by P. W. Child
"No problem, sir," Tyrone's professional smile was unwavering. He gestured to a bellhop who skipped straight to his side. "Show these guests to 414," he said, and then melted back into the crowds.
"Oh, my god." Nina collapsed onto the massive bed, sprawling out like a starfish. "Please tell me we don't have to do anything else today. I just want to lie here and never move again. Well, not quite. I just want to have a bath, and then lie here and never move again."
"That sounds like an admirable plan," said Purdue, dropping into an armchair to pull off his boots. "Should we order room service while you bathe?"
"Mmm. That would be great, thanks." She dragged herself onto her feet, and then disappeared into the bathroom. Sam and Purdue heard the click of the lock, followed by the muffled sound of rushing water.
"There is a second bathroom in the suite," Purdue said. He opened his safe deposit box and took out the only thing inside, which was a small USB stick on a chain. "It adjoins the other bedroom. Do you want to bathe too?"
Sam, slumped in the chair opposite Purdue's, shook his head. "I'll wait until after we've eaten, I think. I'm not much of a one for soaking, and I don't think I've got the energy to stand under the shower just now. Just a little rest and some food, then I can worry about getting myself clean."
He sat with his eyes shut, half-listening while Purdue called room service and ordered steaks, fries, green salads with balsamic vinegar, dinner rolls, sparkling water, and a bottle of robust burgundy. Even the sound of the word "steak" set his mouth watering. It would be a welcome change from the lentil-heavy diet offered at the campsite. "So what's the plan?" he asked Purdue. "We're staying here tonight, we're picking up your key . . . and then what? Do we destroy it before we go after the others?"
"It might be best if we do not," Purdue mused. "There are alternative methods in place in the event of anything happening to the keys. As long as the backup servers remain operational, destroying the keys alone will not be sufficient. First, we must get hold of all three so that I can wipe the backup servers. Then we will destroy the keys and leave FireStorm to pick up the pieces. I propose that in the morning, once we are rested, we collect Julia Rose's car from the valet service here and make our way back to Parashant, where I believe we will find Sara's key—and perhaps a little information on where to find the third."
A pang of guilt shot through Sam as he remembered Julia Rose, trapped in Nina's old cell beneath the campsite. To his shame, he had barely thought about her since their escape. "We need to find a way to get her out," he said. "I don't just mean if she's still in the cell. I'm really sure she won't be—I mean, she was really cozy with Sara, so I'm sure they'd have got her out. But I don't like the way they sucked her in. She's young, and they shouldn't be preying on vulnerable young women. We need to get her way from Sara, if we can."
Purdue nodded. "I am surprised that she became quite so caught up in FireStorm," he said. "My initial impression of her was one of resilience, not vulnerability."
"Mine too," Sam said grimly. "But I think we were wrong, and I feel responsible for getting her into all this. So let's go and get Julia Rose and the key."
By midnight Sam, Nina, and Purdue had all eaten and bathed and were wrapped in thick, soft robes. They sat around a small table sharing a twenty-five-year-old bottle of Talisker, discussing their plans.
"How dangerous are they likely to be?" Nina asked. "With Cody out of the picture, do you think Sara's likely to also be armed? And what about the acolytes?"
"To some extent," said Purdue, "Though I suspect Cody was their muscle. They have knives, we know that. I think our best hope is to try to isolate Sara and subdue her."
"I suppose that as soon as we get Sara's key from her, time won't be on our side," Sam speculated. "She'll contact whoever has the third key. Can we stop her from doing that?"
"Put her in the cells," Nina suggested. "I'm not keen on the idea of inflicting that on anyone, but it would buy us a bit of time. Mind you, that will only work if the initiates aren't around. Can we bide our time until the end of the Mind Meld?"
Sam shook his head. "They'll be waiting on Cody coming back. When he doesn't, they'll know something's wrong. Purdue, are they likely to figure out that we're after these keys?"
