“We do?” Dominic Quill wondered aloud and raised his eyebrows at Park.
“I think a few Molotov cocktails come in handy for most plans.” Park uncapped another bottle of Corbin and emptied it on the grass.
“You think?” Quill knew it was a great idea and hated himself for not helping out.
Park shot a glance at the cop and turned back to the ice-cooler. In half a minute, all eight bottles were empty. He used the Zlatuost blade to tear his own T-Shirt into long strips.
He went to the SUV’s fuel tank and punctured a hole in it. He knew that a GLA-200 could hold 50 liters and surely would have enough to fill a few bottles. The petrol flowed into the bottles, one by one. Park stopped when he had filled six bottles. He handed them over to Quill and doused the pieces of cloth and began stuffing it.
“Got your Zippo with you, kid?” Park asked.
Quill reached for his pockets and handed over a steel lighter. “When we get your research back, we’ll smoke a few Cubans that I’ve been saving for something special.”
“Sure.” Park was not a smoker but would not mind a victory cigar. His face lit up with a wide grin while he hastily explained the immediate plan of action to Quill.
The cop took the lighter and all the bottles and positioned himself by the backdoor of the villa. He was in an elevated place and could see the designed route the bears would most likely take towards their prey.
With all this luck, the timing was perfect. Quill could hear the growls approaching from a distance. He refused to believe that the trap in motion would consume the bait. That was the usual purpose of a bait, logic told him. But Park had insisted that this was a solid plan and Quill couldn’t dare argue at the madman who was risking his own life.
The two men waited in their positions. Nothing happened.
5 seconds. . . 10 seconds. . . 20 seconds. . .
Then the growls began. Wild loud footsteps approached.
They came from the very route the two men had taken. This was enough of a signal for Quill. He opened the Zippo and lit the fuse of a bottle. Yet he couldn’t sight any bears. He began glancing at the fiery fuse and tensed up. The bomb was going to take him out. If he threw it, it would warn the bears. His perspiration increased in the night.
With a fear-inducing roar, the two gigantic polar bears leaped over the Mercedes. Park, who was right below the car, rolled away and began running. Being bait, using his scent was a plan. But not a good one.
Just as Quill spotted the bears ravaging and clawing at the roof of the SUV, he flung the Molotov cocktail. The frightened cop could see this in slow motion because of the rapid pace of his heart thumping. At around twenty yards away from the cop, the two Arctic beasts turned back towards Park and were about to leap from a stance. The petrol spilled as the Corbin bottle spun sideways towards their target. Quill was somewhat amused by everything happening now, before and everything that would occur in the short moment.
The bottle went through the broken window and set the seats on fire. The explosion sent the bears tripping and crashing towards the pavement.
Park knew he was screwed but remained cool as ice. Now, he wasn’t consumed by fear. He knew what was needed for his survival no matter how evil that would make him in the eyes of environmentalists.
He turned and aimed the two Glock 22 pistols at the savagely approaching bears and kept firing until the magazines were empty. Both the guns went into the jaws of the bears. Teeth, blood and fur covered the Glocks and Park’s forearms. Behind the heads of the bears were the ugliest and bloodiest piece of savagery.
Surely, Park hated every fiber in him for causing pain to creatures who were manipulated into hunting him. Men had made these animals into weapons. And these weapons didn’t deserve pain just for the sake of Park’s survival. In a way, Park felt responsible as he had synthesized the virus that wasn’t letting them die.
“You had one job! And you failed!” yelled Park without taking his eyes off the bloody bears.
Quill jogged towards the older man, while holding the five remaining bottles. “Damn good art you have here.”
“Watch your language, kid.”
“It was your plan, wasn’t it? You wanted to blow them to bits. Why the change of heart? Wanna be bear food?” Quill knew this was going to come around on him.
“Survival? I get it.” Park was in a zone. “But repeatedly causing pain to animals who don’t have any personal beef with us? That’s wrong. I was trying to end their misery, once and for all. But you made me kill them a few more times.”
“Uh. . . What do you want me to do?”
“Nothing that you can do.”
Park grabbed the bottles and dropped them on the bodies of the bears that were on top of each other. One by one, the bottles bounced off the fur, spilled fuel all over the bears and broke on the pavement. With a grim face, feeling sorry for yelling at the young cop, he grabbed the Zippo lighter. What needed to be done was not nice but was necessary. He flicked open the lighter and heard klaxons approaching. Without thinking twice, he dropped the lighter and set the poor bears ablaze.
The fire spread over both the bodies and slowly burned to a crisp. This might not be permanent but it would be enough for now.
Both men stood staring at the fire, unmoved by the police klaxons. They knew that the answers would soon come out. And that this was only the beginning of the fray with the mysterious enemy.
In his peripheral vision, Park spotted many police sedans encircling the perimeter of the villa. He dropped his guns and raised his hands in the air, as he didn’t want to catch a bullet from a trigger itchy cop. Nick Park’s work had caused enough pain to this peaceful town. He assumed that he was the prime suspect in this mess.
