Extinction Machine (50 page)

Part Six

Terminal Velocity

Everyone is a moon, and has a dark side which he never shows to anybody.

—MARK TWAIN

Seven blunders of the world that lead to violence: wealth without work, pleasure without conscience, knowledge without character, commerce without morality, science without humanity, worship without sacrifice, politics without principle.

—MAHATMA GANDHI

Chapter One Hundred Four

On the road, Western Pennsylvania
Monday, October 21, 4:03 a.m.

We left my uncle’s farm at four in the morning. I was in the Explorer with Ghost and Junie. Top and Bunny were in the backseat.

The rest of Echo Team was in Black Bess. I left Church in the care of Brick and Birddog.

“Whoa, whoa now,” said Brick. “How is it that the young miss gets to go on this raid and we have to sit here and play with our dicks?”

“That’s not how it is, Gunny. Junie volunteered to go. She knows Tull, she understands the science, and she has to be close for us to use the team channel because the other stuff is tapped. She has to come. You don’t.”

“Listen, boss,” protested Brick, “maybe I don’t have a left foot but I can pull a trigger and fire an RPG.”

“What he said, Cap,” agreed Birddog. “They were my friends at the Warehouse, too.”

“Look,” I told them, “I appreciate the offers, but this isn’t a frontal assault. We don’t even know if Shelton is our bad guy. I need you guys to make sure Mr. Church gets to the Hangar safely. The DMS is on the run and we can’t trust our radios. You need to get him to Aunt Sallie and then go to ground. We don’t know what else Tull and these Closers have planned, but hear me on this: If anyone takes a run at Church I want you to give them the worst day of their lives. Understood?”

“Hooah,” they growled.

Church walked us out. “Good hunting,” he said.

He had created the DMS and over the years he’d seen hundreds of his people fall defending the country and the world. Now a fool of a president and a group of maniacs were trying to tear it all down. Even battered and pushed to the edge, I did not believe for one second that Church was going to accept defeat. Not him. Not after everything that had happened. As I climbed into my Explorer I met his eye.

“Good hunting to you, too,” I said to him. He measured out a frozen millimeter of a smile.

The drive to Pittsburgh took a little over three hours. I dented a few traffic laws. Sue me. World in the balance, yada yada yada.

It was also one of the most awkward drives.

We talked about friends who had died in Baltimore.

We talked about Shelton, building our case against him.

We talked about aliens and UFOs, and the fact that we were having the conversation at all. When Junie reminded us that she had alien DNA it shut us up for almost twenty miles. I mean, really, go ahead and story-top that.

When the conversational button reset, we talked about all the things we each wanted to do to Erasmus Tull. I doubt Junie enjoyed that part of the trip. I did, but I was of two minds. Half of me wanted to take about forty minutes and use every second beating the son of a bitch to a finely textured pulp. The Warrior inside my head cheered that decision.

The rest of me wanted to give him the Indiana Jones treatment the second I saw him. If you ever saw
Raiders of the Lost Ark
you’ll know the scene. Indy is suddenly confronted by this Arab warrior who’s like seven feet tall, packed with muscles and swinging a scimitar. The crowd clears out, leaving a market square empty for what will be the fight scene of the century. But Indiana Jones just pulls his pistol and shoots the guy in the world’s best “oh, fuck you” moment. Turns out, the actor, Harrison Ford, had dysentery and really wasn’t up to filming the elaborate fight scene that had been choreographed. Spielberg loved it so much he kept that version of the scene in the movie. Every soldier I’ve ever met agrees that it’s the smartest fight scene in the history of film.

Tull was a hybrid who was supposed to be faster, stronger, and more ruthless than anyone. Thing is, I’ve both been there and done that. Genetically enhanced mercenaries amped up with ape DNA. People infected with a prion disease that turned them into zombies. Soldiers who had undergone gene therapy with insect DNA. And last year … the Upierczi. Actual vampires. Okay, they weren’t supernatural or anything like that, but they were easily twice as strong and three times as fast as me. So … I’ve done the whole fight the impossible fight thing and it’s getting old. I’m only in my early thirties and my body is crisscrossed with scar tissue. I’ve had more broken bones than I can remember. There was a time in my life when I thought I needed to prove to myself that I couldn’t be defeated, that I was strong, that the bad guys could never hurt another innocent because I wasn’t tough enough to stop them. But, you know, me and the guys have saved the world. The actual world. A couple of times now. I don’t need to prove anything to anyone, and Rudy has been trying to tell me for fifteen years that I
never
had to prove anything.

