The Aegis Solution (49 page)

Elias glanced at Tillie and gave her a slight nod. With a loud chuff of disgust, she reached into her
pocket and threw the key on the floor in front of Faulk. The agent picked it up and trotted to the end
of the hall, where Boehn was still shackled to the steel framing piled outside the exit door. The two
moved back to join their boss.

"Quite a touching scene," Faulk snarled with undisguised venom, "seeing the two of you reunited."

Elias bit his lip and said nothing.

"I must admit, Leah, you surprised me. All of the time and effort we expended to break you and
you never gave us a thing. Even Khalid, with his barbaric bent, failed."

"What's the point of all this, Faulk? You faked her death and grabbed her two years ago. That's a
long time to work anyone over. Whatever she had learned…whatever she might have known…would
have resulted in someone taking action against you at some point during that time. Holding her that
long doesn't make any sense."

Faulk gave Elias a withering stare. "I suppose you are right, old friend. Oh, wait, as you have
corrected me at every possible opportunity, I am not your friend and never have been."

Elias let the comment slide.

"If all we were worried about was whether Leah revealed our plans, we would have disposed of her
almost two years ago. But it was much more complicated than that."

"I'll try my best to understand."

"As she played the part of cabin maid for Khalid, she found two things, the report we sent him on
the completion of the pathogen, and something else. Something much more important."

"Do I have to guess?"

"No. And I doubt that you would be right if you did."

"The vaccine." The two words came from Wilson.

Elias spun around to stare at his friend as he explained. "That is the only logical explanation which
fits all of the facts. It appears that the goals of Mr. Faulk, and whomever he has associated himself with,
have taken a turn for the eschatological. You and your people have created a doomsday bug, something
that will exterminate all human life on the planet. No complex delivery system needed. No infiltration
into enemy territories required. One infected person anywhere in the world will do the job for you."

Faulk glared at him. "Not bad, old man. Please go on."

"As Elias mentioned, a weapon like that is worthless, insane…unless you have a vaccine to protect
yourself. With my admittedly shallow knowledge of you and this brief interaction, it appears that you
are indeed insane, but of a type very different from that of a suicidal madman. My diagnosis, as a layman
and not a trained psychiatrist, is that you are a classic narcissist. You vaccinate every person whom you
have chosen to be a part of the new world and turn the bug loose on the rest of us. Leah must have
found that vaccine. I am guessing that by the time Eric Stone captured her, she no longer had it with
her. Only that single fact had the potential to completely ruin your plans. You needed to make absolutely
certain that she hadn't passed it into the hands of anyone who wasn't on your list. You also needed to
know that she hadn't delivered it to a place where it could be replicated and widely distributed."

"I'm impressed. You are quite perceptive, Doctor Chapman. I guess that the cat is out of the bag."

"You couldn't cancel the ongoing operation to infiltrate Khalid's camp," Elias interjected. "It would
have been too difficult to explain. That's why you sent Eric. He wasn't there to provide cover and
support for Leah; he was there to watch her, to make sure she didn't stumble upon your secret."

"Obviously true and obviously required, as, unfortunately, she did."

"You weren't certain that you wouldn't need me at some point, to help you break her. But you
didn't want me spending every waking minute searching for her, so you had to stage her death."

"Also true. And killing her off had the additional advantage of allowing me to take over your
position. Sadly, as entertaining as this game of Jeopardy might be, I do need to finish my business here
and move on. And now, thanks to the good professor, we all know what it is I want from her. I also
assume that you have the missing bombs, Elias – which I need."

"If you think, after all of this time, that Leah will talk now, you're crazy," Elias uttered coldly.

A nasty grin spread across Faulk's face. "I think you are wrong, Elias. Because, for the first time,
we have at our disposal a tool previously not utilized by us…you."

Faulk motioned to one of his men, who stepped forward and pointed his gun directly at Elias.

Despite her weakened state, Leah jumped up. "No! Don't."

Faulk shrugged and, in an almost conversational tone, explained, "But, Leah, we've tried everything
else: beatings and torture, drugs, sleep deprivation, starvation. Nothing has worked. Starting to shoot
holes in your beloved husband is really the last trick in the bag."

"Leah, don't."

She had stepped next to Elias, and he could see that she was biting on her bottom lip so hard that
she was drawing blood. No one moved. No one spoke for several seconds as Faulk allowed his
intentions to sink in. Blinking back tears, she turned to Elias. "Baby, I'm sorry. I can't tell him."

Elias felt no anger at hearing his own death sentence coming from the mouth of the woman he
loved more than anything in the world. "Don't be. I would have made the same choice."

Their intense connection was shattered by a harsh laugh from Faulk. "Heartbreaking. No, it truly
is. We will test the firmness of her admirable resolve when you are on the floor, screaming in a pool of
your own blood."

He turned to the armed man. "Let's start with a leg."

The agent switched his rifle out of automatic mode and lowed the barrel so that it was pointing at
Elias' right thigh. As he was about to pull the trigger, Leah stepped in front of Elias, blocking the shot.
The gunman, momentarily flummoxed, moved closer, raising the rifle with the clear intent of bashing
the stock into her face.

The proximity of the man was what Leah was waiting for. As he swung the rifle to strike her, Faulk,
recognizing her intent, shouted, "GET BACK, YOU FOOL!" but it was too late. She ducked under his
arms and pivoted, burying her elbow in his groin. As he doubled over, Elias, who had reacted instantly,
pulled the rifle from him and, using the same butt of the stock the man was going to use on his wife,
battered the top of his head, sending him to the floor.

