from the wrong perspective. What if this tailored virus was marketed as a limited-area effect group pacifier? Destroy an enemy by making them destroy themselves, with little fallout on surrounding groups?”
“That may be fine for areas with a high concentration of blood relations, but what about a disparate group of terrorists, for example?” a board member asked. “You can’t tailor one virus to each separate member of a non-related group.”
“That’s the beauty of it, Mr. Seiver,” Stengrave replied. “If the virus works, any uninfected stand a high chance of being destroyed by the infected—two possible ways that they are removed from the equation. Even the mental effects Dr. Richter claims can be presented as a positive, as anyone who survives is impaired enough to no longer be a threat. Doctor, how much trace evidence is left in the victims afterward?”
Richter blinked at the calm assessment and then found his voice again. “It’s hard to say, since we haven’t run the entire gamut of tests yet. There are no obvious traces of the serum itself, just an abnormal build-up of lactic acid in the muscles after so much activity in so short a time frame and, as mentioned, the mental impairment. I need to do more tests to provide an accurate baseline, but so far physical traces of the ingested drug itself have been minimal at best.”
Stengrave nodded. “There, you see, gentlemen? It’s very possible that the good doctor may have stumbled on the best weapon to eradicate potential enemies of the state. Need to wipe out a terrorist cell? Slip this into their water supply, and they’ll kill themselves for you. Drug or sex smugglers running roughshod over the border? Give them a large cocktail of our special blend, and we could eradicate the fragmented growers, and even the cartels overnight with the right insertions.”
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