by Ted Dekker
Carlos moved slowly, crouching to minimize his profile against the forest behind. Tumbling rocks were his primary concern. Stones clicked softly under his feet, but not enough to wake the average man.
Then again, Hunter wasn’t the average man. But he was unarmed, and he was with a woman he would undoubtedly want to protect.
The moment the ground leveled, Carlos rushed in on the balls of his feet. Four long steps, quick pivot. The wedge of darkness beneath the branches opened up to him. He dropped to one knee, extended the nine millimeter’s barrel to the head of the man he recognized as Thomas Hunter, and pulled the trigger.
Thunder crashed in his ears.
The body jerked.
There was no second body.
The revelation that the woman wasn’t here stopped him short of pulling the trigger a second time. If not here, then where?
He quickly felt Hunter’s neck for a pulse, found none, and ran around the boulder, gun still extended. Nothing. He rounded another boulder, but with each step his hope of finding her faded. She wasn’t here.
He ran back to where Hunter lay and noted the ground beside his body. Small indentations in the earth confirmed that another body had rested here. No sign of the slacks with the tracking device. He felt for Hunter’s pulse one last time, and satisfied that the man was very much dead, he stood and scanned the forest.
She had been here less than five minutes ago. He pulled out the receiver and turned it on. It took only a few seconds to acquire the signal. Directly ahead in the forest. Close. Very close.
Carlos began to run.
The odor of sulfur hung low and thick over the Scab camp. It had taken them an hour to reach the huge army, and the sun was already hot on their backs. Twenty warriors rode on either side of Thomas as they approached the same spot where he’d negotiated his treachery with Johan less than twenty-four hours ago.
He’d bathed from a canteen last night, and he was now allowed one additional canteen, which now hung from his belt. He wouldn’t drink it, but he would bathe if the meeting at the Council kept him more than a day. Justin would arrive in the evening. The Council would hear the matter, and the reversal would end in Qurong’s death. By morning, Johan would be exchanged for Thomas at the forest perimeter. But if there was any delay, he might need the water.
In the meantime, he was consigned to spend the rest of the day and the night in this cursed— Something hit his head.
He jerked upright and twisted in his saddle. Nothing. But his head was ringing as if a mallet had struck it. Pain spread down his spine. He began to lose focus.
He knew then that something had happened in the other reality. Carlos had found them. He’d been shot. In the head!
Thomas’s world suddenly began to spin and darken. He felt himself falling from the horse. Heard his body thud into the ground.
His last thought was that his assumption had been right. If he died in one reality, he also died in the other.
Then everything went black.
Monique had her thumbs hooked in her underwear when the still night exploded with a terrible boom.
She instinctively jerked. Behind her! A gunshot in the quarry! She spun, thumbs still hooked, heart pounding.
The trees blocked most of her view, but she peered under a branch by her head and saw in one horrifying moment what had happened. A dark figure stood up by the lean-to, then ran around the boulder, gun in hand.
Carlos! It had to be Carlos! He’d followed them. And he’d just shot . . .
Monique lifted her hand to her mouth and stifled a cry. Thomas!
She nearly ran for him, but she immediately knew that she couldn’t— not with Carlos so close. He’d fired point-blank! No one could have survived that.
Monique stood frozen by horror. How could his life end like this? Would he come back? No, he’d told her that his dreams could no longer heal him! Or was that something she’d learned from her own dream? They were terrified that Thomas might be killed here, because they were sure it would mean that he would also die there.
Carlos ran back around the boulder, dropped to his knees, and was checking Thomas’s pulse. This confirmed it. Thomas was dead.
Monique fought a nauseating wave of panic. She had to get away! Carlos had already searched the quarry for her . . . he’d assume she’d gone into the trees . . .
She ran then, on her toes, through the forest toward the distant farmhouse. The leaves crinkled under her feet. Too loud! She slid to a stop, turned to the quarry, saw that Carlos was still leaning into the shelter. He hadn’t heard her.
She moved quickly, but as quietly as possible now.
Her slacks! No, no time to go back.
Monique was halfway around the quarry when she glimpsed Carlos through the limbs, running toward the section of forest she had occupied only a minute earlier. Had he seen her?
Run! Run, Monique, straight across the quarry, across the meadow to the farmhouse!
No, she shouldn’t. In fact, she should do the opposite. She should stop. Monique slid behind a tree and breathed deep and slow to catch her breath. The night was quiet. No rustling of leaves or snapping of twigs from where she’d run. What was Carlos doing? Waiting?
She stood still for what seemed like an hour, though it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes. Tears blurred her vision. The thought of Thomas lying there, bleeding on the ground, was enough to make her scream, and it took all of her strength to bury the emotion. She had to survive. Thomas had risked his life to bring her out. She had information the outside world desperately needed.
Monique tiptoed forward, picking her way over the leaves as carefully as possible. She remembered seeing that this strip of woods ended in a meadow to her left. The meadow ran directly to the farmhouse.
