Empire Builders (31 page)
FORTY-THREE
“GO ON AHEAD,” George whispered to the two women. “Don’t leave us,” Kimberly pleaded.
FORTY-FOUR“I won’t. You just go ahead a few steps.” “Please!”
“You can trust me.”
Kate took her sister’s hand. “Come on, Kim.”
They started down the narrow spiral stairs again, just as hurried footsteps told them that the men they heard were coming up toward them. George saw the glow of a flashlight bouncing off the curving walls. He shrank back up the stairs until the two women were out of his sight.
“Hey!” a man’s shouted. “How did you get out!” “We tried the door and it opened,” Kate answered. “I bolted that door. It was locked.”
“It opened when we tried it.”
Kimberly said shakily, “We were afraid, all alone up there with all the shooting.” “I locked that door!”
“Never mind,” came the other man’s voice. “It doesn’t matter.” “You saying I forgot to lock it!”
“It doesn’t matter. You two get in front of us. You’re gonna be our shields until we get out of here.” The other man chuckled. “Not bad-looking shields, eh?”
George saw the flashlight glow dwindle down the stairs and heard their footsteps going away from him. As silently as he could he tiptoed down after them, always staying around the curve of the wall so that they could not see him.
The women and the two gunmen reached the stone landing at the bottom of the spiral staircase. “What do we do now? Those commandos are gonna be comin’ up here any minute.”
“Let ‘em come. We got these two redheads to protect us. We go down to the courtyard, get in a car, and get the hell outta here.”
George saw them standing there, one with the flashlight, the other with a shotgun in his hands. He was about a dozen steps above them, hidden in shadow.
“Come on,” said the one with the flashlight. “We’re not waitin’ for those soldiers to find us.”
No time left. George roared out a bellow that would freeze a buffalo herd and leaped at the guy with the shotgun. He hit him like a mammoth lineman blindsiding a quarterback. The man went down, the shotgun skittering across the stone floor. The one with the flashlight threw it at George and reached for the pistol in his shoulder holster as the two women clutched at each other and edged back toward the wall.
George rolled to his feet as the other man yanked the automatic out of its holster. With a single big ham-sized paw George grabbed the gunman’s extended hand and squeezed. Hard. The man screeched
with pain. George bent his arm back and he sank to his knees. With his other fist George smashed him in the jaw as hard as his massive weight allowed. The man’s head spun almost completely around and he went limp in George’s steel grip.
with pain. George bent his arm back and he sank to his knees. With his other fist George smashed him in the jaw as hard as his massive weight allowed. The man’s head spun almost completely around and he went limp in George’s steel grip.
George spun to look down at the other one. He was sprawled on the stone floor, out cold or dead, it did not matter to him which.
“You didn’t leave us,” Kimberly said, almost breathless.
“Told you you could trust me,” said George as he bent down to pick up the shotgun. “You didn’t leave us,” Kim repeated, her eyes riveted on the big Australian.
Holding the shotgun in one huge hand, the pistol tucked into his waistband, George made another little bow to them.
“This way, ladies,” he said. “Thanks,” said Kate.
Kimberly said nothing, but her eyes were sparkling.
“I mean it,” Gaetano said. “Drop your weapons, all of you, or I’ll kill her.
Dan knew that Gaetano and his thugs would shoot the assault team as soon as they had put their weapons down, the same way they had when they had abducted Jane in the first place. These guys are wearing body armor and helmets, he thought swiftly. But even if they don’t get killed, that bastard will still be walking away with Jane.
Before anyone could reply to Gaetano’s ultimatum, Dan yanked off his goggles and stepped out of the shadows of the corridor to the doorway, where Gaetano could see him clearly.
“Before you shoot her, you’re going to have to shoot me, you sonofabitch.” “Dan, no!” Jane said.
But Dan walked slowly into the room, straight toward her. Gaetano’s eyes were filled with fear, but his lips twisted into a nasty little smile.
“If you want to be shot I will be happy to accommodate you,” he said.
