The Lucifer Code (29 page)

In the left-hand corner of the room two sets of clothing were neatly laid out on a bench, one large, the other smaller. A bulging rucksack lay on the floor beside the bench. 'There's one set each and I've filled the rucksack with climbing gear and rations. You're probably more familiar with this stuff than I am, Miles, so I suggest you check what else you need and help Amber kit herself out.' Reaching into the rucksack, Knight retrieved a palm-top computer and handed it to Fleming. 'This contains a full map of the area and plans of the old Alascon Oil site. There's a rangers' station to the east of here.'

Fleming nodded. 'I noticed it from the chopper when I flew in.'

'Your smart suits are equipped with microphones and transceivers to contact each other and send distress signals a few hundred yards, but to make long-distance contact up here you've got to get to the rangers' station. Apparently no one mans it at this time of year, but it's got a fully equipped communications suite. You can get a message out from there. Now hurry - there isn't much time.'

Fleming began to check the contents of the rucksack as Amber got into her smart suit. 'Why are you doing this, Virginia?' he asked.

'I wish I could do more, but the helicopter's off limits.'

'Why's he so keen to kill us?' Amber said. 'I know we're a liability but we're stuck here and it's-'

'It makes no sense. I tried to call the authorities before I came to get you. I wanted to turn myself in and call for help but, as you saw, that's not an option. Anyway, even if I had got through there's such chaos out there it'll take ages before any sort of normality is restored.' Her shoulders sagged. She looked lost, broken. 'If it ever is restored.'

'Why are you helping us, Virginia?' Fleming asked again. 'Why now?'

'I did wrong and I'm trying to put it right. I'm sorry for what I allowed to happen - what I made happen.'

'But why?' Fleming probed, as he checked that the power leads in the lower legs of Amber's survival suit were plugged into her kinetic boots. 'If there's no God, there's no reason to stick your neck out for us. Aren't you concerned about what Bradley will do to you?'

'Yes, but it hardly matters now. I did everything-good and bad - because I thought I was serving God through the Red Pope's grand mission. Now, after all that, there's nothing anyone can do to me. Got nothing left to lose, nothing left to believe in-except myself. And to be true to myself I've got to help you. If I can't hang on to the belief that my life's been worthwhile, everything's been for nothing.'

Fleming saw her despair and confusion, caught a glimpse of the woman he had known at Barley Hall. 'Come with us,' he said.

'No, I can't. I gotta keep an eye on Soames. He's not who I thought he was. It's like he knew what the Red Pope would reveal. There's something more to this.'

'You think the Red Pope's revelation wasn't necessarily the whole truth?' Amber said.

Fleming turned questioningly to Amber, but before he could say anything Knight said, 'You saw the first sign - the darkness and what happened afterwards. That was the first horseman of the Apocalypse. In the Bible, the Book of Revelation says that the first horseman will spread unrest around the world. The other horsemen will follow and I'm afraid they'll prove beyond doubt that the Red Pope's revelation was the whole truth.'

'It's not as simple as that,' Amber said. 'It can't be. There's more, I can feel it.'

Then Fleming heard a sound which triggered something primal in his brain. His heart beat faster and his muscles tensed in preparation for flight. He reached for Amber, checked that the zips were done up on her survival suit, that the collar microphone and helmet speakers were operational, and that the kinetic boots were delivering power to the rest of the suit when she moved her feet. 'Can you feel warm air between you and the suit?' he demanded.

She nodded.

'Good. Keep your zips sealed and follow me.' He turned to Knight, who was staring out of the glass door into the reception lobby and to the exit door beyond. 'You sure you're not going to come with us?' Fleming asked.

She didn't answer, just opened the door to the survival room and made for the exit door.

Slinging the rucksack over his shoulder, Fleming ran to the exit. Then he heard the sound again.

Wolves howling.

From the corner of his eye he saw a movement, and turned. Soames was standing fifteen yards behind him in the lobby, just beyond the survival room. His wolves stood at either side of him, yellow eyes staring, hackles raised.

