by Ian Edward
‘Detective Bennett is a friend,’ Costas assured Daniel.
‘Your pursuers have no way of knowing you ended up here with Costas and Barbara and Northern Rock’s a big town,’ Adam told the boy. ‘Sergeant Kirby’s men at the police station are already keeping an eye out for those men from this morning. I’m now going to issue a directive that the matter is one of extreme importance.’
‘Thanks,’ Daniel said in a small voice.
Adam sat at the table, conscious of the need to generate a non-threatening presence. ‘I understand you’ve travelled a long way and that you had a pretty tough day today.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Hey, Daniel, you can drop the “sir”. Adam’ll do just fine.’
‘Okay.’
‘You were living in New South Wales, in the country?’
‘That’s right, sir…um, Adam.’
‘Daniel’s told us he’s from a place he calls The Com,’ Barbara said.
‘What can you tell us about The Com, Daniel?’ Adam asked.
‘Well, I guess it’s a house, except…it’s much bigger than this one. Has lots and lots of rooms, some that we weren’t even allowed to go in to, like the one with the newspapers from the outside world…’
Adam exchanged brief, concerned glances with Costas and Barbara at Daniel’s strange terminology.
‘Why’d you come to Northern Rocks?’
‘I’m looking for my friend, Elizabeth. I’m worried about her. So when I saw the picture in the paper-’
‘Of Elizabeth?’ Adam prompted.
‘No. Another girl, I don’t remember her name. She left the Com ages ago, but I knew her face. She’s the girl who drowned at the beach here. I just hoped, that if she’d been in this town, then maybe Elizabeth was here as well.’
Adam allowed Daniel’s words to sink in. He could hardly believe what he was hearing. He put a reassuring hand on the boy’s shoulder. ‘I’ll be back as soon as I can and we’ll get everything sorted out. Okay?’
‘Okay.’
Costas and Barbara saw Adam to the front door. ‘We’ve had a look through the boy’s journal,’ Costas said, ‘and Adam, this place the kid’s run from sounds like some sort of weirdo religious sect. What do you think?’
‘It’s possible. And, incredibly, this kid who’s come from nowhere recognised our Jane Doe after every other line of enquiry failed.’ Adam didn’t elaborate further that the same investigation had also led, via the owner of the boat and the anonymous phone tip, to Westmeyer’s Institute.
He hurriedly excused himself and joined Harrison in the car.
Collosimo parked around the corner from Melanie Cail’s apartment block, then walked to the building. He didn’t see Donnelly’s vehicle and presumed the other man had done the same – parked somewhere inconspicuous.
But what was going on? Why had Donnelly called him to meet here?
He approached the open front door. He could see nothing unusual. There were no sounds…
He moved slowly into the apartment, drawing his weapon. He was approaching the kitchen doorway when Donnelly lunged at him, embedding Melanie’s kitchen carving knife straight into his heart. The shock had barely registered on Collosimo’s face as he toppled back, blood beginning to run from the corners of his mouth. He was dead before he hit the floor.
To investigators, the scene would appear exactly as Donnelly intended: they would speculate that Collosimo had gone to the apartment to confront Melanie Cail as being the saboteur. The investigators would assume an argument ensued. They could only guess Melanie became hysterical, charging at Collosimo. Her fingerprints were the only ones on the knife. Collosimo must have fired his pistol in self- defence. They would be left to surmise that the blade sliced into his heart as his bullet entered her skull. A tragedy with two players, neither alive to tell the tale.
Donnelly reached down and exchanged Collosimo’s pistol for his own. Both were registered to the Institute and Donnelly had already altered the computer records on which executive had been issued with which weapon. Both men were registered to carry a firearm for security purposes.
Melanie wouldn’t be around to deny having been the saboteur. No more sensational reporting. It would be much easier to convince Asquith to step back, and allow the final stages of the project to run their course.
It was a shame to have had to sacrifice Collosimo. But essential.
Donnelly had placed calls earlier from Melanie’s phone to Collosimo’s, and vice versa. On each occasion he’d done this when neither of them were in their respective homes. The calls had gone unanswered, picked up by their answering machines, but would show when police accessed phone records. It established a fake link between the two. It provided circumstantial evidence, on top of the double murder, that they could have been conspiring together.
It stopped any further scrutiny of the Institute, and Collosimo wasn’t important in the grand scheme of things.
Donnelly thought the same of Erickson and Stephen Hunter. Not important in the grand scheme. He didn’t like it when others, close to Westmeyer, began to have more of a say in the decisions.
Ultimately, he liked to keep the real control to himself.
Casually he returned to his car and drove away. He imagined the wail of sirens that would approach later, after Stephen Hunter had made the discovery.
CHAPTER FIFTY TWO
Joey spent some time introducing Daniel to the Nintendo. Daniel fumbled for a while with the console and with the terminology on the screen. Before long, playing a game of battleship warfare, he was manipulating the joystick so that his ship avoided the enemy whilst firing off cannon blasts.
‘Now you’re getting the hang of it,’ Joey said.
‘You think so?’
‘Sure. Boy, I can’t believe you didn’t have any of this stuff, not even TV, in that place.’
