The Web

by neetha Napew

  He heard the Russian voice again on the loudspeaker. "Paul Rubenstein.

  This is by order of General Varakov; you are to stop immediately and lay

  down your arms."

  Rubenstein spotted what Rourke had told him once was a deer trail; it

  looked the same. He wrenched the bike into a hard left, onto the deer

  trail, the branches cracking against his face and body as he forced the

  machine through. The path was bumpier than the dirt road he had just left.

  "Paul Rubenstein . . . you are ordered to—"

  He looked up, cursing under his breath, then looked ahead of him. A

  deadfall tree lay across the path. He started to brake, and the Harley

  skidded from under him. Rubenstein threw himself clear, hitting the ground

  hard.

  He pushed himself to his feet, the Harley lost some­where in the trees. He

  started to run, snatching at the battered High Power under his jacket. He

  stopped at the tree line, snapping off two fast shots toward the nearest

  helicopter; the machine backed off. He had lost sight of the other one

  after heading onto the deer path.

  Machine-gun fire was coming at him, hammering into the ground and the

  trees ten yards behind him as he ran, swatting away the tree branches that

  snapped at his face. Pine boughs still laden with snow pelted him, washing

  wet snow across his face. The machine-gun fire was edging closer and he

  dropped to his knees, wheeling, firing the High Power in rapid, two-shot

  semiautomatic bursts.

  The helicopter backed off.

  "Son of a gun." He smiled, pushing himself to his feet,

  turning to run again.

  Three Russian soldiers blocked the path. The other helicopter, he

  realized, had landed its men.

  Rubenstein started to bring the pistol on line to fire, but something

  hammered at the back of his neck and he fell forward, the gun dropping

  from his grip.

  Hands reached down to him; voices spoke to him in Russian. Rubenstein

  rolled onto his back, his left foot snapping up and out, into the crotch

  of one of the Rus­sians; the man doubled over.

  Rubenstein reached up, snatching hold of a fistful of uniform, hauling

  himself up to his knees as he dragged the soldier down, his left fist

  smashing upward, into the face. Then he was on his feet, running. Someone

  tackled him; he went down, the ground slapping hard against him.

  Another man was on top of him, holding him. Ruben­stein snapped his left

  elbow back, found something hard against it, and heard a moan and what

  sounded like a curse despite the language barrier.

  He pushed himself up, wheeling, his left swinging out, catching the tip of

  a chin. A man. fell back under his blow.

  Rubenstein wheeled again. He saw the two bunched-together fists swinging

  toward him like a baseball bat, felt the pain against the side of his

  neck, then there was nothing but darkness and a warm feeling.

  John Rourke squinted against the light, his belly aching, a sudden

  stabbing pain in his left upper arm. The pain was familiar—the arm aching

  like a bad tooth. He moved that arm, but it wouldn't move well. And when

  he opened his eyes, his vision was blurred. His other limbs didn't work

  when he told them to. He fell, feeling some­thing tight around bis neck,

  choking him, feeling bands on his shoulders, moving him.

  A voice. "John . . . John. I told you the last time, don't try to stand

  up. You can't walk; don't you know that by now? Thanksgiving's almost

  past. I'm sorry I couldn't give you any turkey; you've been throwing up

  every­thing I give you. But tomorrow's Christmas and then it'll all be

  over."

  Rourke shook his head, murmuring, "I like turkey— Thanksgi— Christmas?"

  "I'll help you onto the cot." Above him a woman's face smiled.

  "Strong," he muttered, feeling her hands under his armpits. He wanted to

  help her, very badly because the floor was cold under him. Naked? His

  hands—he squinted to look at them. Tied together. So were his

  ankles. The thing around his neck choked him again.

  "Vm sorry, John. That rope around your neck—it got caught on the edge of

  the cot. I'll fix it." The pressure around his neck subsided.

  "Thanks—Martha," he murmured. Martha? Martha Bogen? "Coffee," he shouted,

  his own voice sounding odd to him, his tongue feeling dry and thick and

  hot.

  "Yes. You asked the same question the last two times I gave you an

  injection. I drugged the coffee with chloral hydrates—I just had to give

  you so much of it it made you sick. And I gave myself an apomo.rphine shot

  after I drank the first cup. I just threw it up. So it didn't bother me. I

  just made myself throw up. You are very forgetful, John." The voice cooed,

  good-naturedly.

  "Sor—" Why was he sorry? he wondered. Because he was forgetful? He

  couldn't remember why he was sorry.

  There was another needle plunged into his arm, and the pain was there

  again.

  Why was she giving him two shots? He tried to think— if he could think.

  The nausea—from the chloral hydrate she had said. But not the shots. "Not

  the shots," he ver­balized.

