Singularity

by Bill DeSmedt

  But Mycroft was still talking. “Do you recall the external links I found on that CROM website? The encrypted ones?”

  “Mmm, vaguely.”

  “Well, accessing the CROM machine this morning gave me the keys I needed.” Mycroft paused for breath. “Jonathan, those links led to an intranet site inside the Russian Embassy. A site maintained by some entity called the ‘FSB.’ ”

  “Sure, that’s their, ah, Federal Security Service. What about it?”

  “You’re their featured attraction.”

  “Come again?”

  “Your name and address, a none-too-flattering likeness, and a caption in Russian. Babelfish translated it as ‘Detain and interrogate.’ ”

  “Detain and interrogate? For what?”

  “I couldn’t be certain. But almost the entire site was devoted to ‘the business of G. M. Postrel’nikova.’ Does that mean anything to you?”

  “Yeah, sure, the G. stands for Galina—a friend I haven’t seen for twenty years.” And now never would again.

  “And, Mycroft? I hate to tell you, but your Babelfish is misfiring again. That word it translated as ‘business’ ? I’m sure it’s delo in the original, and that can mean any number of things: ‘Business’ is one, but in this context the best translation would be . . .” Knox trailed off as the implication hit him.

  “Jonathan, are you still there?”

  “It means ‘case,’ ” he said. “As in criminal case—the FSB’s investigation into Galina’s disappearance.”

  “But if you haven’t seen this person in twenty years, then why—“

  “I don’t know why!”

  His shout echoed off the vaulted marble ceiling, loud enough to startle the two other men sharing the hall with him. They quickly turned back to the display cases they’d been inspecting, but not before Knox had managed to get a good look at them.

  They didn’t look much like your typical mid-week museum-goers. If anything, they looked more like museum specimens. The big guy with the sloping forehead and thick-muscled frame, for instance, could have stepped right out of the Early Man exhibit upstairs. And his smaller companion—thin, sharp-featured, with glittering, furtive eyes that slid away when Knox returned his stare—he would’ve looked at home among the shrews and voles of the Rodentia collection.

  And, now that he’d seen them, Knox realized he’d been seeing them all along. They’d been with him, hovering at the edge of noticeability, ever since Ancient Seas at least, maybe since he’d entered the museum.

  Mycroft was saying something. “You seem to have come to the attention of some powerful instrumentalities of late, more’s the pity.”

  It came back to him then: detain and interrogate.

  “Listen, Mycroft, I’ve got to go.”

  Knox pocketed his handheld and swallowed hard. It was probably pure coincidence. This whole CROM thing had him jumpy enough to start seeing patterns where there were none. And even if it was the FSB, what could they do to him here in the heart of D.C.?

  Still, no sense taking chances. Knox began to sidle toward the exit, past case after free-standing case filled with shards of pottery and small bronze medallions, all inscribed with graceful loops and whorls. Something called “The Enigma of Linear A.”

  Any other time, he might be interested. What interested him now, though, was that his shadows had picked up the pace. Perhaps ten feet behind him, and closing. With the exit arch still thirty feet away.

  He was just debating whether to make a run for it, when he saw something that stopped him cold. There, beneath the exit sign, stood an all-too familiar figure, waving to him.

  Marianna raised her arm and called out, “Jon, over here!”

  What a time she’d had reacquiring him. The Smithsonian was just too damned big. Marianna felt like she’d been tramping around it for hours. She must’ve passed that damned stuffed African elephant three times by now. Why couldn’t the guy have gone to a bookstore or a bar or the goddamn Lincoln Memorial, for godsakes? Why’d it have to be this barn?

  It was only as she’d circled the Rotunda once more that the special-exhibit poster finally registered. “The Enigma of Linear A.” No time right now, but it was here through the end of September, maybe she’d come back and scope it out some other day.

  Or . . . What the hell. As well look for Jon there as anywhere. She studied the floorplan she’d downloaded to her handheld. Past Pacific Cultures, left at the Mighty Marlin . . .

