Extinction Countdown

by James D. Prescott

  The elevator dinged again. “Listen, I hate to dine and dash, but I gotta meet with someone. You’re the best, Ramirez. Get well soon.”

  Kay hung up, stepped onto the elevator and let out a deep sigh of relief. She could feel the weight melting off of her shoulders. As soon as those arrests were executed, the dangers of having a treasonous usurper and his band of conspirators calling the shots would be past them.

  Down in IT, Lucas saw her coming and rose to meet her halfway. “I tried calling you before, but your phone was off.”

  She glanced down and didn’t see any missed calls. “Maybe I was in a dead spot when you called. Why, what happened?”

  “Two men from the FBI came and confiscated the laptop you dropped off.”

  “Oh, crap! How did they know you had it?”

  “Great question.” He rested a hand on his hip. “I was wondering the same thing myself.”

  Kay rubbed her head. “Did you make a copy of the hard drive at least?”

  Lucas tweaked a single eyebrow.

  “Of course you did. What about the agents who paid you a visit? Did they ask you if you made a copy?”

  This time the other eyebrow went up.

  “And you lied and told them you didn’t, right?”

  “When I say I love you, Kay, I hope now you see I really mean it.”

  She cinched him into a firm hug. “I know you do. Now stop giving me a heart attack and show me what you found.”

  He handed her a slip of paper with a GPS location.

  “What’s this?”

  “Whenever someone takes a picture on a smartphone,” he explained, “it records the GPS coordinates where that image was taken. It’s a feature that has to be turned off, but you’d be surprised how sometimes the simple things get overlooked by the smartest people. I remember once…”

  “Tell me next time,” she cut him off. “Did you look the location up?”

  “Hell, yeah.”

  “And where does it lead?”

  “Nowhere you would ever expect.”

  Chapter 32

  Greenland

  After the barrage of falling ice had ceased, it became clear that some of the chunks were as big as a semi-detached home. The tower had not taken a direct hit, although the same could not be said for several of the ancient buildings in other parts of the city. At least two of the stone structures lining the plaza had been pulverized. Jack and the rest of the team had taken shelter inside the shrine, where they had listened to the booming sounds of impact and felt the tremors shake the very bones in their bodies. The only ones still unaccounted for were the aircrew—Steve, Natalie and Chris.

  “If I gotta go,” Dag said, his features set, “I want a block of ice to drop right on my head.”

  Rajesh’s face scrunched up. “But you won’t even know what hit you.”

  Dag pointed at him. “Exactly!”

  Eugene’s features were fraught with terror. “Would you stop? You’re gonna jinx us with all your death talk.”

  Jack stood by the temple’s arched entrance, scanning the extent of the damage. “I just hope Steve and the others aren’t hurt. Any luck raising them?”

  Mullins didn’t reply, but Jack knew a dark cloud over someone’s head when he saw one.

  Grant pointed to the damage outside. “If we had any doubts before whether or not an Atean vessel was in the vicinity, I assume those doubts have now been silenced.”

  Jack glanced over at the biologist and blinked. He switched the light from his helmet on, cupping it with his gloved hand. “Close your eyes a sec, will you? This may be a little bright.”

  “What in heaven’s name are you on about?”

  “Just do it.”

  Grant obliged and Jack illuminated his features.

  “Your skin’s smooth and unblemished,” he said in wonder.

  “This is hardly the time to start complimenting each other’s complexion,” Dag said, digging in his pack for something to eat.

  “There was a point back on the Orb,” Jack said, switching his light down to twenty percent strength, “where your skin was so ruddy I worried you were either sick with the flu or having a heart attack.”

  “Or drunk,” Grant said, through a disapproving look. “Gabby has accused me more than once of taking a nip at an inopportune time. I am British, after all. One of the perks is that you can hammer down a few quick ones and be no worse off for it.”

  “This is not about your drinking,” Jack said. “You wanna have a sip here and there, what do I care? But what I’m seeing here is completely different. I’m saying I think your skin has healed.”