So, my game plan, should I see Erasmus Tull, was to put him down like a dog and call it a day.

I liked that plan.

We drove on toward the dawn.

And the one thing we did not talk about—Junie and me, that is—was what happened last night. That was the thing I wanted most to talk about. Something that wasn’t tainted by madness and murder, by terrorist agendas and political corruption. By blood and death.

But as we drove, Junie Flynn took my hand and held it. She didn’t care if the two hulking thugs in the back saw it. Neither did I.

Chapter One Hundred Five

Near VanMeer Castle
Pennsylvania
Monday, October 21, 7:22 a.m.

Ten miles from Shelton’s castle there was a distinctive
bing-bong
in my ear and I heard Bug say, “Bug to Cowboy, do you copy?”

“Bug,” I said tightly, “this line has been compromised.”

“Not anymore,” he said with a laugh.

“What?”

“We found a whole bunch of these weird little transmitter things stuck to the outside of the Hangar and the other offices. That’s how they hacked our system. Well, that kind of pissed me off, so I took a laptop up to the roof, cut one of the little bastards open and uploaded a whole bunch of really fun viruses, kicked them off the satellite and long story short—we have a clear com channel. If they hack it, they get a feedback screech at one hundred and eighty decibels. Anyone listening in is going to be saying, ‘Huh?’ a thousand times a day for the rest of their lives. So, booyah!”

I laughed. “Bug, I could kiss you.”

“Um, dude … no. Just … no.”

“Where are you, though?” I asked. “I thought they shut the Hangar down.”

“Well … yeah, they have us surrounded and all that, but Aunt Sallie initiated Protocol Seventeen. We sealed the upper levels and we’re down in the bunker. They, um, probably don’t know we
have
a bunker.”

“Nice.”

“Where are you?” he asked, and I gave him as much of the story as I could.

“Shelton, huh? Yeah, maybe. I’m going to put all of this new stuff into MindReader and see what she says. Last time I ran him, we only got a sixty-eight percent confidence that he’s the bad guy.”

“I need more than that or I really am going to jail.”

“Speaking of which, before that … stuff down in Baltimore … Mr. Church called a bunch of his lawyer friends. Jesus, Cowboy, you wouldn’t believe who he has on our legal team. Three of them are former U.S. attorney generals. Three. And other guys. It’s like the Justice League of America without the spandex. They’re putting together your defense right now.”

“Nice.”

“Tell you one thing, man,” said Bug, “if this is a frame up and the acting president is involved in
any
way … this will take him down.”

“I’m going to block out some time later on to cry about that,” I said. “But right now we’re pulling up to Shelton’s place.”

“And I got your back.”

I stopped on a rise a mile from the estate. Top and Bunny leaned forward and peered through the windshield. Bunny whistled. Ghost made a corresponding
whuff.
He was impressed, too. Though, I’m not really sure whether we were really impressed or simply appalled. The Shelton house was a castle. An actual castle. One of those old world fairy-tale castles brought over from Europe and reassembled stone by stone here in the States. Bug told us that it had two hundred plus rooms. Plus. Like they have so many rooms they lose track. The room count didn’t include the bathrooms. Made me want to piss in as many of them as I could and leave all the seats up.

The castle had spires and turrets and wings sticking out at improbable angles. Smoke curled from several chimneys. I didn’t even bother trying to count the windows just on the side I could see. My math skills don’t extend into abstract numbers.

“Wonder if Count Dracula rents a room from him,” said Bunny.

“Time to go,” I said.

Without another word, Top and Bunny exited the car. The plan was to have them close on the property through the thick pine forest that lined the right side of the road. They took heavy equipment bags out of the back. They left the door open for Junie.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you?” asked Junie.

