The Devil You Know

by Sean Ellis

  “It’s a good theory.” He handed the phone back. “I’m sorry, but your informant was wrong. I don’t know anything about it.”

  Though it pained him to do so, he turned his back to her once more and moved toward the exit. Her voice--imploring him to wait, accusing him of falsehood--followed after, but she did not move to physically prevent his departure as before. Perhaps she sensed that this time he would not be swayed.

  Part of him wanted to tell her; to trust, or perhaps burden, her with the knowledge he had carried for so long. His considerations weren’t solely motivated by the fact that she was very attractive--there might have been a very good reason why the anonymous message had been channeled through a journalist with an interest in secret societies--but he couldn’t deny that it was a compelling factor. Ultimately however, he decided not to dance to the tune called by the unknown piper. If the informant wanted to make contact, he obviously knew where to call.

  A squeal jarred Kismet from his thoughts. Before his eyes could make sense of the sudden mayhem, moving like a wave across the observation deck, another of his senses detected a clue that instantly alerted him to danger. It was an odor he had not smelled since leaving the military: the acrid fumes of a smoke grenade.

  He whirled, flexing his knees like a linebacker preparing to meet a rush, and was immediately caught in the onslaught of panicked tourists stampeding toward the elevator lobby. As he struggled to stand his ground, he could see three separate yellow plumes positioned decisively throughout the area. The fierce wind instantly snatched them away, scattering the smoke before it could form a thick covering cloud, but the hissing pyrotechnic canisters had been more than sufficient to trigger pandemonium.

  “Capri!”

  As he pushed against the human tide, he could see the two men in suits similarly struggling to reach her position. He still didn’t know whether to count them as friend or foe, but their pained expressions gave evidence that they were not the instigators of the minor riot. Kismet didn’t believe in coincidences. Whoever had done this was either after him or Capri, or both, and the common thread was Prometheus.

  The two watchers had almost reached her when abruptly they were intercepted. Four figures--young men with dark complexions--broke from the outer edge of the horde and formed a ring around Capri. The group looked ridiculous in baggy jeans and t-shirts bearing familiar slogans, but underneath those innocuous trappings, they were tough as nails. The suited pair immediately assumed bellicose stances, but the quartet around Capri appeared unimpressed.

  It was over in an instant. The two burly men, relying on their superior size and strength, plunged headlong into the fray only to be overwhelmed by a lightning quick defense. The four young men employed a combination of martial arts and basic street-fighting techniques to put the suited pair on the ground, stunned or unconscious, in the time it took Kismet to break through the crowd.

  From the moment the smoke grenades had ignited chaos on the observation deck, Capri had stood motionless near the place where Kismet had first seen her. But the approach of the watchers and the subsequent combat had produced an expression of shocked familiarity. She knew the two men, recognized them on sight, but had not expected them to be here, at the site of her covert meeting with Kismet. When they went down under a flurry of punches and kicks, her mask changed to one of horror. That was all Kismet needed to know.

  Two of the young men abruptly turned and seized Capri, each grasping an arm and lifting her off her feet. A third brought out a small syringe and quickly pressed it to her upper arm. Capri struggled against her captors, but it was clear that the contents of the hypodermic were having a soporific effect.

  “Let her go!”

  The four men regarded Kismet with fierce countenances, but showed no special recognition. To them, he was nothing more than a meddlesome bystander, rushing to the rescue of a damsel in distress. The two holding Capri continued to do so, while their comrades closed with Kismet, eager to dispatch him as they had the earlier pair.

  Remembering the failure of Capri’s would-be protectors, Kismet feinted toward the nearest attacker then pulled back as the young man committed to a counter-assault in the form of a roundhouse kick aimed at the space where he expected his foe’s head to be. Kismet caught the man’s foot out of the air and whipped his opponent around, slamming him face first into the iron barrier. Even as the bloodied attacker tumbled unconscious to the deck, Kismet ducked under the fists of a second assailant and launched into the man’s mid-section with an old-fashioned football tackle that drove him back into his other companions. Capri slumped to the deck as one of her captors was caught in the collision and the other simply abandoned her in order to join the fight.

