Lethal Exposure

by Kevin J. Anderson

  “Hello, General. Thank you for the official citation your government sent me. That was most kind of you, sir. And our mutual friend again says hello. It turns out we’re working on another case together, one similar to yours… only much worse. A lethal radiation exposure this time.”

  Ursov suddenly sounded cagey. “I am sorry to hear that, my friend. An accident? And… where did this radiation come from?”

  “It happened at a high-energy accelerator. Perhaps an accident, or perhaps not,” Craig said. “I need some information from you, General.”

  “Me?” Ursov said, genuinely surprised. “How can I assist you? I am on the other side of the world.”

  “The victim is an emigre Ukrainian scientist. He defected during the breakup of the USSR -”

  “A defector?”

  “Encouraged by us. He came to work at Fermilab, our largest particle accelerator, near Chicago.”

  “I am familiar with CERN in Geneva. It is similar, yes?”

  “Yes. From what I can tell, the victim worked for the Soviet Union on some projects-but he has kept extremely quiet about it. However, I believe some of his previous work may have endangered him here. And others. My own partner Ben Goldfarb has been shot. You might remember him.”

  “I see why you have such incentive to solve this case. But a defector-”

  “The victim has only about two days to live, General. A distinct part of the trail leads back to the physics he performed in the former Soviet Union. I want to know what it was, and why it might have marked him for death.”

  Ursov was silent for a moment. “Agent Kreident, I have no knowledge of such matters. You must realize this.”

  “But certainly, General Ursov, a man in your position has ways of finding out?” He pursed his lips, but Ursov didn’t rise to the bait. “The scientist’s name is Georg Dumenco. He was a highly esteemed physicist. I believe his work must have been ground-breaking, judging from the terms my country offered him when he defected. He’s under consideration for this year’s Nobel Prize in physics.”

  Ursov interrupted him sourly. “Yes, we remember Dr. Dumenco. It is too bad he fled to your country. We would have been proud to have him accept his prize in Stockholm in the name of my country instead of yours.”

  “Well he’s not going to be accepting it for either country,” Craig said. “Dumenco is in a hospital bed dying from radiation exposure. I need to know about him, General. Tell me what you can about his work.”

  Ursov paused again, as if pondering the implications of answering. “If he conducted his research for Soviet military, those records are classified and sealed. I now merely work for Russian Strategic Rocket Forces.”

  “Yes, General,” Craig said with total skepticism, “and I’m merely an accountant for the FBI.”

  Ursov chuckled. More static came on the line.

  Craig glanced at his watch. He didn’t have a clue how much money was left on his card, but he made ready to slip in another one before the line went dead. “Look, General, I don’t need to know the exact nature of what he was doing-I probably wouldn’t understand it anyway. But give me a lead, something that’ll help me solve this murder.”

  Ursov sighed. “It will take some time, my friend, and do not expect too many details. I know I owe you my life, but sometimes a life is not worth all that much. At least not to people over here.”

  “Do what you can, General, and don’t take too long.”

  “Very well-and say hello to the lovely Dr. LeCroix for me. From the way she talks, I believe you still hold a special place in her heart.”

  “Thanks, General,” Craig said, embarrassed, “that’s not the information I wanted to hear.”

  “And say hello to the equally lovely Ms. Mitchell.” Ursov sighed. “Ah, to be twenty years younger. You must still work with both of them.”

  “Yes, sir, I am-but it’s much too complicated to go into now.” And boy is that an understatement, he thought.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Thursday, 3:31 p.m.

  Fox RiverMedicalCenter,

  Intensive Care Unit

  As they left Ben Goldfarb in his hospital room, Craig and Jackson strode down the hall in their dark suits, making their way past ICU rooms with dying or recovering patients. Their partner’s condition was unchanged, still weak and precarious; but the doctors had kept him on a ventilator, sedated and stabilized, with the endotracheal tube in his throat, which prevented him from speaking even if he had awakened. Goldfarb’s wife and daughters hovered beside him, giving their silent support.

