He finished the final stroke, and his finger hovered over the Enter key. He closed his eyes and let his finger fall. The countdown on the screen began to tick away the seconds. When the time reached zero, the facility’s fail-safe system would be activated—a small thermonuclear device designed to annihilate their creation if the creature were to become compromised in some way.
He found it strange that he wasn’t more frightened by his approaching death. He no longer cared about his own life. While he had sat alone in his cell, he had had ample opportunity to look back on his life and the choices that he had made along the way. He now knew that his involvement with Manifold Genetics, and in turn, this project were mistakes so large that they exceeded his ability to ever rectify them. He had been blinded by his own ego, among other things: breaking new ground in science, ushering the world into a new era, leaving behind a legacy, fortune and glory. The road to hell truly was paved with good intentions. His vision for the future had been corrupted, and now the greatest thing he could hope to accomplish with the last moments of his life was to undo all that he had done.
He closed his eyes and felt great satisfaction that within a short time everything would be set right. He had been unable to bypass the fail-safe’s countdown and detonate it instantly, but he had succeeded in disabling all of the system’s announcements and notifications. He had also disabled the de-activation mechanism. Unless Cho specifically checked, the man would never know that his death was approaching until it was upon him. And even if he did discover that the fail-safe had been activated, Cho wouldn’t have time to crack in and stop the detonation.
Salvatori pushed away from the desk and exited what was once his lab. He moved down a long, white hallway toward the bunker’s exit. He had one item left to accomplish, and then his victory would be complete. Cho had a personal transport, a specially modified Sikorsky S-92 helicopter, located on the roof of the adjoining building. He needed to disable the helicopter to ensure that Cho couldn’t escape with his research if he learned of the bomb’s activation.
Salvatori was only a few feet from the exit when Cho stepped around the corner from one of the adjoining hallways. Cho held a Norinco QSZ-92 semi-automatic service pistol in his left hand. The weapon was leveled at Salvatori’s chest. A wide grin cut across the maniacal young man’s face. The whites of his eyes were blood red. His breathing was fast and erratic.
“I’m proud of you, old man,” Cho said. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”
“You’d be surprised how much fight is left in this old dog,” Salvarori said, thinking of the countdown ticking down even as they spoke.
Cho issued a high-pitched chuckle. When he spoke, his words came out slurred. “It doesn’t matter now, anyway. You see, I went to retrieve you from your cell, because I want you to bear witness to my ascension.”
“What are you talking about? You’ve lost your mind.”
“Come, come, come. I’ll show you.” Cho gestured toward his lab with the gun. “I’ve done it, old friend. I’ve cracked the code to immortality. You’re going to watch me become a god, and then you’re going to die.”
25.
With the can of JP-8 jet fuel in his left hand, the FS2000 in his right and a couple of tools in his pockets, Knight ran in the direction of the abandoned car. He could feel the beast’s eyes on him. The sound of movement registered high above on his left, but he didn’t turn.
Then a thunderclap sounded on the pavement behind him, and his legs trembled from the sudden shockwave. The beast roared at his back. But still, he willed himself not to turn around. Not yet.
He pressed forward as fast as his legs would carry him, his own footfalls being drowned out by the heavy tread of the beast.
His heart throbbed against the walls of his ribcage, and his lungs burned with fire.
The pounding of the beast grew closer and closer—nearly on top of him.
He could see the creature from his peripheral vision in the reflections on the glass fronts of the surrounding buildings. When the distance was just right, he spun around and tossed the can of jet fuel into the air above the creature.
Simultaneously, he squeezed back on the trigger of the FS2000 and unleashed a barrage of 5.56mm rounds into the sailing can. He knew that despite what was shown in the movies, bullets didn’t spark and ignite fuel. Instead, the can filled with holes, and its contents rained down on the beast.
It paid no attention to the attack and continued its loping charge.
Knight stood his ground, staring directly into the reptilian, yet oddly human eyes.
Then, at the last possible second, he dove to the side and rolled away.
The creature’s momentum carried it forward past the spot he had just occupied. He shot to his feet and pulled out the flare gun he had retrieved from the Osprey’s cockpit.
The beast shrieked and wheeled around.
Knight sighted in and fired.
The fiery projectile rocketed forward and struck the beast squarely in its chest. In a brilliant explosion of flame, the jet fuel covering the creature’s body ignited.
The beast howled out a cry of agony the likes of which Knight had never heard before. Although its wounds were healing, it still couldn’t extinguish the accelerant-fueled flames, and the fire was consuming its flesh as fast it could regenerate. It thrashed wildly around the street, slamming into the buildings and smashing through the glass facades. Then it sprinted away, its prey apparently forgotten.
Knight had no idea how long the fire would keep the creature distracted, so he didn’t waste a moment of time. He discarded the flare gun and rushed toward the abandoned vehicle.
The car, a new model Hyundai Elantra, had been tirelocked, most likely by one of the city’s few law enforcement officers who had nothing better to do before being evacuated. He checked the driver’s side door. The first rule of breaking and entering was to always check to make sure that the door wasn’t already open. In this case, it was locked, so he used the butt of the FS2000 to break in the window. The hood release sat to the left of the steering column just under the kick panel. He pulled the release and moved to the front of the vehicle.