Dan said nothing, just kept pacing into the big room, closing the distance between himself and Jane. His weariness was gone. His legs felt strong and sure. He noticed every detail of the candlelit scene. Malik staring at him with round eyes. The other gunmen shifting uneasily, knowing that if a firefight started they would be quickly killed. Gaetano still smiling, moving his pistol from Jane’s head to point squarely at Dan’s own chest.
Ten paces separated them. Nine. Eight.
Jane grabbed at Gaetano’s crotch and squeezed. He shrieked and doubled over. Dan dove into the two of them, knocking them onto the bed and then over its side to the floor as the room erupted in gunfire.
Dan grabbed Gaetano by the hair and pounded his head against the stone floor. Again. Again. He bashed Gaetano’s bloody head against the stone until someone pried him off.
Jane was sitting on the floor beside Gaetano’s inert form, his pistol in her hand. The room was blazing with light. Gaetano’s dead face looked surprised, the back of his head oozing a pool of blood. “Are you all right?” Dan and Jane asked simultaneously. Then they burst into exhausted, relieved, almost hysterical laughter and fell into each other’s arms.
Gentle hands pulled them apart and helped them to their feet. “That was a very brave thing you did,” said the assault team leader. “But very foolish.” She had removed her helmet, as had all the other Yamagata commandos. Dan was surprised to see that she was a woman.
“You mean I’m a hero, after all!” he said, grinning crookedly. Then he saw that Malik was on a stretcher, his legs soaked with blood, a plasma IV already inserted into his forearm. All the gunmen were on the floor, dead.
“It’s finished,” Malik muttered as Dan went over to him. “It’s all over.” Dan shook his head. “Nope. It’s just beginning.”
THE ROOM LOOKED more like a conference center than a hospital suite. Malik had cranked his bed
up to a half-sitting position, the best he could do while his legs were still in their casts. Jane and Kate Williams sat on comfortable leather chairs beside his bed; Dan, in white hospital pajamas, in a wheelchair between them. Nobuhiko’s lean intense face filled the phone screen set at the foot of the bed. The big TV screen on the far wall was still showing the devastation of New Orleans . Malik had muted the sound but none of them could take their eyes from the scenes of the flooding, the wreckage, the rescue workers searching in boats for survivors—and bodies. “They’re blaming us for the disaster,” Jane said. “The public is confusing this tidal wave with the greenhouse effect.”
up to a half-sitting position, the best he could do while his legs were still in their casts. Jane and Kate Williams sat on comfortable leather chairs beside his bed; Dan, in white hospital pajamas, in a wheelchair between them. Nobuhiko’s lean intense face filled the phone screen set at the foot of the bed. The big TV screen on the far wall was still showing the devastation of New Orleans . Malik had muted the sound but none of them could take their eyes from the scenes of the flooding, the wreckage, the rescue workers searching in boats for survivors—and bodies. “They’re blaming us for the disaster,” Jane said. “The public is confusing this tidal wave with the greenhouse effect.”
“We can thank your pirate television broadcasts for that,” Malik said to Dan.
Dan gave him a sardonic grin. “I guess you’ll have to explain the difference—and admit the truth of what I’ve been saying.”
“All those people killed.” Kate’s voice sounded hollow, far away.
“Multiply it by a million,” said Dan, his grin evaporating. “All the coastal areas on Earth will look like that if we let the greenhouse cliff happen.”
“How can we stop it?” Malik asked. “We tried and look where it’s brought us. We were merely arranging the world for the crooks to take it over.”
Dan gave him an exaggerated frown. “Vasily, much as I hate to admit it, you had the right idea. Wrong implementation, but basically the right idea.”
“What do you mean?” asked Jane.
“We’ve got to work together, the whole world has to work together, all of us, government, industry, the corporations, the GEC, everybody on Earth. The greenhouse cliff is a global problem and it can only be beaten by an all-out global effort.”
“That’s what I tried to do,” said Malik.
“Not quite,” Dan said. “You tried the old collectivist approach: take control of everything and make all decisions at the top. It didn’t work in the old Soviet Union and it won’t work now. It never works!”