  Kismet rolled away from the tangle of limbs and squared off against the remaining faux-tourist. The young man tried to retreat, but his back was already against the barrier. Kismet edged closer and raised his fists warily. Although he outweighed the youth by a good twenty points, he did not succumb to overconfidence; the four young men were clearly trained in ground fighting techniques, the same techniques he had learned in the army. But while size wasn’t always the determining factor in a close quarters battle, if the combatants were of equal skill, it might make all the difference. He moved in.

  The olive-skinned youth threw the first punch. Kismet made no attempt to block or dodge, but instead tightened the muscles of his abdomen and simply grunted as the blow struck home. Before his attacker could recover, Kismet clapped his hands against the man’s head, stunning him with a minimum of effort, and then rammed a knee into his midriff. The youth threw a wild swing that glanced off Kismet’s temple and for a moment Kismet saw stars but another knee to the gut left the assailant breathless in a fetal curl on the deck.

  Kismet was still seeing double, but he could approximate Capri’s location. As he took an unsteady step in her direction however, everything changed. His senses were abruptly assaulted by a deep bass rhythm, a noise that rang in his ears and resonated in his chest cavity. Suddenly, three distinct shapes rose up beyond the limits of the barrier, blasting the deck with the artificial tempest that could only be caused by the rotor wash of a helicopter.

  Faster than the eye could follow, three Bell Jet Rangers rose above the level of the barrier and hung in the air, their noses point toward the aerial tower that sprouted from the stout base of the eighty-sixth floor to give the skyscraper its legendary and one-time record breaking altitude. The choppers moved closer, their rotor blades invisibly carving the air dangerously close to the tower. The pilots were hotdoggers; only someone with the skills of an expert and the ego of a daredevil would attempt what they were now doing. It would take only a sudden crosswind to nudge the choppers into the aerial, shattering their rotor vanes and unleashing an unimaginable catastrophe on the unprotected occupants of the observation deck and countless more oblivious souls on the street below.

  Spotlights stabbed down from the helicopters, blinding the onlookers, and ropes unspooled from the side doors to dangle at arm’s length from the outside of the palisade. It was as close as the pilots dared get. As soon as the thick lines were deployed, a pair of dark-clad figures quickly abseiled down until they were level with the top of the iron barrier. The metal bars, which rose high above the heads of visitors to the observatory, were bent inward at a forty-five degree angle and ended in sharp points to discourage jumpers. The two men fast-roping from the helicopters had little difficulty pulling themselves over to perch atop the barrier, where they brandished stubby machine pistols. One of them spied Kismet and brought his firearm around intently.

  Kismet spun away from Capri’s supine form, seeking cover in the huddle of terrified onlookers. A short burst escaped from the automatic weapon and a scattering of rounds chewed up the area where he had been standing, but the airborne commando did not direct his fire into the innocent crowd; it was enough that Kismet had been driven away. A moment later, that same man dropped down onto the deck.

  The gunman moved towar
d the dazed quartet that had first attacked Capri, and began rousing them. The implication was all too clear; the helicopters and their deadly passengers were working in tandem with the youths who had been impersonating tourists. As the men regained their senses, another object descended from the center helicopter and was guided down into the observation area by the man atop the palisade.

  Kismet instantly recognized the aluminum-framed wire contraption–search and rescue teams called it a ‘Stokes basket’--and just as quickly divined its purpose. In a matter of seconds, the men bundled Capri into the mesh stretcher and secured her with heavy nylon straps. At a signal from the ground force, the litter was drawn back up into the aircraft.

  With the gunmen providing cover, the four ersatz tourists moved to the ropes that still dangled from the helicopters on either side and were draped over the spiked barrier. Although only two commandos had rappelled down, a total of six heavy-duty lines had been thrown out, doubtless to facilitate the team’s extraction. The men tore off their slogan t-shirts to reveal climbing harnesses outfitted with Jumar ascenders which they hastily secured to the ropes.

