Kate desperately wanted to take a step back from the window. There was something unnerving about being that close to something so unbelievably deadly, no matter how many safety protocols were in place. She watched as another scientist, a Chinese man, took a tray of eggs to an incubator and opened it. There were four other trays in the oven-like machine.
“If you’re already producing virus from what you got in Antwerp,” she asked, “why did you need to steal another sample?”
“The one from Antwerp was small, and production would have dragged on,” Dragan said. “The additional virus we’ve just acquired will speed things up exponentially. Plus the virus in Nick’s system is derived from a more recent, and far deadlier, strain smuggled out of a weapons lab near Novosibirsk, Siberia, by a rogue microbiologist in the late 1990s. The smallpox Nick carries is a chimera.”
“What’s a chimera?”
“It’s from Greek mythology. A fearsome monster made of parts of many different animals. In this case, it’s a pathogen composed of more than one deadly virus. The smallpox that Nick is infected with is mixed with Ebola. You could call it ‘big pox.’ It embodies the worst of smallpox and Ebola. It’s one hundred percent fatal and incurable.”
“You neglected to mention that detail to us before,” she said.
“Oops.” Dragan shrugged. “My mistake.”
“What was the institute in Paris doing with a smallpox chimera?”
“They’re studying it to find a cure,” Dragan said.
“In the center of a densely populated city?”
“There are level-four biolabs in major cities all over the world,” Dragan said. “The institute is just one of many secretly hired by governments to find cures for the worst possible bioweapons in case an army, a terrorist group, or an enterprising investor like me decides to unleash a plague.”
“So how do we do this?” Kate said. “I presume we aren’t just going to throw those eggs at people.”
“Once the eggs are teeming with new virus, we extract the goop and turn it into an aerosol spray.” Dragan led her to the next window. Inside that lab, she saw more workstations and freezers. “This is lab number three, where we will be creating the spray and storing it for the weapon.”
“Where’s the weapon?”
Dragan reached into his pocket and took out a small breath freshener dispenser. It was roughly the same shape and size as a keychain thumb drive.
“It will look like this, only it will be equipped with a small timer,” Dragan said, admiring the device. “It releases a mist of micron-sized virus particles. One of these placed in an inconspicuous spot in an airport terminal will infect thousands of people in just a few minutes and spread ‘big pox’ all over the globe. But I prefer a more targeted approach.”
“That shouldn’t be hard to smuggle into the U.S. or to hide in a movie theater or an enclosed shopping mall,” Kate said. “But you’d have to prove to me that the timer works before I set one up. One spritz and I’m dead, too.”
“We’ve created some harmless mock-ups that you can test.”
“How many scientists do you have here?”
“Six scientists in the labs and two engineers who run the air filtration and decontamination systems.”
“Where do the scientists come from?”
“England, China, Russia,” he said. “There’s no shortage of disillusioned, underpaid, ethically challenged scientists out there who aren’t getting the respect or salary they want from their country or their profession.”
“How many Road Runners are here?”
“A dozen,” he said. “Why do you ask?”
“I’m wondering how many people we have to kill to cover our tracks.”
Dragan smiled. He liked her answer. “Then you also have to include the two maintenance workers who run the castle’s heating and electrical system.”
“That’s a lot of killing,” Kate said.
“There’s enough gasoline stored in this castle to power a small town, not to mention the oxygen tanks in the filtration system,” Dragan said. “With a few well-placed explosives, we can kill them all on our way out the door.”
“I’m glad we’re good buddies now.”
“Me, too,” Dragan said. In fact, he was getting hard again at the thought.
“I haven’t slept in over twenty-four hours. Now that we’re friends, I can take a nap without worrying you might slit my throat as I sleep.”
“I doubt that you ever sleep without worrying about that,” Dragan said, leading her back to the air lock. “I certainly never do.”
Nick lay on his cot, enjoying a tumbler of scotch and a good Cuban cigar. It was relaxing.
“Even though it’s not the smallpox chimera, it’s still one hell of a scary virus they’re hatching next door,” Nick said through Kate’s earbud. “It’s a good thing I fortified myself with cigars and plenty of strong liquor.”
Kate entered her room and closed the door. “This is no time to get drunk,” Kate said.
“I meant it literally,” Nick said. “Dragan not only escorted me through security, he kindly provided me with a lighter and an accelerant to set the place on fire.”
“Can you do it without infecting yourself and still escape?”
“I certainly hope so.” Nick blew smoke rings up at one of the cameras aimed at him. “But I’ll need you to knock out the cameras and create a distraction so I am not disturbed.”
“I can take care of the cameras,” Kate said.
“I’ll create the distraction,” Jake O’Hare said.
—
“Dad?” Kate went to the window in her room and looked outside. Everything was the same as before. “Where are you?”
“In the woods,” Jake said. “I can see you in your window. You’re wearing the perfect camouflage for hiding in a jar of jelly beans.”
“You’re early,” she said.
“The traffic was light,” Jake said. “Is that a problem?”
“No, it’s not.”