"I should think so," Purdue said, with a hint of hollow amusement. "Sara is many things, but she is not stupid. Because Cody was able to pinpoint our destination, we can safely assume that Sara knew that I would attempt to destroy those servers. No matter how confident she is in Cody's thuggish abilities, she would be a fool not to take steps to protect the key. She will be ready for us. I am just not sure what form that will take. Perhaps more drones, hopefully nothing worse. I was not directly involved in the development of the Parashant base, so I cannot speak for its aggressive capabilities."
"Are we out of ice?" Nina leaned over and looked into the ice bucket. "Damn it, we are."
"Then try drinking it properly," Sam teased. "Just whisky in the glass—no water, no ice, no nonsense. It's the only way."
Nina snorted. "Yeah. If you like the feeling of your throat burning. I'll just go to the machine and get some more. Back in a second." She pulled on a pair of white hotel slippers, grabbed the bucket, and reached for the door handle. "How do I unlock this? Is there a trick to it?"
Purdue crossed the room and tried the handle for himself. "It's not locked," he said, but the door did not budge. "Or at least, it shouldn't be. Perhaps I locked it without thinking." He pressed his hand against the plate above the handle, and then tried once again to open the door. Nothing happened, but Purdue's spine stiffened and his face went white.
In one swift, fluid movement Purdue ripped a panel from the wall beside the door, revealing a touch screen. He pressed his fingertips against it, then his whole hand. When this failed to get the result he wanted, he cursed softly and began tapping and swiping rapidly. "Nina, call reception," he said, not looking up from his task. "Ask them to confirm whether this door is supposed to be locked."
Scrambling across the bed, Nina snatched up the phone and pressed zero. A few moments later she slammed it down again. "They said it's unlocked," she said. "They told me to try again." Purdue tried the handle once more, but to no avail.
"Can we shoulder it open?" Sam asked. He scanned the outline of the door, looking for hinges, and then remembered that it only slid. He banged on it with his fist. "It doesn't feel that solid. We should be able to budge it open."
"Try your handprint first." Purdue seized Sam's wrist and pushed his hand against the panel. The uncovered screen flashed red. The door stayed in place. "No, not you, either . . . They have your handprint."
"Who?" Sam asked. "FireStorm? Why would they—"
"I think they have someone in the building. Someone who knows we are here and is overriding the door controls to keep us contained. If they had deactivated the doors for the whole building the reception staff would be bound to know by now, but it appears that it is just us. The door should unlock at the touch of my hand. Indeed, when opening from the inside, any door in this place should respond to the touch of any hand—the correct print is only required to gain entrance to a room, not exit from it. I can only assume that they have overridden that command specifically for us."
Sam racked his brain, trying to think when FireStorm could possibly have acquired his hand print. He could not remember giving them any identifying information, but there was so much that was strange and hard to remember about the events of his time at Parashant.
An image flashed in his mind of warm, damp earth, dark walls, and a strange glow in front of him. The trials, he thought. When we had to put our hands on that orb and keep them there . . . That must have been it. Staring into the pool, being prodded in the mouth by whatever that was. Were they harvesting biometric information? I thought they were just hippies . . .
"Nina!" Sam called over to her. "You didn't do the trials, did you?"
Her eyebrow shot up. "What? Why the fuck are you asking me that?"<
br />
"Never mind!" he yelled. "Did you do them?"
"No, I—" she was cut off with a yelp as Sam dived across the bed and swept her up, carrying her over to the door. He pushed her hand against the panel. At last, the lock clicked. Sam yanked the handle and the door slid silently open.
"Sorry, Nina," Sam said, gasping a little from the sudden exertion. "I just wanted to spare your ankle. I hope I didn't—"
"Get down!" she yelled. Sam obeyed on instinct, just in time to hear something whistling past his head.
Purdue was less swift. The knife hit him in the left shoulder. He stifled a cry of pain as he pulled it out, then, with a snarl, threw it straight back in the direction from which it had come. He hit the female acolyte square in the chest. She fell to her knees, collapsed onto the floor and began to stain the pale hallway carpet with blood.
