SANDSTORM sf-1

by James Rollins

But that would not achieve their objective: to recover the schematics and research for the orbital plasma cannon. Zhang had managed to steal the data from a secure federal server, leaving a worm behind. The next morning, a Los Alamos technician by the name of Harry Klein accessed the file, inadvertently releasing the data worm that proceeded to eat all references of the weapon while defecating a false trail that implicated Klein. That bit of computerized sleight of hand cost investigators two weeks as they pursued the false trail.

  It had taken a dozen DARPA agents to filter through the worm shit and discover the true identity of the thief: Xin Zhang, a spy positioned as a technologist with Changnet, a telecom upstart out of Shanghai. According to the CIA’s intelligence, the stolen data was on the suitcase computer in Zhang’s suite. The hard drive had been trip-wired with an elaborate encryption defense. A single mistake in attempting to access the computer would wipe everything.

  That could not be risked. Nothing had survived the worm at Los Alamos. Estimates were that the loss would set the program back by a full ten months. But the worst consequence was that the stolen research would advance China’s program by a full five years. The files contained some phenomenal breakthroughs and cutting-edge innovations. It was up to DARPA to stop it. Their objective was to gain Zhang’s password and retrieve the computer.

  Time was running out.

  Painter watched from the reflection in a Wheel-of-Fortune slot machine as Zhang and his bodyguards stepped into an express elevator that led to the private suites that topped the tower.

  Touching his throat mike, Painter whispered, “They’re heading up.”

  “Got it. Ready when you are, Commander.”

  As the doors squeezed closed, Painter rushed over to a neighboring elevator. It had been crisscrossed with bright yellow tape, lettered in black:OUT OF ORDER Painter ripped through it while punching the button. As the doors parted, he ducked through. He touched his throat mike. “All clear! Go!”

  Sanchez answered, “Brace yourself.”

  As the elevator doors shushed closed, he leaned against the mahogany paneling, legs wide.

  The car shot upward, driving him toward the floor. His muscles tensed. He watched the glowing numbers climb upward, ever faster. Sanchez had rewired this car for maximum acceleration. She had also slowed Zhang’s elevator by 24 percent, not enough to be noticed.

  As Painter’s car reached the thirty-second floor, it decelerated with a shudder. He was lifted off his feet, hung in the air for a long breath, then fell back to the floor. He ducked through the doors as they opened, careful not to disturb the taped entry. He checked the neighboring elevator. Zhang’s car was three floors away and climbing.

  He needed to hurry.

  Painter raced down the hall of suites. He found Zhang’s room number. “How are we positioned?” he whispered.

  “The girl is handcuffed to the bed. Two guards are playing cards in the main room.”

  “Roger that.” Sanchez had placed pencil cameras in the room’s heating vents. Painter crossed the hall and keyed his way into the opposite suite.

  Cassandra Sanchez sat nestled among her electronic surveillance equipment and monitors like a spider in a web. She was dressed in black, from boots to blouse. Even her leather shoulder holster and belt matched her outfit, carrying her 45 Sig automatic. She had customized the pistol with a Hogue rubberized grip and mounted the thumb catch for her magazine release on the right side to accommodate her left hand. She was a deadly-accurate marksman, trained like Painter in Special Forces before being recruited into Sigma.

  Her eyes greeted him with the sparkle of the endgame.

  His own breath quickened at the sight of her. Her breasts pushed against the thin material of her silk blouse, snugged tight by the shoulder holster. He had to force his eyes up to maintain proper contact. They had been partners for the past five years and only recently had his feelings for her deepened. Business lunches turned into drinks after work, and finally long dinners. But still, certain lines had yet to be crossed, a distance tentatively maintained.

  She seemed to sense his thoughts and glanced away, never pressing. “About time the bastard got up here,” she said, turning her attention back to her monitors. “He’d better burn those files in the next quarter hour or- Shit! ”

  “What?” Painter stepped to her side.