“That’s not entirely true,” Jane said.
“And rain makes applesauce. Look, all of you, we need to have all the corporations work together with the GEC and all the individual national governments—but not all locked into some grand master plan that doesn’t allow deviations or creativity or individual initiative. Free men and women can beat the greenhouse and keep people like Gaetano from sinking their claws into everything.” “You believe so?” Malik asked.
“I know it,” replied Dan fervently.
“Then what are you suggesting?” asked Jane.
“Run this battle against the greenhouse cliff the way a good general runs a campaign. Set out the goals that must be reached—reduce fossil fuel burning by so much each year, replace fossil-fueled electrical plants with fusion, build solar power satellites, make solar cells cheap enough so private homeowners can afford to cover the roofs with them, replace fossil-fueled cars with electric or hydrogen fuels . . .” He
paused to take a breath.
paused to take a breath.
Malik mused, “Greenwell of Detroit wants to produce hydrogen cars.”
“Let him! Let a thousand flowers blossom, as an old Communist once said. As long as they’re cutting down on fossil-fuel burning, let them work out the problem in their own way.”
“It would be chaos,” Malik said.
Dan shook his head. “It’ll take a helluva lot of coordination from the GEC. Coordination, not control. But it can be done.”
“Do you think so?” Jane asked. “Yes.”
“In ten years?” asked Kate.
“What choice do we have?” Dan countered. “If we do nothing half the world will look like New Orleans
. If we try to force everybody into some master plan imposed by the GEC, it won’t work—and bastards like Gaetano will be just itching to take it over for themselves. Let the people work out their own solutions, coordinated by the GEC. That’s the way to win the battle.”
. If we try to force everybody into some master plan imposed by the GEC, it won’t work—and bastards like Gaetano will be just itching to take it over for themselves. Let the people work out their own solutions, coordinated by the GEC. That’s the way to win the battle.”
Malik remembered something. “That old man that Gaetano took us to see, he’s still there, you know. Neither Interpol nor the Italian authorities have any evidence that he’s ever been involved in any crime.”
“The rats are always hiding behind the walls, Vasily. That’s part of human nature. You’ve always got to be on the lookout for them. But the more you centralize control the easier you make it for them to bend everything to their own uses.”
“Yes,” Malik admitted, “you’re right. You’ve been right all along, I suppose.” “Then we can return Astro to Dan,” said Jane.
Malik nodded.
“You’ve all forgotten one thing,” Kate said. When they turned to her she went on, “You might be able to change over all the world’s electrical power generation to solar and nuclear. You might even be able to replace all the transportation vehicles on Earth with ones that use electrical or hydrogen fuels. But what about the factories? What about manufacturing and metal smelting and all the heavy industries? They bum coal and oil and natural gas. How can you convert them to nuclear electricity?”
The others looked at each other. Then they all saw that Dan was grinning like a school kid who knew the answer.
“Well?” said Jane.
“You remember that asteroid we corralled ten years ago? We never even started to use its mineral resources, but it’s still up there in a high Earth orbit.”
“So?”
“We estimated it contained roughly four million tons of highgrade iron ore. Plus a few thousand tons of impurities like platinum and gold. And that was just a teeny asteroid, hardly bigger than a football field.”
Malik groaned. “What you would do to the world market for precious metals by dumping a few thousand tons of gold.”
“Screw the precious metals,” Dan snapped. “There are thousands of asteroids out there. Millions of ‘em! Some of them are miles wide! Enough metals and minerals to supply the whole world for a billion years. And we can smelt them in space, as well. Use sunlight for energy, focused sunlight for heat-” “The capital costs would be tremendous,” Malik pointed out. Dan grinned again. “Well, if I can have Astro back in my hands again, I’ll raise the capital. Don’t worry about that.”
Kate said, “I don’t see how you or anybody else could replace the world’s metals industry in ten years.”
“We can’t, Scarlett. But we can get started. We can go as hard and as fast as we possibly can. We’ll have to get the leaders in the industry to go into this with us; we want cooperation, not competition.