He fumbled a bit to open the hood and found much of the engine hidden beneath by a black engine cover. But he’d come prepared. Using a ratchet, he quickly removed the cover and tossed it to the side along with the bolts. With the battery exposed, he went to work with a wrench, loosening the retaining bolts and pulling the cables free from the positive and negative terminals. With everything loosened, he reached in and took hold of the battery.
His heart was throbbing so loudly in his ears that he mistook the sound for the heavy footfalls of the creature. A part of his mind kept picturing the beast closing in on him, its talons extending toward him, its razor sharp teeth ready to tear into his flesh.
Then it was over, and he had the battery cradled under his left arm. The whole process took nearly two minutes, but the threat of being torn apart made it feel like hours. It was Hyundai’s own brand of battery that probably came with the car, and he prayed that it still held enough juice to detonate the warhead.
He sprinted toward the site of the downed Osprey. He didn’t know how long the beast would be occupied by his fiery distraction, but he hoped it would buy him enough time to reach the others and set the trap. Because either way, he knew that the next time he saw the creature, one of them wouldn’t make it out alive.
26.
Phillip Cho punched a key on his keyboard, and a three dimensional molecular model of the newest generation of his serum appeared on the seventy-inch display mounted on the wall. He pointed toward the screen and said, “Behold, the key to immortality.”
Out of curiosity, Salvatori moved forward and studied Cho’s work. After a moment, he laughed.
Cho’s face was a mask of confusion and disgust. “What’s so funny?”
“This serum won’t work. In fact, it’s likely to kill anyone foolish enough to attempt its use. I see what you were tryi
ng to do, Phillip. You hoped to stop the onset of adverse effects by reducing the replication rate of the circovirus and the manner in which it inserts the foreign genetic material. But all this will accomplish is a more drawn out and painful transformation. Plus, you’ve inadvertently removed the restriction placed upon the virus’s incubation period. We engineered the virus so it would die off once the transformation was complete. But with this, the virus will not stop. It will continue to spread, and the subject will continue to change and grow, likely to the point that the circovirus destroys the poor creature from the inside out. Or worse. I wouldn’t even dare to predict the effects that something like this would have upon a living host.”
Cho stood there for a moment. The confusion etched onto his features. His eyes darted between the display and Salvatori. Then the look on his face turned from confusion to anger, and he slapped Salvatori hard across the jaw. The old man cried out and toppled backward to the lab floor.
“You’re lying!” Cho screamed. “You’re just trying to trick me. And I won’t let you stand between me and my rightful destiny. Nothing will stand in my way!”
Salvatori could see that Cho was beyond rational thought, and nothing he could say would convince the man that what he was attempting was insane. Salvatori used the corner of one of the workstations to pull himself up and said, “Fine, Phillip. Test out your serum. I’d prefer it if you killed yourself anyway.”
Cho’s mouth curled into a snarl, and he shook with rage. “How about I kill you first?”
Salvatori watched the pistol buck in Cho’s hand and a line of flame shoot from the gun’s barrel. It took him a moment to register that Cho had just fired the weapon. It took another moment to feel the pain in his abdomen.
He suddenly felt light-headed. He touched a hand to his side. It came back smeared with red. He reached out to grab the table, but he missed and crumpled to the floor.
Cho smiled down at him. “Don’t feel bad, old friend. We can’t all live forever.”
From his place on the floor, Salvatori watched as Cho retrieved a syringe from the table. “Here’s to immortality.” Cho plunged the needle into his arm and pushed the amber-colored liquid into his body.
Cho stood absolutely still for a moment. Then he said, “I can feel it. I can feel myself changing! It’s working!” The look on the younger man’s face was euphoric at first. He laughed uncontrollably and spun round in a little circle.
But then his limbs started to shake. His arms clutched around his abdomen, and he doubled over. “No. What’s happening?”
Using the distraction to his advantage, Salvatori dragged himself across the tile floor toward the exit. At his back, Cho began to scream. There were no words that he could understand. It was a feral howl of agony spoken in the language of pain. He refused to look back. He focused on the door ahead, and within a moment, he was in the hallway.
The screaming continued within the lab along with the sounds of shattering glass and breaking equipment. The change would be slow and terrible. He pitied the man, but he had tried to warn him. Although many would say that Cho had gotten what he deserved, Salvatori knew that no man or beast should ever to have to die like that.
27.
The pain had become its world, agony extinguishing all thought and drenching its mind in chaos. It fought against the madness and searched for a way to make the pain stop. It shrieked out for help. It slammed against walls and rolled on the ground, but nothing seemed to break the hold that the agony had upon it.
Its vision came and went, giving it only scattered, incoherent glimpses of its surroundings. It could feel the eyes melting within its skull and then reforming. It would be granted a second’s worth of sight, and then the darkness came again. Then the process repeated itself over and over.
But then, through the flames, it saw something ahead. A dock. A lake. Water.