“Good, because I’ve got ten men in the woods and two more in the Apache attack chopper that will be here in ten minutes,” Jake said. “I’m aware of two men walking the grounds, four more on the battlements, and one in the tower. How many more are we up against?”
“There’s one outside the labs,” Nick said.
“And one more at the security desk,” Kate said. “I don’t know where the others are.”
“Perhaps they’re manning the cauldrons of lye,” Nick said.
“The what?” Jake said.
“Just don’t come in the front door,” Kate said. “It’s a trap.”
“We won’t be coming in at all,” Jake said. “There’s smallpox in there. The fireworks start in eight minutes.”
—
Kate slipped out of her room, walked down the hall, and passed the security guard at the console. She was heading for the third door off the foyer. It was the only one she hadn’t been through yet.
“Halt,” the guard said, standing up at the console. “You can’t go there.”
Kate stopped and turned to face him. “I’m Dragan’s very special guest. I can go anywhere I want.”
The guard stepped out from behind the console and came toward her. “That’s Mr. Kovic’s private wing. You can’t go there unless you are summoned.”
“Maybe I want to surprise him.”
“Surprises are forbidden,” the guard said.
“Okay, if you say so.”
As Kate walked past him, she lashed out at the back of his knee with the flat of her left foot. His knee folded and so did he. As he tumbled, she spun around and kicked him in the jaw, snapping his head back and knocking him unconscious. She took his gun and dragged him back behind the console, where she sat down, studied the switches, and began shutting down systems.
—
Dragan was pondering his extraordinary good fortune as he sat at his office desk, watching the video feed from the lab where the once great Nicolas Fox was mumb
ling drunkenly to himself and blowing smoke rings at the ceiling.
The Paris job had gone completely wrong in so many ways and yet, inexplicably, it turned out to be an extraordinary success. Instead of getting a mere vial of smallpox chimera, Dragan had lucked out and acquired an infected man, a living factory of the virus. On top of that, Dragan had also acquired Kate, an American who could easily deliver the viral weapon to Los Angeles. Now he had the means to create a global genocide if it pleased him, either by spreading the virus himself or by selling the means to others. It felt good.
But he was a businessman, not a madman. He gained nothing from a worldwide pandemic except proof of his power and a certain sense of accomplishment. He was content to settle for a few thousand deaths, billions of dollars in profit, and an early retirement. However, it might be time to paint his face on God on the dining room ceiling after all. He was imagining how that might look when the video screen went dark.
—
Nick had just finished his tumbler of scotch when Kate spoke in his ear.
“The cameras are down,” she said. “Make it quick. I’ll be waiting for you outside the main air lock.”
Nick got up, set his cigar on the cart with the bottles of liquor, and stripped the bedding off his cot. He stuffed the sheets into the bottom shelf of the cart and wheeled it through the air lock into the suit room, where he was greeted by a bloodcurdling scream of sheer terror.
The scream came from a Chinese scientist who was already in the room, preparing to get into a pressure suit. The scientist scrambled backward so fast that he tripped over his own feet and landed hard on the floor.
“I thought you might like a drink,” Nick said, gesturing to the cart. “Whiskey, perhaps?”
“Who are you talking to?” Kate asked in his ear.
The scientist covered his nose and mouth, got to his feet, and rushed into the air lock leading to the showers.
“You’ll be seeing him soon enough,” Nick said.
Nick put on a pressure suit, attached an air hose to it, and waited to see if there were any leaks that became obvious when it inflated. Satisfied that his suit was airtight, he detached the hose and pushed his cart through air lock number two and into the lab.
The four scientists were intent on their work and paid no attention to him at first. Nick snapped an air hose to his suit and wheeled the cart up to the incubator. He opened the incubator, picked up the bottle of 140-proof Habitation Clément Rhum Vieux Agricole, and began splashing the eggs with the rum.
One of the scientists behind him stood up from his seat. “Halt! Arretez! Stop!”
Nick turned around, his lighted cigar between his gloved fingertips. “Anyone want a smallpox omelet?”
He tossed the cigar into the incubator, igniting the rum in a flash of fire that made an audible whoosh.
The scientists got to their feet and stood frozen for a beat, mouths open in shock. Nick picked up the Stolichnaya bottle by the neck and smashed it on the edge of a workstation, splattering 100-proof vodka and glass shards all over a tray of eggs. He held up the jagged edge in front of him.
“One tear in your suit and you’re infected with plague,” Nick said. “Who wants to take me on?”
Okay, so he wasn’t sure if they understood English. He thought they would understand the tone and the gesture.
—
“Time for Nick’s distraction,” Jake said. He was deep in shadow in the forest with Willie, who was holding a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher and aiming it for fun at the helicopter on the grass. She started to hand him the weapon when he shook his head. “No, you do it.”
“I’ve never fired a rocket launcher before,” she said.
“Then you’ve been denied one of life’s greatest pleasures.”
“I’ve never denied myself any pleasure, and I’m sure as hell not going to start now,” she said. “What do I do?”
He handed her a set of earplugs and gave her quick instructions on how to release the safety and fire the rocket.
“A child could do this,” she said, took aim, and fired.