The other three men were already bringing their weapons to bear, when Tillie, taking advantage of
the distraction, snatched up the shotgun and quickly fired a booming shot in the their direction. Given
the distance, the shotgun blast did little damage, but served to send Faulk and the other three diving
around the two opposite corners for cover.

Elias, still holding the rifle seized from the now unconscious agent, went to take Leah's arm, but
she was retrieving the AK-47. After she grabbed it, she and Elias dashed for the utility room, following
Wilson, who was already running in that direction. Tillie kept the shotgun pointed in the general
direction of the intersection, ready to fire off another round if a head suddenly appeared, as she also
backed toward their former hideout.

Kreitzmann was still sprawled on the floor in a stupor when they entered, with Tillie arriving last.

"Who is that?" Leah asked.

"You aren't going to believe this," Elias explained as he took position next to the door jamb. "Rudy
Kreitzmann."

"Kreitzmann! Man, after we get out of this, you've really got to fill me in."

Tillie left her spot by the doorway and walked over to Leah, sticking out her hand. "I'm Tillie."

Leah gave her a broad smile and shook her hand. "Leah. Pleasure to meet you. I understand you're
the one who popped Eric for me."

Tillie shook her head. "Wow! You and your husband are going to give me a complex about that.
Look, I'm sorry I didn't figure out a way to save him for both of you."

Leah glanced over at Elias. "Sensitive type?"

"No, not at all. Leah, the gentleman to your left is John Wilson Chapman."

She turned and looked at Wilson with surprise on her face. "Chapman. You're the…."

He held up his hands. "I'm just a friend of Tillie's."

Exasperated, Leah turned back to her husband. "Yep. We're going to have a lot to talk about."

Elias nodded. "Maybe later. Right now, we need to get ready for those guys. Tillie, break out more
of the fume masks, goggles, and earplugs."

Tillie gave him a mock salute and hurried to the storage shelves. Elias, keeping his head close to
the frame, peeked out and saw that two of the agents were beginning to round the corner, moving
toward them. Flipping his rifle back to full automatic, he loosed a quick spray toward the agents,
brushing them back.

"What's the plan?" Leah asked, checking the AK-47.

"Plan? I don't have a plan. You're the field agent. I'm just the desk guy."

Making a rude sound to show her disgust, she pressed him, "Okay, Mr. Desk Guy, can you at least
fill me in on our situation?"

Elias, keeping his head tilted slightly outside the door to watch the hallway, answered, "Happy to.
We are currently inside Aegis, which is basically a huge prison. We are trapped in a utility room. This
door is the only way out of it. There are at least three trained agents plus Faulk blocking the end of the
corridor. That open door out there and to the left, the one packed with several tons of twisted steel and
shattered solar panels, was the only exit from Aegis. They probably have tear gas and concussion
grenades. We have welder's goggles, painter's respirators, and foam earplugs. Tillie has a shotgun. You
have an AK-47. I have my Beretta and this."

Leah shrugged. "Not as bad as I thought. You forgot to mention that Faulk has a second team
on-site and they are on their way."

Tillie returned and handed Leah the protective gear, which she quickly donned, as did the rest of
them, with Wilson putting the items on the semi-conscious Kreitzmann.

"What about the bombs?" Tillie inquired hopefully.

"Bombs?" Leah's voice was almost flat.

Elias glanced at his wife, fighting back his amusement at how she was receiving what must seem
like an endless stream of outrageous facts, and explained, "The two that Faulk is looking for. After he
sent me in here, he stocked me with Incendergel devices, enough to take out all of Aegis."

"Why?"

"Not now. But I did bring a couple of them with me, including the primary. I really don't see how
we can use them in this situation."

Immediately, Tillie snapped, "Why not?"

"Well, they have timers on them, not fuses. The timers don't even have the option for seconds, just
minutes with a minimum duration programmed to give the person setting the charge enough time to
get away. Besides, with the size of the charge, even if I could roll one down the hall at them, like a
bowling ball, and it detonated at the exact moment it reached them, we'd have another problem. The
fireball would probably take out this end of the hall at the same time, and us with it, or it would
consume all of the available oxygen and we would suffocate."

"All right, so that won't work."



Faulk had positioned himself several feet back from the corner and was planning the next move
with his team, when his cell phone rang. He pulled it out and looked at the display, seeing that the call
was from Sheldon Kennerley at the lab.

Punching the button, he barked into the phone, "What is it?"

"Director Faulk, we've had a breach at the lab."

Faulk hesitated for a moment before deciding that a breach at this point was not a serious issue.
"How bad?"

"We're not sure yet. We're putting together a team to go in. They're suiting up now, sir."

Feeling the muscles in his neck suddenly tighten, Faulk asked, "Why do they need suits?"

Kennerley's nervousness was apparent in his voice. "Well, sir, one of the lab techs is dead."

"Dead? How is that possible? Was it a heart attack? A coincidence?"

There was a long pause on the connection before Kennerley explained, "That's why we're sending
in the team, to make sure. But from the video feed, it looks as though she died from massive
hemorrhaging."

He could not believe what he was hearing; there must have been another explanation. "But she was
vaccinated. All of you were."

"I know, sir. It could be some anomaly. She might have received a defective vaccine. Perhaps it
doesn't work on a small percentage of the population. We simply don't know until we can check her
out."

"That doesn't make any sense! The vaccine worked on one hundred percent of the test groups."
Taking a minute to digest the information and forcing himself to calm down, Faulk continued, "You
said she was in the lab, right?"

"Yes, sir."

"And the air lock hasn't been opened yet?"

"That's correct, sir." Kennerley, hearing the direction of Faulk's questions, began to gain a little
confidence.