“I don’t know,” A board member named Ari Tomas replied. “Given the current administration, I can hardly see the U.S. government going for this.”
Stengrave chuckled. “It doesn’t necessarily have to go straight to the top. I am aware of several black-bag programs at the Pentagon that would find this tailored virus very intriguing. But if they are not interested, we have other customers all over the world who will gladly take advantage of it. I can think of a half dozen who will be very interested in this weapon right now. We can begin recovering our expenses on it immediately, and when the refined version comes out, we’ll simply market that one to the government. We’ll have two revenue streams from one experiment line that could reap millions, even billions of dollars, and it would save lives in the process, since our customers wouldn’t have to send their men in to neutralize enemies, when this would do it for them.”
Richter nodded; the man’s line of reasoning paralleling his own. For this particular experiment, he didn’t care what they did with it, as long as he could sell it as enough of a success so that he could get back to doing what he wanted to be doing: his own experiments into rewriting the genetic code of the human body.
“With all due respect, Chairman, I have serious reservations about this line of procedure.” The new speaker was one of the recently elected board members, Forbes Taney, a younger man with styled, black hair who also wore expensive suits. Richter had pegged him as a relative of one of the major shareholders, so he was surprised to see him taking this adversarial stand. “From what little findings have been made available—” Stengrave stiffened at this, but the other man didn’t seem to notice “—is it true that you’re performing tests on an indigenous population there?”
“Yes, but all test subjects are volunteers who are cared for and well compensated for their time,” Richter lied.
“Including the ones suffering from these mental issues of... and I quote ‘...impaired thinking, judgment and motor skills’? And now you’re actually proposing selling the virus that made them do this as a biological weapon? Not only would that violate several accords of the Geneva Convention, but we also have no indications of the long-term effects of this organism on the test subjects or the environment.”
“Mr....Taney,” Richter said. “We have been careful to select those subjects who do not have family, so any adverse effects will not harm them or potential relatives. Also, there is no danger to the environment, as the virus cannot survive on its own for longer than twenty-four hours. It is a built-in fail-safe that results in the virus killing itself at the end of its allotted lifespan if it has not found a suitable host.”
“Yes, but what about mutation?” the young man asked. “Look at the SARS virus, which leaped to humans. The fact that this is based off a virus present in roughly half of the human population around the world greatly concerns me.”
Tomas didn’t even acknowledge his words with a glance. “You let me worry about those details. We’ve invested a great deal of money, time and effort into creating this on-site facility and it has to produce tangible results. Some of the greatest inventions of mankind have been created accidentally, and this may be one of them. If there is a practical use for what Dr. Richter is working on—one that can save lives while eliminating an enemy—then we should find it.”
Stengrave hadn’t said a word during the exchange, instead just listened to the various members make their points. Now he leaned forward. “Mr. Tomas, Mr. Taney, I want proposals from each of you on the pros and cons of your positions regarding this program. Dr. Richter, continue your tests for now, but be prepared to have your staff evacuated on twenty-four-hour notice.”
“Yes, sir.” Richter kept his eyes on Tomas and wasn’t surprised to see the man move his hand back and forth on the polished tabletop, the gesture clear. Eliminate all potential witnesses. His acknowledging nod was barely perceptible, but the other man replied with a minute nod of his own.
“Gentlemen, if you’ll excuse me, I have much to do here,” Richter said, then signed off.
Even though it was cold in his air-conditioned room, the doctor wiped his forehead and found the back of his hand covered in beads of sweat. And the sooner I can get out of here and back to civilization and my true research, the better, he thought.
He was just about to dive back into the problems with the latest tests when his phone rang. “Yes?”
“Very good, Doctor, you handled them quite well.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“You received the email with the new lines I wish created?”
“Yes, sir, my people are already working on it.” Early that morning, the doctor had gotten a message about beginning to develop large batches of the virus tailored to a fairly specific genome type. “This version has the capacity to impact a sizable portion of the population, sir.”
“Indeed it does, Doctor, indeed it does,” Stengrave replied. “I want reports as to the quantity of the virus created ’round-the-clock.”
“And you will have it, sir.”
“In return, I will keep the board off your back. Just keep on doing what you are doing, Doctor, and I will take care of the rest.”
“Thank you, sir.” Something struck Richter when he hung up the phone. Everything Stengrave had said was supposed to sound reassuring, but somehow it didn’t.
Instead it sounded as though he didn’t care if this product ever made it to the market.
And for some reason Richter found that strangely ominous.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Striker, come in. Striker? Are you all right? Over.”
Bolan regained consciousness to find Akira Tokaido talking urgently in his ear. The soldier was crumpled on the bottom window of the sideways Range Rover, with his legs and feet on top of the rest of his body. Untangling slowly and pulling himself to his feet, he found that his head hurt and his right shoulder was numb from lying on it, but he didn’t think he’d suffered any real damage in the crash.
“Striker here. I’m okay, Akira, just a couple of bruises.”