"I think," he panted, "we can safely say that they know we're here."
☼
Chapter Twenty-Nine
"Purdue!" Sam rushed over and crouched beside him. Blood was flowing freely from the open wound. Behind them Nina slammed the door shut again, and then turned to see her blood-soaked lover slumped on the floor. Without a word, she and Sam took hold of Purdue and stripped his bathrobe from him, then folded it a couple of times and held it against the gash in his skin.
"Keep that there," Nina said. "I'm going to call for help." She lifted the receiver on the bedside phone, picking up Purdue's folded clothes from the bed and tossing them to Sam while she waited for an answer. There was none. She hung up and pressed zero again, pulling her own clothes on with her free hand. The phone rang and rang. She tried 911. Instead of clicking straight through to emergency services, that number rang and rang. "They've cut us off somehow," she muttered, hanging up. "Let me take over. You need to get dressed."
Sam did as he was told. He dashed through to the other room where he had left his clothes and pulled them on, returning just in time to hear tapping on the door.
"Open the door, please." They heard Sara's voice from the corridor. "I would like to resolve this without any further bloodshed, but if you continue to resist I will have the hotel call the police. I'm sure they would be interested to hear about why there is a dead woman out here—especially because the knife in her chest has Dave's fingerprints all over it."
Nina, Sam, and Purdue glanced at one another. Sam saw the alarm in Nina's eyes and thought her expression must be a match for his own. With pain in his every movement, Purdue held up a hand, motioning them to be silent.
"Dave, I know you're injured," Sara's voice rang out again. "I'm sure you've already tried to call for help. Well, that won't work until we stop jamming your phone, so if you want to get a medical team here before you bleed out, let me in."
Nina nudged Purdue gently, and Sam watched them have a rapid, silent argument. She flicked her eyes toward the door and gestured at his wound, but he made a small, emphatic gesture with his open palm, refusing any suggestion that they should surrender in exchange for his well-being.
When Sara spoke again, the irritation in her voice was obvious. "This is not going to help, you understand. We can wait here until Dave finishes bleeding to death. Sam, Nina, maybe you'll wait it out a little longer than that. Maybe you'll stay in there a couple more days, who know? You can survive without food for a while. But I can keep someone posted outside your door constantly, and the moment you open it, we'll kill anyone we find and take the key. Or we just call the police and let them take it from there. There's no way for you to get out of this with the key in your possession if you want to keep your lives or your freedom. Give me the key. If you're prepared to promise us secrecy and give up the key, I can promise that you'll get out of here alive."
"Stall her," Sam whispered, leaning in toward Nina and Purdue. "We have to open the door, but you need to keep her talking. I'm going to get downstairs and get help."
"Sam!" Nina reached across Purdue and grabbed Sam's hand. He thought she was about to object to the plan. Arguments that it was the only option they had were on the tip of his tongue. Then she squeezed his fingers between hers. "Be careful," she said. "Don't get hurt."
"I'll do my damnedest," he promised. "I need you to open this for me."
I must be insane, Sam thought as he stood behind the door, waiting for Nina to press the panel that would unlock it. I might be about to get a knife buried in my back. Or a bullet. Or god knows what else. They might just shoot us all as soon as the door opens. But if they don't . . . I hope I can run fast enough.
The door slid back. Sam exploded out of the room, knocking Sara and the male acolyte back against the wall. He tore along the hallway, pulled open the door to the stairs and ran down, his feet slamming into the concrete, grabbing the handrail to pull himself around corners. He was not sure whether he was being followed. He did not dare to check.
"Well, that's a futile endeavor, isn't it?" Sara strode into the suite, her usual elegant glide abandoned in favor of a stiffer, angrier march. "What does he think he's going to do? Get reception to call the police? Does he really think I don't have the hotel security primed to take him down the second he starts yelling about throwing knives and impossible lock-ins? Sit down, Nina."