  She pointed to one of the monitors. It showed a three-dimensional cross section of the upper levels of the Grand Pequot Tower. A small red X glowed within the structure. “He’s heading back down!”

  The X marked the tracer built into the microtransceiver. It was dropping through the levels of the tower.

  Painter clenched a fist. “Something’s spooked him. Has there been any communication with his room since he entered the elevator?”

  “Not a whistle.”

  “The computer is still there?”

  She pointed to another monitor, a black-and-white image of Zhang’s suite. The suitcase computer still rested on the coffee table. If not for the encryption, it would’ve been so easy to break in and abscond with the computer. But they needed Zhang’s codes. The planted bug would record every keystroke he made, capturing the code. Once that was obtained, they could lock down Zhang and his men.

  “I’ve got to get back down there,” Painter said. The tracking device was built on such a small scale that it had a range of only two hundred yards. Someone had to be close at all times. “We can’t lose him.”

  “If he’s wise to us-”

  “I know.” He headed for the door. Zhang would have to be eliminated. They’d lose the files, but at least the weapons data wouldn’t make it back to China. That had always been their fallback plan. They had safeguards built upon safeguards. There was even a small EM grenade affixed inside one of the suite’s ventilation grates. At a moment’s notice, they could activate it, triggering an electromagnetic pulse that would activate the computer’s self-defenses to wipe the data. China must never gain the research.

  Painter rushed down the hall and crossed back to the taped-off elevator. He ducked inside. He spoke into his radio’s throat mike. “Can you get me down there ahead of him?”

  “Better grab your balls,” she answered.

  Before he could take her advice, the elevator dropped from under him. He was weightless for a long stretch, stomach riding up into his throat. The elevator plummeted in a free fall. Painter fought down a surge of panic, along with a rise of bile. Then the car’s floor came crashing up. There was no way to hold himself upright. He fell to his knees. Then the slowing eased and the elevator came to a gliding stop.

  The doors whisked open.

  Painter stumbled to his feet. Thirty floors in less than five seconds. That had to be a record. He pushed through the doorway and out into the elevator lobby. He glanced to the numbers above the express elevator Zhang had taken.

  He was only a floor away.

  Painter took a few steps back, near enough to cover the door, but not close enough to arouse suspicion, posing again as casino security.

  The doors opened on the main floor.

  Painter spied indirectly, using the reflection of the polished brass elevator doors across from the express. Oh no… He swung around and crossed in front of the elevator. No one was in the cage.

  Had Zhang gotten off on another floor? He stepped into the vacant elevator. Impossible. This was the express. There were no stops between here and the floor of suites above. Unless he had pulled the emergency stop, then forced the doors open to make his escape.

  Then Painter spotted it. Taped to the back wall. A glinting bit of plastic and metal. The microtransceiver. The bug.

  Painter felt his heart pound against his rib cage as he stepped into the elevator. His vision tunneled on the bit of electronics taped to the wall. He ripped it free, examining it closely. Zhang had lured him away.

  Oh God…

  He touched his throat mike. “Sanchez!”

  His heart continued its heavy thudding. There was no answer.<
br />
  He swung around and punched the elevator button, marked simply SUITES The doors closed too slowly. Painter paced the tiny compartment, a caged lion. He tried his radio again. Still no response.

  “Goddamnit…” The express began its climb. Painter pounded a fist against the wall. Mahogany paneling cracked under his knuckles. “Move, you fucker!”

  But he knew he was already too late.

  02:38 P.M. GMT

  LONDON, ENGLAND

  STANDING OUT in the hall, steps from the Kensington Gallery, Safia could not breathe. Her difficulty was not from the stench of wood smoke, burned insulation, or the residual scorch of electrical fires. It was the wait. All morning long, she had watched investigators and inspectors from every British bureau traipse in and out. She had been barred.

  Official personnel only.

  Civilians were not allowed to cross the streamers of yellow tape, the cordons of barricades, the wary eyes of military guards.