  “You suppose it could have something to do with the recent blast?” Gabby asked, her voice still a little shaky from the recent scare.

  “Most certainly it does,” Rajesh said, piping in. “If you recall on the Orb, Dr. Holland’s hip fracture occurred directly following a particularly violent gamma-ray burst.”

  The link made Jack think of Mia. The last time they’d spoken, she had been on a plane heading for Kolkata. Although that had only been a handful of days ago, down here, three days might as well have been three years.

  “Anna, is there any chance you can access a satellite from down here?”

  She grimaced. “I’m afraid even with the boosters I have been planting, that might be a tall order. On the other hand, I do have news I would categorize as very good if not wonderful.”

  “What is it?”

  “I have detected a low-level signal at one hundred and twenty hertz. I believe it is coming from Aphrodite.”

  “The drone?” Mullins said, sneering.

  Anna threw him a look and brought her robotic arm down in a wide arc, her digits snapping three times. “Do not be throwing shade, girlfriend,” she said, her head bobbing from side to side.

  Anger filled Captain Mullins’ face as the rest of them burst into laughter.

  “That’s right, Anna,” Dag cheered her on. “Don’t let anyone diss your girl Aphrodite.”

  Rajesh looked on in horror. “Anna, where did you learn that?”

  Anna straightened. “I acquired the vocalization and movements from The Real Housewives of Atlanta.”

  Jack’s belly spasmed with a burst of much-needed laughter. Fat tears ran from his eyes.

  “Yeah, well, the next time that bucket of bolts insults me,” Mullins said, speaking to all of them in general, but aiming his threat at Jack in particular, “I’m gonna put a bullet between its eyes. See how much laughing you do then.”

  Jack knew there wasn’t any point responding. It would only make a bad situation worse. He also knew the emotional program Rajesh had detected within Anna’s neural network was magnifying the connection she felt to Aphrodite. For them, it was little more than a tool. For Anna, it was like a friend, perhaps even a child. Still, pulling the drone back online might give them a chance to survey the extent of the damage, check on the missing air crew and locate a group of killers.

  When Mullins walked off, Anna moved in closer to the others. “I should let you know, following the last gamma-ray discharge, I was able to triangulate the source of the disturbance.” She fed a visual into each of their glasses. It showed a growing, spherical wave originating from the pyramid and pushing outward in all directions.

  Jack finished watching and waved the animation away. “So either the pyramid is a ship or whatever’s creating the flashes is somewhere inside. Either way, we know now for sure which way we’re going. Let’s hope we’re the only ones.”

  •••

  Aphrodite’s aluminum and plastic frame had suffered a hairline fracture in her initial tumble, but otherwise she took to the sky with ease. The group repositioned to a collection of intact stone structures at the north end of the plaza. Since this was the way the flight crew had taken, it would cut down on the time needed to rendezvous once contact was reestablished.

  Anna patched the feed from the drone’s camera into every member’s OHMD glasses. Together, they watched
as it buzzed over the tops of buildings, giving the barest of glimpses into the roofless structures lining the city streets.

  “Can you switch to infrared?” Jack asked.

  “Affirmative,” Anna replied, doing as he suggested. From now on, heat would show up as orange blobs against the now-purple background. The only thing the camera couldn’t do was see through walls.

  Aphrodite swept forward, reaching about a hundred yards ahead of them before Gabby shouted for Anna to stop and pull back. Since leaving the plaza, the entire image had shown little more than shades of purple. The drone hovered over a spot where three roads intersected. On one side was a large rounded building, surrounded by a wall, a structure that had taken a direct hit from a piece of falling ice, collapsing part of the wall and showering the area with crystal shards. But that wasn’t why Gabby had ordered Anna to stop. Alongside the wall lay three figures. The heat signatures from all three were barely present.

  “You think that’s them?” Captain Mullins asked, hesitating.

  Jack checked the pistol on his hip and swung around the M4 strapped to his back. “We’re about to find out.”