She perched in the nearest armchair, the acolyte close behind her, and smoothed her closely fitted black skirt over her knees. Nina considered whether there was anything that she could use as a weapon, any heavy or sharp object that could be thrown, but there was nothing close enough that she could be sure of getting to first. She sat on the end of the bed, helping Purdue to lean against the edge of it.
"I never should have made your invitation a plus one, Dave," she said with a tight smile. "Or at least I should have vetted your guest more closely. If I had known this woman was going to cause so much trouble, I would never have agreed to her coming. She's one of the few people that FireStorm can't help—one of those unfortunates who won't cope well with the new order when it begins."
"New order?" Nina spat. "Just how insane are you? How the hell did you get from large-scale data harvesting disguised as New Age nonsense to . . . this?" She gesticulated wildly at Purdue's wounded shoulder and the looming acolyte behind Sara's chair.
"Such a closed mind," Sara hissed. "You're so certain that things can never change. The world is in a mess, and it needs a strong vision to bring it back on track. People like you are the problem."
"Their vision is extensive, Nina," Purdue's voice was strained, as he tried to ignore his pain. "It's a complete restructuring of the world as we know it."
"Whether we want it or not? That's been tried before. I specialize in studying the people who tried it."
"Ah, yes," Sara's tone sparkled with forced brightness. "You're the Nazi history specialist. You, of all people, should understand how cheap it is to compare anyone who attempts to build a better world to the Nazis."
"You make it difficult not to," said Nina. Her hands were shaking as she held the towel and she knew that she should not be running the risk of talking back to Sara, but she could not stop herself. "It's not just your dodgy ideology—you're even appropriating the same symbols as they did." She nodded toward the brooch on Sara's lapel.
"Ah," Sara's slender fingers flew to the polished ebony. "The black sun. The energy capable of generating a better race. It's an ancient symbol, Nina, surely you know that? The Nazis were not the only ones to adopt it. If you're trying to suggest that the use of it indicates that our intentions are not good, well . . . that's an argument as spurious as suggesting that anyone who studies Nietzsche or listens to Wagner is hell-bent on genocide. Good ideas are sometimes co-opted by bad people, Nina. That doesn't mean that we abandon them. But we are wasting time here. Dave is in need of medical attention, I would think. And all he has to do to get it is give me that key."
A little way down the corridor, Sam hauled open the door to the stairwell. Flights of steps stretched before him in both directions. He ran up at first, going far enough to conceal himself while he waited
for the door to open again.
It remained closed. I'm not being followed, he thought. That's . . . good, I suppose? But if they're not following, they're still there. In the room. With Nina and Purdue. That can't be good. And if they haven't followed, it's got to be because they don't need to. Because they know I'll go for help, but there won't be help available . . . shit. Well, I have to try. I can't stay here all night. Slowly, cautiously, he straightened up and ran lightly down the stairs, thanking whatever fates had deposited them on the fourth floor instead of the fortieth.
The double doors at the bottom of the stairs brought him out into the lobby, which was crowded with people even at this late hour. He looked at the long line of reception staff, wondering whether any of them were safe to talk to. Are any of them part of FireStorm? All of them, maybe? Damn it, I can't assume that anything is safe.
He walked up to the nearest receptionist and flashed his most charming smile, trying to conceal his nervous shortness of breath. "Hi," he said, "I wonder if you could help me? I think there's a problem with the phone in my room, but I need to make a call quite urgently. You don't have another phone I could use?"
The young woman smiled back blandly. "I'm so sorry that there's a problem, sir. Can I take your room number and we'll get someone to take care of it right away?"
"Room 515," Sam lied automatically.
The girl met his gaze. Sam could not decide whether he detected a look of doubt. "Room 515. Right. One of our engineers is on his way. Now let me help you with that call." She picked up the receiver of the phone in front of her. "If you'll just give me the number, I'll be happy to connect you. It will, of course, be complementary."
Sam hesitated. If I say 911, and she's one of them, I'm dead, he thought. If she's not, I might be able to make the call and get us some help—but look at her. She knows. I can see it in her eyes. She's waiting for me to make that mistake.