The Chimera Vector (12 page)

Sophia’s hands clenched into fists. ‘Then why did you program me in the first place?’

‘Most difficult to program means easiest to deprogram. Also, you make better decision than every other operative in every training exercise we make for you,’ he said. ‘You are least ruthless operative, but this is precisely what makes you best Denton has ever seen.’

‘I . . . I thought Denton kept testing me so I would fail,’ Sophia said. ‘And I eventually did.’

‘No. He keep testing to find your limits,’ Leoncjusz said. ‘You are both greatest threat and greatest promise to him.’

Sophia let her fists relax. ‘What does that mean?’

‘First time your programming break is on operation in Jordan,’ he said. ‘In your report you accurately describe every terrorist in hotel ballroom. But you also mention a girl, who you don’t describe at all. When I question you afterwards, you admit there is no girl, that it is an error on your behalf. That is when I know your programming has been compromised.’

Leoncjusz cleared his throat. ‘Your second break—Iran. The operation I rescue you from. I knew you are capable of this. Of all operatives, you are unique. But I did not know when and where you would break again.’ He shook his head. ‘We were running out of time, so we had to induce break. We are, how you say, rolling with the punches.’

She turned to his bookcase and pulled out his journal. ‘When were you going to tell me all of this?’

Leoncjusz took a tentative step forward. He opened his mouth to reply but she cut him off.

‘Why did this Cecilia McLoughlin person put a key inside me? What gives her the right to do that? What gives any of them the right to do anything like that to me?’ She shook her head. ‘You’re all the same. The lot of you.’

‘The key is provirus. A harmless carrier,’ he said.

‘Harmless? What’s it carrying?’ she shouted.

‘An encryption key. A key to Fifth Column’s greatest success and greatest failure.’

‘And why make me the key?’ Sophia said. ‘Am I supposed to go back and steal the code for you? When exactly were you planning on filling me in?’

He exhaled slowly. ‘I wasn’t. Yet. Because I think is too dangerous. This is why I tell her I do not want you to do it. And I do not care what she says. As long as I am here, you will not do this. It is suicide.’

Chapter 11

The subsonic round from Damien’s suppressed UMP45 submachine gun struck the guard under his nose. A burst of red and he was gone.

‘You’re clear,’ Damien said.

Jay ran. Without moonlight, the Algerian desert was ink black. But his vision was sharp enough that he could manage to weave among the palm trees without too much trouble. After that, it took him twenty long, anxious seconds to cover the flat, mostly open ground and reach the back wall of the two-story house.

Pressed against the white bricks, he slowed his breathing and lowered himself silently into a crouch. A helicopter insertion would’ve been easier than crossing the freezing desert at night, but everyone in the small town of Djanet would have known they were there before they’d even zip-lined out. This wasn’t Hollywood; they had to do it properly. That meant less glamor and more hard work.

He flipped the folding stock on his UMP and wedged it in the soft muscle between his shoulder and chest, then took a moment to scratch his two-month beard.

‘When you’re ready,’ he said into his throat mike.

Damien broke into a run, slower than Jay as he moved around the palm trees with only a night-vision monocle to aid him. Jay didn’t have a particular arc to cover, so he raised his UMP halfway. If anyone spotted Damien, they’d likely be on the roof, and he didn’t have line of sight for that.

Damien reached the wall, at the other end. Between them, the blue door. Jay waited for Damien to lower his breathing and remove his lock-picking kit. He looked hilarious, the whites of his eyes contrasting with the camo paint used to darken his skin color. He was darker than Jay.

Jay moved closer to his side of the blue door and kept his UMP ready. Damien switched his to safe and let it hang from a tactical sling, then tested the door handle as quietly as possible. No point starting picking only to discover the door’s already unlocked, Jay thought. Damien inserted a wide pick into the keyhole. His enhanced hearing made him especially adept at lock picking. Jay simply didn’t have the patience for it.

Damien turned the lock with a tension wrench—a tool that reminded Jay of a miniature golf club—and withdrew the pick quickly, bouncing the pins. Jay hoped he’d get lucky and lodge all the pins with a quick rake or two. Otherwise he’d have to get more precise and pick the lock pin by pin. But the longer they could hold off going loud, the better their chances of nailing their target.

