The Demon Plagues (16 page)

It opened a moment later with a knock and a
cough. “Commander? It’s Major Muzik.”

“Yes, Roger? Come in. Call me Ann,
please.”

“Uh, yeah…I just thought the Colonel was a
little hard on you, that’s all. I’m not sure what’s got into
him.”

“I do.” She took a deep breath, reaching
around him to push the cabin door shut. Her arm brushed his,
wafting her delicate scent to his nostrils.

His body responded without volition; his
pulse climbed, his breathing deepened.

She stepped back but not far, her face inches
from his. She breathed, “He’s a Psycho.”

Muzik’s jaw dropped, all carnal thoughts
submerged. “Impossible,” he hissed. “He’s…he’s a legend, he’s been
with us since the beginning, he’s passed all the tests…”

“Then why are you trying to convince me? Why
aren’t you running to him to report my accusation? Is it because
you think I might be right?”

Muzik slid around her to sit down on the
bunk. “How can I believe that? Yeah, he’s hard and tough and cold
as hell. He’s been a killer but he’s not like that anymore…”

“How long have you known him?”

“Two years, almost three.”

“Is that really long enough to know for
sure?” She reached across the space between them to put her hand on
his neck, tracing his jaw with her finger. “You think I’m cold:
he’s colder. Really, my blood runs hot. Does his?”

Muzik’s mind whirled with confusion,
implications and the resurgent demands of his too-long celibate
body. Reaching out to wrap his cabled hands around her slim waist
he pulled her toward him, burying his face in her neck. He took
what she offered in a sweet frenzy of athletic effort. There was
nothing of affection in it, merely release of pent-up tension and a
repudiation of the constant fear of death they all lived with.

As soon as they had expended themselves, he
grunted with the pain of one sting in his thigh, then another. He
fell unconscious before he could see her pulling the trank gun’s
needle from his flesh, failing to appreciate her ironic gift.

After all, I could have tranked him a lot
earlier. But then again, a hard man is good to find.

Later on in the hotel, Markis came out of
the sauna shaking. He dressed slowly, in a mental funk that kept
him from recognizing the strangeness of his own condition. Bettina
immediately noticed something wrong.

“Sir, you seem sick. Are you feeling
well?”

“I do feel a little…” With these words he
collapsed in a dead faint.

“Shit. All net all net, Chippendale is down,
I say again, Chippendale is down.” She grabbed him under the
armpits and dragged him toward the private elevator. “Bringing him
up now.”

Karl’s voice snapped over the secure link,
“What do you mean, down? Report.”

“I mean he looked sick and just collapsed.
We’re in the elevator, coming up. Meet you there.”

The doors to the Chairman’s floor opened to
two of the team with weapons drawn. “Holster those; it’s some kind
of sickness.”

The two did, helping Loosher carry Markis to
his room. Karl came pounding up as they laid him on his bed, and
the four stared down at him.

“What do we do now?” asked Robert Calhoun,
one of the team members.

“No idea. We never planned for a medical
emergency. Hell, we’re Edens. Combat trauma treatment should be
enough. Bettina, get the kit and put an NS IV in him stat.”

In moments she had nutrient solution dripping
into a vein. They all watched Markis helplessly for a few moments,
until Karl made a decision.

“Dammit, we have to call the Swiss. We need
their doctors. Maybe they can keep him alive for long enough to
fight it off, whatever it is.” He switched his radio frequency and
called for Hartmann, the Swiss Foreign Ministry supervisor
providing the outer layer of security in the hotel.

As they waited, Calhoun asked, “What the hell
could it be, Chief?”

“I don’t know, but damn me for not saying
something sooner, when he was sniffling. I think the UG slipped him
something, either in the handshake or in the air.”

“But none of us are sick.”

“Then it had to be the handshake. I suspected
something, I got the Prime Minister’s water glass in a plastic bag
in my room…oh man, I screwed up big time.” Karl’s voice was
bitter.

“Come on, Chief, none of us was even
suspicious. Don’t blame yourself.”

