by T. C. Edge
The eyes opened. Martha stared, tears building. She didn’t dare breathe, or make a sound. She just stared, waiting, hoping, hardly believing…
The clone of Sarah’s eyes stared up for a moment, bright blue, beautiful. A slight frown fell, then she turned her head, and looked right at her mother.
“Mommy,” she whispered. Her voice was perfect.
Martha’s tears broke free, dripping from her lashes, flowing down her cheeks and into the corners of her quivering mouth.
“Sarah,” she croaked softly. “It’s…really you?”
Sarah frowned again, thinking, eyes distant but…but hers.
“What happened, mommy?” Sarah asked innocently, her voice a beautiful melody. “I had…the worst dream.”
Martha fell forward, collapsing into a crouch in front of the pod. She reached out and took Sarah up into her arms, weeping violently, holding her tight. A sense of profound joy flooded her, casting everything else away. Nothing seemed to matter now. Nothing but Sarah, nothing but her.
She drew back again, holding her daughter’s face in her palms. She stared into that face for a long moment, hardly believing it, shaking her head.
“It’s really you,” she whispered again, sniffing. “It really is you.”
She kissed her cheeks, and stroked her hair, laughing and crying at the same time.
“What’s wrong?” Sarah asked, confused. She looked over Martha’s shoulder. “Where are we?”
Martha heard feet tapping behind her. She turned from her daughter, as if forgetting anyone else was there, and looked to see Pamela approach. Her usual calm countenance was breaking, eyes filled with joy. Martha leapt to her feet and hugged the President tight, ignoring the usual decorum, not caring who was watching. Pamela hugged her back, though maintained a little more presidential reserve.
“I can’t thank you enough, Pamela,” Martha wept. “You did it. It worked.”
“We did it,” Pamela whispered into her ear. She drew back, and turned to look at the scientists, hands clasped before them, smiling broadly. Others were shaking hands, even clapping. A sense of euphoria was filling the air.
Pamela nodded hastily to Doctors Lang and Cavendish. They hurried forward, their exhaustion forgotten, old faces smiling like they hadn’t in years.
“You have done fine work here, gentlemen,” Pamela said. “But there’s still plenty to be done.” Her eyes intensified, jaw clenching, chin lifting proudly. “Activate the first batch,” she said, nodding to them. “It’s time we took our revenge.”
The doctors nodded and hurried away, given no time to bask in their triumph. Pamela looked back to Martha, and then glanced at Sarah, sitting up in her pod, body clothed in light, white fabric. The girl was looking around in wonder, as though her eyes had never been used. They hadn’t, really. Not these ones.
“I’m so happy for you, Martha,” Pamela said, smiling. “You have your daughter back. Now, we take our nation back.” Her eyes narrowed. “And we make the others pay.”
Martha’s joy weakened at the face before her. It was the face of a woman who had murder on her mind.
And much murder, Martha knew, was going to follow.
The world was about to erupt into chaos.
THE END
The Phantom Chronicles will conclude in book 4 - Phantom Unleashed!
BOOK FOUR - PHANTOM UNLEASHED
85
Four men stepped through a thick metal door and approached a man locked tight to a chair.
One of the men was dressed in a functional suit of dark grey, adorned with the occasional embellishment to suggest his high military rank. He was of medium frame, his eyes a moody brown and perpetually cast with suspicion. He nodded to the three men who’d entered with him, each wearing the black combat suits of the Panther Force.
Two took positions behind the seated man to the left and right. The third stepped right towards him and thrust a short needle into his neck.
The drug that was pumped into Ragan Hunt’s body woke him immediately from his induced sleep.
His head, which had been hanging down, chin to neck, lifted suddenly. His eyes opened with a flash, and a gasp of air was hauled into his lungs. He thrashed on instinct, but found his wrists locked into the arms of the chair, and his ankles to its legs.
It hardly took him a second to realise just where he was - he’d visited these interrogation chambers many times when he worked here at the CID, extracting information from persons of interest. He never expected to find himself on the other side.
