Lethal Velocity

by Lincoln Child

  Motionless behind the corpse, he watched the man slow for a moment, glance around, then come forward once again. Poole recognized the halting, deliberate movements: the man was stalking someone. And it was all too clear who it was.

  As the man approached the line of shadow, he stepped briefly away from the dome to avoid some unseen obstacle. His right side came into view, and as it did, sunlight glinted off the barrel of a heavy rifle.

  Poole cursed again fervently under his breath. A weapon like that changed the rules of the game entirely. He couldn’t afford to go one-on-one against a sniper. He’d have no choice but to take a defensive posture, try to avoid being picked off at a distance. Besides, there wasn’t any time for fun and games.

  There was only one thing to do—surprise the man, get him in close enough so that the rifle wouldn’t give him any advantage.

  He glanced up again: the man in the jumpsuit was about to cross out of the sunlight and into the shadow of the dome. Quickly, while he still had the advantage of concealment, Poole ducked further behind the corpse, molding himself to its stiffening curves. The man knew there’d be a body here: no doubt he’d been responsible for its presence in the first place. He wouldn’t be expecting to find a second body behind it.

  Reaching into his jacket, Poole carefully drew out the hacker’s pistol. Keeping his movements to a minimum, he did a press-check to make sure a cartridge was in the chamber. Then, bringing his arm back across his chest, he waited, lying below the lip of the gully, listening. He couldn’t rely on his eyes anymore: the man was in shadow now, too, and if Poole raised his head, the man would notice the movement. So he waited in the gully, waited to hear the telltale sound of approaching footsteps. Sharp stones dug into his back, and the smell of the dead man’s cheap aftershave filled his nose. Nice choice, Poole, he thought. You could have been having another beer in the Sea of Tranquility right now. Instead, you’re snuggled up next to a stiff, about to get your ass either shot off or blown up…

  There was the sound of footsteps. They slowed, stopped, then began again, measured, coming closer. Poole waited, breathing slowly. Five seconds. And then the shadow of an approaching figure loomed over the gully.

  As the figure’s head came into view, Poole raised the pistol, bringing his left arm up to steady his gun hand. “Hold it,” he said.

  The man stopped abruptly, then slowly allowed his upraised boot to settle back to the ground. Poole lay there, in the hardscrabble gully, his gun pointed toward the man’s head. For a long moment, the two simply looked at each other.

  “Nice day if it don’t rain,” Poole said at last.

  If the man heard, he made no response. He was powerfully built, with short hair that fell across his temples and down the back of his head in tight, corrugated waves. The rifle was in his right hand, held away from his body, flash hider on the barrel pointed earthward.

  Now, very deliberately, Poole rolled forward and rose to his feet, keeping the pistol aimed at all times. He could feel the pebbles falling away from his back. He took a couple of rearward steps, planting his feet carefully, making sure he did nothing to upset his balance. Then he nodded toward the M24.

  “Only one kind of person I know favors that particular rifle. Were you in the Corps?”

  The man looked back without replying.

  “Ninety-Sixth Marine Expeditionary Unit myself,” Poole went on. “At least until they tired of my company, I was. Story of my life.”

  Still, the man remained silent, staring back at him impassively.

  Poole sighed. “Well, if you can’t carry on a civil conversation, why don’t you just drop the weapon instead?”

  The man remained motionless, and after a second or two Poole jerked his gun downward, toward the man’s legs. No more time for pleasantries: he’d take out a kneecap, incapacitate his opponent, then get the information he needed.

  Immediately, the man’s right hand relaxed, letting the rifle slip, butt-first, to the ground. Poole smiled. The man had read his eyes: very clever.

  “That’s a start,” he said. “Now, put your hands over your head, spread your fingers, and tell me the fastest way to deactivate all this busywork of yours.”

  With insolent slowness, the man began to raise his arms. Poole was about to complain when he saw the right arm jerk backward with the speed of a striking snake, disappearing behind the man’s back.