  Trish had gone to her temporary office to study lab results and chemical analyses of Dumenco’s condition, leaving the orderlies to do their rounds. Until he heard back from General Ursov, if he heard back, Craig saw no point in returning to Fermilab.

  Seeing the curly-haired agent lying so severely injured, Craig felt his anger rising. Beside him, Jackson was silent and rigid, held erect by his internal fury and his need to find a target against which to release it.

  Craig vowed to talk with the Ukrainian scientist one more time. Craig knew that Dumenco held a key piece of information, but refused to reveal it. Craig had no further patience, no more desire to play games. Ben Goldfarb had put his life on the line for that man. Dumenco could be a bit more cooperative…

  According to Jackson ’s research, the Ukrainian’s grad student was nowhere to be found, not at home, not on vacation. Maybe he had just changed his plans, not in itself unusual, especially not for someone without a wife or children. Perhaps Bretti had even come back to work-but finding any particular individual at Fermilab was a daunting task, since the scientists and technicians didn’t usually bother to make their whereabouts known. Of course, if Bretti had returned, he would certainly have found out about Dumenco.

  As he and Jackson strode down the hall toward the dying scientist’s room, they saw a blond-haired orderly flash his ID and hospital badge to the guards stationed outside. The two hospital security men glanced at the orderly’s ID and let him pass. The white-uniformed orderly slipped inside with his cart of medications and his clipboard.

  Agent Schultz from the Chicago Bureau office saw them coming and stepped around from a bank of pay phones he had been using. He greeted Craig and Jackson. “Nothing much happening,” Schultz said. “That old guy is going to be dead tomorrow or the day after. What’s the use anybody trying to kill him now?”

  Craig checked his watch, trying to remember the shift changes. “Makes no sense to me either,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not worried.” The guards saw them approaching and nodded, alert for any terrorists coming down the hospital corridor.

  An intercom called for assistance on the third floor. Pediatrics paged a doctor. Another orderly emerged from a room down the hall carrying a bedpan.

  With Schultz tagging along, Craig and Jackson approached Dumenco’s room. Creasing his brow, Craig stepped closer, wondering what the orderly was doing inside. Jackson reached for the door, and the nearest security guard moved aside to let the three agents pass.

  “Hey!” Jackson snapped, turning on them. “Are you going to just let us barge in there?” The first guard looked flustered, glancing over at his counterpart.

  Craig glanced through the wire-reinforced window in Dumenco’s door. Oxygen from a wall-mounted valve system ran through hoses to the bed. A thick plastic privacy curtain surrounded the dying scientist, blurring details. Through a crack in the curtain, Craig saw the orderly hunched over the bed, blocking the view. He seemed to be adjusting Dumenco’s pillow, his head rest. In front of the curtain, a teenage candystriper unloaded towels from a cart.

  “You should at least check our badges.” Jackson continued his reprimand, his voice harsh. “I don’t care if you recognize us or not. Don’t you guys understand what high security means? Ever vigilant.”

  “Sorry, sir,” both guards said in unison. Agent Schultz stifled a smile.

  Then Craig noticed Dumenco’s hand reach up, thrashing in the
air, weakly struggling. Battering against the curtain, he struck the back of the orderly’s white coat, leaving a reddish stain from his damaged skin. The orderly didn’t flinch, but continued to hunch over Dumenco.

  Craig shoved the door open and dashed inside. “FBI! Stop right there! What are you doing?” The candystriper looked up, eyes wide. She stood between Craig and the orderly.

  The orderly lurched upward, spinning around. His face was stony but flushed, his hair so pale that it looked recently bleached. The orderly’s eyebrows had been shaved off as well, leaving only smooth skin on his face. A simple but very effective disguise. He would look entirely different from the dark-haired man Trish had seen during the previous attack.

  Dumenco’s free hand reached over to claw at the small, wet pillow that had been shoved against his face so hard his skin had bruised. He gasped in a lungful of air. Blood trickled from his crushed nose.

  The orderly moved like a cobra. With his left hand he whipped out a long razor-edged surgical knife.

  “Don’t move!” Craig shouted, whipping his hand back to his pancake holster and pulling out his handgun. “FBI!”