“Don’t tell me what not to do, Calhoun. If he
dies, I’ll…”

“Don’t give up yet, Chief,” said Bettina.
“Here’s Hartmann.”

The short Swiss man with the sharp eyes
walked quickly into the room, taking in the scene. “He is a Plague
carrier, no? How can he be ill?”

“We don’t know. We have to take him to a
hospital.”

“I can have him taken to a biocontainment
facility, not a hospital. I cannot expose anyone else to this. Half
the
populace Suisse
is of Carriers. Perhaps the virus has
finally mutated.”

“What do you mean, finally?” Karl looked at
Hartmann suspiciously.

“It must happen sometime. Viruses mutate
always. Just like the influenza
pandemique. Mon Dieu
, have
you not read the literature?”

“No, and I feel like a complete fool, but for
the moment can you try to save his life?”

“He does not seem to be in any particular
danger.” Hartmann peeled back an eyelid, looking down his nose past
his thin moustache. “It looks like the flu to me. His Plague will
fight it off.”

“The Canadians gave it to him!”

“There is no proof of that. So I will tell
you once again – I can take him to a facility, or we can wait and
see what is happening here.”

“Hey…” Karl reached across abruptly, grasping
the smaller man by his uniform tunic. “Why are you speaking French
words with your English? Switzerland speaks German.

“
Gott in Himmel, Die Schweiz
has three
official languages and I speak all of them plus English, do you
know nothing? Now unhand me, you buffoon.”

“Yes, let him go, Karl,” came a weak voice
from the bed.

Karl released the handful of uniform and
dropped to his knees next to Markis. “Sir, how do you feel?”

“Weak, but not that bad. Like the man said,
the Plague should beat it, whatever it is. I could use some water.
I’m burning up.”

Karl put his hand on Markis’ forehead,
feeling the furnace-like heat. “Well, you sure got something duking
it out inside you, sir. Loosie, get some ice water. Hartmann, sorry
about that, and thanks for your help.”

Hartmann brushed himself off, sniffed
contemptuously and stalked out.

Three glasses of ice water and another IV bag
of NS later, Markis was sitting up in bed. His eyes were puffy and
red, bloodshot, his skin blotchy. There was a widening bruise
around the IV site and his breathing came shallow. He called for a
wastebasket and vomited up lunch.

“I’m all right, really. Whatever it is, I’m
beating it.”

“Sure. Sir,” began Karl, “I was thinking that
all went a little too smooth for the first high-level meeting of
two enemy nations. If I may say so, you are so used to everyone
around you being polite, and reasonable, and agreeable that your
hackles don’t rise when the enemy suddenly gets polite, and
reasonable, and agreeable.”

Markis nodded. “You think Portmanteaux was
playing me somehow. I got that feeling too, Karl.”

Rogett looked pained. “No, sir, that’s not it
at all. That’s what he wants you to think – that it’s all politics
and to keep you wondering and focused on whatever he’s trying to
pull on you in the negotiations.”

“So you’re
not
trying to tell me how
to do my job?” Markis said archly. He sneezed. “Crap.”

“No, sir, I’m trying to do
mine
. I
think the
only
reason he was there at all was to
shake
your hand.”

Skull woke to the sound of cowbells before
dawn. After checking the video to make sure the Chairman’s plane
wasn’t being prepared for departure, he stepped outside the shed to
relieve himself, then ate sparingly from his dwindling stores. The
coffee was cold but it revived him. As morning broke he examined
the ground below his hill.

The two farmhouses showed activity, the
routine of the agrarian – a milk cart with stainless steel cans
pulled to a barn, hay loaded from shed to trailer, a tractor
refueled from a standing tank. There was no way a kill team was at
either of them; everything looked far too peaceful.

He focused on the construction materials
yard, with its trucks and its large tin-roofed shed. There was no
activity at all that he could see until a man stepped into view to
light a cigarette. He wore a watch cap and a clean,
expensive-looking bush jacket; Skull recognized the model. The man
took a long look around, and then stared in the direction of the
airport less than a quarter mile away. A commercial turboprop took
off, and the man followed the airplane with his gaze.