You’ll have to sweet-talk a lot of those old farts on their boards of directors.” “Me?” Kate asked.
“Sure, you. Who else? I’m going to be too busy with the asteroid project to hold hands back here on Earth. You’re going to be Astro’s CEO.”
She gasped. “You—you’d trust me?”
Dan laughed. “Your sister’s fallen in love with Big George, hasn’t she? That makes you practically a member of the family.” “You’d trust me,” Kate said again, in a whisper.
Dan turned his wheelchair to face Jane. “And what about you, lady? Are you ready to step down from your lofty position in the GEC and marry a guy who’s going to be spending most of his time in space?”
Jane raised a brow. “Such a romantic proposal, Dan. I’m swept off my feet.” “Good. Then that’s settled.”
“Now wait a minute “
But he had already swung back toward Malik’s bed. “Vasily, get well quickly. We’re going to need you at the head of the GEC. And we’ll do everything we can to support you.”
“I never thought I’d hear such words from you, Mr. Capitalist.” “Strange times make strange alliances,” said Dan. “We’ve got ten years to save the world.”
“Do you think we can?”
Dan shrugged. “We’d better. If we can’t, then who the hell can?”
That evening Dan and Jane had dinner together on the terrace outside his hospital room. The moon smiled lopsidedly down at them. The Mediterranean glittered in its silver radiance.
Dan was still in his hospital whites. Jane had changed to a peach-toned knit dress with a scalloped neckline.
“I’m serious,” Dan said as he poured the wine. “I love you, Jane. I want to marry you.” “But you’re going to be dashing off to the Moon again,” she said.
“A lot farther than that, dear. The main asteroid belt is out beyond the orbit of Mars.” “You’ll be gone for years at a time.”
“I’d like you to come with me. The accommodations won’t be plush, but we’ll be together. Make a terrific honeymoon.”
“And what will I do out there?” she asked, her voice low, trembling. “I’m not an engineer or an astronaut.”
“You—well, you could be with me,” Dan replied uneasily. “You could learn to help. You could start a new life.”
She leaned across the little table and put her hand atop his.
“Dan, I’m a politician. I’m very good at it. I can get people to work together. I’ve even gotten you and Vasily to work together, haven’t I?”
“You ...?”
She smiled. “I’ll take the credit for it. That’s what politicians do.” “Okay by me,” he said.
Her smile turned sad. “There won’t be anything for me to do on your wonderful space missions, Dan. But there’s an awful lot I can accomplish here.”
“I don’t want to be apart from you ever again.”
“Me neither. But I’m needed here, Dan. Don’t you see that? I can help! I can keep Vasily on track and help to keep things running smoothly here.”
“But I want you?
“Would you give up your asteroid project to be with me?
Would you turn away from what you do best, for my sake?” Dan looked away from her, out to the gleaming sea and up at the moon. It seemed to be laughing at him now.
“You won’t marry me?” he said at last.
“I won’t go out on your space mission, where I’ll only be in the way,” Jane said. “And you won’t stay here on Earth when you’ve got so much to accomplish out there, will you?”
He saw that there were tears in her eyes. And he realized that his own eyes were misting over. “You mean it’ll never work out for us,” he said, the words almost choking in his throat.
“You described it best when you said that what we’re facing is a war. We are at war, against an impending disaster. You make sacrifices when you’re fighting a war.”
A million thoughts ran through Dan’s mind but he could not find a single word to say. “Dan ... I’m sorry.”
“Me too.”
“Maybe when all this is over. Maybe then.”
He looked into her eyes and saw his own pain mirrored. “Maybe then,” he whispered. Jane pulled her hand away and straightened up in her chair.
Trying to sound more cheerful, she asked, “Do you think we’ll really beat this greenhouse cliff?” He shrugged.
“In just ten years?”
Dan pushed away from the table and got to his feet. “I don’t know. Nobody knows. All we can do is try.”
And he walked into his hospital room, went to the closet and began to pull out his working clothes.
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