It took her only a minute of high-stepping to reach the grass. She stopped for a few seconds, heard no sound of pursuit, and entered the field. Maybe Carlos was waiting by the quarry, watching for her return. Ten steps out she felt the horror of her exposure. If Carlos was anywhere near this side of the forest, he would surely see her! But she’d committed herself.
She began to run. If the man behind had noticed her, there was nothing she could do now except run.
With every step she was terribly aware of the fact that she was leaving Thomas dead behind her. She tried to think of a way to get to him, bring him with her. Wasn’t it possible that he was alive?
No, she had to reach safety. She had to survive, and then she had to reach England.
She hadn’t noticed the Peugeot in the driveway until now; it was parked near the front of the farmhouse, out of sight of the quarry.
Could she?
Yes, she could. Assuming the keys were in it, she could take the car and explain to the owner later.
She approached it in a crouch. Tried the door. Open! She slid in and searched madly for keys. Visor. Passenger seat. Cup holder. Dash.
They were in the ignition. She twisted and looked out the rear window. Still no sign of pursuit. But if she started the car . . .
Monique gently pulled the door closed, heard the latch click. No lights—she couldn’t dare use lights. The driveway was gray enough to see despite the lack of moonlight. She prayed the car had a decent muffler, fired the engine, pulled the stick into drive, and rolled over the dirt, holding her breath to help the silence.
She made two short turns before driving behind a hill. Still too close for lights. Still too close to rev the engine. He might hear or see, even at this distance. For all she knew, Carlos was sprinting across the meadow now. Over the hill to cut her off.
The moment she entered the trees she picked up her speed, but she dared not turn the lights on. Without them, she could hardly see. She drove at ten kilometers per hour for a kilometer. Then two. Still no one behind.
But that wasn’t true. Thomas was behind. An image of his body filled her mind. Bleeding from the head. Dead.
She wiped her eyes to see the road.
After five kil
ometers, Monique turned on the lights and shoved the gas pedal to the floor.
25
DEPUTY SECRETARY Merton Gains adjusted the receiver to give his neck a break. He’d been on hold for ten minutes despite the assurances that the president would take his call immediately. Immediately had always meant a short wait, but ten minutes? This was the new meaning of immediately—the one that came after a week of beating their heads against this brick wall called the Raison Strain.
Gains always vaguely feared it would come down to something like this. It was why he’d introduced his bill to change the way vaccines were used in the United States. Of course, he’d never anticipated a crisis as widespread and terminal as this one, but the danger had always lurked out there. Now it had bitten them in the rear end without so much as a warning.
He’d seen Raison Strain simulations a dozen times. It grew quietly and then struck with a vengeance, rupturing cells in indiscriminate, systemic fashion. It was precisely how the political fallout from the crisis would develop, he thought.
At this very moment, a hundred governments were on the verge of ending the silence they’d managed so far. A thousand reporters were sniffing and starting to come up with questions no one could answer. The world’s genetics labs were working overtime, and the thousands of scientists on the Raison Strain were murmuring already.
This didn’t include the military personnel who had been involved in the massive movement of hardware to the eastern seaports. They’d been trained to keep their questions to themselves and their mouths firmly shut. But all told, over ten thousand people now directly engaged the Raison Strain, and most of those suspected that the new virus that had been restricted to a small island south of Java wasn’t nearly so isolated as everyone was saying.
He’d taken a call yesterday from Mike Orear with CNN. The man was on to them. He didn’t say how he’d uncovered his information, but he knew that terrorists had released a virus of some kind, and he threatened to break the story in twenty-four hours if the president didn’t come clean. It was all Gains could do to hold the man back. He couldn’t very well refuse to comment, and a flat denial might push Orear over the edge. Gains had threatened the man with a long list of national security violations, but in the end, it was apparent the man knew too much. Orear had finally agreed to hold off until Gains had spoken with the president.
That was twenty-four hours ago, and the president had seemed surprisingly ambivalent about the prospect of CNN breaking the story. When the news broke, it would boil over and swamp the world. God only knew to what end.
There was only one way to temper the news.
“Merton?” The president’s voice took him off guard.
“Yes, hello, Mr. President. I, um . . . I just got off the phone with England, sir.”
“I don’t mean to push, but I’m late for a meeting with the World Health Organization.”
“Yes, sir. I just got off the phone with Monique de Raison. She called me from Dover about twenty—”
“She’s alive?”
“She evidently escaped from an undisclosed location in France. She managed to get across the English Channel.”
“And Thomas?”
“He was killed during the escape.”
The receiver hissed quietly.
“You’re sure about this?”
“About which—”
“About Hunter! You’re sure he’s dead?”
“Monique seems quite sure.”
Gains hadn’t realized how much stock the president had put in Thomas, and hearing the admission in his tone brought surprising comfort. Amazing that certain things didn’t change even in the face of crisis.
“Does she have it?” the president demanded.
“She thinks so. At least a very strong lead.”
“Okay. I want her here now. Put her on the fastest plane we have out of our air base in Lakenheath. Use an F-16—use whatever we have that can make the flight. The British are aware of this?”
“I’m waiting for a callback.”