The rocket shot out and the backfire from the launcher blasted chunks of bark off the trees behind them. An instant later, the helicopter blew apart, sending rotors flying in all directions.
“Hot damn,” Willie said. “That’s a rush. What can I blow up next?”
Jake shoved her to the ground just as a barrage of machine gun fire from the castle shredded the trees and branches above their heads.
—
Dragan was about to call the security desk to find out what had happened to his video feed when there was an explosion outside, followed by the sound of automatic gunfire from the ramparts above. His radio crackled. A guard spoke in frantic Serbian.
“This is the tower. The helicopter is destroyed. We’re under attack.”
Dragan grabbed the radio from his desk and spoke into it. “From who? From where?”
“I don’t know,” the guard said. “The rocket came from the woods in front of the castle. We’re returning fire.”
Those facts immediately raised a crucial question in Dragan’s mind. If everybody’s attention was focused on the front of the castle, what was coming from behind?
“Zone four, report,” Dragan said, addressing the guard patrolling the southern rampart. “What do you see?”
Some initial crackle came over the line. “I see nothing unusual.” There was the sound of the guard gasping in surprise, and the gasp was followed by swearing in three languages, an explosion, and gunfire.
—
An Apache helicopter gunship is a fast, lethal, and versatile flying arsenal designed to destroy armored vehicles, bunkers, and buildings. It’s typically equipped with thirty-eight Hydra rockets, nineteen on each side of the aircraft, and a 30mm automatic chain gun loaded with 1,200 explosive armor-piercing rounds mounted on its nose. That was what the Zone 4 guard saw heading toward the castle.
The next thing the guard saw was the Apache fire a Hydra rocket that zoomed past him at 2,425 feet per second. So at almost the same instant he was aware of the missile firing it had already slammed into the castle’s tower, shearing off the top in an explosion of fire and stone.
A cascade of rubble tumbled into the moat as the Apache streaked past the castle, the guards along the battlements firing at the gunship in futile fury.
—
The two explosions rocked the lab. Beakers and test tubes fell to the floor, providing enough incentive for the scientists to forget about Nick and rush for the air lock. They bunched up in front of it, only able to go through one at a time in their inflated suits. One of scientists slapped the emergency alarm button, setting off a shrill siren.
Nick struck a match and tossed it on the vodka-soaked eggs. The tray of eggs went up in flames. There was a notebook on the table. He tore the notebook in half and tossed some of the pages into the incubator and the others onto the tray to keep the fires going.
He opened the freezer, doused everything with whiskey, struck a match, and set the contents on fire. He reached for the nearest air hose and sprayed oxygen on the fire, fanning the flames.
There was one last thing to do. Nick yanked the bedsheets off the cart, draped them over some of the workstations, splashed the remaining whiskey on everything, and then tossed a few lit matches on top. The sheets ignited.
—
Kate sat impatiently at the security console, waiting for Nick. She could hear the gunfire, even over the wail of the alarm, and could feel the rumble of the Apache passing overhead. There was a lot of action going on and she was sitting it out. The guard on the floor began to regain consciousness so she kicked him in the head, more out of frustration than her legitimate need to keep him down.
One by one, beginning with the terrified Chinese guy, the scientists ran out of the air lock, through the foyer, and across the rubble-strewn courtyard in a mad flight out of the castle. Even two guards ran past Kate without giving her a second look. They were all rat
s leaving a sinking ship. But where was the king of the rats?
Kate hadn’t seen Dragan since the grand tour, and that concerned her. As far as she knew, there was only one way out of the castle, and he hadn’t come out yet. Where was he? She was tempted to hunt him down, but she didn’t want to leave Nick unprotected in his escape.
“Hurry up, Nick,” she said.
“My work is done,” he said. “I’m on my way out.”
The Apache gunship swooped around the castle, raking the battlements with its armor-piercing bullets, obliterating the parapet and killing two guards who tumbled into the moat. A handful of people with their hands raised in surrender spilled out of the castle and ran for the woods.
Jake grabbed his radio to relay orders to the strike team. “Apprehend those people when they reach the woods. Nobody gets away.”
The Apache came back around and fired two Hydra missiles into the castle walls, blasting huge holes in them. One of the missiles hit something extremely flammable, perhaps propane or gasoline, Jake didn’t know what, but it set off a chain reaction of explosions that moved like a blazing zipper along the eastern wall. It looked to him like the choreographed sequence of blasts used to demolish a building. That wasn’t supposed to happen yet, not while Nick and his daughter were still inside.
“The castle is coming down,” Jake yelled, hoping Kate and Nick could hear him on their earbuds. “Get the hell out of there now!”
—
Kate got the warning just as she saw Dragan dash across the courtyard from some unseen doorway and climb into the wishing well.
“Oh crap,” she said. “Dragan is getting away.”
“Go after him,” Nick said.
“I’m not leaving you.”
“I’m right behind you,” he said. “Don’t let him escape!”
Kate grabbed her gun and ran to the courtyard. The castle walls were cracking, huge slabs of stone tumbling down as the fissures widened and spread. She climbed over the rim of the wishing well and set her foot on the first rung of a ladder that descended thirty feet down the shaft.
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