  More intent on killing his victim than in escaping, the blond-haired man slashed downward toward the body on the bed. But Dumenco somehow had enough presence of mind to yank the wet pillow across his chest. The blade plunged into the pillow.

  The assassin twisted the knife free. Craig leveled his gun, as did Jackson and Schultz, who also charged into the room. The candystriper screamed and backed into the curtain, uncertain where to move in the confusion.

  Jackson ’s eyes narrowed, and he held up his pistol. The assassin slashed sideways with the knife, this time severing some of the tubes and cables connecting Dumenco to the oxygen, IV fluids and life-monitoring apparatus.

  Alarms squealed from the disconnected apparatus. A louder, more insistent alarm sounded at the ICU’s central monitoring station.

  Jackson yelled, “Put down your weapon, sir! Now!” and tightened his finger on the trigger.

  From the other side of the hospital bed the murderous orderly grabbed his cart and shoved it forward, moving in front of Dumenco. Jackson pulled his gun back, not willing to risk hitting the Ukrainian or the candystriper.

  “Block him off,” Craig said, moving toward the door. The impostor orderly ran with surprising power, using the sharp-edged cart like a battering ram. He smashed into Schultz, and Craig heard the sound of cracking bone. The young candystriper scrambled out of the way, gasping.

  With deadly precision the orderly threw his knife at the nearest hospital guard, who also stood in his way out in the hall. The blade dug into his right breast, and he staggered back, gasping and coughing blood. Jackson ran after the impostor, but Schultz went down in front of him.

  More alarms sounded out in the halls. Doctors came rushing from their emergency stations, while hospital aides stood at the doors, perplexed and astonished.

  As the orderly plunged through the door, Craig dove at his legs, but the man kicked him in the chin. His teeth clicked together with a noise that vibrated through his skull. In his spinning vision, he saw black static.

  Jackson leaped over a moaning Agent Schultz and passed Craig in hot pursuit after the orderly. “Everybody, out of the way!” he yelled. “FBI!”

  Craig struggled to his feet as the first emergency doctor arrived in response to the automatic alarms. “Help them!” he said, shaking his head to clear it as he gestured to where the stabbed guard writhed in pain. Dumenco lay disconnected from the oxygen, IV fluid, and life-monitoring equipment, wheezing, and Agent Schultz nursed what appeared to be broken ribs and a broken arm. “Get help for all of them.”

  Craig raced down the hall after his partner. The would-be assassin ran for the stairwell with Jackson close behind him. Grabbing a metal cart, the orderly flung it behind him like a carnival ride. Jackson crashed headlong into it. The cart toppled over with a loud clatter, spraying medication cups, syringes, and supplies across the floor.

  Jackson didn’t slow, hopping over the obstacle and staggering to regain his balance. He held his handgun out, but didn’t fire as he charged ahead. People in the hall squealed and scattered out of the way.

  The assassin hit the stairwell, ripped the metal fire door open, and bounded down the stairs. On pneumatic hinges, the door began to shut behind him. Jackson, running at full speed, grabbed for the door.

  Craig saw the potential trap and shouted, “ Jackson – on your guard!”

  The tall, dark agent passed the threshold at full speed into the dimmer light of the stairwell. He posed a perfect target-but Craig shouted his warning at just the right instant, and Jackson apparently realized his peril. He threw himself sideways just as bullets smashed into the stairwell’s metal door, making large puckered craters.

  Jackson wasted no time and swung down his own gun with practiced ease. He didn’t bother identifying himself-and FBI agents were trained not to fire warning shots. Jackson pulled the trigger three times, clustering the shots around the impostor orderly’s chest. Aim for the center of mass. Remove the threat.

  The orderly flew backward into the concrete wall, his chest ripped open. With the impact, he bounced like a rubber ball down the remaining half-flight of stairs, leaving a series of red stains until he crashed against the corner landing. Jackson froze in position, his gun still aimed, waiting to see if the blond man made a further move. But the attacker lay sprawled, his eyes wide but unseeing. Speckles of blood and cooling perspiration dotted his smooth forehead.

