The Devil's Pitchfork (29 page)

From inside the spacesuit Coffee said, “In we go, buddy.” He waved the gun at Derek.

For a wild moment Derek considered refusing. He felt panicky, butterflies spinning in his veins, the fear a tactile entity living inside his skin. He stared at Coffee. Coffee would be clumsy in the suit. He could end this now. Kill Coffee, put on a suit, enter the lab and kill Dr. Lee and destroy everything inside the lab.

Coffee stepped backward, as if sensing his thoughts, and held the gun in two hands. His muffled voice could be heard clearly. “You’re expendable, Derek. If you don’t head for that door right this second, you’re dead.”

Derek headed for the door, which led through a makeshift decontamination area, a shower room From there, they were into the laboratory.

Inside the cramped trailer two people were working in spacesuits. Derek couldn’t identify them. Coffee shouted, “Lee, this is Doctor Derek Stillwater.”

One of the spacesuited figures turned to nod at him. The other figure was working in glass-fronted hoods, transferring cloudy liquid from a flask to yellowish clear liquid in another. He or she did not turn and acknowledge Derek. He was thankful for that, sure the tech was working directly with Chimera.

Derek took in the room, his brain automatically slipping into observer mode, his mind doing the desperate calculus it had been trained for in Escape & Evasion School. It was a laboratory. Black-topped chemical resistant counters. Two stacked incubators that looked like steel cupboards, attached to a number of gas tanks—typically carbon dioxide. Most cultures required temperatures of about 98.6 degrees with a percentage of carbon dioxide pumped in to supply carbon for growth. The humidity in the incubators had to be kept high to allow for cell growth.

There was another room—at least another—beyond a sealed door. The walls on the inside had also been sealed with some sort of putty or rubber cement.

Coffee said, “About a year ago Dalton got us a copy of the black patent on Chimera M13. Lee has been working from them ever since to develop a vaccine.”

“Any luck?” Derek asked, heart racing just a little bit. If the Korean scientist had developed a vaccine then it might be enough to get his hands on it and escape. Not an easy task, but far simpler than destroying Chimera and stopping Coffee.

In a heavily accented voice Kim Pak Lee said, “We are making progress now that we have the actual virus. It is showing signs of being effective on our test animals, but we have not tested it yet on a human being.”

“Well,” Coffee said. “Dr. Stillwater here has volunteered.”

Derek turned to stare at Coffee through his faceplate. “The fuck I have.”

Coffee raised the gun and pointed it at Derek’s heart. “I could kill you now.”

“I know what that shit does to a human being,” Derek said, standing his ground. “I’d rather you shot me than—”

Derek felt something bite into his arm and lashed out. He spun and saw that Lee had injected him with a syringe. For a horrifying moment he thought the Korean had injected him with Chimera, but as the scientists stepped back, holding the hypodermic in one gloved hand, Derek felt the darkness close in around him. Staggering, he turned and tried to punch Coffee, get in one good solid hit, but he slowly sank to the floor of the trailer and everything went dark.

When he came to he was once again lying on a cot, but this time he wasn’t strapped down.  He got to his feet and glared around. It was small, the walls and floors bare. There was a thick glass mirror on one wall, which he imagined was two-way. Next to it was a mesh speaker with a button. He could be observed from the other side.

Coffee’s voice came over the speaker. “Well, Derek. I just want to thank you. You will turn out to be very helpful in our enterprise after all. Dr. Lee injected you with our vaccine, then just a few minutes ago injected you with Chimera. We should know in a few hours whether the vaccine works. In the meantime, I’ve got a lot of preparations to make. It was nice seeing you, buddy. If you’re lucky, this stuff will work.”

“If it works,” Derek snarled, “I’ll hunt you to the ends of the earth, you bastard.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure. Look, something to keep in mind, friend. You break out of here somehow, you’re infected. You don’t want to be the cause of the end of the world, do you? Why don’t you just lay down and take it easy. Make peace with yourself in case Lee’s potion doesn’t work.”

Derek slammed his fist against the glass, but it did not break. “It’s not over,” he screamed. “It’s not over, Coffee! I’m coming after you! I’ll stop you!”

“Goodbye, Derek. See you later.”