His eyes centred quickly on the man standing before him, adorned in his normal military suit, narrow eyes inspecting him. Commander Richard Wexley was a man for whom suspicion was a default setting. His expression - tight eyes, thin lips in a line, jaw set - was one he commonly adopted. Though a man into his fifties, Richard Wexley wasn’t particularly wrinkled around the eyes. Those ‘laughter lines’ hadn’t had much chance to develop. Smiling was as alien to Wexley as snow on a tropical beach.
Ragan’s eyes darted left and right. Through is periphery, he found two Panthers stationed to his flanks and slightly behind him, with a final man stepping over to Wexley’s side, needle being tucked away into a pocket. That man Ragan recognised - he was the captain of the Panther unit Ragan had surrendered to in Cincinnati. The man who’d looked at him with disdain as one of his men put Ragan under.
His eyes hadn’t changed much; he still regarded Ragan with contempt.
Commander Wexley took a short step forward, though stayed several metres back from the chair. His eyes didn’t leave Ragan, nor did they appear to blink. They regarded him carefully, almost studiously. Several moments passed before his lips broke open, and he spoke.
“Welcome back, Ragan,” he said quietly. “You’ve certainly had a busy week, haven’t you.”
Ragan didn’t answer, his mind busy. He hadn’t expected to be put to sleep for the journey back to New York, time he might otherwise have spent configuring his lies and arranging a suitable story. The decision he’d made back in Cincinnati to leave the others had been a snap one. To his mind, that had been only minutes ago. Now he was opening his eyes to an immediate interrogation. If he was going to convince Wexley to help him, he would have to be smart.
Wexley continued to study Ragan, standing ahead of him, stiff and upright. He was almost entirely motionless, his hands grasped behind his back, feet planted securely beneath him.
“So, you failed to capture Mikel,” he said. “That’s disappointing, Ragan.”
“Your men interrupted my hunt,” said Ragan, voice croaking as it woke. “You told me that you wouldn’t interfere, sir. He was frightened off, and I lost my chance.”
That much was loosely true. Sort of.
“I didn’t interfere,” said Wexley. “The commanders at the field camp were drawn by gunfire, Hunt. I have no jurisdiction over military matters in Cincinnati.”
Ragan’s eyes narrowed.
“But your Panthers had orders to take me in,” he grunted, looking to the man standing behind Wexley, chin sliced by a nasty scar. “This captain and his team told me plainly, Commander Wexley.”
Wexley glanced at the captain to his left.
“Captain Maddox was on standby in the event that your attempts to take Mikel in fail,” he said calmly. “I needed to make sure you were taken in. Surely you understand that?”
Ragan glared at Captain Maddox, an odious look on his face. He nodded and turned his eyes back to Wexley.
“I do, sir,” he said. “And I can’t blame you, after my behaviour of late. However, I chose to give myself up to Captain Maddox and his squad. I hope that shows my loyalty. You are fully aware of how urgent things have become. My failing to capture Mikel shouldn’t change that.”
Wexley drew a breath, stroking his chin, eyes wandering away for a moment in thought. Then a frown settled, eyes turning back to Ragan.
“Who were you with?” he asked.
Ragan clenched his jaw. This was just the sort of question he e
xpected, the sort he’d wanted time to prepare for. Time he hadn’t been granted. That was probably the point of his immediate sedation.
“I was with…Chloe,” Ragan said. That was the safe answer. Wexley already knew that Ragan was still protecting her.
“And who else?” Wexley asked immediately, stepping forward a pace. He glanced back to Captain Maddox. “Apparently, you had two other allies with you. Who were they?”
What to say? He couldn’t exactly reveal that they were part of a secret organisation of anti-technologists, hellbent on destroying the data. He was trying to get Wexley onside, trying to enlist his support. If Ragan’s full duplicity was revealed, nothing he said would ever be trusted.
“Allies of Chloe,” Ragan said suddenly. “I needed aid in capturing Mikel, sir. She’s gone with them now.”