  “When someone yells fire in a theatre,” Dag said with a nervous smile, “Jack’s the only guy I know who rushes back inside.”

  “If that was me lying there,” he snapped, “I’d hope you’d do the same.”

  Gabby stayed behind with Anna while the rest of the team pushed ahead to the intersection.

  Jack wanted to believe it was the falling ice that had injured the figures in the street. Even if it was wiser to head in expecting the worst.

  They followed the drone’s blinking red light. Jack and Mullins were in the lead, pushing hard over the icy ground, at times struggling to keep their balance. Up until that point, they’d had the luxury of maintaining a regular pace. Now, facing the possibility their friends were up there, seriously wounded, all notion of moving at a safe speed had gone out the window.

  A second before they arrived, Tamura appeared next to Jack, matching their brisk pace in spite of a recent wound to the shoulder. They were less than five yards away when Jack got a visual.

  “I got three on the ground ahead of our position,” he called out, chopping the air in front of him.

  They arrived to a confusing scene. The three figures were indeed the air crew. Littering the ground around them were ice boulders ranging in size from basketballs to sofas. One particularly large piece was pinning Steve’s legs beneath it. It was clear he was dead. The infrared had shown some remaining body heat in Natalie and Chris. Jack moved to the loadmaster, Grant dropping down by his side.

  “What the bloody hell?” Grant exclaimed upon seeing the man’s helmet.

  It had been punctured by two tiny holes, the glass spider-webbing out from the points of impact.

  Chris’ biosuit was saturated with a large, frozen bloodstain over his chest.

  “They weren’t killed by falling ice,” Jack shouted.

  He barely had time to get the words out when a violent crack rang out, followed by another, knocking Aphrodite out of the sky. It tumbled to the ground, where it hit the stone wall next to them and shattered.

  Jack tugged on Chris’ right arm, intending to throw him over one shoulder, but already his body was becoming rigid. He yanked again and rose up on a pair of wobbly legs. A shot buzzed in, striking the wounded man’s helmet. Both he and Jack fell to the ground.

  Behind him, Tamura, still exposed in the street, jumped behind a collection of boulders. Carrying the air crew away was a guaranteed way to get themselves killed. Clearly, the people shooting at them would like nothing more.

  Jack rolled the now-dead body off of his back and crawled over to a section of wall. Rounds zinged past his helmet, kicking up bursts of snow and puffs of stone dust. The same thing was happening to the others, spread all over the road.

  “Can you see where they’re shooting from?” Jack shouted, peering over the edge. His eyes found Captain Mullins, his back against a large chunk of ice. Ahead of them, he saw how the road bent into a gentle curve, the perfect place for an ambush.

  “One of the snipers is in the building at your twelve o’clock,” Mullins cried out, rounds keeping his head down. “Second-story. Left-hand window. If you can make your way around by hopping the compound wall, you may be able to sneak in from behind them. Grant and I will give you cover.”

  “Dag, Tamura,” Jack said, fighting the rapidly diminishing moisture in his mouth. “Wait for the covering fire and stay on my six.”

  Both of them nodded.

  Mullins and Grant rose up, firing at the second-story window.

  “Now!” Jack cried. He sprang to his feet and stormed across the compound’s open terrain. Tamura and Dag jumped over the section of wall nearest them and followed closely behind. Suddenly, the volume of fire increased as the ground at their feet exploded from incoming rounds. Jack hopped the northeast wall and dropped on his haunches waiting for the other two. From here, he could see onto another street which swung around and linked up just past where the air crew had been ambushed.

  Up ahead, a darkened figure came into view. Jack rose. Seeing him, the figure skidded to a stop and leveled his weapon. Even from here, Jack could see he wasn’t in a biosuit. He wore a light-colored parka, his head covered by a grey combat helmet. Over his eyes were a pair of ski goggles. Jack braced the stock into his shoulder and squeezed the trigger several times, riddling the man before him. His target dropped and didn’t move.

  A second later, Dag and Tamura showed up, the latter’s eyes wide at the sight of the man Jack had just killed.

