Pandora's Temple

by Jon Land

  His first thought was that the captain was going to use the extinguisher as a ram. Instead, though, McCracken watched as he angled the nozzle straight on with the thing surging straight for him, steadying his aim.

  “Take this, motherfucker!”

  And Captain Seven opened up on the thing with a shower of white, foamy spray. Absurd at first glance until McCracken realized the captain had focused all the spray toward the bank of red LED lights and lenses that held the prototype’s sensory and visual capabilities along its boxlike head extension.

  “Heeeee-yahhhhhh!” he wailed as the thing suddenly veered right, then left, then right again.

  It seemed to refocus its attention on Wareagle this time and swung blindly toward his shape, looking almost drunk with its motions turned clumsy and awkward and leaving Johnny to battle both prototypes now.

  Beyond the glass entry in the reception area, meanwhile, a pair of helmeted SWAT police frantically worked explosives into place along the doors, wedging a transistorized detonator into place. The rest of the police scurried for cover, obeying orders unheard within the Homeland office’s lobby.

  McCracken rushed across the floor toward Wareagle, forgetting the pain long enough to knock him aside and sparing him a wild blow from the now blind prototype. Instead, the strike slammed into the other Atlas, which retaliated by hammering its twin with a pair of strikes that left them tied up like wrestlers, whirling across the floor together and obliterating anything they struck.

  BOOM!

  The glass entry doors blew open in a spray of glass behind a white-hot flash. SWAT personnel poured into the Homeland lobby and opened fire on the prototypes in a nonstop stream, continuing until they keeled over to the floor as a single, twisted assemblage of smoking steel.

  Wareagle helped McCracken back to his feet, Blaine careful not to test his injured shoulder, which that ached badly but felt structurally sound. Folsom was still down and dazed, while Captain Seven clung to his fire extinguisher the way a gunfighter would his pistol after shooting down someone intending to do the same to him.

  McCracken started for the corner where Katie had pinned herself, freezing just as fast.

  “Shit,” he muttered.

  Because Katie DeMarco was gone.

  PART FOUR:

  THE TEMPLE

  CHAPTER 57

  New Orleans

  Leander Levy watched Shinzo Asahara enter his shop and approach the counter with hands clasped behind him. Four other Japanese men followed him inside, their motions so precise as to appear robotic right up to their eyes that didn’t seem to blink.

  “It’s been a long time, Shinzo-san.”

  Asahara bowed slightly. “Too long, Levy-sensei. But I understand a samurai sword fashioned by a disciple of the great Masamune has come into your possession.”

  “It did,” Levy nodded, feeling himself stiffen, and he leaned forward casually to appear more at ease. “But I’m afraid I’ve already placed it with another party.”

  “How disappointing,” Asahara told him. “I thought we had an agreement on such items, that I would always be informed of their procurement first.”

  “These were extenuating circumstances. It won’t happen again, I assure you.”

  “I trust that it won’t, Levy-sensei.” With that Asahara pulled his hands forward and swept the one encased by a black mitten sideways, sending an elegant crystal vase tumbling to the floor where it smashed into unrecognizable fragments. “You must forgive my clumsiness,” he apologized, holding up his covered left hand as explanation. “An unfortunate malady, I’m afraid.” His gaze moved to the shattered vase. “I trust it wasn’t too valuable a piece.”

  “Waterford dating back two centuries. Priceless,” Levy managed, through the thick clog forming in his throat.

  “Another pity then,” Asahara said, reaching into his jacket pocket with his uncovered hand. “But if you help me with something else, I can assure you I will be more careful.”

  He unfolded the simple sheet of copy paper and laid it on the counter. Levy lifted the reading glasses dangling at this chest to his nose to better regard a series of unrecognizable symbols. Based on the discolorization and degradation of those symbols, Levy guessed the copies had been made from photographs taken of whatever had originally contained them.

  “I’ve never seen anything like these before,” Levy told Asahara.

  “Any idea what they mean, Levy-sensei?”

  Levy lifted a magnifying glass from the counter, trying to still the trembling in his hand.

  “They aren’t figures or drawings,” he said, running the magnifying glass up and down, and then side to side. “Nor are they from any symbol language I’ve ever seen before. There’s no pattern, no discernible repetition that would indicate any language at all, at least none I or anyone else is familiar with. Except . . .”

  “Proceed, Levy-sensei.”

  “Well, these do somewhat resemble portions of ancient cave drawings found in the Andes Mountains and elsewhere. While those drawings and symbols have never been successfully translated either, I see some similarities, particularly in the use of lines, dots, and circles, that would indicate they may have originated with the same source.”

  “Those Andes drawings have sometimes been linked to extraterrestrial beings legend says once visited earth, yes?”

  Levy nodded and lowered his magnifying glass.

  “And can you draw any conclusions based upon that?”

  “I’ve read some linguistic analysis that speaks of those symbols forming a warning, Shinzo-san. Perhaps as simple as Do Not Enter or No Trespassing.”

  “And if not as simple?”

  Levy found his mouth too dry to swallow, the unblinking stares of Asahara’s four henchmen now locked upon him. “A warning about the end of the world.”