  There, in the center of the special exhibits hall, stood case after case of priceless artifacts. What had they done, moved the whole Iraklion collection here for the month? They would have loved this, Mom and Dad both. Marianna brushed at the corner of her eye.

  When she looked up again, she saw him: Jonathan Knox.

  And beyond him, two FSB foot-soldiers, to judge by the dark suits and dour expressions. They looked for all the world like the sweepers for an abduction op.

  Shit! Jon was going to be spoiled goods for sure if he showed up at the gala tonight with the smell of the Russian Federal Security Service all over him. Or failed to show up at all.

  She beckoned to him. Even the FSB wouldn’t try picking him up if he were in the company of an eyewitness. Look at me, dummy!

  He did. He stopped short and stared at her.

  “Over here!” she called again.

  Then she watched, dumbfounded, as he turned tail and bolted for the far exit, with the FSB in hot pursuit.

  11 | The Beast of Evil Heart

  INTENT AS HE was on his discovery, Jack still sensed someone hovering behind him. He whirled to see—

  “Shif, Igor! You damn near scared the hell out of me!”

  There in the glare of the single bulb stood the young biologist from last night’s campfire, the one with the shy grin and the hip-flask of “mosquito repellent.”

  “What’re you doing out here in the middle of the night, anyway?”

  “Forgive me, Professor Adler.” Igor Zaleskii shuffled into the clearing. His grin wasn’t working tonight. In its place he wore a hangdog expression.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Please understand, it is none of my doing, but . . .” A sigh of Russian proportions. “Academician Medvedev complains that your diesel generator keeps the entire camp awake. He insists you leave still tonight. I am to help you pack.”

  “What? Leave? But, but he can’t do that!”

  Igor sighed again. “It is already done. The Academician has radioed to the authorities at Tomsk University denouncing the noise and, ah, other disruptions you are causing as an obstacle to the progress of the expedition. They in turn contacted your own Texas University administration.”

  It was Jack’s turn to sigh. “And they caved, right?”

  “Beg pardon?”

  “My guys back in Austin, they went along with it, didn’t they? Anything not to rock the boat.”

  Igor just nodded, eyes downcast.

  “That’s okay. I’ve got a little boat-rocker of my own here—a major find, I think. Just let me finish my analysis, and we’ll see who’s standing in the way of progress. By tomorrow, I should—”

  “Tomorrow? No, no, impossible. The helicopter will be here for you in an hour.” Then Igor blinked. “Did you say major find? Is it—that is, may I be permitted to know?”

  “Just let me square things with our fearless leader first.” Jack glanced over at the SQUID and the laptop, its display still alight with the raw data of his discovery. “Damn! This couldn’t have come at a worse time. Are you positive Medvedev won’t keep till I’ve wrapped things up here?”

  “I think it best you talk to him now. I shall watch over your equipment for you until you return.”

  “Well, okay. But no touching, promise?”

  “Do not worry. Go now, and . . .” The shy grin made a brief reappearance. “Good luck!”

  “Thanks.” Jack smiled back. Hell, it wasn’t the kid’s fault if Medvedev had him doing his dirty work for him. On impulse, he whippe
d off his Stetson and set it on Igor’s head. “There you go. Them as guards the gear, gets to wear the hat.”

  “Oh, yes, please.” Igor beamed, managing to look even more boyish than usual. “I like cowboys!”

  Yuri was in luck. The target—wearing that same foolish, wide-brimmed hat from the photographs—sat with his back turned in the middle of the clearing, hunched over a computer screen, oblivious to what awaited. The element of surprise should more than make up for any awkwardness with the unfamiliar weapon.

  He checked to be sure he was holding the device as instructed. Arming it had been a chore in its own right. A wolf’s jaw could exert a pressure of fifteen hundred pounds per square inch. Simulating its bite required setting and locking three separate spring mechanisms, each requiring all Yuri’s strength. And that in total silence not fifty meters from the kill zone, since the weapon was too dangerous to carry armed through the tangled underbrush.