  Poole raised his gun and immediately fired. There was no crack of explosion, just a low, dry click, and by the time Poole realized the round was a dud and racked the slide to clear the chamber, the man’s hand was in view again, filled with a .45, and then the big gun was obscured by a gout of flame and Poole felt something like the burning hoof of a horse pass through his gut and his own gun went off but he was already falling backward, the black curve of the dome and the blue of the sky wheeling dizzy above him, and then the cruel unyielding rock of the escarpment rose to meet his shoulders and all the breath fled from his lungs and everything went abruptly dark.

  THE HEAVY STEEL door was labeled High Security Area: Authorized Personnel Only. Warne stood beside it, stealing a nervous glance up and down the hallway, while the man named Smythe typed a code into the adjoining keypad, unclipped a passcard from his jacket and swiped it through a scanner, then placed his palm in a geometry reader. There was an audible click and the door sprang open. Dry air whistled out. Warne noticed that the edges of the door were coated in stripes of rubber.

  “Seems deserted down here,” Warne said. The remark sounded inane even as he made it, but he felt a need to say something, anything. He’d evaded most of Smythe’s questions on the way down, saying merely that the Park was in grave danger; that Smythe was the only one now who could help them. Better to fill the silence with idle chatter than face more questions. On the far side of the door, Peccam waited. The look of disbelief had been slow to leave his face.

  “The area’s off-limits while the armored car is in the building,” Smythe said. “Only specialists or crew members with level 2 security or higher have access.” He stepped inside, Warne and Peccam at his heels.

  The room seemed large, remarkably so: its length and relative emptiness reminded Warne of a gymnasium. The floor was covered with squares of black rubber matting. The walls were bare, save for a variety of posters and warning signs: No Synthetic Clothing. Minimize Bare Skin. Complies with APA 87-1. In the center of the room, spaced perhaps twenty meters apart, stood a long line of metal containers. They were identical, each about seven feet high by fifteen feet long, bolted to a concrete platform that ran the length of the room. Heavy padlocks were fastened to their front faces. Beside each sat a small green plastic trash can, Live Waste stenciled in black letters.

  “Are those the storage magazines?” Warne asked, pointing to the containers.

  Smythe nodded. “As you can see, they meet the separation distance mandated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. In fact, everything here meets or exceeds all regulatory standards. Except for one thing.” He walked over to a small door on the far side of the room and jiggled its handle. “See?” he said, frowning, as he returned. “Locked.”

  “So?”

  “It’s locked electrically. A security measure while the armored car is being loaded. And a flagrant violation of OSHA’s multiple exit requirements. I’ve complained about it on several occasions, but I’m always told it’s only for ten minutes, once a week. Once the vault’s closed and the car is on its way, the electric lock is cut off. But it’s a violation, nonetheless.” Smythe looked over at Warne suddenly, as if a new thought had hit him. “Maybe you can put in a word about this to the right people, hey?”

  So the car’s still here, Warne thought. He turned toward Smythe with renewed urgency. “Show me the magazines, please. The ones with…”

  “High-level shells,” Smythe completed the sentence for him.

  Warne nodded. Smythe pursed his lips disapprovingly, but led the two men across the rubber floor toward the line of storage magazin
es. Wingnut followed in their wake, moving more cautiously than usual, cameras panning around the walls and ceiling as his processors constructed a topological map of the vast space.

  Smythe stopped at the fourth container, digging into his pocket for his keys. There was a wet-mat on the ground before the container; a waterproof GFI light switch on its face; and a large orange placard on its side panel that read Explosive 1.3g.

  Opening the padlock, Smythe switched on the light, then wrenched open the heavy metal door and stepped inside. Warne ducked in after him. A hygrometer sat on the floor, and strips of wicking paper hung from the ceiling. Tall wooden platforms ran along both walls of the magazine. On their shelves sat dozens of cardboard boxes, stamped with identical labels: Fireworks UN 0771. Handle Carefully—Keep Fire Away. Long series of numbers had been scrawled onto the side of each box in black Magic Marker. At the far end of the magazine, Warne could see countless tubes of what looked like thick black cardboard. The top of each tube had been painted a unique color, according to height.