Not exactly normal clothing for a worker at a
construction materials business; an expensive jacket would not stay
in such good shape for long. Not exactly normal behavior, either;
he would expect a local worker to ignore the aircraft they saw by
the dozens every day.

Gotcha.

He reset his optics for daytime, then took a
reading with another toy he had purchased, a laser rangefinder. He
read off 473 meters to the corner of the construction shed. He
checked several points with his binoculars – the wind sock at this
end of the airport, the tops of trees below him, smoke from the
farmhouses – and estimated the wind at six knots from the
northeast. Neither range nor wind would challenge the limits of his
skills.

More observation of the construction yard
told him there were three men in the team. They stepped out to look
over the ground, using binoculars and laser rangefinders of their
own. He watched them select their firing position and clear the
backblast area of anything burnable. The missile exhaust could
ignite flammables on the ground, as it would be launched at a steep
angle, sending flame and smoke driving downward.

Skull made sure all of his optics remained
deep in the shade of the interior of his own shed, to eliminate any
chance of a reflection. Then he waited and watched.

He couldn’t simply engage and kill them now.
He had no way of knowing whether Markis was going to depart in
hours or days. Someone would be checking on the kill team, by radio
or perhaps physically. There might be a backup kill team in case
this one was discovered. He had to do it right before, or during,
the takeoff.

On the other hand he didn’t see any sign of
the Swiss security forces; this indicated that the Chairman wasn’t
departing right away. They wouldn’t waste man-hours staking the
ground out days in advance.

Speak of the devil
. Several marked
paramilitary police cars and trucks drove into view, exiting off of
the main road and deploying into the surrounding area. The Swiss
spread out, sending a vehicle to each of the three widely separated
structures and others taking positions at the intersections of the
farm and access roads to control traffic.

The kill team members scurried inside the
shed as soon as they noticed the security forces. Skull wondered
how they were going to put off the Swiss team assigned to the
construction yard. It was going to be an interesting exercise in
timing; the kill team had to hide, then either fool or neutralize
the Swiss, buying themselves a minute or two before the other Swiss
forces reacted as they exposed themselves in the open next to the
metal-roofed shed to place themselves in position for the missile
shot.recovery.

Alkina arranged the bunk linens hastily
around the drugged soldier, hoping they looked natural. She would
have very much liked to believe Muzik was on her side after one
fling, but she couldn’t depend on it. She knew loyalties were
skittish things when they intersected with emotions.

Slipping the tranquilizer gun into her
pocket, she retrieved her PW5, checking her watch. Repeth always
took a shower at this time, like clockwork. She sneered within.
These stupid grunts know nothing about tradecraft. Always vary
your routine.

In the head designated for the two females,
she approached the steaming shower stall. She slid open the curtain
just as Repeth was soaping up her hair with shampoo, her eyes
tightly shut against the suds. The trank gun hissed. The Marine
made a mewling sound, then slid slowly down the wet wall until she
rested naked on the floor. Alkina turned off the water, threw a
towel onto the unconscious woman, pulled the curtain and left.

Slipping ghostlike through the corridors, she
listened and watched, taking a roundabout way to the largest space
on board, the gym-sized missile room. There she found the three
technicians finishing up their labors.

Tucking the weapon into the small of her
back, she approached open-handed. “Almost done?” She put on her
best smile, friendly, harmless.

“All done except putting the access panels
back on,” Doc said absentmindedly while the others worked. “The
decryption modules cracked the warhead codes just like they said
they would. Took quite a while. The targeting coordinates and
detonation timing was easy compared to that. There, see? All
done.”

“Excellent.” She pulled out the firearm and
shot all three in their abdomens with Needleshock before they could
react, then tranked them to keep them under. Taking some spare
cabling she hogtied them as well, dragging them one by one into the
far corner of the room, behind the missile tubes.

She thought she saw a shadow out of the
corner of her eye. Taking cover, she moved slowly and silently
behind the tall metal cylinders until she could slip out the hatch
at the other end. It may have been nothing.