  "It'll be all right, John. I'll give you the antidote and when I do in

  thirty seconds you'll be just fine—honestly. And then we can hold each

  other's hands maybe and watch when the fireworks start and the mountains

  start to crash down on us. We'll die together. Neither one of us will ever

  be alone again, John." He saw her face; it looked distorted to him, like

  something seen through a tube with the lighting wrong. She was smiling.

  "I still have all my husband's drugs, John, so I can bring you out of this

  very easily when it's time. Just a day

  or so, really. You'll just feel like you're very drunk and it won't bother

  you. It hasn't. And then when I give you the antidote you'll be your old

  self again."

  She kissed him on the cheek; he could feel it. He tried moving his arms,

  but they wouldn't move.

  "Now, John," she said with what sounded like a mother's severity to him.

  "Even if you should get yourself untied, it won't do you any good. With

  what I've given you, you can't walk and you can't really think too well.

  You're locked in the library basement and I've taken your clothes and

  those guns of yours. I'll be back in a few hours with another set of

  shots. Maybe we can get some good soup or something into you after it all

  wears off. But I think if I fed you now, well, you'd just get all sick

  again."

  He felt her kiss his cheek again, and then she dis­appeared from his line

  of sight.

  He heard a door open, shut, and the sound of a key in a lock.

  There was nothing else to do, he thought, so he started to move his

  shoulders and his hips. He kept moving them, throwing his weight to his

  right; then he rolled.

  The basement floor slapped hard against his body and the side of his face.

  The pain—it cleared his head. He rolled with much effort, twisting his

  body and throwing his weight, onto his back. He tried to move his legs;

  they wouldn't move. He squinted against the light, looking at the ropes on

  his hands.
Ordinary rope—clothesline, he thought. He tried tugging against

  the rope; his arms didn't respond.

  "Muscle relaxant—curare deriv—" He felt the nausea welling up inside him

  and leaned back his head, staring at

  the ceiling. He looked behind him, awkwardly. An end of the clothesline

  snaked across the floor and was tied to a support post for the basement

  ceiling. When he moved his head, the rope moved a little; it was the rope

  that had him tethered by the neck.

  Muscle relaxant, he thought. If she didn't know how to administer it, he

  would stop breathing, just die. She was only giving him enough so that it

  would wear off every few hours.

  The swimming feeling in his head—the nausea, the cold . . . The muscle

  relaxant wouldn't make him, like she had said, "drunk." He closed his eyes

  a minute against the feelings. . . .

  "Mor—" he shouted, the needle jabbing into his arm again. "Morphine!"

  "You've had morphine before, then, John, and you recognize the effects.

  Well, then you know it would take an awful lot to addict you, wouldn't it?

  And anyway, well—all our problems will be over."

  Hours had passed, he realized. What time was it? Was it Christmas? He felt

  the second needle going in. "I have to go now, John. Please try to stay on

  the bed this time."

  He felt her kiss him again, and then heard the click of her heels on the

  concrete floor. "Insane!" he shouted, but he realized then that he'd

  already heard the door opening and closing, the lock being turned.

  "Mor—morphine," he said with a thick tongue. Thirty seconds, he

  thought—something about thirty seconds. He would be himself again in

  thirty seconds. The muscle relaxant had to wear off well before she gave

  him the morphine. The muscle relaxant would be something . . . "Morphine,"

  he said again. "Narcan."

  Rourke realized suddenly that if she kept it up, she'd kill him. He could

  barely breathe—which meant there was a build-up and she was giving the

  shots too closely spaced.

  "Die," he rasped. Morphine—he couid fight that, with his body. But the

  relaxant ... He vomited over the side of th<£ bed and his eyes closed.

  Natalia watched as he closed the door. She had been formally reintroduced

  to Rozhdestvenskiy that after­noon, and now things were less than formal.

  But she did &#;wear black, a tight-fitting jump suit, a black scarf tied

  across her face like a bandanna, a second scarf binding and covering her

  hair, black tight-fitting leather gloves on her hands. She usually used

  less tight-fitting, finger-less cloth gloves for work like that she was

  about to per­form, but the fingerless gloves would have allowed her to

  leave behind fingerprints. That she could not do. Were she discovered

  raiding the office of the head of the American branch of KGB, she would be

  tried and executed—and so would her uncle. Likely, her uncle's secretary,

  Catherine, too, and perhaps, others of her uncle's staff.

  Rozhdestvenskiy walked directly under her, and she watched his face

  through the slats in the air-conditioning vent. She glanced at the Rolex

  on her left wrist, watching the minutes pass as she waited to make certain

  he was indeed gone.

  She had crawled in through the air-conditioning system on the far end of

  the floor—through her uncle's

  office. She had traveled through the dusty duct for what seemed like

  miles. Using a needle-thin powerfully magne­tized angled screwdriver, she

  had released the screws holding the vent in place, then waited. No one had

  come in or out; security was at the far end of the corridor. She knew that

  routine too well, and decided Rozhdestvenskiy hadn't had the time to

  change things substantially. It was her dead husband's old office.