‘Our Carers taught us all these things were evil. But…well, you sure seem okay, Joey. You and your folks have been great.’
‘There’s nothing wrong playing a game or watching a show,’ Joey said. ‘And I tell you what – I can’t believe you wrote all that stuff in that journal. There’s years and years of stuff.’
‘Yeah.’
‘I’m no writer myself. If I have to write an essay for school then I’m pushin’ it to come up with half a page. But you –incredible…’
‘I guess it was the only way I could say what I was thinking, without getting into trouble.’
‘That sucks.’
Daniel looked at his new friend as though such a comment was a real revelation to him. ‘We were brought up believing the outside world was corrupt, that we were being protected from it and prepared for a special future – the chosen family for the return of Christ. But I never felt any real sense of caring from our Keepers and Carers, not the way it is here.’ After a brief pause, he added: ‘It feels good here.’
Joey stared back, Daniel’s words equally a revelation to him. ‘But I don’t think it says anything like that in the Bible. That’s not what true Christians are supposed to be like.’
Their attention was diverted back to the game as an explosive sound signalled that Daniel’s ship had received a direct hit from the enemy. “FINAL PHASE – GAME LEVEL 3. FINAL WARNING” flashed on the screen.
‘That sucks,’ said Daniel, imitating Joey’s words with a grin.
Watching from just beyond the doorway, Barbara smiled and then headed back into the dining room. Costas, restless and on edge, was thumbing through the journal again. He handed it to Barbara, open at one of the most recent entries.
‘Read this,’ he said.
The rear of the Institute was not visible from the main roadway. However, remnants of light spilling around the building’s edges suggested activity.
There was no movement at the front or sides of the Institute and no vehicles outside in the covered parking station.
Further north the coast road veered inland, with forest on either side. The road was quiet, no
other cars passed them, and there was no sign of a large truck.
‘You know, there’s tiny foot trails all over those woods,’ Harrison said. ‘I had a girlfriend once who was, like, into bush walking, man. ‘Coupla times I joined her group for hikes out there.’
‘And the Institute backs onto that reserve,’ Adam said. ‘We could see if it’s possible to approach through the woods for a closer look.’
‘Your call.’
‘We’ll give it the old college try, John, but for no more than thirty minutes, and we stay at all times within sight of the roadway.’ Adam’s cell phone rang.
‘Success, detective,’ said a buoyant James Reardon, ‘our signal bounced back. I’ve got a record of the PING number.’
Adam took the number down. ‘Thanks, James, I’ll get this traced.’ He rang off, noting as he did that he’d received a text message: FLYING IN, ARRIVING LATE. WILL CALL. KATE.
In spite of everything, he could barely wait to see her again – but he couldn’t dwell on that now.
‘It seems we’re close to finding who planted the Institute’s computer virus,’ Adam told Harrison.
‘I remember when the Institute first opened up,’ Harrison said. ‘Big influx of international eggheads, and local job opps. The mayor did a song and dance and had the area re-zoned. Then all the bullshit died down. And now - who would’ve believed this?’
Adam phoned through the PING number to Arthur Kirby. Then, he excused himself to Harrison, and stepped out of the vehicle so he could speak privately with O’Malley. He hadn’t been able to raise him prior to leaving the Cail home. ‘There’s a young man hiding in Northern Rocks and a mysterious bunch of men searching for him,’ Adam informed the superintendent when he came on the line. ‘This boy recognised the face of the local drowning victim when he saw it on the TV news.’
‘You have my attention.’
‘The boy’s been through some trauma, Inspector. He’s safe for the moment, but we’re going to need a place he can stay and counsellors – people who can befriend and reassure him and obtain his full story. I’ll be able to give you the details in full when we meet in the morning.’
O’Malley took a deep breath. ‘Incredible. Okay, Adam , I’m on it. And the Institute?’
‘Doing some recon right now.’
Adam and Harrison kept their torches low and moved quietly and carefully. They were able to get close enough to the fenced-off rear of the Institute to see a large loading dock bathed in overhead lights. An enormous 10-wheel haulage truck accessed the dock.
‘A rig that size could carry the mid section of a large boat,’ Adam observed.
‘You think they’d be carrying a part of a boat?’ Harrison was confused.
‘That’s something I’ll explain later, John.’
‘Okay.’ Harrison knew not to probe further. ‘I didn’t know the Institute had a second dock area like that.’
‘No one did.’
‘It seems it’s been built especially to accommodate a rig that size.’
‘It looks that way. And the interior ramp slopes down, so there’s an underground section, one of which no one on the site seems aware.’ This must have been part of what had puzzled Rhonda Lagan.
Rhonda had become suspicious of computers brought to her for repairs, then collected by the same technicians for return…but they weren’t connected to the network and she couldn’t pinpoint their location. Snooping around, she’d noticed late night truck activity. She’d written of this in her diary, and someone had deleted it.
Rhonda had gone to the council requesting copies of the building plans. Before she could follow up she’d been killed in a freak road accident. Now Adam found himself questioning whether it had been an accident.
Adam and Harrison watched silently as the massive truck disappeared into the dock.