He heard a relieved sigh on the other end. “About time. I’ve been trying to raise you for five minutes. What happened?”
“I let Sevan drive.” A groan from the front seat alerted Bolan that he wasn’t alone. Pushing himself up, he found the Armenian still buckled into the driver’s seat and clutching his head. He looked around for a weapon, but both pistols had disappeared. He did have a combat blade on him and drew that to put to the other man’s throat.
When he felt the cold steel on his skin again, the Armenian grunted. “Son of a bitch. You really don’t give up, do you? I’d heard Americans are tenacious—almost as tenacious as we are.”
“You got that right,” Bolan replied. “Since you’ve broken our ride out of here, I’ve got to go find another one, but you’re coming with me.”
“Fine, fine, just let me get out of this—” Sevan stopped talking as the Range Rover creaked and shifted a bit. The two men exchanged glances.
“Probably just settling. Let me—” Bolan stopped again as metal creaked again, louder this time and from the back of the SUV.
“That wasn’t settling.” Taking another zip tie from his pocket, Bolan grabbed Sevan’s hand and lashed it to the steering wheel.
“Hey!”
Bolan held a finger to his lips. “Don’t want you going anywhere,” he whispered. “I’ll be back.”
He had just turned to see what was going on at the back door when a blurred shape leaped at him from around the top of the backseat. Bolan was shoved backward, against Sevan’s seat, as a sweating, snarling, spitting, scratching old man tried his best to claw Bolan’s eyes out.
The sideways back passenger seat of an SUV wasn’t the best place for fighting, but Bolan had incapacitated a lot of people in a lot worse places. Sweeping the man’s hooked fing
ers away from his face, he followed up with a ram’s head punch to the man’s chest, just to the right of his breastbone and into the heart. Normally an incapacitating wound, it usually stopped a person in their tracks.
This old man, however, was made of stronger stuff. Even as he gasped for air after the blow had emptied his lungs, he continued trying to get at Bolan, staring at him with red-rimmed eyes while clutching at his arm and snapping his toothless mouth.
“What the hell is going on here?” Bolan drove a short punch into the man’s jaw, making his gums click together as he dropped, unconscious, to the bottom of the compartment.
“Do you have everyone in town on your payroll?” Bolan asked.
The mob leader looked down at the old man in surprise. “Hardly. That was Hanes Palatian, the town butcher. I hope you are satisfied, American. You just assaulted an innocent citizen of Armenia. I will be happy to let your superiors know about this once we get to wherever you think you are taking me.”
“Apparently you weren’t watching the same fight I was. He came at me first, or did you conveniently miss that?” Bolan asked. “We’re leaving.”
He reached over and cut the man loose. “Follow me, and don’t get any stupid ideas.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.” Rubbing his wrist, the Armenian stayed behind Bolan as he climbed over the body and headed for the rear of the Range Rover. Through the open back door he could see people moving around farther up the street, but there was no crowd gathered as there normally would be at the scene of an accident. Bolan also couldn’t see any police on the scene, which made him frown. What was going on here?
The moment he appeared at the back of the SUV, however, Bolan attracted a lot of attention. Practically everyone on the street looked at him at the exact same time, making him think he’d stumbled onto a wolf pack in human form.
“Hello, is there a—” Bolan began to say as everyone began to move toward him. But they weren’t approaching in any way that looked helpful. Instead they ran at him with outstretched arms, faces twisted in snarls of rage. As they got closer, he saw that they looked like the old man, with sweat running down their faces and red-rimmed eyes glaring at him.
Grabbing the handle of the back door, Bolan pulled it shut, just as the first of his attackers, a teenage girl, slammed into it and bounced off. She was followed by two more, each of whom hit and spun away.
“What is happening? What’s going on out there?” Sevan asked.
“I’ve seen people act like this before, but I doubt it’s the same thing. Your fellow villagers are under the influence of something,” Bolan said.
By now a small group had clustered around the back of the Range Rover. Most of them were just screaming and pounding on the glass, but a clever one had found the back door handle and was trying to pull it open. Bolan held it closed, but the one pulling on the door was joined by another, both yanking on the handle with all their might.
“Akira, lock the doors!” Bolan snapped as he held the door closed with everything he had.
“I can’t, Striker, I lost my connection to the vehicle!” Tokaido replied.
“Well, get it back!” Bolan ordered as he looked at his prisoner. “Sevan, get up front and lock the doors before they find another way in!”
The normally unflappable mobster actually seemed taken aback by what was happening outside. “All...all right.” Slipping past the rear passenger seat, he was able to reach the driver’s seat just as the SUV rocked back and forth and Bolan heard footsteps overhead.
“Hurry up, one’s on top of us!”
Sevan stabbed at the lock button just as a hand scrabbled at the top rear door and pulled on it. When it didn’t budge, the crazed man let out a howl of rage and began slamming his head and hands into the bulletproof glass over and over.
“What is happening here?” Sevan shouted.
“You tell me— These are your people!” Bolan yelled back. “What could have affected all of them like this?”
