A Deal to Die For

by Albert Able

  “Wow,” Rudi squealed with pleasure. “You see, you trusted that silly old fool Bouchard, but I knew he would fail and so I secured the bomb.”

  He snarled like a caged animal: “And don’t forget I also have the real ones”.

  Carl Peterson was defiant. “At least with the nuclear ones they cannot be exploded without the special remote switches and I have those hidden away.”

  “Indeed you do, but what you don’t realise is that I don’t need your remote switches because I have altered the devices to explode, not only with the command from your remote switch but also by a signal from my computer.” Rudi waved the monitor.

  At that point Karen, looking briefly at her wrist watch, got up from the settee, moved to her brother and hugged him. “You are so clever my little tiger,” she nibbled his ear for a moment before suggesting: “Do you think we should be making a start as we planned?”

  Rudi took a deep breath. “You’re right, of course. Jerry, I want you to take my sisters to the ship’s cutter. Eugene, you collect that special equipment we prepared to the cutter and Carlos, you stay with me. Oh, Michelle, you better go with my sisters.”

  Rudi’s commands were followed without question.

  Carl Peterson, who had remained silent throughout the whole demonstration, finally spoke. “So what are you planning to do now?”

  Rudi just pointed at the TV and said simply, “Watch”

  The picture of the two aluminium boxed nuclear devices appeared on the TV screen, and like the first case, each had a six figure number stencilled on its face. The picture quivered for a moment as a hand grabbed one of the cases. Eugene’s voice was clearly heard out of the picture: “Rudi, I am confirming that I have 265890 and we’re on the way.”

  “OK,” Rudi confirmed into the monitor and proceeded to input the information.

  Carl Peterson, his mind working overtime demanded: “So what are you going to do?” There was a distinct tremor in his voice.

  “Work it out, father. What would you do?”

  Rudi, assisted by the faithful Carlos, wriggled out of his chair. “Oh, Carlos, one last thing.” Rudi gestured to his mouth and pointed at Carl Peterson.

  Carlos stripped a piece of tape and with some difficulty eventually covered the struggling Carl Peterson’s mouth.

  ***

  In London Hans de Wolf had already discovered that his computer had been raided by Rudi’s technology and he was fuming. “How could I have been no naïve?”

  And so it was as he was sitting in front of the computer that one of the screens sprang to life.

  “Hans,” Rudi’s voice beckoned. “I know you’re there - good, I can see you now. I’m sorry that I have accessed every one of your most confidential files, but I was naturally obliged to. If it’s any consolation, however, I recognise your unique skills and consider that you are the only person who I could possibly respect as an equal. So Hans, I want you to watch the new technology at work and then consider if you would join me. There is a whole new micro world just waiting for a team like ours to conquer.”

  He paused. “So, first, I want you to watch this demonstration. It is sure to impress you.”

  Hans watched the same demonstration staged for the others in silence and trembled with the realisation of its terrible significance.

  “Clever stuff, eh. Hans?” Rudi’s voices blared from the computer consul. “So what is it to be? Are you in or out?”

  Filled with a terrible anger Hans reached out and without replying muted the sound and called the Boss.

  ***

  Securely tied and gagged, Alex Scott and Carl Peterson were left alone in the suite while Rudi, his sisters and the others boarded the ship’s cutter which had been carefully moored on the side of the ship away from the quay.

  “Is that everything?” Rudi checked.

  “Everything is in place as planned,” Jerry Fielding confirmed.

  “OK, so let’s go then.” Rudi settled into one of the comfortable seats in the cockpit and tapped his monitor as the cutter pulled away from Le Monde. Satisfied that it was linked to his computer, Rudi folded his arms and gave a relieved sigh. “Well, my little kittens, it looks as though we’re on our way.” He wallowed for a moment in their nuzzling embrace.

  “Will we see the next bit?” Karen asked in anticipation.