Jay held his UMP with his other hand, supported by a tactical sling, and shoved the cold fingertips of his firing hand under his armpit to warm them. He didn’t want slow fingers when it came to shooting. He couldn’t wear gloves because they made firing a weapon clumsy and slow. Both he and Damien had removed their thick gloves before reaching the town, just keeping the fingerless gloves they wore underneath, which were mostly concealed by their traditional, dusty Arab robes. Under the dishdasha, they wore para-aramid vests loaded with their radios, flashbangs, smoke grenades and ammunition. Lacking pouches on their belts, they’d instead holstered their SIG pistols under their arms. Not the easiest place to get to, but as good as it got while dressed like a local. Never mind the fact that half the people he’d seen here tonight were dressed in khaki or black leather jackets. On the upside, the robes made it easy to conceal their UMPs.

Damien paused. He looked tense. Had he heard something? Jay checked the safety catch on his UMP. It was off. He focused on the door.

He could hear it too. Voices from inside. Arabic. He couldn’t make out the words, they were too muffled. Damien probably could. Problem was, Damien couldn’t speak much Arabic.

The voices were louder. Closer to the door.

Jay indicated with his UMP barrel for Damien to move away. Carefully withdrawing the tension wrench with a soft click, Damien crawled back. Jay hoped they hadn’t heard that. He aimed at the door, ready to shoot anyone who opened it.

Damien packed away the wrench and pick, then took the safety off his UMP.

A chill ran through Jay. Whether it was from the cool night or the situation, he wasn’t sure. How long should they wait before Damien started picking the lock all over again? What if the men had heard them and were at this moment rallying their forces to ambush them? What if they were just sitting there inside, AK-47s ready to shoot?

The longer they waited, the greater the risk of being discovered—if they hadn’t been already. Their choices were to pick the lock or risk going loud. Damien wouldn’t like this. Jay tapped his UMP, then pointed at the door.

Damien gave him a reluctant nod.

They were both in position at a forty-five degree angle from the doorway, giving them the widest view possible once the door was open. Damien was standing, legs slightly bent; Jay was crouching.

Jay fired a suppressed three-round burst into the handle of the blue door. He heard the wood splinter, moved in quickly and gave the door as soft a kick as he could manage. It creaked open. Chunks of wood clattered to the floor.

Jay stacked on Damien and they entered the room. Damien aimed left so Jay aimed right. Clear.

There was a flight of stairs leading to the second level. The bedrooms were upstairs. But there was also a passage that curved around the first level, connecting the rooms together in a loop.

Damien seemed to have already made the decision. He pointed to the passage. He would clear the second floor, quickly.

Jay couldn’t support him; he had to go up the stairs or risk losing the target—if, in fact, he was here.

Jay was halfway up the stairs, finger resting lightly on the trigger, when he heard the soft thump of a body falling. Then another. He pictured Damien taking out the enemy one by one. He hoped that was the case. His instinct was to rush down to Damien and make sure he was OK. But he reminded himself that Damien was capable of taking care of himself.

No more thumps.

‘You OK?’ Jay said softly into the mike, running the risk of being heard on the second floor.

One click response.
Yes
.

Good, he thought. Let’s do this.

The first doorway was on the left, two more beyond. Jay moved to the right side of the stairs as he climbed. There wasn’t a wall but a landing, looking out onto the floor below. More exposure than he would’ve liked. And Damien hadn’t cleared that floor yet either.

The house smelled faintly of tobacco, gunpowder and motor oil. The oil was most likely used to clean the AKMs—updated versions of the AK-47. He noticed movement in the first doorway. A robed man dropped into a crouch, rifle aimed. Jay shot him in mid-crouch. Blood smeared the doorway as the man collapsed into a seated position.

Jay reached the top of the stairs and surveyed the level below. He saw Damien move silently past two bodies lying in pools of viscous liquid. A moment later, he was at the bottom of the stairs.

‘The middle door’s closed,’ Jay said into his mike. ‘Check it last.’

There were three rooms. It was up to Jay to clear the first. Damien couldn’t cross to the other side without exposing himself.

While Damien kept watch over the landing, Jay moved in a wide arc, keeping as far away from the doorway as possible. It was clear.