“I’ll see you in hell, Richard! In hell!” And with a moan Derek collapsed to the cot and buried his head in his hands.

44

FBI Headquarters

T
HE
FBI
MOLE,
J
UDE
O’Hara, took in a deep breath. Standing in the men’s room staring at himself in the mirror, he steeled himself. This was it, he thought. He had to trust Fallen, this freak, this nutcase, that if he did what this guy wanted he wouldn’t turn his escape plan over to the authorities, wouldn’t make his escape impossible.

What choice did he have?

He took his Sig Saur 9mm out of its holster, double-checked that the magazine was full, that there was a round in the chamber, that the safety was off. From his coat pocket he took an excellent and highly illegal silencer and screwed it onto the barrel.

In his mind’s eye, he rehearsed it. What he would have to do, the steps he would have to take. What he would have to do once it was over to make his escape.

He put the gun back in its holster, then filled the wastepaper basket with toilet paper and paper towels. He took paper towels and crumpled them into tight balls and stuffed them into his jacket pockets.

Now?

He thought it through. He knew he would require some luck. Maybe more than a little luck.

What choice did he have?

He could run. He could walk out the door, get into his car and drive home, grab his stash and his passports and drive. He could be in New York, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Atlanta in a very short period of time. Catch a flight out using fake ID. Disappear.

No wait.

He could transfer the money first. That way he’d be out of it, one step ahead of Fallen.

Sweat broke out on his forehead and his stomach churned.

He could feel the weight of time pressing down on him.

The door opened and Bill Stallings walked through, one of the older agents, a guy who had been working anti-terror for twenty-some odd years. Stallings had spent half his career in Peru talking to Shining Path psychos, advising the government. His pink scalp peeked through straggling strands of gray hair and he had a scruffy gray beard. He looked a little like Santa Claus after a few too many drinks.

“Hey,” Stallings muttered. “Fuckin’ nightmare tonight, eh?”

“Yeah.”

Stalling shoved into one of the stalls. There was the zwick of a zipper followed by the thud of gun and handcuffs hitting the floor with his pants, followed by a moan of relief.

O’Hara stared at the shoes beneath the stall, brain frozen. What the hell was he supposed to do now? Could he wait for Stallings to finish up?

“You heard?” Stallings said from the stall.

“What?”

“Big fuckin’ mess out at Rock Creek Park. Coast Guard helicopter went down, couple trucks on fire. Pilcher, Spigotta’s golden boy, called in to say the chopper pilot survived, it looks like that Homeland troubleshooter was out there, there was some sort of motherfuckin’ firefight. And get this ... they found the body of Sam Dalton out there.”

O’Hara’s blood went cold. “Dalton’s ... dead?”

“Yeah. Shot to pieces. Good riddance. The question is, was he working with these Fallen Angels or what? Or is this a coincidence? Taking advantage of another terror attack. MacNeil pulled me off, has me going back over every single file we’ve got, looking for any kind of reference to The Fallen Angels we can find. I’m talking to the Russians, that Stasi prick, Eberhardt, remember him? Back when East Germany was East Germany? He said he’d get back to me. And get this, you know what he said to me?”

“Uh-uh,” O’Hara said, stomach cramping.

“Goddammed kraut goes,
‘Ah, Ze Falling Angels. Ja. I haf heard of zhem, natürlich. But we never wanted to discuss zhem wit’ you because we always suspected zhey had a mole in your CIA or your FBI. Zhey sold a lot of American ordinance
.’ Can you fuckin’ believe it?”

“Maybe he meant Dalton,” O’Hara said, head feeling light.

“Maybe. But MacNeil’s putting together a task force to make sure there isn’t somebody else.”

Taking a deep breath, O’Hara walked over, kicked the door in and shot the FBI agent twice in the head.

“You and Elvis, dead on the toilet.”

He closed the door, took out a lighter and set the waste basket on fire.

Now. Move it, move it, move it.

He walked from the men’s room. Every time he saw an empty office, if the door was unlocked he stepped in, lit up one of the crumpled balls of paper towel and dropped it in a waste basket or recycling bin.