  It had happened in only a few seconds. Craig finally caught up with his partner, who stood panting and shaking in the instantaneous after-rush of the ordeal.

  “Where’s his weapon?” said Craig, scanning the floor.

  Jackson nodded down the stairwell. “Secure it-I kicked it away.”

  Furtively, Jackson glanced over at the bullet holes in the metal door only inches from where his chest and head had been. His skin took on a pasty appearance, tinting the rich brown of his face with a grayish cast.

  One of the doctors on duty rushed up and knelt over the assassin. It only took a moment to check the man over and determine that nothing could be done to save him. The doctor stepped away.

  After retrieving the dead man’s weapon, Craig felt cold. He had known there was no other option, but still he shook his head. “Is that our killer?” he asked. “You think that’s the guy who triggered the accident at Fermilab?”

  Jackson panted, then sank to his knees. “He sure didn’t want Dumenco to live through the day.”

  Then the other implications struck home for Craig. “Just what we needed, a Board of Inquiry in the midst of this. We’re already short on time.” Jackson seemed too wrung out to do more than just stand motionless. Craig squeezed his shoulder. “I’ll back you up all the way, Randall.”

  He went down the stairs to search the body. His fingers sticky with blood, he patted down the man’s clothes, pawing in his pockets.

  Naturally, he discovered no identification. With the disguised appearance it would be difficult to tell who this man was, unless the FBI fingerprint database could help out. In the shirt pocket beneath his white orderly coat, however, Craig found two pieces of paper, one bearing a list of names with corresponding cities, and another a small business card. Physicians for Responsible Radiation Research, with a stylized logo that showed PR-Cubed. Craig’s stomach twisted in knots.

  What did Trish have to do with this?

  Back in Dumenco’s room doctors scrambled to put everything back in order. Schultz and the injured guard had been taken off to be treated, but they weren’t in any danger.

  In his bed the Ukrainian lay devastated. His already horrifying condition had grown noticeably worse, as if he had been through some mangling industrial machine. His face was ravaged, his eyes wild and scarlet.

  Trish tended him, trying to soothe him. Her face was flushed, her expression pinched with concern. She’d succeeded in replacing the IV drip tubes
and reattaching the electrodes to his medical monitoring equipment. Trish looked up at Craig with concern and questions in her sepia eyes.

  He took a deep breath and clasped his hands, still sticky and stained with blood from the dead assassin, behind his back. Other Chicago Bureau agents, local law-enforcement, and the remainder of the hospital security staff, had converged on where the body had fallen in the stairwell.

  Soon it would be time for all the paperwork, all the reports. Craig nodded at Trish. “You don’t have to worry about that man anymore. Whoever he was. He doesn’t have any identification.”

  Trish looked relieved.

  Craig narrowed his eyes and spoke sharply. “So do you want to save us a lot of time and trouble and tell me who he is?”

  Trish blinked, apparently baffled. Craig held up the business card, and it seemed to burn in his fingers. “He had this in his pocket. PR-Cubed, Trish. Your organization! I thought you were hiding something from me this morning, not telling me everything you thought. Now who is he?”

  “He could have gotten that card anywhere-our convention was in town last weekend, and-”

  Craig raised his voice, but was still under control. “Who is he, Trish?”

  She paled and rested against the metal support bar of Dumenco’s bed. “I… I thought he might have looked familiar. Someone from the PR-Cubed who was-who said he was tracking down Chernobyl information. He wanted to know where I could find Georg’s family members, since I’d had some contact with them in the Ukraine. But I didn’t know anything. He asked me several times, and he was very insistent-but I didn’t know!” Her voice became thin and watery with her own anxiety.

  “Then why didn’t you tell me this morning, dammit?”

  “Because I wasn’t sure. He was wearing a surgical mask, it was dark. I thought I was imagining things.”

  Dumenco spoke weakly from his bed. “Not… imagining things.”

  Craig marched toward Dumenco, holding out the list, unfolding the sheet of paper. “Dr. Dumenco, I need you to look at these names. Do you recognize them? The man who attacked you carried them.”