He moved step by step, testing the floorboards for creaks as he made his way to the third room.

Walking past the doorway, he cleared eighty percent of it. But there was an unseen corner tucked away on the far right. He needed to enter the room to check it. If anyone was hiding in there, that’s where they’d be. He didn’t want to use a flashbang yet. There was no other way to do this except make himself a small target and go in fast.

He swallowed, lowered his UMP to chest height and moved quickly.

A woman trembled in the corner, dressed in purple robes. She held an AKM in her lap. Her reactions were slow. She pulled the barrel around to Jay, but he beat her to it. Three-round burst to the head. Bone and brain matter splattered the wall behind her.

Jay checked behind and under the bed, then stepped back onto the landing. Damien was waiting on the opposite side of the middle door.

This was it.

Jay moved into position. He flicked his UMP trigger group switch from semi to automatic, then plucked a flashbang from his vest. He uncurled his trigger finger and slipped it through the ring of the flashbang, ready to pull. After he pulled it, he’d keep the ring around his finger and be able to shoot without delay. He glanced at Damien.

Damien finger-counted him in from five, stopping at three to ready his own UMP. He stood directly in front of the door. Together, they counted the final two in their heads. Damien kicked the door in, withdrew his leg, then pulled back to the side, UMP aimed.

The moment the door opened, Jay pulled the ring from the flashbang and flung it inside. Opposite him, Damien retreated. The suppressed barrel pointed at the ceiling. Jay braced himself, shut his eyes.

The room lit up with a white flash and a sudden bang that rattled Jay’s head. But he was ready. He entered the smoke-filled room, his pseudogene-enhanced vision burning through the smoke and dust. Five human-shaped forms rippled like flames. Four of them were armed. Two had collapsed to their knees. The other two tried to aim their AKMs at Jay. One let loose a volley of rounds that punched through the wall beside him.

Jay dropped instinctively to one knee, shot him in the face with a single round, snapped his barrel towards the second target, single round. Moved to the kneeling men, just one round each. The fifth man was still unarmed and made no effort to reach for a weapon.

Keeping an eye on him, Jay switched his UMP to semi-automatic and concentrated to filter the infrared wavelengths from his vision. He drilled a set into every one of the four men as they lay crumpled among bone and brain matter.

The smoke cleared. Jay pulled a card from his vest. It had the target’s face on it. Thick, long black hair, drooping eyelids and wide, thick lips. Denton had codenamed him Crackerjack. Jay matched the image with the man before him. He hadn’t shaved in a few days and had more stubble than Jay, but he was definitely their target.

Jay aimed his UMP at Crackerjack’s head. Then he heard Damien coughing in the corridor.

‘Damien?’ he said.

Crackerjack was recovering from the flashbang, blinking quickly. ‘Don’t shoot,’ he said.

‘That’s original,’ Jay said.

‘Everything they told you,’ Crackerjack said in accented English, ‘it is not true.’

‘You’re a mass murderer,’ Jay said. ‘You deserve worse than a bullet in your head.’

‘I have not killed a single soul!’ Crackerjack’s eyes were rimmed with tears.

Jay adjusted his aim, sighting the bridge of the man’s nose.

‘Please, listen to the truth,’ the man said. ‘They want me dead because I threaten their control!’ Jay ran his tongue along the roof of his mouth. He could taste the man's fear.

‘You better take out the target,’ Damien whispered into Jay’s earpiece. ‘We have company.’

Jay squeezed slowly on the trigger, reached first trigger pressure. ‘Shut the fuck up,’ he said to Crackerjack.

‘All I wanted was for my country and my neighbors to be independent.’

Jay’s finger uncurled a fraction. ‘Then why did your country revolt against you?’

Crackerjack looked genuinely confused. ‘They . . . there was no revolt. NATO bombs destroyed everything.’

Jay ground his teeth together. ‘You lying piece of shit.’

‘Ninety percent of my people supported me!’ Crackerjack yelled suddenly. ‘What does that tell you? I suppose you will never know this because—’

Jay squeezed the trigger. Blood splashed the wall behind the man. Jay felt some hit his face.

Damien entered the room and held up four fingers. Jay could hear the four men moving up the stairs. Shit.