by Joseph Nagle
“What are you doing in here?” asked the student. “I’m calling campus security, don’t move!” he commanded without waiting for a response.
“Wait!” Michael said firmly as he backed up slightly—he needed the necessary room to counter in case the student decided to test his physical prowess. “Just wait, okay? I can explain.”
The student let the phone continue to hang down to his side but said, “I want you to leave! Get out of here now, or I will bloody well show you the way through the door!”
“Okay, I will, but first finish your sentence.”
“What’d ya mean? Finish what sentence? Look, mate, I don’t know who you are, but you can’t be down here. You need to leave now!” He moved closer to Michael.
Ignoring him, Michael’s voice rose when he shouted, “When you walked in, you said it wasn’t the beat of a child’s heart. What was it, then?”
The student had first worn a look of confidence when he had walked in, but now that look changed. It was confusion. He scanned Michael’s face carefully; he saw the small shimmering beads of sweat across his forehead; he saw the slightly shallow breaths that he took. He knew something was wrong.
He crept closer toward Michael, dropping the cell phone into his lab coat pocket.
Michael saw this and matched his movements, sidestepping to be at a better angle for the attack he expected was about to come.
The student’s confusion morphed into intensity; he looked ready to spring forward. His jaw tightened and his muscles tensed.
Michael held out his hand as if to plead; the last thing he wanted was to go toe-to-toe with the large man in front of him.
The student moved closer.
Michael lowered his head, stared directly at the young, confident man, and flatly warned, “Do not come any closer. I suggest that you turn around and just walk away. It’s your best choice.”
A cocky grin cut the corner of his mouth. “My best choice, eh, old man?”
“Old man?”
Aw, hell, thought Michael, as they say: the bigger they are, the harder they fall.
Michael let out a slow breath, readying himself for what would come.
“When the medics pick you off the floor, don’t say I didn’t give you a chance to leave,” barked the student.
It was a mistake by an untrained man.
In an instant, Michael seized the opportunity. He couldn’t leave yet. He needed the student to answer the question. The student’s last sentence took but a moment to utter, but that moment was all that Michael would need. In the fraction of time that the student was not focusing on his opponent, Michael leapt forward, placing his knee in the man’s kidney while simultaneously striking the jaw with the thick, padded part of his palm. It was enough to put him off balance. His meaty hands grasped ineffectively at Michael. Michael shoved the now-reeling student backward and then spun him around. His face was firmly pushed into the padded medical table. Michael had him in a horrific arm lock behind his back and gave it a hard pull upward.
The student wailed out at the pain.
Michael growled into the student’s ear, “Like I said, I am not here to give you any trouble, and I don’t want to hurt you. I just need you to answer the question: what was the sound you heard?”
The student groaned somewhat, and Michael released some of the pressure he had put on his arm. He painfully bleated back, “It’s a countdown, a diminishing algorithm!”
“A what? How do you know?” spat out Michael.
“Diminish…diminishing algorithm: a loop of calculations in an array. Ah! Please, you’re hurting me!”
Michael released the pressure slightly and shouted, “Now finish!”
The student grunted. “Each calculation ends with a result, and the next one starts with that result; it will continue until it reaches its global target.”
“Global target?” Michael was confused. “Explain.”
“It’s the final calculation—the target is always zero,” he answered with some difficulty. “I’ve studied it! The algorithm is a simple one; a repeating cycle represented by a series of monotones. Each cycle will get repetitively faster until the space between the repeating tones is eliminated.”
The student paused, and Michael gave his arm a yank to remind him to finish.
“Please!” he groaned loudly. “Let me go—my arm, I think it’s going to break! Please!”
“Then what!” shouted Michael, “What happens?”
“I, I don’t know, the tone should just continue as a constant and without a break! The algorithm has finished. It will have reached zero!”
“That’s it?” shouted Michael as he gave the arm a tug. “It’s finished? Nothing more?”
“Yes, yes! That’s it. Please, mate, let me go! I beg of you! I don’t know what else it could mean—maybe it just stops working—I don’t know! Please…”
Michael thought for a moment about what he had just said: maybe it just stops working.
Or maybe it self-destructs, Michael realized. He knew if that happened, a hole would be torn into his femoral artery. It wouldn’t take much force; arterial walls are relatively thin. Such a tear would cause him to bleed to death within minutes.
He shuddered at the thought.
“Listen to me,” said Michael. “Like I said to you, I’m not here to give anyone trouble, I just needed to use some of the equipment. I am going to let you go, and then I am going to leave. Do not move until I am gone, do you understand?”
The student nodded vigorously with his face still pressed onto the table.
Michael released him slowly and backed away. The student slumped across the table. As Michael neared the laboratory’s door, he heard the student’s feet moving quickly across the floor.
Shit, Michael thought, he didn’t understand.
Quickly he spun around to counter the attacking student.
A thick arm was coming down like a sledgehammer at Michael. Reaching up, he blocked the arm with both hands, but the student was strong, really strong.
