Hayden gives a curt nod of affirmation.
“Hold on,” Hardebeck says to Florian. “Now that you have what you want, I want to hear you give us those fucking coordinates.”
“Oh, I will,” Florian says. “Just as soon as I have my fucking contract.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The door to Alexei’s bedroom cracks, then creaks open just enough to accommodate a long, thin, matte-black muzzle. The rifle barrel pivots in the opening as it targets the pale moonlit figure in the bed, and then it is momentarily still as it is steadied. There is a sharp pneumatic hiss followed instantly by a thud as the ballistic syringe embeds itself and the lead ball in the rear of the dart uses its momentum to depress the plunger. The figure in the bed does not initially react to being tagged; it remains motionless for several seconds, and then—very gradually—begins to deflate. From behind the door, Alexei seizes the muzzle with his left hand, and in a single violent motion, heaves it forward into the room while using his right arm to drive a long, black, serrated tactical blade in the opposite direction at what he estimates to be right around gut level.
He is not surprised when the tip of the blade is stopped by alternating layers of densely woven composite-fiber body armor, but the strangled retch he hears tells him that the blow has collapsed his attacker’s celiac plexus and sent his diaphragm into spasm. Before the man can collapse or even double over, Alexei’s knife is down between his legs—up close to his groin, but just below his cup where the need for agility makes body armor impractical. When the blade is withdrawn, it has severed the femoral artery, and by the time the man goes down, blood has already pooled around his black boots. The man cannot even get enough air into his lungs to scream as he pulls his knees up to his chest and bleeds to death in the doorway between the bedroom and the hallway.
Although the threat was effectively neutralized, Alexei knows that his work was sloppy. He realizes now that he should have given the man a bear hug after slicing into his inner thigh, holding him upright rather than allowing him to crumble. Not only could he have pinned the man’s arms to his sides to prevent him from getting off a few final and potentially lucky shots, but gravity would have helped to drain him a few precious seconds faster. Additionally, Alexei could have used the well-armored torso to stop any possible incoming rounds from the rest of the man’s team. But in his defense, it has been many years since Alexei has seen actual combat, and his reflexes and instincts are not what they once were.
Alexei is half expecting to either get tagged or torn apart by rounds coming from multiple support positions, but the hallway is clear and quiet. It’s possible that the man was alone, but not likely. Full body armor and sophisticated nonlethal weaponry suggest a special operations unit over a lone assassin. Since Alexei sleeps in a different room each night, there was no way a strike team could have known precisely where to find him. The most likely scenario is that a full-size team agreed to split up in order to cover more ground—an arguable tradeoff between maintaining force and finding their target before their target had a chance to find them.
He goes back into the room to retrieve the dart from the deflated decoy (still warm from the internal heating element designed to ensure that it emits the proper thermal signature) and to work his bare feet into his slippers. Before stepping over the body on his way back out, Alexei dips the rubber soles lightly in the pool of blood on the floor, then walks down the hall in the opposite direction of his office. When enough of the blood has been absorbed by the carpet that he is no longer leaving tracks, he stops, removes the slippers, and turns back. On his way past his room, he tosses the slippers back behind the bed, then continues down the hall.
Houses that generate all of their own power have a tendency to invite suspicion, so Alexei’s compound draws from the main electrical grid. But houses that draw too much power from the main electrical grid are equally suspicious, so Alexei uses local hydrogen fuel cells to keep the demand to within an inconspicuous range. In addition to concealing demand, on-site fuel cells also serve as backup in the event that the main power goes out—or, as in the case of a well organized and probably government-sponsored raid, has been intentionally cut. Alexei grasps the knob of his office door and waits for the scan of his hand’s geometry, thermal signature, and fingerprint patterns to be combined with the 3-D infrared facial model being constructed by the cameras in the door. He uses the back of his hand to cover the green LED in the jamb indicating that his identity has been verified.