It charged blindly forward until it felt the ground disappear beneath its feet. Then the cool water washed over it, extinguishing the flames. Relief flooded its mind along with other strange emotions that it could not fully comprehend. It allowed itself to sink slowly below the waves and into the depths of the lake.
After a moment, its lungs cried out for air, but it didn’t want to leave the soothing cocoon that had rescued it from the pain. It fought against the urge to breathe for a few moments longer but then acquiesced, and its gigantic limbs clawed for the shore. It grabbed hold of one of the dock’s wooden support pillars. Talons dug into the wood, and hand over hand, it hauled itself onto the dock’s surface.
It laid there for a moment on its back. Wispy clouds shifted through a light blue sky. They masked the sun, but it could see the light from the giant star illuminating the edges of one section of the canopy.
A flash of memory shot before its eyes, and it realized why the small thing it had been had volunteered to become something more. It remembered the fire now. It remembered burning. It remembered the immense pain. But it wasn’t a memory from this life. It was from a time when its flesh didn’t grow back, a life where it had a wife and a little boy. It caught a glimpse of their faces with surprising clarity. It fought to remember their names, but the effort made the memory of their faces fade away.
It knew that they had died somehow but couldn’t recall the details. The emotions surrounding their deaths were still intact, however, especially the guilt. It realized that it was to blame for their deaths. Its flesh had been badly scarred, and it had spent a long time in some sort of hospital.
Gradually, the memories dissolved back into some inaccessible part of its mind. It fought for them. It closed its eyes and tried to remember the little boy and the woman. But they were gone. And all that remained was the objective, piercing its consciousness like a thorn.
It knew then that it couldn’t change the past or what it had become. All it could do was complete the mission. Or perhaps the small things would finally succeed in killing it. A part of it, the part that remembered, hoped for death and a release to the pain that had become its life.
28.
Knight scanned the streets surrounding the parking structure. The beast couldn’t be far behind. He had returned with the battery a few moments ago, and Donahue had quickly set to work in preparing the bomb. He just hoped that they would be able to draw in the creature and contain it long enough to detonate the warhead.
He reached for the radio, clicked on the receiver and said, “Ling?”
A frightened voice replied in a flurry of words. “We’re here. Can we leave now? Are you coming to get us?”
“We’re almost ready, Ling. We’ve got a plan to kill the monster. Just stay where you. This nightmare is about over.”
“Okay, Knight. Please hurry.”
“I’m on it, kid. See you soon.”
The children were understandably frightened, but they had also showed a great deal of strength and fortitude from the first moment that he met them. He felt a strange sense of pride even though he could take no responsibility for instilling such strength in them. He suspected this might be what it felt like to be a parent. He had never wanted kids; they weren’t compatible with his lifestyle. But for perhaps the first real time in his life, he wondered if he was missing out on something by not settling down and having children of his own.
“Knight, come over here,” Donahue said at his back. He gave the perimeter one last check and then joined the SAS officer next to the downed Osprey.
“I got the hot dogs and marshmallows all set. You ready to light the fire?” Knight said.
Donahue nodded. “Aye, we’re ready to deep fry that big iguana, but we’ve got two problems. One, I have no bloody clue of how we’re going to keep big ugly in range of the bomb long enough. It needs to be contained right here at ground zero. We can’t take a chance of the blast wave blowing it clear and having it regenerate on us.”
Knight thought for a moment and then said, “Leave that to me. I’ll keep him pinned here. What’s problem number two?”
Don
ahue smiled, but it wasn’t an expression born of joy or humor. It was the type of smile that a person would display at a funeral to the grieving widow. “The detonation mechanism is trashed, but I was able to hot-wire the warhead to be detonated manually. Somebody’ll have to stay behind and trigger it.”
Knight stiffened and looked deep into Donahue’s eyes. “No, there’s got to be another way. Too many have died already. Either we’re all going home or none of us are. We could—”
Donahue held up a hand to stop him and then opened his flak jacket. A jagged wound carved through his abdomen. Blood soaked his clothes and the interior of the jacket. It looked as if a black substance had mixed with the blood. “I caught a stray round in the side. Went right in under my body armor. I’m not gonna make it, Knight. This bloody thing killed my men, and I’m going to take it down. When I see my boys in the next world, I want to tell them that I showed that thing that you don’t screw with the SAS.”
Knight smiled and gave Donahue a slow and solemn salute.
A roar sounded in the distance. The beast was coming.
“You better get going, Knight. You just pin that thing down, and I’ll blow it all to hell.”
29.
As they ran toward the distant skyscraper, Knight heard gunfire and clanging noises coming from the top of the parking structure. Corporal Jenkins turned back and said, “He’s in trouble. We’ve got to go back and help him.”
Beck grabbed the remaining SAS officer by the arm before he could return to Donahue. “He’s fine. He’s just trying to draw in the creature. And if we’re not ready when it finds him, then he’s going to die for nothing. You want that?”
The corporal stared back at the building without a word. Knight could sympathize with the man. He had no idea how he would react if it were King up there preparing to take his final breaths. “Come on, Corporal. Let’s make him proud.”
Callsign: Knight - Book 1 (A Shin Dae-jung - Chess Team Novella) Page 7