“Allies of Chloe,” murmured Wexley, thoughtful, fingers stroking his chin. “I wasn’t aware that Miss Phantom had allies.”
“Of course she does, Commander. How else would she have gotten by all these years?”
It seemed a reasonable explanation. Ragan was seasoned in both forming believable lies, and delivering them in an earnest tone.
“And you just decided to work with these men?” asked Wexley, suspicious but open to the idea.
“I trusted Chloe’s judgement,” said Ragan, deepening the lie. “When our mission to capture Mikel failed, we were forced to flee in the face of the NDSA forces. I made a promise to them that I wouldn’t let them be captured. They have no love lost for our nation, sir. I helped them free, then turned back to give myself up. As I told you earlier via comms, I wasn’t going to let Chloe be taken, nor her allies. I…care for her too much.”
Captain Maddox snorted at the comment.
“You care for the Phantom,” he growled. “That’s treason, Commander Wexley. We should execute…”
“Yes, thank you, Captain,” said Wexley, lifting a hand. “As always, your insight is appreciated. But please, do keep your opinions to yourself.”
Ragan lifted a smile.
“Wipe that smirk off your face, Hunt,” came Wexley’s voice again. “Captain Maddox is heavy handed, but he does have a point. Fraternising with a fugitive as important as Miss Phantom is deserving of capital punishment in extreme cases. That will be for President Rashmore to determine. And believe me, he’s been in a foul mood ever since you absconded with the girl. I’ve had to talk him down from having you shot on sight several times.”
Ragan, though fastened securely to his chair, seemed to sink a little lower into it.
Wexley drew a breath.
“The fact is, the President has been obsessed with finding the missing pieces to Professor Phantom’s research ever since his death,” he said. “The fact that it slipped through our grasp has sent him rather close to the edge. I’m inclined to say he isn’t in his right mind at this point, and thus his ability to make decisions - decisions to the benefit of this nation - has been compromised. And now,” Wexley went on, narrowing his eyes on Ragan, “you tell me that the data is in the possession of the MSA at some secret facility. That it is entirely out of our hands now. It isn’t news the President wants to hear, Hunt. He is out for vengeance towards anyone who has contributed to this mess.”
Ragan nodded solemnly.
“I know I’ve screwed things up,” he said quietly. “And I understand President Rashmore’s frustration. If I have to suffer the full force of his wrath for my part in this, so be it. But, sir, before that happens, it is critical that you begin searching for this facility immediately…”
Wexley waved a hand to silence Ragan.
“The search has already begun,” he said.
Ragan started.
“It…has?” he asked. “I thought you didn’t believe me? I thought…”
“Whatever you thought is irrelevant,” Wexley said bluntly. “Do you really think I was going to ignore what you said, merely wait for some further confirmation in order to act? Don’t be ridiculous, Hunt. As soon as we spoke, I ordered for a full satellite sweep of Chicago, Lake Michigan, and the surrounding areas as per your advice.”
Ragan shook his head, bemused. But, should he be? He knew Commander Wexley to be utterly rational in his thinking. Any and all major threats to the NDSA required immediate investigation. Clearly he’d concluded straight away that what Ragan told him was logical, and in need of urgent action.
“But…why send me to find Mikel?” Ragan asked, shaking his head lightly.
Wexley shrugged.
“I wanted to get you somewhere where I knew where you’d be,” he said. “Mikel is our most wanted, and you are - were - our finest tracker, and a good man to bring him in. I had Captain Maddox scanning for your arrival in the city, ready to capture you both when the time came. It turns out your firefight was rather important in alerting us to your specific location.”
Wexley shook his head, brows crunching. Fingers swept for his chin, scratching.
“Now, who exactly were you fighting?” he asked coolly. That calm gaze of his returned, fixing to Ragan, searching him for the truth.
Another question Ragan would have liked to prepare for. Again, he couldn’t exactly reveal his knowledge of Captain Quinn and the men of the Crimson Corps. Doing so would naturally include his own part in that. And, well, execution would most certainly follow then. Perhaps, after everything, that might happen anyway. But…he rather hoped not.