  No need for silence or subtlety anymore, though. Three swift paces carried Yuri across the clearing, to where the target was just beginning to turn and rise from his seat. One hand clamped the mouth shut and tilted back the head. The other pressed steel jaws against the exposed throat, depressed the mechanism’s release, then wrenched back as it slammed shut.

  Yuri was an accomplished knife-fighter, well versed in the close-quarters kill, but even he was surprised at the amount of blood. A knife leaves a narrow slit of a wound from which blood merely seeps or at most, when an artery is hit, jets out in a spray. But here the cruel steel teeth had torn one whole side of the throat out. Gore fountained from the severed carotid.

  It would not do to be drenched in blood. The real wolf might—

  Yuri released his hold and took a step back. Unsupported, the body fell and lay twitching.

  He took a last look at the curious weapon before pocketing it with a grin. He would have to see about having one of these made for himself.

  He wiped his hands on the fabric of his jacket. Now for the rest of it.

  Yuri set about smashing the equipment spread out on the camp-table and the ground beside it. He was supposed to make the damage look haphazard, like the work of an animal. And how the devil was he supposed to know what that looked like? His employers would just have to be satisfied with his standard, manmade death and destruction.

  The target was still trying to scream. Only a hoarse rattle gurgled through the mangled larynx.

  Yuri looked up from his work, looked into the dying eyes. Take away the hat, and the man lying there didn’t much resemble the snapshots in the dossier. But then dead faces all tended to look alike, especially when contorted in such horror and covered in so much blood.

  The one look was all he got. The damaged diesel generator sputtered and died. The single bulb winked out. Silence and night reclaimed one more tiny patch of light and purpose, merging it again into the vast, dark, meaningless wilderness beyond.

  A moment more and the ragged breathing ceased. Only one thing left to do.

  Yuri withdrew a bottle from a zippered pocket and uncapped it carefully. Holding it at arm’s length, he splashed its foul-smelling contents around the campsite, careful not to get any of the liquid on the body itself, lest it overpower the coppery stink of coagulating blood.

  He paused a moment then, listening. Vagrant breezes bore a faint sound in from the banks of the Khushmo. A low growling sound.

  Good.

  Jack was halfway to the main camp when he stopped short and slapped his forehead. That’s what he got for going off halfcocked. In his rush to confront Medvedev with his find, he’d neglected to bring along any of the evidence for it. All the tracking data, from last night and this, were still on the laptop back at his choum.

  He retraced his steps. It would take no more than five or ten minutes to set up the printer and hardcopy the key observations. The delay would doubtless piss Medvedev off even more, but screw that! He’d come around once he understood the significance of the find, once he realized the danger posed by a miniature black hole orbiting inside the Earth.

  Jack slowed to a halt again, struck by another thought: my God! Forget Medvedev—it was going to take the entire world scientific community working together to avert a global disaster!

  Jack quickened his pace. He could see his choum now, through the trees, outlined by the light from the one small bulb. He could hear the rumble of the generator and . . . a crash?

  Dammit! He’d told Igor not to touch anything.

  He reached the edge of the clearing and froze. In the dim light, he could see someone, not Igor—a stranger standing there, a large man all in black. He couldn’t see Igor at all, unless . . . could that be him lying on the ground? The light cut out then, but it sounded like the stranger was smashing Jack’s equipment to hell and gone.

  Jack’s scream caught in his throat. Speechless with shock, he groped his way forward through the darkness.

  Yuri retraced his path, marking the trail with more of the reeking liquid.

  The steel cage was sitting on the riverbank where he had left it. His eyes confirmed what his ears had already told him: the wolf was awake.

  The beast was pacing the narrow confines of its prison, slavering, biting at the bars in its consuming hunger. The GEI expediter had assured Yuri that the wolf had been starved for three days in preparation for this mission. It was ravenous, ravenous enough to overcome its natural fear of man, ravenous enough to kill and devour anything in its path.