Michael put a knee into the visibly angry and newly confident young man’s midsection, but if it had any measurable effect, the student didn’t show it. There was a fire in the young man’s eyes that burned into Michael’s own.
Something was gripped firmly in the thick fist of his attacker.
Protruding from the student’s hand was a syringe, and he was forcing it down toward Michael’s chest. A small drop of the toxin in the needle glistened at its tip.
It inched excruciatingly closer.
Michael tried to push back, but the man was just too strong. The student pushed harder; the needle was piercing the outer edge of Michael’s jacket. Michael couldn’t win this battle. The principles of physics always applied, the stronger force prevailed. He felt it poke through his skin. He winced.
The student placed the thick flesh of the tip of his thumb onto the hypodermic’s plunger.
Michael did the only thing that he could think of: he opened his mouth wide and clamped down on the man’s hand. He bit as hard as he could.
The man screamed out; Michael could feel some of his strength give way. Blood poured from his hand. At that moment, Michael grabbed the man’s thumb and forced it into an unnatural angle. He felt it snap. Spinning to his right, Michael kicked out the student’s leg, sending him hard to the floor. Falling on top of him, Michael threw a crushing blow into the man’s temple, knocking him out.
And then Michael felt the world spin.
He fell to one knee. Ventricular arrhythmia and respiratory depression—side effects of the drug—were coming quick.
Some of the drug had made its way into his system.
Michael groaned fiercely, his heart beating erratically. His breaths were shallow and fast, and his body was going cold.
He tried to stand, but staggered. Catching himself, he looked frantically around the laboratory.
It didn’t take long to see the needle. Michael shuffled to it and snatched it from the floor.
He read the name printed on its side: Embutramide.
Fuck me and modern medicine, thought Michael.
It was a drug with a number of purposes, one of which was to euthanize animals.
He needed to move fast. He hoped that he could get to his safe house in time. He hoped the cab was still there.
In the basement hall of the building, a security officer shouted out for Michael to stop; in his hand and held close to his mouth was a radio. He was speaking into it.
Michael put both hands to his side as if to say I give up. Time was running out, and reinforcements would certainly be on the way.
Michael couldn’t wait for the right moment. He had to act now.
The security officer peered into the research lab and saw the unconscious student sprawled across the tile floor. He spun to Michael while reaching for his gun. This was his mistake.
Michael was close enough. His arm felt heavy when he lifted it, but his blow was spot on: the security guard slumped immediately to the floor.
Pulling the officer’s forty-five caliber handgun from his hand, Michael released the clip and emptied the bullet from the chamber into his hand. He tossed both down the hallway.
Michael staggered outside; the sunlight slapped him in his face. His already dilated pupils were no match for the newly intense light of day. Raising his hand to cover his eyes, he looked straight ahead, then left, and then right.
He froze.
The cab was gone.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
DEATH IS INEVITABLE
LISBON, PORTUGAL
Michael was afraid.
Throughout his career he had defied death on a number of occasions. Each time death approached, he felt fear, but he was always collected: the side effect of being a well-trained special operations soldier and an officer with the Clandestine Services.
Not this time.
The cab was gone.
His world was spinning.
Time didn’t slow down.
Time ran faster.
He felt his breathing worsen; he struggled for air. Stumbling forward, he did what he had been trained to do; it was the only thing that he could think to do: he moved.
The hotel—the safe house—had an emergency epinephrine kit; it was the one thing that he knew could save him.
The graduate student had been sloppy in his attack, but he had made up for his untrained ways with brute strength. Just enough of the embutramide had made its way into Michael’s system—enough to tempt death. Not enough to kill immediately, but enough to attack his system; it was enough to kill him slowly.
Frantic but still in control, Michael scanned from left to right as he moved. Seeing a trashcan, he ran awkwardly to it. Reaching in, he rummaged around until his fingertips grazed along the side of a paper bag. He snatched it from the can and instantly put it to his mouth and breathed in it.
The hyperventilation, Michael knew, was causing him to expel large amounts of carbon dioxide, and its excessive loss was causing his blood to become alkaline. It wouldn’t counter the effects of the drug, but it would slow down one of its side effects. The safe house was just over five kilometers away, and he would need every extra second to get there; seconds that would need every spare molecule of oxygen he could get.
The irony was that he was yards from a major medical center, but he could not risk going into its emergency room. He only had one hope, and he knew he couldn’t reach it by foot.
His stride was choppy as he moved; Michael focused on the near horizon to maintain his balance. The sweat across the top of his brow had worsened and grown colder. The pain in his chest compressed inward, making him feel as if he were being crushed between two walls.
Onward he struggled.
In front of him was Av. das Forças Armadas. The traffic was heavy.
He wasted no time nor cared in his manner.
He fell into the busy street. The driver of a small Peugeot slammed on his breaks; espresso from the small porcelain cup in his hand spilled onto his lap, burning him where he would have least wanted to be.