  “The hell took you guys so long?” he said.

  They moved west into a grouping of oddly shaped stone buildings. Jack motioned to an entrance before disappearing inside, the others close behind. He could hear short bursts of automatic fire coming from upstairs. He sprang up the stairs two and three at a time.

  The sniper in the window had just finished reloading when Jack stepped into the tiny room. Jack aimed and pulled the trigger. Like before, he expected the weapon to vibrate in his hands, pushing back against his shoulder. Except this time all he heard was a click.

  His eyes met the sniper’s, whose own gaze flickered from surprise to amusement. The enemy’s rifle rose up at about the same time that Tamura let out a primal scream, pushing Jack aside and firing two shots into the sniper’s chest. He slumped forward, his eyes staring blankly ahead.

  “Three of them just ran off,” Captain Mullins called out from the street below. Dag leaned out the window aiming his M4, but there was no shot to be had. “You two all right?” Mullins followed up when he didn’t hear back from Jack or Tamura.

  Jack got to his feet slowly, rubbing his bruised behind. “I nearly bit the big one until Tamura here knocked some sense into me.”

  She smiled, and to Jack her angular features looked even more beautiful in the soft light. His mind flashed back to the man he’d killed and how quickly his own life had nearly been snuffed out. “Thank you,” he said, taking Tamura’s hand and squeezing it. “I owe you one.”

  Chapter 33

  Rome

  Mia glanced up from the research paper she was reading to find Ollie limping across the hospital cafeteria toward her.

  “My gosh, did they neuter you?”

  He flashed her a halfhearted grin. “I’m happy to report my manhood is intact. Apparently, Sentinel had inserted the tracking chip into my left arse cheek.” He rubbed his backside gently. “They also gave me this.” He produced a ten-inch burgundy-colored inner tube. Ollie laid it on the bench next to her and carefully settled onto it.

  “They destroyed it, right?”

  Ollie shook his head. “It was mine to smash and I took great pleasure in the act, thank you very much.” He happened to glance down at the paper she was reading. “Biophotons & Biocommunication: Understanding the Language of Cells. Wow, sounds riveting.”

  “It is,” Mia said, excited. “Don’t laugh. I think we mig
ht be onto something here.”

  Ollie read the name on the paper. “Roberto Rizzo. Never heard of him.”

  She stopped and glanced around. “Neither had I. Would you believe I had to push for nearly twenty minutes before Dr. Putelli handed over Rizzo’s work? He kept trying to convince me to read his own papers on cell communication instead. I humored him, but Putelli’s stuff was more or less the same safe research that gets published all the time. Rizzo, on the other hand… I think the guy was a genius. I did a little searching online and found out Rizzo used to be Putelli’s research assistant. But when Rizzo’s work began taking him too far outside the mainstream, Putelli got uncomfortable and tried to undermine the guy.”

  “Either Rizzo’s a whackjob or Putelli doesn’t like to share the spotlight,” Ollie observed, wincing as he shifted in his seat. He plucked the half-eaten donut from Mia’s plate and tossed it in his mouth.

  “Our general understanding is that cells communicate via chemical signals. Instructions are sent out via hormones and neurotransmitters and picked up by cells using receptor proteins. Let’s take that donut you just stole to illustrate my point.”

  Ollie swallowed, a guilty look spreading across his face.

  “As soon as your pancreas detects you’ve eaten that donut, it releases a hormone called insulin into your system, instructing certain cells to start taking in the rush of glucose from your blood.” She smiled. “I hope you liked it.”

  “It was delicious. My pancreas and I thank you.” He picked up Rizzo’s paper and flipped through it. “So how’s this guy and his biophoton theory any different?”

  “Rizzo was actually continuing a line of research begun by a Soviet scientist in the forties, who found that the cells in our body produced a low-level radiance in the visible and ultraviolet frequencies. Think of the bioluminescence you see in fish and then imagine something infinitely weaker. Rizzo’s breakthrough was in hypothesizing that the light was one of the ways cells communicate with one another.”