It was time to explain and get explanations. Park could barely hear through all the screams and tensions in the air, but Quill heard his superior’s orders and cuffed Nick Park. There was no resistance. They both knew it wasn’t over.
8
Chapter 8
June 2nd
O1:40a.m
New-Leaf Island
South-East Alaska
“The carcasses get locked in the morgue. That’s final.”
“How can you be so foolish to douse the flames and lock those damn monsters with some forensic nerds? I tell you for real that they’ll heal in minutes,” Dominic Quill pleaded outside the police station that overlooked the harbor.
“I’m willing to temporarily consider this madness and not have anyone in the morgue for now.” Edna Morgan sighed. The sheriff was tired and fatigued after managing the crowds and handling the situation with an assortment of agencies.
“What happened with you while I was gone?” Quill could see the tension on the face of the attractive sheriff who was too young for her job but too old for his tastes.
Morgan led the rookie a long way from her car, where Nick Park was locked for the moment. She looked around with mild paranoia to check if anyone was nearby. When she was sure that they were alone, she explained the call that she received a few minutes before she had left the wreck of the lab to head to the sight of the burning car.
“Did you catch the Colonel’s name, branch or unit?” Quill asked.
“No. His message was in a hurry. He forced me to stop communicating with other agencies until his men arrived.”
“What do you mean forced?”
“He, uh. . . said that he’d cut the communication lines in our island if we passed along anything about what’s happening here to anyone. The other orders make him Park’s ally in my opinion.” Morgan wondered why she was telling the rookie about any of this.
“And what would they be?”
“To protect Park and aid him with anything he needs without risking the lives of the civilians. He also told me to not publicize anything Park tells anyone, including the ones under my command.”
“See it all makes sense now.” Quill was somehow satisfied. “Park creates a regenerating serum for the government but under the wraps of Nate McCain’s
corporation. Someone steals it and now it’s a classic government cover-up.”
“Don’t jump to conclusions. The one thing playing poker with Park has taught me is that he always has surprises.”
“Then why’d you tell me to arrest him?”
“That’s the only way I could secure him from a crazed crowd filled with conspiracies. Why don’t we ask him what’s really going on?”
“Fine by me.” Quill followed his boss towards the car and remembered something. “Any word from McCain?”
“I sent Deputy Harris to McCain’s home. No word from either of them. Maybe the Colonel has really cut our communications as insurance.” Morgan could feel the chills.
“Maybe so. You never know.” Quill knew something like this would happen.
* * *
Nick Park grew impatient inside the sheriff’s sedan. He had sat shotgun on the ride back to town and had not moved or spoken since. The migraine was back and was not letting him think tactically. He was now literally useless and his anger only increased the ache.
The car was parked by the cliff, directly overlooking the harbor. Far to the right was the bridge that connected the island to the mainland, which was still under construction. Far beyond the sea, Park noticed a tiny copter gliding past the trees in an unnatural way. Something was not right. And the approaching storm would only make things harder for everyone.
He opened the glove compartment and found a pair of binoculars and a pill bottle of Excedrin. Luckily it was a headache drug made using a combination of aspirin, acetaminophen and caffeine. It would be a temporary fix for the migraine and the caffeine in it would keep him alert. He popped a few pills and scanned the view with the binoculars.
The copter looked like a HH-60 Pave-Hawk that was normally used by the Air Force. But based on the large symbol painted on its body, it seemed to be in use by NOAA.
The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Agency, which mostly did research didn’t use this particular model of Sikorsky choppers, per Park’s knowledge. He studied the symbol hoping to spot a mistake but found none. The symbol, created in 1971, a year after the re-establishment of NOAA by Nixon, was real. It showed a sea gull inside a circle separating two different shades of blue that signified the two ecosystems - the atmosphere and the hydrosphere - that were the concern of the research agency.
The copter had hovered past Nate McCain’s home and this made Park paranoid. He had been in the police sedan for around ten minutes during the ride and then a couple more. Slowly, he set down the binoculars and began to mentally go back to everything that had happened five years ago, the events that were responsible for all the problems he now faced.
He stared into the rear-view mirror of the Ford sedan. His round face, weathered with hardships - both physical and emotional - gazed back at him. The close-cropped hair, which was dark as night, and all the small scars which had almost faded were the only physical reminders of an era he struggled to forget.
His current impatience made Park remember what he was capable of. Once he had waited for more than three days, while performing reconnaissance before commencing an assault. Park’s legendary focus had left him with only one failed mission during his service. And that failure was only because his second-in-command, Darius Cross had gone against Park’s orders and eliminated the target before an electronic transfer was confirmed.
Park had suspected Cross of working with the highest bidder but had never acted on it. The probable traitor was Park’s best source of moral support in his hardest moments.
Around six years ago, Park’s wife Katie had died of lung cancer while he was halfway around the world fighting a shadow war that he never believed in. He couldn’t save her with his PhD in microbiology or with all his military medals.
Cross had given Nick Park a shoulder to lean on. Park knew that his friend was only assuaging his anger to enjoy some peace in the field but had not bothered about it.