The cursing driver jumped out of the car, slapping at his groin, and moved to where Michael lay.
He saw the American curled into a ball just in front of his bumper.
He leaned down instinctively and shook Michael’s shoulder.
That would be the last thing he remembered until after he would be revived with an ammonia ampoule by the soon-to-arrive paramedics.
Michael felt the Portuguese man’s hand on his shoulder and with lightning speed he grabbed his wrist, twisting it awkwardly. The man fell to the ground and screamed out in pain. Michael rolled the man’s body atop his own and put him into a headlock designed to cut off all circulation to the brain.
The move could certainly kill, but that was not Michael’s intention.
He just needed the man’s car and for the man to be unable to identify him.
The Portuguese driver of the Peugeot had only wanted to meet his friends at the café, but he had been unfortunate to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.
He gurgled as his eyes rolled into the back of his head. Michael felt him go limp. Just before death would have approached, Michael let go.
He pushed the man off and rolled onto his knees. It was difficult to rise; energy spent on the driver of the car nearly tapped him of the rest of his strength.
Getting up, he used the car’s body as a crutch and climbed into—fell into, really—the front seat of the car. Wasting little time, Michael slammed the accelerator and sped away down the avenue.
His driving was as erratic as his breathing. Staying in the lanes was difficult. Horns blared as he sped past, weaving from left to right.
In a few moments, he saw the Norte-Sul roundabout, but ignored it. He didn’t want to slow down, and driving around the cloverleaf would just waste time. Instead he jerked the wheel of the small car forcibly to the left, sending the car into a fishtail. He cut in front of oncoming traffic and headed south on Av. dos Combatantes. The car just barely missed connecting with the back end of one of the oncoming vehicles, but he wasn’t able to avoid the light pole that stood just to the right.
The fishtailing car slid just enough for the right side of the car to meet the base of the pole. With a horribly loud, metallic screech, the pole grated across the side of the car and then snapped at its base.
He hit the gas pedal harder.
In his rearview mirror, as he sped away, Michael saw the pole topple over and was thankful that it had hit no one on its way to the pavement.
For the next few minutes, Michael gripped the steering wheel with an intensity and focus he had learned in Ranger school, with the discipline honed by training at the Farm for the Clandestine Services.
His thought was singular.
He ignored red lights.
He cared little about other drivers.
Speed limits were of no concern.
His life was ending.
Solar do Castelo was approaching; in it was his safe house; in it was the only thing that could save his life.
Michael was aware enough to know that the once-bright sunlight was now darkening. Not because the sun was going down, but from the passing of his life. He squinted and focused harder. He worked to keep his breathing under control and his heart rate in check.
But he was scared, really scared. He thought of Sonia. He struggled to remember her smile. The hypoxic effect from his increasingly labored breathing was making his ability to think efficiently difficult.
He saw a castle.
He loved castles. He could spend hours in them, admiring the masonry, contemplating the history; losing himself within the confines of the walls.
He saw the castle, but thought of none of these things.
Castelo de São Jorge was directly in front of him. In 1569, a young King Sebastian ordered it rebuilt; the young king wanted it to be his home, but, instead, it would go unfinished after his disappearance, becoming a prison. Its history and architecture m
eant absolutely nothing at the moment. It might as well have been a backwoods trailer in North Carolina.
All Michael cared about was his safe house.
The castle was in the way.
He would have to drive completely around it and its grounds: ten times farther than the actual distance he was away from it at the moment.
Going around it would waste precious moments—moments that might be the difference between living and dying.
As they say: the shortest distance between two points is a straight line.
Michael hit the accelerator until the pedal smashed into the floorboard; he drove over the curb, digging the wheels deeply into the expansive green lawn of the castle. The grounds that separated his current location from the safe house were meticulously kept and covered with people.
His right hand steered the car; his left hand held down the horn. Clumps of mud and grass sprayed from the spinning tires, bathing a number of the unlucky. Some leapt from the path of the oncoming, horn-blaring Peugeot, while others not in its path shouted curses and warnings.
In moments, he saw the hotel, but he didn’t see the tree. The impact sent a deafening noise throughout the park. Michael’s face slammed into the steering wheel. It was the most fortunate part of the trip. The impact sent a wave of adrenaline into his veins, and he shot up with one last purpose.
He fell out of the car and jumped to his feet just as one of the men in the park approached. He was shouting angry Portuguese words at Michael—words he couldn’t understand—but Michael shoved him as hard as he could, sending the man, and nearly himself, to the ground.
Scrambling on his feet, awkwardly he ran through the rows of trees.
He moved as best he could under the circumstances.
He hoped no one would follow.
In the hotel, he secreted into the stairwell and climbed the first flight. His heart no longer pounded forcibly. A telltale sign: Michael knew that narcosis was setting in; a stupor-like effect that was reversible, but only with the right treatment. Upward he heaved himself, using every bit of strength. His hands slid as he grasped the railing; his legs were getting heavier each time he raised one to the next stair.