“I have no idea!” Sevan replied. “For all I know, it was something you did!”
Bolan eyed the crazed mob beating on the windows of the SUV. There were so many of them here now that he couldn’t see the street. “I get in, I get you, I get out.”
“Yes, and that’s gone exactly as you’d planned so far, hasn’t it?” Sevan asked.
“I wasn’t doing too bad until your crazed mob came after us,” Bolan told him. “We’ll figure out what happened later. Right now we have to figure out a way out of here.”
“Striker, what the hell is going on over there?” Tokaido asked through his earpiece.
“I’m not sure,” Bolan replied. “My first instinct is that some kind of mind-altering chemical has been introduced to the population. I can’t think of any other explanation for such homicidal mania occurring so quickly in such a concentrated area.”
“Are you saying that someone used a bioweapon?”
“Based on the evidence, it’s the hypothesis that fits best so far,” Bolan replied.
“What can I do to help?” Tokaido asked.
“Right now, inform the bosses. If I’m right, we’re going to need to bring in specialists to get a handle on this. Also, get Bear and the two of you go over all the footage from the past twenty-four to forty-eight hours. Find anything out of the ordinary, or whatever you can about how whatever this is began so we can figure out a way to stop it.”
“What about notifying the Armenian police or maybe the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control?” the hacker asked.
“Good thought that it might be a disease, but we can’t contact them until I’m out of here. I don’t want to be caught in a quarantine or detained for questioning,” Bolan said. “Someone set this chaos in motion, and I want to find whoever’s behind it. Any questions?”
“Hey, I’m with you, but if this is a disease, shouldn’t we be concerned about either or both of you already being infected?”
Tokaido’s question brought Bolan up short and he glanced at Sevan, who was staring at the frenzied mob outside the SUV.
“I mean, if you don’t get help from somewhere pretty soon, they might get there to find your dead body.”
The SUV was starting to rock back and forth from the constant pounding. “I think you’ve been spending too much time with Bear,” Bolan said. “There’s always a way out of these situations.”
“If you say so,” Tokaido replied. “But you know if Bear feels differently about this, which I bet he will, you might be out of luck. At least let me contact Jack. Having someone closer on-site might be able to help with your exit strategy.”
“Negative. I want him on the plane, ready to go the second we reach the tarmac,” Bolan replied. “If he comes in and gets wounded or taken, then that’s one more variable I’d have to deal with, and this mission is already so beyond FUBAR I’m not sure what to classify it as anymore. Radio in when you’ve got something for me, otherwise I’ll call once we’re out of the SUV.”
“Got it...and good luck, Striker. I’ll be in touch the second we find anything. You be sure to call in when you’ve reached safety, okay?”
“I will. And don’t worry—I’ve been in tougher spots than this. Striker out.”
“You have?” Sevan eyed the crowd of sweating, wild-eyed people hammering on the windows. “When?”
Bolan looked around at the sea of manic faces filling every window, scrabbling at the glass with their fingernails and teeth. “A while back, on a beautiful island.” Searching himself for usable equipment, he came up with a knife and the tranquilizer gun.
“What is that?” Sevan asked.
“Trank gun,” Bolan replied. “What I used to get past your dogs.”
“Great! I’ll open the door and you start shooting them.” The mobster reached for the front passenger door, but Bolan grabb
ed him before he could pull the handle.
“The only thing it’ll do here is guarantee us a quick death,” he said. “It’s aerosol, not darts. Besides, even if I did try to spray them, there’s a good chance we’d inhale some, too, so that won’t work. What does this thing have for equipment?”
“How the hell should I know?” Sevan said as he looked around. “I just get chauffeured around in it.”
“Great...watch him.” Bolan pointed at the old man as he moved to the back of the Range Rover and pulled the rubber protection mat off the cargo area floor. Underneath was a large hatch, which he opened to reveal a collapsible jack and handle and a small plug that, when pulled up, revealed a large nut.
“Hey, I found a flashlight on the door.” Sevan held up a sleek black 3-cell flashlight. “Now I have a club at least.”
“Great.” Bolan was reading a sheet of paper that gave him instructions for releasing the spare tire underneath the SUV. “Well, that’s fairly useless.”
“Why don’t you use your knife to cut up that mat you’re holding and the ones in the foot wells to cover yourself in rubber using the zip ties? It might keep them off you long enough to get away.”
Bolan blinked and turned to look at the other man, who stared back at him with an equally serious expression. “You weren’t kidding about that, were you?”
“Absolutely not. We often had to improvise using whatever we had around here when I was growing up.” Sevan shrugged. “It was just a thought.”
Bolan picked up the mat again and studied it. “Too thick to really be of any help. It would slow me down more than anything. Good thought, though.”
“So, do we open a door and come out swinging?” Sevan asked.
“Not just yet,” Bolan replied, although he was currently stuck as to exactly what to do. Over, under, around or through was typically one of the four basic solutions to obstacles in the military, however, each choice here was unfeasible for one or more reasons.
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