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Authors: Jon Land

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“Wayne, you there?”

“Yeah, Joe.”

“I’m heading your way. We’re calling this in. I’ve had e—”

The walkie-talkie went cold in Wayne Denbo’s hand. He brought it back to his lips.

“Joe? Come in, Joe, come in … .”

No response.

“Joe!”

Denbo was already sprinting down the hall. The stink Joe Langhorn had referred to, like rotten eggs, drew him toward the science labs.

“Joe,” he kept calling into his walkie-talkie. “Joe.”

“Joe
.”

His own voice bounced back at him, and Denbo looked through the door of the second lab on the right. Joe Langhorn’s walkie-talkie lay on the floor, speaker facing up. Denbo backed into the corridor and drew his gun. His mouth felt like someone had papered it with Kleenex. He started running, heels clacking against the linoleum tile and contents of his gun belt bouncing up and down.

He burst through the front doors and reached the patrol car breathless, one hand on his knee as he reached for the door.

In the backseat the slumped form of Frank McBride was gone.

“Jesus,” he muttered, only halfway in when he grabbed the mike. “Base, this is Seventeen. Base, come in!”

“Go ahead, Seventeen,” returned dispatcher Harvey Milkweed.

Denbo muttered a silent thanks, glad there was still a voice out there to greet him.

“We got a situation here, a major situation.”

“What is your location, Seventeen?” asked Milkweed. “Are you requesting backup?” He’d rooted himself to a desk after a brief visit to the Gulf War left him with part of a land mine stuck in his leg. Milkweed hated the desk, missed situations.

“Backup? We need the whole goddamn national guard down here in a hurry. We need—Wait a minute … What the … Oh my God … Oh
my
—”

The hairs on Harvey Milkweed’s neck stood on end. He leaned forward in his chair.

“Seventeen, what’s going on? Seventeen, come in … . Denbo, what’s wrong?”

Milkweed waited.

“Denbo? Denbo, come in!”

There was no response, and Milkweed realized there wasn’t going to be.

Wayne Denbo was gone.

Jon Land is thirty-six years old and lives in Providence, Rhode Island where he is at work on his next bestseller for Tor, THE KINGDOM OF THE SEVEN.

Notes

Trilateralism: The Trilateral Commission and Elite Planning for World Management
, South End Press, Boston 1980.

The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied so that you can enjoy reading it on your personal devices. This e-book is for your personal use only. You may not print or post this e-book, or make this e-book publicly available in any way. You may not copy, reproduce or upload this e-book, other than to read it on one of your personal devices.

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.

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental.

DAY OF THE DELPHI

A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, N.Y. 10010

Tor® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.

ISBN: 0-812-53434-4

Cover art by Paul Stinson

eISBN 9781429956871

First eBook Edition : July 2011

First Tor edition: November 1993