Alexei’s office has no windows, so after closing the door behind him, he dials up the LED strips just enough to navigate to the bathroom. With the door closed, he can turn the bathroom lights all the way up, but he decides to keep them dimmed in order to preserve some of his night vision. He uses the tip of his knife to depress the plunger in the back of the dart, and as the residual fluid begins to emerge from the hypodermic tip, he smears it onto the mirror. He tosses the dart in the steel trash can and places the knife in the sink, then pulls his handset from the pocket of his sweatpants and photographs the tainted section of mirror in various wavelengths. The handset cannot come up with an exact match, but it has identified the substance as some form of synthetic opioid. The fact that his handset was not able to find a closer match in any of the databases it has access to tells him that the compound is likely among some of the most secret incapacitating agents in the world, which reinforces what he already suspects: government sponsorship. The fact that the syringe inside the dart contained a relatively small dose of a synthetic opioid as opposed to a larger dose of an electrolyte like potassium chloride or a barbiturate like sodium thiopental tells Alexei that whoever wants him, wants him alive. And the fact that the substance was obviously intended to be delivered tactically in a very precise quantity rather than indiscriminately as an aerosol pumped through the vents of the house or dispersed through the nozzles of a chemical grenade tells Alexei that whoever is behind this was able to make a pretty good estimation of his height, weight, and age.
Whoever is after him is almost certainly someone he knows.
Alexei leaves the bathroom and moves to the back of his office. As he depresses a spring-loaded panel in the wall and slides it smoothly to the side on its ball bearing tracks, a set of LEDs illuminates the voluminous cavity to a muted intensity appropriate to the lack of ambient light. He takes the black tactical waist pack down from its hook and straps it on—one belt around his waist, and one around his upper thigh to keep it tight against his leg. He removes the Gryazev-Shipunov 10mm pistol from its rack along with its suppressor, aligns the threads, and tightens the thick titanium cylinder down against the barrel. The injection-molded PVC holster on the outside of the pack is open at the bottom in order to accommodate an extended weapon, and Alexei fits the pistol snugly into place. The magazine contains full eighteen hollow-point rounds (one already chambered), but he takes a second high-capacity magazine down and slips it into a long thin pocket in the pack.
The next item he selects is a jet injector. He takes a vial of adrenaline from a narrow shelf and inserts it into the grip, then turns the wing nut beside it to engage the CO2 cartridge. The device fits snugly enough in the main pocket of his pack that he leaves it unzipped for quick access.
Among the vials of adrenaline, there is a small unmarked atomizer. Alexei removes the cap, stares into the nozzle, and recoils slightly as he applies the tropicamide aerosol to one eye, then the other. While he blinks tears out of his eyes and waits for his pupils to dilate, he uses his handset to activate the compound’s infrared illumination system. In addition to emitting visible light, every bulb in the house can also operate in the 700–1,000 nanometer spectral range, which means as Alexei slips his panoramic night vision goggles over his head, he can see almost as clearly as though it were day.
His handset goes into an outside pouch with its screen facing in so that it won’t give away his position should it activate for any reason. He has heard plenty of stories of good men losing their lives ove
r unsolicited messages promising several inches of additional girth and length, or veritable cornucopias brimming with premium pharmaceuticals at third-world prices.
Alexei cautiously slides the wooden panel back into place. His goggles are equipped with a gated power supply that reduces the photocathode voltage in the presence of visible light so the LEDs inside the cabinet don’t blind him. He stops in the bathroom on the way out for his knife, which fits nicely into his pack’s leather sheath.
Alexei draws his pistol as he eases the office door open. He checks the hallway as soon as there’s enough room between the door and the jamb to accommodate his head and goggles. It’s clear to the right, but to the left, the dead body straddling the threshold between the hallway and the bedroom has drawn attention. A crouched figure is following the direction of Alexei’s staged footprints, moving with caution and obvious apprehension toward the corner ahead.