  Half a day later, she was finally being allowed inside, to see firsthand the destruction. In this final moment, her chest felt as if it were clamped in a giant stone fist. Her heart was a panicked pigeon, beating at her rib cage.

  What would she find? What was salvageable?

  She felt stricken to the core, devastated, as ruined as the gallery.

  The work here was more than just her academic life. After Tel Aviv, she had rebuilt her heart here. And though she had left Arabia, she had not abandoned it. She was still her mother’s daughter. So she had rebuilt Arabia in London, an Arabia before terrorists, a tangible account of her land’s history, its wonder, its ancient times and mysteries. Surrounded by these antiquities, walking the galleries, she heard the crunch of sand underfoot, felt the warmth of the sun on her face, and tasted the sweetness of dates freshly picked. It was home, a safe place.

  But it was more than all that. Her grief went deeper.

  At her core, she had built this home, not just for herself, but also for the mother she barely remembered. At times, when working late at night, Safia caught the faintest wisp of jasmine in the air, a memory from childhood, of her mother. Though they couldn’t share their life, they could share this place, this bit of home.

  Now it was all gone.

  “They’re letting us in.”

  Safia stirred. She glanced to Ryan Fleming. The head of security had kept vigil with her, though it looked like he’d had little sleep.

  “I’ll stick with you,” he said.

  She forced air into her lungs and nodded. It was the best she could manage as thanks for his kindness and company. She followed the other museum staff forward. They had all agreed to help with the cataloging and documenting of the gallery’s contents. It would take weeks.

  Safia marched forward, both drawn to and fearful of what she would find. She rounded past the last barricade. The security gates had been removed by the coroner’s office. She was thankful of that. She had no desire to see the remains of Harry Masterson.

  She stepped to the entrance and stared inside.

  Despite the preparation in her head and the brief glimpse from the video cameras, she was not ready for what she found.

  The bright gallery was now a blackened cavern system, five chambers of charred stone.

  Breath caught in her chest. Gasps arose behind her.

  The firestorm had laid waste to everything. The wallboard had been incinerated down to the base blocks. Nothing remained standing except for a single Babylonian vase in the center of the gallery. It stood waist-high, and while scorched, it had remained upright. Safia had read reports of tornadoes doing the same, cutting a swath of total devastation while leaving a bicycle resting on its kickstand, untouched in the middle of it all.

  It made no sense. None of it did.

  The place still reeked of smoke and several inches of sooty water covered the floor, left over from the deluge of the fire hoses.

  “You’ll need rubbers,” Fleming said, placing a hand on her arm, guiding her over to a line of boots. She pulled into a set numbly. “And a hard hat.”

  “Where do we even begin?” someone muttered.

  Properly outfitted now, Safia stepped into the gallery, moving as if in a dream, mechanical, eyes unblinking. She crossed through the rooms. When she reached the far gallery, something crunched under her boot heel. She bent down, fished through the water, and retrieved a stone from the floor. A few lines of cuneiform etched its surface. It was a piece of an Assyrian tablet, dating back to ancient Mesopotamia. She straightened and stared across the ruin of the Kensington Gallery.

  Only now did she note the other people. Strangers in her home.

  Folks labored in pockets, talking in hushed tones, as if in a graveyard. Building inspectors examined the infrastructure while fire investigators took readings with handheld devices. A pack of municipal engineers argued in a corner about budgets and bids, and a few policemen stood guard by the collapsed section of the exterior wall. Workmen were already constructing a crude plank blockade to cover the opening.

  Through the gap, she spotted gawkers across the street, held back by cordons. They were surprisingly persistent considering that the morning drizzle had turned into sleet by the afternoon. Flashes of camera bulbs flickered in the gloom. Tourists.

  A surge of anger flamed through her numbness. She wanted to throw the lot of them out of here. This was her wing, her home. Her anger helped focus her, bring her back to the situation at hand. She had a duty, an obligation.

  Safia returned her attention to the other scholars and students from the museum. They had begun to sift through the debris. It was heartening to see their usual petty professional jealousies set aside for now.