  “Not from inside the suite, we’ll only see it from out here, but they’ll see it on the TV screen.” The gurgling continued for quite some time, then suddenly he sat up. “Where’s Michelle?”

  “We must have left her,” Jerry exclaimed.

  “Or she slipped away,” Carlos suggested sombrely.

  “Well, she’ll pay the price then, won’t she?” Rudi lapsed into another rasping gurgling fit.

  ***

  In Carl Peterson’s luxury suite aboard Le Monde the two men struggled in vain to release their bonds as Rudi’s rasping voice sounded from the TV: “Well, gentlemen, you are about to witness the final trick in this little game.”

  The screen switched suddenly to a view of the Statue of Liberty, obviously taken from Le Monde’s cutter somewhere in the bay; the picture panned around until the great liner filled the screen.

  “I couldn’t make up my mind which would be the most interesting final sight for you both, a view of Le Monde exploding, or the look of joy on our faces as it happens.”

  The picture switched to Rudi and his sisters sitting in the stern of the cutter. “But today I feel generous and so I’m going to let you have both.” Rudi’s manic laugh screeched from the TV.

  The two trussed men looked at each other, the first hint of fear in their eyes.

  “Oh, one final thing, Alex. You don’t mind if I call you Alex, do you?” Rudi paused. “Anyway, I just thought you should know that I have made suitable arrangements for your family. Falmouth, isn’t it? That little boy will soon learn how to manage with only one hand - after all, I did.”

  Rudi waved his prosthetic hand.

  Alex strained at his bonds as for the first time in his life he felt a terrible rage and lost control of his usual iron-clad nerve. The more he lurched and struggled the more numbing his frustration became until something seemed to burst within him and he fell back into the chair in a faint.

  Carl Peterson also tried everything he could but the bonds were impossible to break.

  The picture on the screen changed again with Rudi and his sisters still seated in the stern seats of the cutter, but now with Le Monde filling the whole background of the picture.

  “Perfect.” Rudi complimented whoever was holding the camera. “Now, gentlemen,” Rudi raised his prosthetic hand holding the monitor: “Watch.”

  “Oh, wait a moment, it looks as though Alex is taking a little nap.” Rudi chuckled again and tapped the monitor transmitting an ear piercing screech that hammered into Carl Peterson’s ears.

  Alex stirred as the raucous sound penetrated his brain.

  “Wake up, Alex,” Rudi called, “don’t want you to miss the fun.” And he tapped the monitor, keying in a long series of numbers and then held it out for the viewers to hear, as he had done with the earlier demonstration. “Are you fully awake now, Alex?”

  The piercing alarm had brought Alex back to consciousness but he still felt as though he was drifting in some kind of dream as Rudi’s voice persisted. “Can you hear me OK now?” Rudi enquired conversationally.

  “Oh, Rudi,” Liz squealed with excitement and wrapped her arms around her brother.

  Then the sound of the numbers being punched into the monitor seemed to scream from the TV as both men, now resigned to their fate, watched in frozen horror.

  After a pause the sound of the dial tone filled the air as the monitor methodically completed selecting the numbers.

  In the deathly silence prior to the expl
osion Alex had one final thought: ‘Please God, somehow protect my innocent wife and children from this monster.’

  In the next second the TV picture blanked out. Alex snapped round to look at Carl Peterson as a gigantic explosion shattered the silence. At almost the same time the main door of the suite burst open and Igor Pulaski, accompanied by two other armed men, burst into the suite.

  Igor stood over Alex and not too delicately stripped the tape from his mouth.

  “What was that?” Igor jerked his head towards the balcony as one of the other men relieved Carl of the tape over his mouth.

  “Don’t let him go,” Alex’s ordered, “he’s the man we’ve been looking for. He’s the leader of the Syndicate!”

  Tough though he undoubtedly was, the trauma of the last few minutes had left Alex weak at the knees, so when he was finally released from his bonds he happily accepted Igor’s hand to help him from the chair.