  Smythe turned to a nearby shelf, ran his finger down the series of handwritten numbers on one of the boxes. Then he pulled a box down from the shelf, placed it on the floor, and opened it carefully. Inside, sealed in individual plastic bags, were several spherical-shaped parcels wrapped in brown paper. “These are the outdoor fireworks,” Smythe said. “For the above-the-dome displays we shoot at Park closing.” He removed one of the parcels and gingerly freed it from the plastic wrapping. He held it up to the light, turning it around in his hands, as if inspecting for tears or imperfections. Then he held it out to Warne.

  It was surprisingly heavy. As he hefted it, Warne noticed that a fuse of twisted paper was fastened to its side by white string. Several small labels had been glued to the casing. Warning, one read: Extremely Dangerous. For Professional Use Only.

  “It’s a golden willow,” said Smythe. “Not especially bright, but very high—rises a thousand feet before it releases its composition—and quite spectacular. It’s got a heavy lift charge, needs at least a ten-inch mortar for all that black powder.”

  Hastily, Warne handed it back. Smythe placed it on the floor beside the box, then walked deeper into the magazine. “And here we’ve got double chrysanthemums, very large shells, usually used with cakes and illuminators during a finale.” He moved to the opposite bank of shelves, pointed to a stack of boxes. “And these are silver dragons, full of aluminum or magnesium flash powder. Magnesium in particular is remarkably bright; the composition burns at an incredible temperature. A perfect accompaniment to maroons.”

  “Maroons,” Warne repeated. “You mentioned those before.”

  Smythe blinked at him, wiped his glasses. Then, motioning them to follow, he stepped out of the storage magazine and walked down the line. Stopping outside another magazine, he unlocked the padlock and let them in. Wingnut remained outside, muttering electronically, rolling restlessly back and forth.

  The walls of this container were lined in panels of wood. There were no platforms or shelving. Instead, rows of heavy metal ammunition boxes sat on the floor, two deep.

  “Maroons,” Smythe said, opening the nearest box. “Salutes, as you Americans usually call them. Made entirely of gunpowder. No stars, no illuminators, just a huge bang. Very brutal and powerful. A favorite of Spanish pyrotechnists, you know.”

  “Gunpowder,” Warne said, looking down at the cylindrical packages lying inside the box. “Pure gunpowder.”

  “Or flash powder, yes.”

  At that moment, a low beeping noise sounded through the room.

  “That’s the vault tone,” Smythe said. “It means the vault’s sealed again, and our escape route’s unlocked. We’ll hear the all-clear in a couple of minutes, I imagine. Once the armored car has left the Underground.”

  Warne spun around. “Left?” Then he pointed at the open ammunition box. “We’re going to have to borrow some of these.”

  Smythe blinked through his glasses. “I beg your pardon?”

  “And some of the shells in that other magazine, just in case. The golden willows, the mortars.”

  “Borrow,” Smythe repeated, still blinking.

  “Hurry, man! Hurry!”

  Smythe carefully scooped a few salutes out of the box, then left the magazine, trotting back in the direction from which they had come.

  Warne turned toward Peccam. “How long do we have until the armored car’s gone?”

  Peccam returned the gaze. “I don’t know, really. Not long. If the vault’s been sealed, that means the car’s already on its way out.”

  “Shit!” For a moment, Warne felt despair wash over him. “Look. You know what I’m planning to do. Right?”

  Peccam’s eyes narrowed. “I think so.”

  “And you agree we’ve got no other choice?”

  Peccam nodded slowly.

  “I’ve got to go with Smythe, see that he gets what I need. There may still be time, we have to pray there’s still time. Meanwhile, there’s something I need you to do.”

  He unfastened the echolocator from his wrist. “This is a homing device for Wingnut,” he said, handing it to Peccam. “If I order him to, he’ll head for it, wherever it is.”