“Callback? This isn’t a time for callbacks! I want her here in four hours, you understand? And make sure that she’s under a heavy guard the whole way. Send an air escort with her. Treat her like she’s me. Clear?”
“Yes sir.”
26
RACHELLE CRESTED the dune that overlooked the Horde camp when the sun was halfway up the eastern sky.
Find Thomas, Justin had said. The words had haunted Rachelle as she stumbled over the sand. No matter how terrible, he had said. What could possibly be so terrible?
She ran down the dune toward the Horde camp. In all truth her spirit soared. Yes, Thomas was in the Horde camp, their virtual prisoner, and yes, there was danger on every side—she could feel it like the sun on her back.
But she’d found Elyon! Justin was the boy; she was sure of it. He’d changed her skin from gray to flesh tone, and he’d healed her wounds with a single word. Elyon had come to save his people! She couldn’t wait to tell Thomas.
She understood that Monique had made a connection with her. What Monique was doing now, she had no clue. Unlike Thomas, who seemed to have an awareness of both worlds at all times, her and Monique’s connection was apparently sporadic and depended on Thomas.
Rachelle began to yell when she was still two hundred yards out, before anyone had seen her. Whatever happened, she couldn’t risk them misunderstanding her intentions as hostile.
“Thomas! I need to see Thomas of Hunter!”
She must have screamed it a dozen times before the first soldiers appeared at the perimeter. And then there were a hundred of them, staring out at the strange sight. This unarmed woman screaming in from the desert, demanding to see Thomas of Hunter.
She pulled up panting, twenty paces from the line of ugly beasts.
“I’ve been sent to speak to Thomas of Hunter. It’s urgent I see him.”
They stared at her as if she’d lost her mind. And why would they ever agree to let her see him? Thomas was their insurance.
“What business do you have?” one of them demanded.
“I am here because my lord needs me,” she said, remembering what Thomas had told her about the way the Horde women spoke of the men. Several seemed stunned by her request. Was something wrong with Thomas?
“I am here to ensure that nothing is wrong with him. I am sent by our Council to know that he’s in good health.”
The Scab who’d assumed charge scowled. “Be gone, you wench! Tell your commander that we don’t accept spies.”
Rachelle panicked. “Then Mikil will cut Qurong’s throat!” she screamed.
That set them back.
“If you turn me back, I will go straight to them and tell them that you’ve betrayed them, and Qurong will die. If I don’t return in good health myself, then the same will happen. So don’t think of hurting me.”
The leader, a general by his sash, studied her for a moment. “Wait here.”
He backed away, conferred with several other warriors, sent one of them off with a message, then returned.
“Follow me.”
She entered the camp surrounded by a small army. The smell was hardly tolerable, and so many shrouded eyes peering at her made her skin crawl. She tried to breathe in shallow pulls, but it only made her dizzy. So she breathed deeply and forced her mind from the stench.
No women that she could see. Naturally, the Horde didn’t allow their women to fight. She couldn’t bear to look the men in the eyes, but she refused to look any less than a warrior herself, so she walked tall and straight, praying that she would be directed at the next possible moment into a tent to see Thomas.
They led her to a large tent in the middle of the camp. If she was right, this was the royal tent where Thomas had found the Books of Histories.
A guard parted the front flaps and she stepped in. The general who met her was named Woref, if she understood the guards correctly. His eyes had the look of a snake, and his face looked as though it might crack if
he tried to smile.
“Where’s Thomas?”
“We did nothing to him. You should know this. His wounds are self-inflicted.”
“What wounds? Take me to him!”
He dipped his head and led her down a hallway. The serpentine bat they worshiped was everywhere—decorative paintings on the walls, molded statues in the corners. Teeleh. Elyon, protect me. They entered a large room where a half-dozen guards stood at the ready. A long table was spread with an array of fruits and wines and cheeses.
But where—
A body lay on a cushion along one of the walls. The head was bloody.
Thomas? Yes, it was him; she recognized his tunic immediately. He was wounded!
Rachelle ran over to him, dropped to her knees, and stared in horror at a round hole the size of her finger in his head. Blood had run into his hair. Dried.
“Thomas?”
But he was dead. Dead! And by the looks of him, he had been dead for some time.
She couldn’t breathe. It wasn’t possible! No, this couldn’t be happening! Justin had found her, and she had just been saved, and Samuel and Marie were still children, and . . .
What could have made this kind of wound? No weapon of this world.
Something had happened to Thomas in the other reality. She recalled that Monique had been sleeping next to him under the boulder. Carlos must have found them! Now Thomas was dead. But she was still alive!
The thoughts drummed through her head painfully. Her heart didn’t feel like it was moving. And behind her the Scabs were staring.
She spun around. “Out! Get out!” she screamed. Her vision was clouded with the pain. “Leave!”
The general scowled but left her alone with the body.
Rachelle sank slowly to her knees, knowing precisely what she had to do. Elyon had told her to find Thomas, not this dead body. Justin had healed her from near death. He carried the power of the fruit in his hands, they said, because he was the power of the fruit.