“I can’t be sure, sir.” He decided it best to play dumb on this one. Ignorance was often a useful fallback option. “They might have been after Chloe. Or…perhaps they were there for Mikel as well.”
Wexley didn’t speak. His expression turned thoughtful again.
“But no one knows that Mikel stole the data but us,” he said, stroking his chin, eyes to one side. “Are you suggesting that other parties are now involved in this?”
His eyes surged back at Ragan in a concerning manner. They searched his every twitch, every flick of his eyes, every movement of his lips. Ragan never liked that stare. Wexley had an unnerving manner of scrutinising people, of reading them.
“It’s possible, sir,” Ragan said, trying not to abandon his gaze or drop his eyes - often a sure sign of deceit.
“And you’re certain you didn’t know these men who were pursuing you?” Wexley asked slowly. He took another half step forward.
Ragan shook his head.
“I didn’t get much of a look at them, sir,” he said, resolute. “Mostly, we had to retreat from them due to numbers. It was only when Chloe…”
He stopped, thinking, a memory stirring. Chloe had used her electrical discharge powers to hold Quinn and his men off, disabling them. But what had happened to them? Had they all perished? Had they only been temporarily disabled, and then managed to escape? Or had…had they been captured?
The final thought sent Ragan’s pulse spiking. It took all he had to stay calm, to maintain a placid poise, to remain in control under that deathly stare of Wexley’s. If any of them had been taken in alive, then the game was surely up already? They’d be only too happy to reveal Ragan’s role in everything…
Ragan gulped silently, and saw his old Commander’s lips curl up a little at the sides.
“I see,” Wexley said quietly. “It’s interesting you say that, Hunt. Because there’s a man just next door who seems to know just who you are.”
Ragan was close to losing himself. He must have shown something in his expression; some panic, some guilt. His eyes wanted to turn away, down, anywhere. He wanted to blink hurriedly and begin sweating, to let his breathing rush and his pulse clatter. All those things would be natural reactions to being caught out as he surely was.
He managed to hold himself together, if only just. Though really, there might not be any point in that anymore. He’d come here, it seemed, for no reason at all. If what Wexley said was the truth, then the NDSA would now be taking over the search for the MSA research facility, bringing all their tools to bear in the search. Ragan hadn�
��t needed to convince them of that, to try to enlist their support. He hadn’t needed to return here at all.
All he’d done was abandon Chloe. And Nadia. And Tanner, poor Tanner…
He finally let his eyes slip away and look at the floor. He shut them, shaking his head gently in defeat. Then he heard footsteps draw near, the Panthers to his flanks closing in. He opened his eyes to find them unfastening the clamps on his wrists and ankles.
He looked directly at Wexley.
“Let’s go next door, shall we?” the man said. “Continue our little chat in there…”
86
Ragan was hauled to his feet, wrists dragged behind his back and refastened.
He considered, though briefly, the idea of trying to escape. It didn’t have a chance to settle.
From where he was right now - in the cells and interrogation rooms down in the basement levels of the CID headquarters - getting out would be impossible. He was also unarmed, his weapons having been stripped from him, and accompanied by three fully armed and armoured Panthers, with many more guards beyond, both throughout the building, and New York itself.
Nope, escape wasn’t a good idea.
He drew a breath as Captain Maddox stepped to the door, opening it up. He walked out into the corridor alongside Commander Wexley, Ragan pulled along behind them with the Panthers at his flanks. They turned him to the right, to the very next door a little way down the dimly lit hallway.
Maddox opened the cell, and they all walked inside, Ragan being dragged along rather more unceremoniously than he’d like.
Ragan’s eyes quickly drew in the interior - a carbon copy of the room he’d just occupied. It was simple, functional, intentionally intimidating. Square in shape, with a large chair contraption at its centre, armed with clamps and locks for wrists and ankles.
The room was otherwise completely bare - its walls were of gritty grey stone, chipped and flecked with stains of blood - and intended for the single function of locking prisoners here, often in stress positions, and torturing them if the occasion called.