  Since by some miracle they were all still alive, the explosion was not aboard Le Monde but somewhere nearby.

  ‘But where?’ he muttered, ‘what other sick trick has Rudi’s warped mind created?’

  “Quick, out there.” Alex pointed and the three men moved quickly on to the balcony. “You stay in there and watch that one, please.” Alex instructed the man who had removed the tape from Carle Peterson’s mouth.

  They were just in time to see a significant cloud, reminiscent of the mushroom created by the original Atomic bomb detonations. The air not much more than five hundred metres away was still filled with bits of twirling debris that was quite clearly all that remained of Le Monde’s cutter and its passengers.

  The three men stared in silence until Igor said: “Poor devils! I’m glad I wasn’t on that boat. I wonder what happened?”

  Absorbed with the confusion in the bay, the men failed to notice the glass doors to the balcony silently closing; it was only the positive clunk of the door catch firmly sliding into place that alerted them.

  “Bugger,” Alex exclaimed, as he tried desperately to pull the door open. Instantly conscious of their dreadful error, Alex peered through the smoked glass and thought he could just make out the figure of a person leaning over Peterson.

  “Get this bloody door open,” he shouted at the man with the gun, indicating that he should shoot at the glass.

  “A waste of time, I’m afraid, it’s bulletproof,” he raised his pistol, “but I can have a go. Stand back, hands over ears.”

  Even with their hands clamped over their ears the sound of the pistol shot at that range and the echoing effect of the ricochet was not only painful, but as the man had said, totally ineffective, and the bullet left only a small star in the reinforced glass.

  On an impulse, Alex looked over the balcony and could see several faces of passengers or crew looking out towards the explosion in the bay.

  “Hey there,” Alex called. A tanned face looked up and across. “We have an emergency up here, can you call Security to send someone to Mr Peterson’s suite? Hurry, please.”

  A figure waved understanding and vanished from view.

  Alex, with his persona rapidly returning to normal, managed a little grin. “Well, I don’t know how it happened, it’s a bit like being locked in the lavatory,” but his lighter mood vanished as he remembered Peterson and turned to Igor: “I have the worst feeling, because the man trussed up with me in there,” Alex indicated behind him with thumb, “is Carl Peterson, chairman of SKY-SEC, alias the leader of the Syndicate!”

  The other man turned and cupping his hands against the glass tried to make out what was happening. “Can’t see a goddam thing,” he cursed.

  They took turns kicking at the damaged area, but no amount of effort from the relatively frail humans had any effect.

  “Sorry, Alex,” Igor Pulaski paused, “no good”. He flopped back against the door. “By the way,” Igor gestured to the other man, “I thought you knew this guy, Jerry Fielding.”

  Alex’s brow wrinkled in surprise as he held Jerry’s hand. “Now this is going to be interesting.”

  “It’s not the first time he’s conned people. The man you met was my brother, Tim, the black sheep of the family, I’m sorry to say.”

  The real Jerry looked sad: “An habitual conman, never been in the CIA or anything else honest for that matter. He did work for SKY-SEC though, but we had no idea Carl Peterson was, as you suggest, the leader of the old Syndicate. Sorry.”

  “Well, I’m sorry too, because I have to tell you that your brother was aboard the boat which exploded out in the bay.”

  Jerry turned and looked in silence towards the last few floating remains of the cutter and then over to the Statue of Liberty.

  “Oh Tim,” they heard him whisper.

  ***

  It had been a difficult moment for Michelle Le Novas as she helped to carry the cases and followed Rudi’s sisters down to the companion way where the liner’s cutter was waiting.

  She passed the cases to the crew member. “Take these please,” she asked politely, “I have to get another one.”

  Then she slipped along the deck and into a doorway out of sight.

  Carlos, carrying Rudi on his hip, appeared seconds later and carefully positioned him in the boat while Ugine packed the remaining luggage under the seats. ‘Jerry’ Fielding, the last aboard, signalled to the crew man, who let the lines go and the cutter moved away from the liner and quickly gathered speed.