  On a rational level, Kismet was overwhelmed by the complexity of the two-pronged assault. It was unthinkable that Capri’s abductors might have had advanced knowledge of her intention to visit the skyscraper. That meant the operation had been conceived on the fly and executed by a highly trained and well-financed paramilitary team. Kismet knew from experience that the even the famed US Army Delta Force couldn’t--or rather wouldn’t--attempt such an outrageous undertaking; their unparalleled training notwithstanding, Delta force operators were still limited by political and logistical considerations. He knew of only one group that might be gutsy enough to pull off such an exploit.

  But what on earth could Prometheus want with Capri, that would justify such a profligate expenditure of effort and resources?

  With the help of the ascender devices, the four men scurried up the ropes and into the middle and right hand copters. Kismet felt his bile rise as the remaining members of the team, still clipped to their ropes, started working their way back up. He could feel adrenaline coursing through his veins, impelling him to take action, but there was nothing he could do to stop them. The ease with which the commandos had carried out their audacious mission felt like a contemptuous slap and all he could do was clench his fists as he cowered with the rest of the frightened tourists.

  I don’t think so.

  He was moving before he knew why, and certainly before he knew what he was going to do. The gunmen noticed him right away, but were too focused on the task at hand to shoot at him; besides, what could he hope to accomplish? As soon as the second man was clear of the palisade, the pilot of the Jet Ranger eased away from the danger zone, pulling the heavy ropes away from the observatory. The other helicopters had already moved back, but were remaining on station until the last two members of the team were aboard. Kismet made a desperate and ultimately futile grab for one of the ropes as it slipped through the bars and dangled free in the night a thousand feet above the street.

  He stood there, the sound of his own heartbeat roaring in his ears louder than the thumping rotor blades, and stared at the retreating ropes. They remained tantalizingly close, swaying gently as the commandos ratcheted the cam-locks higher, one step at a time.

  “Close enough,” he muttered.

  The adrenaline gave him just the boost he needed. With near superhuman alacrity, he scrambled up the bars and swung his leg high enough to hook a foot between the needlepoints atop the barrier. The sharp tips snagged his suit jacket, but the wool fabric prevented them from piercing his flesh as he hauled himself onto the angled barricade. He crouched there; his fingers tightly gripping the bars as he flexed his legs like coiled springs, and gathered his courage. His gaze was locked on the quivering rope but he could not completely ignore seductive lure of the void. The emptiness yawned below him, so much air, and below that pinpoints of light marked the movement of motor vehicles on the streets of Manhattan.

  Are you gonna do this?

  With the endorphin surge momentarily sublimating his most basic primal fear, Nick Kismet drew in a deep breath and jumped off the Empire State Building.

  2

  In the instant of time it took for him to traverse from building to rope, the helicopter moved, increasing the distance by half again as much. There was a moment of panic as gravity asserted its overwhelming superiority and snatched him down, then abruptly the rope was in his hands.

  He hugged it to his chest and kept his arms bent to absorb the inevitable shock when his full weight settled against his grip. The rope swung wildly beneath the helicopter and he could feel the rough fibers burning against his palms. Instinctively, he tried to lock the rappelling line between his feet to ease some of the strain on his upper body, but his shoes clamped together on empty air. He tried again but the rope simply wasn’t there.

  As his muscles began to burn from the exertion, he risked a glance down, trying to locate the elusive cord. Then, to his utter dismay, he saw an inch-wide strip of electrical tape around an equally short piece of nylon-sheathed rope, poking from just below his clenched fists.

  The curse that escaped his lips was snatched away by the wind as the helicopter pirouetted overhead and began to move off, holding the left wingman position in formation with the others. The milling figures on the observation deck shrank into the distance, as the dark emptiness high above the city engulfed him. On the rope above him, one of the commandos was transferring into the open door of the aircraft, while his counterpart was steadily winching himself higher on the line hanging from the opposite side. The forward motion of the helicopter appeared to be causing the paramilitary operators no real difficulty, but for Kismet, literally at the end of his rope, it was like trying to hang onto the slippery tail of a frightened animal. If he couldn’t quickly find a way to relieve some of the strain from his arms….