After a final successful mission with the 75th Ranger Regiment, Park had resigned. He sought to put his academic skills to a righteous use - curing cancer. But no corporate research firm would grant him a job due to his classified past. And he did not want to go back to the military to do his research. They would surely demand he provide the kind of services he was good at. Park had completely left behind a life of violence and lies.
The search for avenues to use his skills only led to dead ends. Eventually one night, he received a call from an Alaskan oil baron and billionaire investor, Nate McCain. During the long call, the secretive rich man had not just offered Park the job and facilities he wanted, but also a key ingredient to speed up the process. The only downside was that the very existence of the research would have to be a secret from the world. That meant no articles in journals and no consulting with anyone. When Park felt a bit uneasy, McCain promised that he wanted the cancer drug to be a surprise to the world, mostly to prevent competition. In a few hours, Park was on a flight from D.C. to Alaska.
The secret ingredient was a shard of red stone. McCain cut his own wrist in front of Park and placed the stone over the wound. On contact, his flesh healed shut. Instead of being shocked, Park felt purpose drive him. He never questioned the origins of the stone nor did his new boss probe into Park’s past.
Over time, Park missed his old team. Major Nick Park had served as the commander of a special Army Ranger platoon consisting of doctors and biological experts. His unit’s call-sign was Life Support as initially its objective was to medically support wounded units in hot-spots, carry out extractions and CSAR(Combat Search and Rescue). But the Pentagon had seen the potential of this well polished unit and secretly used it to locate bio-weapons.
While working in Alaska on the virus found inside the stone, Park found out that Cross and the rest of his unit had disbanded and gone into the private sector. To make sure that the men he had trained would not work for the wrong people, Park introduced Cross to McCain. It had been four years since the members of the Life Support team began to work security for McCain’s refineries.
A double tap on the driver’s side window of the car brought Nick Park back to the present. Sheriff Morgan entered and handed him a dark pullover.
“Try not to tear this into pieces,” Morgan jested. Park barely managed a smile.
Quill entered the backseat and slammed the door shut. “It’s mine and I want it back in one piece.”
“Get any calls from anyone lately?” Park questioned Morgan who now began to wonder if he was in on everything that was occurring.
“Do you know any crazy Colonel who might be in black ops and willing to screw over every other department to get himself involved in this?” Quill’s words made Park smirk as he knew many.
“What’s got you both thinking that?”
Morgan explained the call that was followed by losing communication capabilities with the outside world. Park listened without any reaction or expression.
Park told the two cops about his cancer vaccine research and how the only person who might have any helpful clue is his employer Nate McCain. Maybe if he could get to McCain’s villa, he would get rapid action support to hunt down the assassins. He would get every sort of logistical support if he could reach his boss. Park hoped for another ride with his old Ranger unit members who were now under contract by his boss.
The sheriff handed Park a backpack. “This was all I could manage from the armory for now. What sort of help do you need?”
“I’m gonna head to Nate’s villa on my yacht. You both can accompany me and head back here with your deputy. Keep the yacht safe. It is a gift from Nate. When I’m gone, do whatever you must to sort out the mess you’re in. Thank you both for everything you’ve done.”
Sheriff Edna Morgan leaned in to give Park a peck on the cheek. But before she could, the former Ranger burst out of the car with the backpack.
9
Chapter 9
June 2nd
02:00a.m
South-East Alaska
The
twin D9 diesel engines cruised through the channel at 26 knots. The 575 horsepower Volvo engines easily powered the 49 meter long 2008 Princess V48 yacht through the stormy Pacific. Deep Vee was the design of the classy fiberglass hull and it was a beauty.
With luxurious living spaces, modern decor and state-of-the-art navigational systems, facilities and electronics, Nick Park’s home had outclassed every other yacht on the docks. He had a love affair with the cockpit BBQ that was a topic of gossip for the town folk. Every weekend, there was a party at the docks that brought out most of the island’s people for Park’s grill and beer. Many had ravaged the yacht numerous times. Yet, Park worked hard to maintain the best home he had so far.
The V48 was now on autopilot and Park sat beside Morgan on the top deck while scanning the seas for a hovercraft. Quill took his time to check out the cockpit fridge and grabbed a beer.
It rained badly with wild winds which was normal for the region but the first big storm of the year was approaching in a few hours. And Park was heading right into it. The civilians of New-Leaf had locked themselves indoors. After hours of not getting any useful updates on the explosions, it was time to put themselves first.
The former Ranger noticed a few dark weird machines hidden behind the trees on the other end. As he approached the second half of the two-mile channel, he spotted McCain’s villa. It had a futuristic design and was fitting for a billionaire. The walls were made of glass aquariums which housed sharks to piranhas. On the third floor terrace was a glass pool. From inside the pool, one could look through the glass walls and into the second-floor library. The literary collection housed hardcover fiction thrillers by the thousands and had two walls of non-fiction on all kinds of strategy. In the basement was the high-tech computing and communications center. It was from here that Nate McCain usually conducted his business. Next to the office was an underground shooting range and an armory that rivaled that of the Pentagon.
Alaskan Storm (Part 1 of Blood Stone Impact): A Taskforce COBALT Action-Adventure Technothriller Page 6