CHAPTER FIFTY THREE
Late night on Australia’s east coast is early morning in North America. The Nexus private jet left the Joint Base Andrews Air Facility, in Maryland, on its flight to Brisbane, Queensland. From there, Asquith and his specially assembled “relocation” team of six men would be ferried by hire cars to Northern Rocks.
Their purpose was fourfold: first, to issue new travel papers and destinations for the scientific staff; second, to ensure system back-up and archiving through to Bethesda was complete; third, to organise the removal of all live samples and specimens; finally, the evacuation and detonation of the Institute.
No trace of the labs or the materials was to be left, and the sub-level was to be permanently sealed off.
‘This would be your second trip to Australia?’ Michael Renshaw said.
‘Yes,’ said Asquith. ‘Although the first one was in and out, blink and you missed it. Frankly, I’d like to spend longer there, scouting new locations. But clearly not this time around. The country has possibilities, with most of its population around the coast, and the interior sparsely populated.’
‘Potential for future Babel projects.’
‘Precisely.’
Commander Robert “Bulldog” Frazer had appointed Asquith, to be Director of the US Defence’s Scientific Research and Development. Later on Frazer and Asquith formed the covert Nexus unit.
The objective of the unit was a closely guarded secret: to develop breakthrough genetic products for military use. This was broadly one of the same objectives of the R&D department at large, but whereas the overall department worked strictly within government codes and ethics, the Nexus unit did not.
When he’d first suggested the secret unit, “Bulldog” Frazer had said: ‘It takes decades for R&D labs to develop new products, then five, ten years, usually more, to go through the testing and approvals. That's as it should be. But there are certain projects that need to be fast tracked, beyond the prying eyes of the do-gooders, there’s always been an aspect of military work calling for such measures. Right at this moment we have literally dozens of projects in hand that are ten, twenty years away from testing on humans. Products we need now’
‘I agree,’ Asquith had said, ‘but we’ve had this discussion before…’
‘Now we’re both in positions to do something about it.’
‘You want to set up a unit to bypass accredited approvals?’
‘Yes. And I want you to run it, reporting only to me.’
‘Without the knowledge of the Joint Chiefs?’
‘Yes.’
‘Bob…it would take…God, I don’t know…millions, and resources in land, buildings, people-’
‘You will have all that,’ the rock-faced Commander replied, ‘creative book-keeping will enable us to siphon off the budget needed. We then use it to fund external contractors to undertake research assignments. We simply ensure that the true nature of those contractors’ work is kept hidden’
And so fifteen years after he’d been a captain in the Mekong Delta, under the command of Fraser, Asquith set up the Nexus unit.
Only the select members of the Nexus board knew of the shortcuts taken by their specialist contractors.
Most of those contractors had been given assistance in setting up by the Nexus Group, and the Westmeyer Research Centre was one of them.
‘I’ve always meant to ask you the actual specifics,’ Renshaw said to Asquith after they’d settled in for the long flight to Australia, ‘how and why Operation Babel, and these relocations, came about.’
‘Babel was my initiative. You’re familiar with the Biblical story of the Tower, I presume?’
‘God scattered the people of Babel all over the earth, speaking different languages, to hinder their progress because of their arrogance…’
‘Something like that. The idea behind our Babel was to contract different, seemingly independent research firms around the world, to camouflage the fact they’re controlled by us, and working on our projects. We ensure they have a range of assignments from various clients and investors.
‘Should any one of them ever be exposed, then that exposure won’t lead
to the other projects. Those projects are with our supposedly unrelated other contractors. We appear only as one of many clients.
‘And it’s always possible to shut down and “relocate” any individual project, should it be in danger of exposure, without affecting the others. Just as we did in Florida.’
Westmeyer paced the corridor of the Institute’s top level, a man both lost and possessed at the same time. As always, he was uncomfortable with the measures he knew would be taken by Donnelly, where Melanie Cail was concerned.
Usually, he blotted these things from his mind.
Westmeyer’s role was to stay focused on the Institute’s work, but tonight the dark thoughts invaded.
It was late, and he and Hunter and his team were working long hours as they readied for the final breakthrough.
He wandered the connecting labs of the Blood Research Division. As he had so many times before he looked along the glass cages containing the mice used in the experiments. They darted about their cages, up and down straw covered scaffolding, furiously turning tiny treadmills. Further along there were canisters and tubes housing litres and litres of blood.
Heavily tinted glass doors separated the labs from a larger room where cryo-preservation tanks stored more blood, this time at a specially prepared temperature of minus 180 degrees Celsius.
Hunter was in his private office. He was huddled over his PC, checking data. Westmeyer noticed uncharacteristic signs of stress.
The on screen data was an endless sea of coding sequences. TGA- TAG- ATG –AAT…
‘It’s one thing,’ Hunter said, without looking up, ‘to rely on email reports from the sub-level, but now that we’re this close, under this much pressure…this ridiculous race to a new deadline, I need those reports continually. Instead, William, I’m seeing them only every few hours if at all…’
‘It’s hard for Donnelly to rush through the final trials and to keep sending the reports simultaneously. Perhaps, under the circumstances, if you went down and personally-’