  Safia crossed back toward the entrance, ready to organize those who had volunteered. But as she reached the first gallery, a large group appeared at the entrance. At the forefront strode Kara, dressed in work clothes, a red hard hat emblazoned with the insignia for Kensington Wells. She led a team of some twenty men and women into the gallery. They were identically outfitted, wearing the same red hard hats.

  Safia stepped in front of her. “Kara?” She had not seen the woman all day. She had vanished with the head of the museum, supposedly to help coordinate the various investigative teams of the fire and police. It seemed a few billion in sterling garnered some authority.

  Kara waved the men and women into the gallery. “Get to work!” She turned to Safia. “I’ve hired my own forensic team.”

  Safia stared after the group as they tromped like a small army into the rooms. Instead of weapons, they carried all manner of scientific tools. “What’s going on? Why are you doing this?”

  “To find out what happened.” Kara watched her team set to work. Her eyes had a feverish shine, a fiery determination.

  Safia had not seen such a look on her face in a long time. Something had sparked an intensity in Kara that had been missing for years. Only one thing could bring about such fervor.

  Her father.

  Safia remembered the look in Kara’s eyes as she had surveyed the videotape of the explosion. The strange relief. Her one spoken word. Finally…

  Kara stepped out into the gallery. Already her team had commenced digging samples from various surfaces: plastics, glass, wood, stone. Kara crossed to a pair of men carrying metal detectors, sweeping them along the floor. One pulled a bit of a melted bronze from some debris. He set it aside.

  “I want every fragment of that meteorite found,” Kara ordered.

  The men nodded, continuing the search.

  Safia joined Kara. “What are you really seeking here?”

  Kara turned to her, eyes ablaze with determination. “Answers.”

  Safia read the hope behind the set in her friend’s lips. “About your father?”

  “About his death.”

  4:20 P.M.

  KARA SAT in the hall on a folding chair. The work continued in the galleries. Fans whirred and rattled. The mumble and chatter of workers in the wing barely reached her. She had come
out to smoke a cigarette. She had long given up the habit, but she needed something to do with her hands. Her fingers trembled.

  Did she have the strength for this? The strength to hope.

  Safia appeared at the entryway, spotted her, and stepped in her direction.

  Kara waved her off, pointed to the cigarette. “I just need a moment.”

  Safia paused, staring at her, then nodded and headed back into the gallery.

  Kara took another drag, filling her chest with cool smoke, but it did little to settle her. She was too unbalanced, the adrenaline of the night wearing thin. She stared at the plaque beside the gallery. It bore a bronze likeness of her father, the founder of the gallery.

  Kara sighed out a stream of smoke, blurring the sight. Papa…

  Somewhere out in the gallery, something fell with a loud bang, sounding like a gunshot, a reminder of a past, of a hunt across the sands.

  Kara drifted into the past.

  It had been her sixteenth birthday.

  The hunt had been her father’s gift.

  The Arabian oryx fled up the slope of the dune. The antelope’s white coat stood out starkly against the red sands. The only two blemishes to its snowy hide were a black swatch on the tip of its tail and a matching mask around its eyes and nose. A wet crimson trail dripped down its wounded haunch.

  As it fought to escape the hunters, the oryx’s hooves drove deep into the loose sand. Blood flowed more thickly as it kicked toward the ridgeline. A pair of tapered horns sliced through the still air as the muscles of its neck wrenched with each painful yard gained.

  A quarter mile back, Kara heard its echoing cry over the growl of her sand cycle, a four-wheel all-terrain vehicle with thick knobby tires. In frustration, she gripped the handles of her bike as it flew over the summit of a monstrous dune. For a breathless moment, she lifted out of her seat, airborne, as the cycle bucked over the ridge.

  The angry set to her lips remained hidden behind a sand scarf, a match to her khaki safari suit. Her blond hair, braided to the middle of her back, flagged behind her like a wild mare’s tail.