Fleming stopped beside Knight in the doorway and wondered how much protection the survival suits would give against the wolves' attack. An aluminium frame ran through them but it was designed to support climbing ropes. And the layers that made up the space-age fabric were lightweight and designed to withstand cold, not teeth and claws.

'Leaving so soon?' Soames said quietly. His scarred face was flushed, his eyes wide and staring. He looked as if he could barely contain himself.

'Let them go, Bradley' Virginia Knight's voice quavered with fear. 'It's over. The Soul Project doesn't matter any more. You never believed in it anyway. You were never one of us.'

'Oh, but I was. I was always a believer, Virginia. I still am. It's just that neither you nor Accosta ever thought to ask me who I believed in.'

A visible tremor ran through Virginia Knight. 'In that case, you got what you wanted. You won. Surely that's enough. You don't need to hurt or kill any more people.'

'Is that what you wanted, Bradley?' Amber asked suddenly. 'To show the world that the Devil was in charge?'

Soames smiled slowly. 'It hardly matters now, Amber, does it?'

'But it does, Bradley,' said Amber, 'because the Red Pope's Soul Truth might not be the only truth.'

Soames's eyes narrowed and Fleming saw a look of understanding pass between him and Amber. 'I think you understand why I can't let you or Miles live,' Soames said.

Carvelli appeared from the white sector behind Soames. 'Bradley? Virginia? What's going on?'

At that moment Knight did two things. First, she pushed Fleming hard in the chest. Off-balance, he stepped backwards, across the threshold into the freezing night. As he did so he pulled her and Amber with him. Then she reached in and pulled her disk from the locking mechanism, closing the sliding doors and locking them outside.

She stared at Soames through the glass. Wearing only her thin navy suit, she shivered but her face was devoid of fear. Even as Soames reached for the locking mechanism, she shouted at him, 'Bradley, I know why the Red Pope's revelation was no surprise to you.'

Fleming and Amber pulled at her, but she wouldn't move. She glanced at Fleming, and said, Go.'

'Not without you,' he said. 'Go,' she spat, then turned back to Soames, who was muttering at his wolves as they howled and scrabbled at the door, desperate to get out. As he placed his finger on the DNA pad and the door unlocked the animals became frantic.

Fleming grabbed Amber's arm. 'We better go.' Then he turned back to Knight but he knew from the look in her eyes that she wouldn't come.

'Go, Miles,' she shouted. 'I can buy you time.' Then she turned back to Soames. Even as the first wolf scrabbled through the door and leapt at her, he heard her say calmly, 'You don't just worship Satan. You-' It might have been the gusting winds or the first wolf ripping at her throat that stole her words. As the second wolf tore at her hamstrings, Fleming willed himself to focus on saving Amber. He didn't see the snow turn red around Virginia's writhing body, or Carvelli staring out from behind the glass door, pale with uncomprehending horror. Or Bukowski and Tripp rushing towards the exit from inside the Foundation.

All his energy was concentrated on pulling Amber through the cutting wind and into the snow-laden night.

Amber welcomed the freezing cold and Fleming's staccato orders: they kept her mind from what she'd seen arid what was behind her in the dark.

'Keep close to me and do exactly as I tell you,' she heard Fleming shout through the speakers in her helmet. Running across the steel platform towards the helipad, he pulled a rope from his rucksack. He clipped one end to an alloy hoop on the waist of her suit and the other end to a similar hoop on his. 'We'll rappel wherever we can get an anchor, otherwise we'll down-climb. Okay?'

'Okay' she replied, although she didn't understand what he was talking about. Running in the boots was difficult because the crampons on the soles dug into the ice. 'Where are we going?'

Fleming pointed into the snow-flecked darkness. Beyond the scope of VenTec's high-beam security lights, she could see nothing. 'Turn on your helmet lamp.'