Alexei lifts his pistol and considers his options. A shot into the back of the neck between the helmet and vest would be the quickest and least disruptive form of neutralization, but it is also the riskiest. Should the shot stray wide and open a hole in the wall at the end of the hallway, the advantage of surprise will have been squandered, and the man might easily get around the corner and out of sight before Alexei can stop him. In another life, Alexei would have been better prepared for urban combat, and therefore more willing to take some chances. With an antiballistic vest of his own—strewn with a selection of flash, frag, or concussion grenades with their cases latex-dipped to make them bounce easily off of walls and around corners—he would not hesitate to take the shot. But considering he is one barefoot man in an old pair of sweatpants and a Los Angeles Hard Rock Cafe T-shirt up against an entire modern strike team probably half his age, he decides to lower the pistol two centimeters and line up the easier shot.
The worst way to fire a weapon is with your eyes closed—except when your pupils are dilated to maximize the effectiveness of night vision and image intensification technologies. Alexei isn’t sure if the processors in his goggles are fast enough to adjust to something as rapid as muzzle flash, so as he squeezes the trigger, he fights against his instincts and forces himself to blink.
He fires two rounds in quick succession, the suppressor vents channeling the hot gases through “dog-whistle” valves precisely machined to produce acoustic vibrations beyond the frequency of human hearing. The shots have the intended effect, which is not to kill the man (the hollow-point rounds Alexei is using are designed to maximize tissue damage and blood loss rather than to penetrate body armor), but to knock him down and lay him out flat on his stomach. Alexei holsters the pistol, sprints down the hall, and has the man pinned before he can roll himself over. The man is so stunned that he does not even fight back as Alexei swings himself around, interlocks his legs with those of his opponent, hugs the man’s feet tightly against his chest, and heaves himself back. There is a rising and terrified shriek as Alexei bears down, which culminates in the slow crackling sound of the man’s spine splintering like the stem of a young tree. When the body beneath him relaxes, Alexei releases the lifeless legs and the feet fall askew.
The house is quiet once again.
Given enough time, Alexei would appropriate as much of the dead man’s armor as he could practically transfer, but he knows that enough noise has just been made to summon the rest of the team. He rips back the Velcro straps on the man’s vest, works it over the limp helmet, and slips it on over his own head and goggles. As he tightens the straps around his torso, he checks both ends of the hallway and ultimately decides to continue on straight ahead and around the corner. If he can get down to the kitchen, the solid hardwoods and stone will give him enough cover to stage a pretty intimidating defense should the night end in a good old-fashioned, all-out firefight.
The remainder of the upstairs hallway is clear, as are the rear stairs. From the back entrance to the kitchen, Alexei can see that one of the house’s porch doors is wide open. After adjusting his goggles into a higher infrared range, he detects a faint thermal residue on and around the knob where the lock was actively hacked, and a few cooling violet patches dispersed across the stone floor where the men stood before deciding to split up. There is an amorphous pool of heat on the floor and another on the ceiling directly above it corresponding to the precise spot upstairs where Alexei bled his first attacker to death. He avoids the mess as he moves to the door and uses his handset to deactivate the cloaking on the cottages out back. Now that he has been located, darkness is clearly a more important tactical asset than structural active camouflage. When both buildings have faded and vanished into the night, he configures his goggles to highlight only thermal signatures consistent with human bodies. The yard is clear.
The patio brick is cool and rough against his bare feet, and the grass beyond is damp. He suspects he can make it across to the closest of the dormitories if he sprints, but he wants to make sure he isn’t followed. If anyone has eyes on him, it’s best they resolve their differences before the children get involved.