  “You’ve piqued my interest, Levy-sensei,” Asahara said, leaning forward over the counter closer to Levy. “What about a location? Do the symbols say anything about a location?”

  Levy pretended to regard the symbols again. “There’s not enough here to—”

  “Mention of a weapon,” Asahara interrupted. “Is there any mention of a weapon?”

  This time Levy didn’t bother checking the symbols again. “If you could bring me more, perhaps . . .”

  Asahara moved his gaze to a lush landscape hanging directly behind the counter, centered over Levy’s head. “I’m told some of the most valuable paintings ever have been found behind other canvases.”

  “That’s correct, Shinzo-san.”

  “Then perhaps the message of these symbols is hidden in plain sight as well. Could that be?”

  “It could.”

  Asahara backed away from the counter, leaving the page containing the symbols atop the glass. “Then find that message for me. Tell me where I can find the means to end the world, Levy-sensei,” Asahara said, staring him right in the eye. “Or next time I come I’ll break more than just crystal.”

  CHAPTER 58

  New Orleans

  “There,” McCracken said, pointing at Captain Seven’s computer inside an office they’d appropriated still lit eerily only by the emergency lighting, which made the screen seem unnaturally bright.

  Standing next to him, Folsom leaned in closer to better see. Outside, the wail of sirens continued to split the night, and they’d closed the office door to at least temporarily shut out the sounds of law enforcement and rescue personnel frantically at work beyond. “What am I looking at?”

  “SF-5-16ARM,” the captain explained, reading the screen before McCracken had a chance to. “It’s the short code for a form of underwater explosives. Been around forever, and nobody’s come up with anything better since the very dawn of . . . well, something.”

  “Who authorized the req order?”

  “The e-mail notation belongs to the Deepwater Venture’s operations manager,” McCracken answered this time. The first paramedics on the scene had confirmed his shoulder was strained but not dama
ged, then offered him painkillers he refused. “But if you check the logs, I’ll bet you your pension that his assistant was actually the one who filed it.”

  “Katie DeMarco? But why would—”

  “Smart girl,” Captain Seven interrupted, words aimed at McCracken. “Doubt anybody would question a requisition for underwater ordnance on a deepwater oil rig.”

  “And,” McCracken followed, “SF-5 works just as well above water as under it.”

  Folsom backed away from the screen, hands planted on his hips. “Where the hell are you going with this?”

  “We had it wrong, Hank,” McCracken told him. “Katie DeMarco, or whoever she really is, was on that rig to sabotage it the whole time.”

  “There’s more, MacNuts,” said Captain Seven. “Just like you thought.”

  “What I did was this,” he continued. “Took a still picture of our girl lifted off this building’s security camera and ran it through facial recognition technology in areas around the attacks at the Hastings Chemical plant bombing, the Royal Dutch Shell supertanker sinking, and the Valley Coal poisoning. I shit you not, managing that all straight was no easy task. If you don’t score me some primo weed like yesterday, I am going on strike and I mean that sincerely.”

  “What’d you find?” McCracken asked.

  “When was the last time you were wrong?”

  “When I decided to come to New Orleans to celebrate my birthday. Now talk to me.”

  Captain Seven hit the Enter button on his keyboard and rolled his chair backward to make room for McCracken and Folsom. “Voilà, boys!”

  Four shots of Katie DeMarco, looking different enough in each one, appeared in equal sizes, each occupying a quarter of the screen. Her hair color and style altered, eyes changed by tinted contact lenses, but it was unquestionably her in each instance.

  “Going clockwise, boys, that’s her at Hastings, the pier where the Royal Dutch Shell supertanker was docked, and Valley Coal headquarters.”

  “So WorldSafe’s taking environmental terrorism to a whole new level,” picked up McCracken, “with her as their chief operative.”

  “And she was going to make the Deepwater Venture her fourth target,” added Folsom, “before something else intervened.”

  “You mean fifth,” said McCracken.

  “What?”

  “Fifth. Check out the screen. Looks like Captain Seven has earned himself a promotion to Eight.”

  The captain wheeled his chair back in front of the monitor, working the mouse so the final, unidentified shot of Katie DeMarco filled the screen. “Software uncovered this, MacNuts, not me. This is the oldest of the four, which probably makes it her first job. Almost seven years ago at a fossil fuel plant outside Stuttgart, Germany. This chick really knows how to make things go bang.”

  “And we let her get away,” Folsom bemoaned, shaking his head. “I let her get away.”

  McCracken laid a calm hand on Folsom’s shoulder. “Time for me to return the favor, Hank.”

  “Favor?”

  “You brought me back into the game, and now I’m going to make sure you stay in it.” McCracken waited for Folsom to turn from the computer screen toward him before continuing. “I think I know what Katie DeMarco’s next target is.”

  CHAPTER 59

  Houston

  Two nights after surviving the attack at Homeland Security headquarters in New Orleans, Katie DeMarco found herself crouched on the roof of a building neighboring the corporate headquarters of Ocean Bore Technologies. Located at the northwest corner of Interstate 45 and Beltway 8 in the Greenspoint area of Houston, Ocean Bore occupied an eight-story, 108,000-square-foot steel and glass building. Security was relatively heavy, but nothing she wasn’t expecting. And her plan did not even involve entering the building.