Tapping the button on the strap, as he'd shown her in the survival room, she heard a click then saw the light beam out into the night. She was glad of it, but it seemed pathetically inadequate in this dark and inhospitable place.

Fleming stopped a few yards ahead, bent over, then disappeared. Running forward into the wind she turned her head madly from side to side trying to find him in the dark and the swirling snow.

Then she heard his voice. 'Stop and look down.'

Four feet in front of her she saw the railing that marked the end of the steel gantry and the helipad. Beyond that there was nothing. Craning over, she saw Fleming securing himself to one of the spider's legs that underpinned the structure. She was amazed at how quickly he had shimmied over the railing and made his way down to the underbelly of the rig. He looked completely confident dangling above the abyss, every movement fluid and assured. Then he raised his right hand and signalled for her to follow him.

She hesitated.

'Come on,' his calm voice urged, through the speakers in her helmet. 'Just climb over the railing and make your way towards me. I'm secured to the stanchion and you're tied to me, so if you fall I've got you.'

She hated heights, always had.

'Come on,' he soothed. 'It's a lot safer to climb down here than it is to stay up there.'

Still she hesitated, screwing up her courage.

Then she heard the wolves, sensed them running towards her, and one fear overcame the other. She climbed on to the railing and inched her way over the side. Her heart racing, she looked down and manoeuvred her head so that the beam of her helmet lamp rested on Fleming. His right arm was reaching for her. But there was a seven-foot gap between them.

'How the hell did you get over there?' she asked.

'I fell.'

'What?'

'On purpose. I dropped down to the next beam then climbed across here.'

She heard scampering above her and growling.

'Jump nowV Fleming ordered.

Taking a deep breath she stretched out her feet, and slipped off the platform. To her surprise, her boots and crampons crunched on the girder, which was broader than it had appeared from above, and she made her way to Fleming, feeling a huge wave of relief when his arm encircled her waist.

'Well done,' he said. 'Now we need to climb to that ice ledge. From there we can rappel down-'

'Rappel?'

'A fancy term for going down using a rope, so I can support you. Don't worry, it's a walk in the park.'

'Honestly?'

She could see him grimace through his snow visor. 'Not really,' he said. 'In these conditions it's going to be fucking difficult.'

'Right,' she said slowly, wishing she hadn't asked, and tried to copy his every move as she followed him down the rig on to the ice ledge of the mountain. He seemed to know the best route down instinctively.

On the ledge, it was misty and less exposed. She wanted to rest but Fleming was already rummaging in the rucksack, taking out ice screws, rope and chocks. He pointed to another ledge below. 'We've got to rappel down to there, then hopefully zigzag our way down this face until we reach the shoulders of the mountain. Then we turn east. The descent to the rangers' hut's going to be tough, but if you do as I say we'll make it.' He paused for a second. 'Shit. How the hell did it get down here so fast?'

Fear ran down Amber's spine as she saw a pair of yellow eyes coming at them from out of the mist.

Fleming swore and indicated to their right. The second wolf was coming from the opposite direction.

Before she had time to think, Fleming had two ice picks in each hand. He handed a pair to her, and shimmied over the ledge. Kicking his boots into the ice wall below he made footholds while he used the picks to pin himself to the almost sheer face. He made it look easy. 'There's no time to rappel,' he said. 'Put your feet in my footholds and dig the picks into the ice to support your upper body. Don't worry, I'll keep the footholds close together.'

This time she didn't hesitate, just clambered over the edge, found Fleming's footholds and began the descent.

The next ledge was probably thirty feet below but to reach it they had to traverse diagonally and it seemed further. Within a few yards her calves were cramping, but her arms were worse, and soon her back muscles were burning. But whenever she faltered, the howling of the wolves spurred her on.

Embed right pick. Embed left pick.

Hold.

Shuffle right leg along to next foothold. Shuffle left leg along to next foothold.

Hold.

It was torture, the rhythm accentuating the pain.

Pick, pick, hold. Shuffle, shuffle, hold.