  Now came the tricky part: releasing the predator without becoming prey. That was what the scent-bottle was for; it contained the urine of a she-wolf in heat. Yuri had laid down a pheromone-trail even a famished animal would be powerless to ignore. With luck, the wolf would heed that hormonal siren song and follow the spoor back to Adler’s isolated camp before it could think of its hunger again.

  With luck. Yuri’s left hand unlatched the cage door and swung it open. In his right, he held a pistol. It would be a shame to have to kill the beast after hauling it all the way up from the staging area. And Yuri stood to earn a premium if no one suspected Professor Dzhek Adler’s death of being anything but an accident. A gunshot now would forfeit that. Still, no sense taking chances.

  The wolf emerged snarling from its cage, and turned to fix Yuri with its yellow glare. For a moment the two formed a dim-lit tableau on the riverbank, animal and man, kindred spirits, beasts of the evil heart.

  The wolf sniffed the air, then turned and loped off along the scent-trail leading to Adler’s camp.

  Jack found Igor lying beside the remains of the laptop. He knelt down, but even in the darkness he could see there was nothing he could do. Arterial blood pooled black in the starlight. It looked as if Igor’s throat had been torn out. My God! What kind of animal would do such a thing?

  He ought to say something: a prayer, a lament . . . some thing. No words came.

  Jack’s Stetson had rolled under the camp-table in the struggle. He reached to retrieve it, and placed it on Igor’s chest. “He liked cowboys.”

  He straightened and walked over to the SQUID. His pocket flash played over a half million dollars worth of scrap and blasted dreams. He couldn’t take it in, couldn’t wrap his mind around it. Why?

  He was still standing there numbly surveying the wreckage when a growl came from behind him.

  He spun around. Caught in the flashlight’s glare, a gigantic wolf stared back at him, no more than five feet away. The creature was sniffing at Igor’s remains.

  “Get away!” Jack shouted. He waved his arms. No effect.

  Still shouting, he grabbed a spare tent stave and swung it over his head. The wolf looked up from his meal.

  One hundred fifty pounds of claws and fangs hit Jack square in the chest, ripping and tearing. The wolf’s stinking jaws stretched impossibly wide, inches from his face.

  He lost his footing, toppled backwards, hit the ground. His head cracked hard against a corner of the case that had held the now-ruined SQUID.

  It didn’t f
eel like dying. Not really. More like drifting down, down, into an ever-widening vortex of light. The pain of the lacerations was receding, along with the rest of his bodily sensations. He let them go, let memory go, let go life itself. The small spark that was Jack Adler made ready to rejoin the universal radiance. The light flowed forth to welcome him home. He beheld it at last in all its splendor.

  The seed, the source, the place where everything began—infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour.

  Even from the riverbank, Yuri could hear the howling. Good, the wolf was busy covering any last traces of his own visit.

  Time to be going. He loaded the empty cage back in the canoe and made ready to push off. The return trip would be easier; it was all downriver to the helicopter landing area, and the sky was already brightening to the east.

  In the far distance, Yuri could see flashlight beams playing among the trees. It had taken them a good five minutes, but the other expedition members had finally roused themselves to investigate the ruckus. With luck, they might even arrive in time to catch sight of the wolf. If not, well, the sound of its snarls and the tracks it would leave behind should be enough.

  Yuri smiled grimly to himself: Grishin would have his “accident,” and Rusalka would keep her secret.

  12 | The Illusion of Choice

  JONATHAN KNOX TOOK the stairs down to street level two at a time, conscious of the pounding of two, maybe three sets of footsteps behind him. Conscious, too, of the pounding of his own heart, the breath catching in his throat.

  Making a run for it hadn’t been such a hot idea, on the evidence. But what else could he have done? Especially once he’d seen that little CROM minx was in on it.

  In on it? She’d probably orchestrated the whole thing from the get-go.

  If he could just get out onto Constitution Avenue, hail a cab.

  Knox double-timed across the Smithsonian’s entrance foyer. Didn’t dare look back, but the pursuit no longer seemed to be gaining on him. Maybe running hadn’t been such a bad idea, after all.