  Her research and previous recon of the site indicated that Ocean Bore used Overnight Express as a delivery service, a leaner version of FedEx, chosen in large part for the twenty-four pickup and delivery services the company offered. Ocean Bore maintained interests all over the world, so deliveries came in at all times and shipments went out that way too.

  Overnight Express maintained a fleet of navy-blue trucks, one less in number as of this afternoon, the same one she’d parked ten minutes ago in the circular drive just out of sight from the security desk before positioning herself on the roof. If anyone grew suspicious of the truck, an inspection of the rear would reveal only properly wrapped, addressed, and invoiced packages of various sizes and shapes; WorldSafe was nothing if not thorough, and forming a storehouse of intelligence on the group’s potential targets had been one of the group’s hallmarks.

  In this case, all the packages stored in the rear of the Overnight Express truck parked before the building entrance contained a hybrid mixture of layers of cotton soaked in diesel fuel, ammonium nitrate, and mechanical-grade ball bearings. Katie watched from the rooftop and pictured the effects of the blast force turning the building’s multitude of glass panes into deadly projectiles propelled in all directions at virtually immeasurable energy and speed. The initial blast and accompanying shock wave would be enough to lay waste to the building’s front section, turning it into a jagged, charred shell. Had this been daytime, hundreds of people would die. At night it would be considerably fewer, but her point would nonetheless be made.

  How do you feel about that?

  Her one visit to a psychiatrist had featured that question being posed to her at least a dozen times and now Katie posed it to herself.

  Something, I feel something . . .

  And Katie would rather feel guilt, remorse, anything, because it was better than feeling nothing; and nothing was all she had felt for a very long time. She did not enjoy killing and had never observed any of her victims close up, with the exception of the fire in Stuttgart that was never supposed to happen. But acting on her aggression, fighting to relieve the demons that had haunted her for so long, was the only thing that made her feel anything at all. She knew it was wrong, but her entire life had been based on wrong, casting both her judgment and viewpoint through a jaundiced eye. Initially, she’d hoped the process would end with Stuttgart; instead, it had only begun there and showed no signs of abating now. Like a drug. She needed her fix. Like an addict.

  This was supposed to have been her sixth attack coming in the wake of her intended bombing of the Deepwater Venture. But fate had intervened in the strangest and most ironic of ways; her identity being thrown into question had ended up saving her life still days away from using explosives to disable the rig’s entire drilling mechanism.

  Before he was murdered, Twist had formulated the explosives and packed them appropriately into the packages now in the truck’s rear. All Katie had to do was steal an Overnight Express vehicle from the poorly guarded depot, drive it to the storage unit containing the boxes, and then park it with the product of Twist’s labor. Beyond that there was only a number to dial on her cell phone to reach an identical phone serving as detonator in the truck’s rear.

  Ring, ring, ring, ring . . .

  All it would take.

  CHAPTER 60

  Guangdong, China

  “We go on my signal,” Shinzo Asahara said into the small wrist-mounted microphone.

  His Aum Shinrikyo troops, composed of his most devoted followers with military or police backgrounds, were stationed at critical points of access to the Nagasaki Yangjiang High Tech Center. The building was the showpiece of the Shenzhen Techno Center, an industrial park in Guangdong, China, that housed small and medium-sized Japanese enterprises specializing in joint research between the two nations involving industry, academia, and government. As far as Shinzo knew, though, only Japanese were employed inside the Nagasaki Yangjiang building.

  Asahara was under no illusions that Leander Levy’s study of the symbols akin to those supposedly etched upon Pandora’s jar would yield the jar’s true location. So he had opted for an all-out breach of this building, the most daring operation Aum Shinrikyo had ever att
empted. He felt his left hand begin to tingle with numbness and a strange sensation that felt like it was being pricked by icicles. The deformity had happened here in this very building in what felt like another life, just days after Japan’s Supreme Court upheld the order for his father’s execution in September of 2006. Shinzo had believed then that if the rumors were true of the Nagasaki Center’s research into particle acceleration and dark matter, the potential to find the very means he had long sought would at last be in the hands of Aum Shinrikyo. That would have served as his father’s final legacy with the group, one that would have lent meaning to his pending execution.

  So Shinzo had assaulted the building with his most trusted followers that night too, raiding the main laboratory to see his life changed radically forever as a result. His hand might have been the most dramatic but was far from the only wound he’d suffered. His vision was cloudy at times, sensitive to light, and often switched from color to black and white like a broken television. He suffered from pounding headaches distinctly different from migraines in that they seemed to radiate outward from the center of his skull. And on top of all that, there were the visions of his father captured in fleeting glimpses in window glass or longer ones in mirrors that had now grown into full-fledged conversations.

  Was his father really appearing to him? Had his first fateful experience with the Nagasaki Center’s particle accelerator opened a door between dimensions, between worlds?

  Shinzo did not know and chose not to consider the ramifications of what such a truth might mean to human existence: proof of an afterlife, of the ability to coexist with departed souls who in death, apparently, differed little from life.