  He didn’t even want to think about that eventuality. The ferocious wind tore at his clothes and whipped his necktie against his exposed face. He managed to catch the offending article between his teeth, and from that minor triumph there was a spark of inspiration.

  He pressed his mouth to his hands and succeeded in trapping the tie under his thumb. Without releasing his death-grip on the rope, he managed to work a loop of the silk fabric around the line, securing it with a half hitch. Once more using his teeth, he twisted the knot until it was tight on the climbing line. Then, with more haste than caution, he released the hold of his right hand and transferred it to the tie. He half-expected his desperate scheme to fail at that moment; the silk would be too slippery to hold or too fragile to bear his weight and he would find himself in a final, fatal free fall. But lady luck threw him a bone; the knot held.

  Before the invention of the mechanical ascender, which was essentially a titanium handle with a small cam to lock into place on a rope and slide in only one direction, mountaineers used a more basic method to hold their place on a line: the prussik. The prescribed technique was to tie a length of cord around the belay line in a girth hitch, which could then be loosened and advanced up the rope, while the free ends of the cord were tied into hand or foot loops. Kismet’s field-expedient twist of silk was a far cry from anything taught in climbing school, but it was enough to ease some of the strain on his arms.

  The flying formation moved diagonally across midtown toward the East River. Kismet could make out the distinctive slab-like dimensions of the UN building looming just to north, and dead ahead, the twinkling lights of vehicle traffic on the massive span of the Williamsburg Bridge. The pilots had dropped the helicopters a few hundred feet since departing the Empire State Building, but the increasing airspeed suggested that the final destination lay somewhere on the other side of the river. Even with his improvised handhold, he could not hope to hang on to the rope much longer. He had to get inside the helicopter.

  He relaxed his hold on the knot and shoved it up the rope until his arm was fully
extended. The makeshift prussik made the task easier, but it still took raw muscle strength to make the climb. In a matter of seconds however, he had progressed far enough to wrap the line around one of his legs and lock it in place between his feet, and for the first time in what seemed an eternity of effort, he was able to rest first his right, then his left arm.

  The victory was short lived. Thirty feet away, framed in the open door of the helicopter, the commando that had preceded him on the same line was peering down intently. With the wind in his eyes, Kismet couldn’t make out any distinctive facial characteristics, but he could see a wicked grin splitting the man’s face. With exaggerated slowness, the commando drew an enormous fixed-blade knife from an inverted sheath on his vest and laid the edge against rope.

  Kismet lurched into motion, shinnying to the halfway point before the man could complete a single saw stroke, but it wasn’t enough. There was no way he was going to reach the helicopter before his foe completed the grim task. On the other rope, the second commando had worked his way to the level of the skids beneath the aircraft and was struggling to pull himself inside.

  Kismet released his foothold and arched his back, then kicked at the empty air. His body arced under the tail boom but didn’t have enough momentum to reach his objective. He tucked his legs to his chest as the pendulum swung back. Faint tremors rippled through the line as the knife blade split, first the protective sheath, then began parting the braided fibers beneath. Kismet knew he wouldn’t get another chance.

  As the second arc brought him back under the airframe, he released his grip from the prussik and flailed blindly for the second rope. When the heavy line bounced off his forearm, he curled it to his body and clutched it in his fist. Before he could release the first line however, it went slack then abruptly wrenched him downward; the commando had succeeded in cutting it, and the strands that had moments before been Kismet’s only lifeline were now a twenty-pound anchor pulling him toward the murky waters of the East River. He let go without a second thought, and wrapped both his free hand and both legs around the secured rope, but his necktie was still knotted around the untethered line. It yanked hard against his neck, cinching tight both the half hitch around the rope and the four-in-one at his throat.