  The security tech took it, a little gingerly, almost as if Warne had handed him one of the explosives from the ammunition case. Wingnut waited outside, watching the transfer with great interest.

  “You know what to do with it?”

  Peccam nodded.

  “Then go ahead. Run. Don’t put yourself in any more danger than you need to. I’ll get Smythe to show me where to set up. If there’s still time, if we’re not too late, I’ll see you there.”

  Peccam nodded once again. His face was pale, his expression grim but determined. He turned and, without another word, ran from the magazine, heading for the emergency exit.

  Warne stepped out of the magazine. “Come on, boy,” he said gently to Wingnut.

  He glanced at his watch. It was twenty-four minutes past four.

  THE LAST CANVAS bag of brown-wrapped bills had been stowed in the belly of the armored car; the checklist was complete and the transfer amount verified; and smiling, mustached Earl Crowe had given the go-ahead to the monitors in the control room. Verne waved back. Crowe clambered up through the passenger-side door of the truck; the door slid closed with a heavy thud; and—after a series of commands had been entered on the vault control board—the vast semicircular door of gleaming steel rolled back into place, opening the corridor while sealing off the delivery chamber and its now-empty vault from human access. The low chime of the vault tone was lost in the growling of the diesel.

  With a final wave, the driver put the truck in gear and slowly eased back down the access corridor. Fifty yards ahead, out of sight around the gentle curve of the passageway, lay a single intersection. Another fifty yards ahead was the guard checkpoint. And beyond that, the tarmac of the crew parking lot; the maintenance road that led down off the plateau to U.S. Highway 95; and an infinity of possibilities.

  But the truck did not continue down the corridor. After a few more yards, it stopped. Then it crept forward again, very slowly, until it cut off the view of two nearby security cameras. Then it stopped once again.

  Almost immediately, an electrical access panel opened in the nearby wall. It banged softly against the body of the truck. The door of the armored car cracked open with a chuff of air.

  John Doe emerged first from the access panel. He looked both ways, smoothed his shirt, then climbed up the stairs and into the truck. And then, another figure emerged from the electrical access. It was Hardball, once again wearing the leather jacket he’d worn when he met Tom Tibbald in the van that morning. He, too, glanced first one way, then another, almond-shaped eyes veiled and expressionless. He mounted the steps, disappearing into the armored car. Last to appear was the young hacker, Cracker Jack. His face was puffy with bruises, and the knuckles of one hand were gashed and bleeding, as if cut on a sharp object or—perhaps—teeth.
He hoisted out a duffel, then closed the panel behind him. He followed the duffel up the three steps, and the passenger door closed once again.

  Inside, John Doe maneuvered his way past Earl Crowe into the back of the truck. Crowe watched as John Doe opened one of the side panels, ran first his eyes, then his hands, over the stacks of evenly wrapped bills, four deep, that filled the shelves within.

  “As George Bernard Shaw said, lack of money is the root of all evil.” John Doe closed the panel. “This should keep us all good little boys for a long, long time.”

  “Got the discs?” Crowe asked.

  John Doe nodded, patting the pocket of his linen jacket absently. He looked at his watch. “Water Buffalo didn’t show up at the rally point. Has he radioed?”

  The driver, Candyman, shook his head. A squawk came over his headset, and he raised one hand to the transmit button.

  “AAS Nine Echo Bravo, over.”

  “Nine Echo Bravo, this is Utopia Central. We show you stopped in the approach corridor. The vault tone’s sounded, and we’re waiting to give the all-clear. Report nature of your delay, over.”

  “Utopia Central, nothing major. The motor’s seizing a bit. I think the air intake is clogged. Trying to clear it now.”

  “Nine Echo Bravo, understood. If the problem continues, request you continue examination on the outside, repeat, on the outside.”

  “Utopia Central, I say again, nothing major. We should be rolling any second.”

  Candyman switched off the radio headset, glanced back into the payload compartment.

  “I’ve been on the scanner, monitoring the internal security chatter,” he said. “Word of Station Omega’s filtering down through C Level. The natives are getting restless.”