  She released the little hook that held up the vent, slipping the vent

  aside and drawing it up into the duct with her. It banged once, slightly,

  against the duct and she froze as she heard boot heels clicking down the

  corri­dor under her. A guard passed, not looking up. She held her breath,

  waiting.

  He walked back, directly under her again, and stopped. She waited, coiled,

  ready to jump for him. If she were spotted coming out of the vent, if she

  were spotted at all ... She waited, and as the guard moved past her, she

  breathed again.

  She continued to move the grill, then set it aside in the duct. She

  listened, hard, holding her breath. It would have been better to wait for

  nightfall, to wait for a later hour when the guards would be drowsy from

  lack of sleep.

  She perched on the edge of the duct, then tucked her shoulders tight,

  Jetting her feet down and raising her arms as she dropped.

  She hit the floor eight feet below, rolled forward into the fall, and came

  to light on her hands and knees. She pushed herself up, then went flat

  against the wall. No sound of a guard coming. She had made no sound when

  she'd left the duct.

  She turned, glancing toward Rozhdestvenskiy's office.

  then glanced back up the hall. The guards were still where they should be,

  by the mouth of the corridor.

  She started toward Rozhdestvenskiy's door.

  She took (he key from inside her glove, tried it, and the knob turned

  under her hand; the door opened. She dropped the backpack from her

  shoulders, and reached inside one of the outside pouches. She took a small

  leather pack, about twice as high as a package of cig­arettes and half as

  thick. She opened it and pulled a pick from it. Taking the pick and

  scratching it against the lock surface, then breaking it against the lock

  surface, she left the small broken end piece on the floor, then reclosed

  the pack. She deposited thestemof the pick and the lock-pick set pack in

  her backpack, then closed the outer compart­ment and stepped inside the

  office.

  Natalia closed the door behind her, quickly. To the best of her uncle's

  knowledge and to the best of her intel­ligence she had not aroused

  suspicion; no ultrasonic or photoelectric alarm systems had been

  installed. There would be the pressure-sensitive plates inside his office,

  but there should be nothing in the outer office. She stepped across the

  room, in darkness, taking the side chair, which sat next to the

  secretarial desk, and carrying it back toward the door into the corridor.

  She opened the door halfway, listening at first; there was no sound. She

  opened it fully. A quick glance revealed no one in the corridor except the

  guards at the far end. They were not turning around. Moving rapidly, the

  chair in both hands, she started into the hallway, positioning the chair

  under the open duct vent. Pulling a third black scarf, like the two

  covering her face and hair, from her side pocket, she unfolded it into a

  square to cover the seat; then stood on it atop the chair seat. The

  magnetic screwdriver was in

  her left side pocket and she got it out; then reaching up into the duct,

  she pulled the cover slightly closer and inserted it over the opening. She

  started tightening the screws.

  Natalia froze at the voice of one of the guards—a remark about hearing
/>   something.

  She shifted the screwdriver to her left hand to hold in place the screw on

  which she was working; her right hand reached for the Bali-Song knife in

  the hip pocket of her jump suit. The knife, unopened, in her right fist,

  she held her breath, listening.

  To kill an innocent Soviet guard was anathema to her—but she would if she

  had to.

  Natalia kept waiting.

  There were no footsteps.

  Dropping the knife back into her hip pocket, she resumed lightening the

  screws in the vent cover.

  Quietly, she stepped down from the chair, snatching the black silk scarf

  and stuffing it into her pocket, the screwdriver having already been

  returned to her other pocket. Then she picked up the chair, which she set

  down to reopen Rozhdestvenskiy's outer office door. Having brought the

  chair inside, she replaced it exactly as it had been, that was crucial,

  she realized.

  Natalia crossed the room to Rozhdestvenskiy's inner office door, her pack

  in her left hand, swinging by the straps. It would not be locked- She

  opened the door, snatching the Kel-Lite flashlight from her pack, scanning

  the floor, the walls—if additional alarms had been installed, they were

  not readily visible.

  She closed her eyes, remembering the pattern of the pressure-sensitive

  plates, the way in which Karamatsov had walked when leaving his office for

  the night with her.

  But it had to be the reverse. He was coining from the desk and the small

  safe behind it; she was going toward it.

  She took a long-strided step to her left, shifted her weight and brought

  her right foot up, beside it. She waited. It was a silent alarm—but it

  would bring the guards almost instantly. She took the next step, again to

  her left, trying mentally to measure and match her dead husband's stride.

  She brought her right foot over, waiting again.

  She was a third of the way across the room.

  She took a broad step to the right, losing her balance momentarily, her

  left foot almost touching the carpet in the wrong spot. She sucked in her