“Not a chance,” I said. “Stay with Top and Bunny and make sure you keep your communicator turned on. You’ll be able to hear what I hear, and I’ve got a lapel camera that will let you see what I see. Feed me any intel you can. People, weird science stuff, anything. But whatever you do, stay away from the house. If we’re right about Shelton, then things could get very nasty in there and you are not a soldier.”

“I can handle a gun,” she said.

“Since when?”

“Lydia showed me this morning. Loading, gun safety, as much as she could, and you know I can’t forget what I learned.” Her eyes met mine. “Or what I experience.”

It was suddenly three hundred degrees too hot in the car.

“Um … listen,” I began, but before I could embarrass myself, she bent forward and kissed me.

And then she was gone. Top, Bunny, and Junie vanished into the woods.

Ghost looked at me with a pitying expression.

“Oh, and like you’re a class act,” I said. “You sniff dog asses.”

I took my foot off the brake and rolled down the long hill.

Chapter One Hundred Six

VanMeer Castle
Near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Monday, October 21, 7:27 a.m.

As I drove that last mile, Bug gave me more background on the man I was going to meet.

Howard Shelton was the third richest man in Pennsylvania. Yeah, I know that doesn’t sound like much if you don’t know Pennsylvania. The coal mines and steelworks aren’t completely gone, and there are a lot of moneymaking industries in the Keystone State. Corn, oat, soybean, and mushroom farming is massive. As is mining for iron, portland cement, lime, and various kinds of stone. Plus there are major electronics manufacturers and some of the biggest pharmaceutical companies. Shelton had fingers in all those pies, which is where his family’s old money came from. Old Abner Shelton, Howard’s great-grandfather, was a crony of Teddy Roosevelt. Abner’s brother, Humphrey, had the stateroom next to the Astors on the
Titanic.

The newer money—say from the thirties on up—was in defense contracts and military research and development. Every time a bomb drops Shelton puts a couple of bucks in his pocket. Even if those bombs don’t have the American flag stenciled on their cowling.

I idled outside a wrought-iron gate that was wider than my apartment and designed with all sorts of animals and oak leaves and birds. Between the gate and the house was a winding half mile of road that snaked between sculpted gardens, marble fountains, and rows of oaks and beeches and elms. The garage stood apart from the house and was nicer than my dad’s mayoral minimansion in Baltimore. There was a Bentley parked outside and a Lamborghini getting a hand polish from a man in driver’s livery.

“Y’know, pal,” I said to Ghost, “there’s rich and there’s rich and then there’s fuck you.”

He flopped down on the seat and began licking his balls. Clearly he agreed.

I tapped my earbud. “Cowboy to Ronin.”

“Ronin here,” came the immediate reply. Sam Imura. We’d timed things to allow Black Bess to take up a position on the far side of the estate with Ivan behind the wheel. Sam and Pete were supposed to break the perimeter and find useful places to loiter.

“I’m at the front gate,” I said. “What’s your twenty?”

“Finished the first circuit and sitting in an apple tree on your three o’clock. Damn, boss, this place is bigger than Rhode Island.”

“Hold there,” I said. “But don’t be a wallflower if the party starts hopping.”

“Copy that,” said Imura.

“Prankster,” I said, “you in the game?”

Prankster—Pete Dobbs—confirmed that he was on the grounds, way over on the east side.

I got right up to the gate and tooted the horn and waited while a guard came out of the booth. He’d been there since I pulled up but apparently didn’t give much of a fuck about a guy in a Ford Explorer. Maybe if I’d rolled up in a Land Rover or a Lexus LX he’d have at least pretended to notice my existence.

Jeez, even the help was snobby around here.

Ghost glanced at the guard, went back to his hobby, then changed his mind and sat up. At first glance the guard was a big slab of white meat in a polyester jacket, but that was all deception. His jacket was a little too loose, his pants cut baggy in the crotch, and he had black sneakers on his feet. If I wasn’t in a sneaky profession I might have dismissed him. But the jacket was a little too baggy, and it was unbuttoned.

“What do you figure?” I asked Ghost. “Uzi or MAC-Ten?”

Ghost offered no opinion.

“MAC-Ten,” I decided. Though it could easily be a microwave pulse pistol if these guys were Closers.