  Once the cutter was on its way, Michelle sprinted back along the internal corridor to the elevators. It seemed like an eternity before the doors finally opened and she started the assent to the top deck. She felt the explosion without at first realising what it was, but the muffled rumble which followed soon confirmed her worst fears, but when the lift finally stopped, she expected to find a scene of destruction. Confused, Michelle sprinted silently on the thick pile carpeted corridor to the suite; where she found the door wide open. When she looked inside she saw one man standing over Carl and three others on the balcony, they were all totally absorbed with something going on out to sea.

  Carefully removing the Taser gun from her bag, Michelle crept silently up to the unsuspecting man standing by Carl. She thrust the Taser into the man’s back and held it there, giving him a massive shock. The man arched his back in a terrible silent spasm and slowly collapsed like a felled tree. Michelle grabbed him and guided the rigid body to the floor, fortunately avoiding any noise.

  Carl Peterson looked up in surprise as Michelle signalled silence with a finger to her lips and moved swiftly to the switch which operated the balcony doors.

  “A very convincing performance, I actually thought you meant it for a moment,” Carl confessed once the doors had clicked shut.

  “Shush, my darling,” she comforted him as she cut his bonds away.

  “All we need is this,” Carl went to a drawer and took out a small transmitter, “and this,” he slipped a small note book into his pocket, “and this.” He pushed one of the elegant portraits aside to reveal a substantial wall safe. Carl swiftly spun the combination wheel and pulled the door open, revealing piles of neatly stacked bundles of money. But Carl Peterson ignored the money and simply grabbed the leather wallet that already contained the passports, their identities and the access codes to all his offshore bank accounts.

  “Finally, we need this for the package, it’s somewhere along the corridor.” He picked up a small ‘cabin baggage’ size case and led Michelle along the side deck until they came to the fire hose locker where the two tactical nuclear bombs had been hidden. To his immense relief, when he opened the locker door the last of the devices was still there. Carl carefully packed it into the case and closed the locker door.

  “Right, let’s get away from this ship.”

  The sound of a helicopter could be heard as they started along the side deck.

&nb
sp; “Quickly, up here.” Carl led the way to the helicopter pad where two passengers had just disembarked.

  Carl approached the smartly dressed ‘Passenger Care Attendant’ standing by the electronic reservation terminal. “Hello,” he said with his practiced charm, “is the helicopter available for a short run to Manhattan by any chance?”

  The attendant smiled and tapped the keyboard, “it’s always available for you, Mr Peterson.” She tapped again, “just you and Miss Le Novas?”

  “That’s great, but in fact what I’d really like you to do is deliver this parcel for me. Michelle was going to do it, but...” he whispered discreetly, “well, she has bit of a dicky tummy today.” Carl slipped a one hundred dollar bill into the young lady’s hand.

  They weren’t supposed to run errands, but how could it hurt? A trip in the helicopter and a one hundred dollar tip! She slipped the note into her pocket and was so excited at the prospect of the trip that she forgot to clear the flight entry. “Sure, Mr Peterson, where am I to deliver it to?”

  Peterson told her that she should ask the helicopter pilot to simply return to their base where they would be met by the man who needed the holdall. “His name is Greg Hanson, I expect he will also want to reward you for your trouble,” Carl Peterson smiled convincingly.

  The helicopter took off, Carl Peterson and Michelle waved, and then having slipped quietly out of sight Carl pulled the little transmitter from his pocket, flipped the cover from the switch and looking at Michelle, said: “For the new Charles and Marion Pemberton.”

  He held her hand and pushed the switch with his index finger.

  The helicopter, already almost half a mile away, vanished in a gigantic cloud of flame and debris. No human remains survived the vaporising explosion.

  The computer records showed that Mr Carl Peterson and Miss Michelle Le Novas were on board when the mystery explosion occurred in the second suspected terrorist attack on that fateful day.