The hall was empty ... for now. He sprinted to the stairwell and dropped ball after ball of flaming paper towel as he climbed the steps to the fourth floor. Soon the smoke alarm would go off. Sprinkler systems would kick in. And he’d better not be standing in the hallway lighting up paper towel when it—

The klaxon sounded, shrill, harsh and insistent. Headquarters was more active than usual at five in the morning, but most agents were still out in the field; most support personnel were home in bed, preparing for the commute into work, perking coffee. He emptied his pockets and lit up the remaining paper, standing at the doorway, watching the stairwell fill with smoke.

He shoved through the doorway and raced toward the interrogation room where Irina Khournikova was being questioned. Half a dozen people were in the hallway, heading for the exit. O’Hara shouted, “This one’s filled with smoke! Go the other way!”

They hesitated, then ran toward the opposite hallway. He saw Spigotta, big and burly, an ugly old bear on the first morning of spring, waking from hibernation. “Where’s the fire?” he growled as O’Hara rushed toward him.

“Stairwell. Third floor,” he gasped out. “Evacuate.”

Spigotta glanced over his shoulder and O’Hara had his hand in his coat, reaching for the Sig, was pulling it out and up when Spigotta turned, his own gun in his hand, already on the move. Damn, O’Hara thought. How did he know? O’Hara tried to get a bead on the older agent, tried to keep in motion, but Spigotta had his own gun aimed directly at him, his finger squeezing ... and O’Hara felt the pain in his chest a fraction of a second before he heard the sound, thought,
That wasn’t too bad
, and kept moving, bringing his gun around on Spigotta, squeezed—

And missed. Spigotta fired again, calmly, no expression on his face, the report loud over the sound of the fire alarm. People heading for the exits turned ... everything seemed to slow ...

O’Hara dropped to his knees, still clutching the gun. Blood dripped onto the tile floor and a part of his mind thought,
Blood Spatter Patterns 101. I hated that subject.

The floor rose up to meet him and he was still.

45

USAMRIID

B
EN
Z
ATAKI STOOD NEXT
to Sharon Jaxon in the animal room of the Level IV facility and felt his heart sink. For a long, hopeless moment he leaned against the far wall and just stared at the cages. Sharon clumped over to him, pushed her face plate next to his and pinched shut her air hose to decrease the roar. “Any ideas?”

Zataki was close to her, eyes only inches away. For a moment he felt something that was probably despair. Nineteen of the twenty monkeys had died. The twentieth monkey would soon be dead. Their plan for a possible vaccine had failed and failed miserably. As far as they could tell, none of the weaker versions of the virus had even slowed down the contagion.

And what an ugly, evil disease, he thought. There were similarities to Ebola, severe hemorrhagic fevers, internal bleeding. But the animals seemed in so much pain... His horrified gaze took in the slack, bloody corpses of all the monkeys. Even more troublesome was the astonishing speed of the infection. Ebola took four days before symptoms started to show. Chimera symptoms began in hours. They had engineered this bug to target vascular tissue systems and made it so energy efficient it was frightening. He’d never seen anything like it. From a purely technical point of view, he was impressed. It had been a technical tour de force to create this monster.

“Anyone working on a weakened virus?” he asked, knowing that they were.

“Yes. It’s slow work.” She hesitated. “Too late to help Liz.”

Zataki nodded. He had checked on Dr. Vargas before he entered Level IV. She was showing signs of mild internal bleeding. They were providing her with clotting factor and saline and three types of antivirals. They had put her on a Valium drip. She was sleeping. It had occurred to Zataki that the most humane thing to do might be to overdose her. But he was a physician and he couldn’t do that. She was still alive and there was still hope. Not much, he had to admit, but some.

“What did Hingemann say?” he asked, wondering what Liz had been thinking when she asked the immunologist from Michigan State University to consult. It had been several hours since the talk and Liz had gotten much worse. At first Liz had resisted the tranquilizer, but then it became obvious she wasn’t thinking clearly and was, in fact, becoming hysterical.

“He said he’d read the papers and see if he had any ideas. I hope he calls back soon.”

“Let’s ring him.“

”We e-mailed him all the information on Chimera. It’s a ton of material. He won’t have been able to get through it all.”

“We don’t have time for him to get through it all. We’ll call him.”

“Okay,” she said.

He and Jaxon moved out of the Level IV containment area into the disinfectant shower—seven minutes under a stream of Lysol.