He is almost halfway across the lawn when he feels something collide with his vest. It is so subtle that he has to look down to verify that he has indeed been tagged. The syringe is barbed, and has penetrated enough of the composite weave that it is dangling. He drops to the ground, but there is no cover out there in the middle of the yard, and before he can even begin crawling, he feels a second dart embed itself deep into the meat of his calf. Instinctively, he reaches down, and the barb tears through muscle and flesh as he snatches it out. He dials his goggles back down the spectrum and sees in the infrared floodlights that the syringe is empty. When he looks up again, rather than the satisfied grin of a sniper walking toward him in a flexible hooded nanocomb heat-sink suit, he sees at least a dozen miniature quadrotor drones hovering and dipping through the air around him. That’s when he realizes that he is exactly where his enemies want him; that the two men upstairs were nothing more than expendable decoys; that the lawn between the house and the children was the focus all along.
At this point, he knows he has nothing to lose. He reaches into the pack strapped to his thigh, removes the jet injector, presses it into his left shoulder to release the contact safety, and fires the high-pressure stream of adrenaline into his muscle. He has no idea how epinephrine will react with the synthetic opioid—or even if it will react at all—but he does know that whoever is after him is very unlikely to tag him a second time. Assuming both the incapacitating agent and the dose were intended to have maximum effect at Alexei’s precise age and weight, a second dose would almost certainly kill him in seconds. And if whoever is after him didn’t have a great deal of incentive to keep him alive, he and the house and indeed the entire property would have already been reduced to nothing more than a smoldering crater strewn with splinters of building materials and barely recognizable body parts.
He tosses the jet injector away, curls up in a fetal position around his pistol, and waits. The autonomic pickups embedded in his spinal cord begin accelerating the centrifuges in his chest and Alexei believes he can hear the blood surging through his body. He begins to sweat, and he realizes that he is feeling the effects of the adrenaline over that of the opioid. As he listens to approaching voices, he focuses on his breathing and on remaining conscious and coherent.
He is suddenly fully illuminated by miniature LED spotlights pointed down at him from the drones, so he peels off his goggles. When he opens his eyes and squints through the glare, he sees two men standing at his feet. One of the men is pointing a nozzle down at him with his thumb on a yellow, rubber-coated release lever. The nozzle is joined by a black woven hose to a canister strapped to the man’s back. Alexei knows the tank likely contains a nontoxic incapacitant—probably some type of foam—that can cover him and harden within seconds. Dangling from the other man’s hands are several recoil cords—bindings made from a type of polymer that releases energy at a rate faster than it is generated, which means they not only instantly
arrest any sudden movement, but violently reverse it.
In order to apply the restraints, the man with the recoil cords will have to get close enough to Alexei’s feet that Alexei can easily smash his nose with the heel of his foot. However, both men are wearing high-impact visors which means, at best, Alexei could only knock the man off balance before the other man covered him with enough foam that Alexei probably would not move again until sufficient quantities of solvent were applied through atomizers in the ceiling of an underground concrete cell hundreds if not thousands of miles away.
The man with the canister must go first.
Alexei closes his eyes, pulls himself into an even tighter ball, and moans, drawing both men in closer as they peer down and attempt to assess his condition. He then opens his eyes long enough to judge the distance and position of the man with the canister on his back, and kicks with all of his strength. His heel strikes the side of the man’s knee, and as tendons wrench and cartilage shatters, the leg buckles in a direction almost perfectly perpendicular to its intended motion. The man screams and collapses, and Alexei sees him look down at his leg, then scream again at what he sees.
The man with the cords does not seem to know whether to advance or retreat, and the moment of indecision is enough for Alexei to get off two shots into the sternum region of his vest. Even though he goes down instantly, Alexei knows he isn’t fully incapacitated, so he crawls on top of him and slips the long black muzzle of his pistol’s suppressor below the man’s visor and up against the bottom of his chin. Alexei squeezes the trigger, and after traveling cleanly through the man’s head, the round strikes the top of his helmet and erupts, instantly covering the inside of the visor with a chunky stew of bloody skull fragments and lumps of fatty brain tissue.
The man with the canister is still screaming, probably as much from what he just saw as from the pain of his torn knee. He is scooting himself backwards as effectively as he can with his hands and his one intact leg. The leg he is dragging is limp and bends at a dramatic and disturbing outward angle.
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