Wired (10 page)

Desh was unsure of
just how to respond to this.

“I haven’t
enhanced myself for some time now,” she continued softly.

 
“Afraid the pull will become too strong for
you to resist?” said Desh

She nodded. The corners of
her mouth turned up slightly in a humorless smile. “Sometimes I think of myself
as Frodo in the
Lord of The Rings
. In
my case the ring’s power is that of almost inconceivable creativity and
intellect. But like Frodo’s burden it is easily accessible, right there around
my neck at all times, exerting its magnetic pull. The temptation to use it,
especially when I’m desperately in need of some insight, is almost
irresistible.”

Desh considered. He
had never really thought about the ring from the Tolkien trilogy as yet another
manifestation of the old cliché regarding power, but of course it was. The ring
didn’t turn its wearer evil; the power inherent in the ring did this. “Power
corrupts,” he began, unable to stop himself from reciting the cliché Kira had
avoided using. “Absolute power corrupts abso—”

Desh never
finished his sentence. With a sound like a shotgun blast the door to the room
exploded inward, propelled by vicious, simultaneous kicks expertly applied by
two men on the other side.

14

Desh’s
head jerked violently from the startling intrusion, and his arms were nearly
yanked from their sockets as he instinctively tried to assume a defensive
posture: his startle reflex not caring that his arms were immobilized behind
his back. Along with the thunderous sound of the door crashing in, the room was
instantly plunged into impenetrable darkness as the rope Kira had attached to
the door handle yanked the lamp cord violently from the wall outlet.

The
momentum from the intruders’ explosive kicks propelled them into the room, guns
drawn, and they hit the trip wire instantly, about the same time their brains
registered that they were now blind. With two surprised grunts, followed
immediately by two loud thuds, they crashed to the floor only seconds after
their attack had begun.

They
had counted on a precision surprise attack executed so quickly that even if the
girl had been holding a gun she wouldn’t be able to stop them. They had not
counted on their actions killing the room’s only light or being greeted by a
trip wire.

Kira
Miller had also jumped in shock when the door was kicked open, but she
recovered quickly. While the attackers lay sprawled on the floor, dazed,
wondering what had hit them and why the world had suddenly gone dark, she slid
her thermal imaging goggles down over her eyes. The two intruders instantly
became visible as glowing, highly resolved three-dimensional silhouettes.

“Don’t
move!” she barked.

The
taller of the two attackers had now fully recovered his wits after the surprise
fall. The girl wasn’t as clever as they had been led to believe, he thought
arrogantly. The room was as dark as a cave, but she had foolishly given them
the upper hand by speaking and giving away her location. He ignored her command
and soundlessly lifted his arm and pointed his gun in the direction from which
her voice had originated.

She
shot him in the chest with her stun gun as he prepared to fire.

The
tall man convulsed violently and lay still on the ground while Kira quickly
retracted the dual electrode harpoons, ready for another shot. The man’s
partner silently began to change position on the floor so that he could attempt
an attack as well, not having learned from his colleague’s miscalculation.

“Just
because
you
can’t see,” hissed Kira, “doesn’t mean that
I
can’t.”

The
man froze in place. Like his paralyzed partner, he had assumed she couldn’t see
him or detect his movements, a foolish and potentially fatal assumption. They
had been warned that she was very clever and not to underestimate her.

“That’s
right,” she said smugly. “I’m wearing night-vision goggles. So let’s try this
again.
Don’t. Move
.” She emphasized each word as if speaking to a
stubborn toddler.

Desh’s
mind had been racing since the attack began, considering his options. But he
realized that even if he could free himself, escape was hopeless. He couldn’t
see any better than the attackers could.

Kira
pulled a Glock from her bag with a silencer already attached, although given
that the sound of the door being forced open would already have awakened every
last motel resident—several of whom, at least, were now calling the police—the
silencer had questionable value.

“I’m
now pointing a gun at you,” she explained. “How many others are with you and
what is their location?” she demanded.

“No
others,” replied the man, shaking his head. “Just us.”

Kira
fired. The silenced gun issued a spitting sound as she sent a bullet tearing
through the meaty part of the man’s thigh. “I’ll only ask once more,” she
growled. “How many others are with you and what is their location?”

“One
other,” grunted the man as he desperately began trying to staunch the flow of
blood from his leg. “He’s taken up a sniper position facing your room to
prevent any escape. He’s equipped with a thermal imager.”

Kira
said nothing. She adjusted a setting on the stun gun and fired. The intruder
convulsed and lay still, unconscious. She reloaded the gun, adjusted the
setting once more, and shot the first man again, rendering him unconscious as
well. She pulled a ski mask from her bag, made from the same material as her
jumpsuit, and stretched it over her goggles. The material snapped back into
shape to fit snugly over her face and nose, fitting perfectly around the
goggles and leaving not a single section of her face exposed.

“Shit!”
she fumed. “We needed more time. They shouldn’t have tracked us here for five
or six more hours,” she said despondently, as much to herself as to Desh. “By
then we would have been long gone.” She had been in complete control when
dealing with the two attackers, but she was distraught now, as if she had just
suffered a terrible loss. Desh was still blind but could hear it clearly in her
voice.

“I
have to get out of here,” she said after a few seconds of silence. “Now.” Desh
noted that any hint of vulnerability had once again disappeared from her voice.
“I can’t trust you untied, and I don’t have time to drag you with me.”

Desh’s
heart raced furiously. So what would she do with him now? Would she decide to
put a bullet in his brain before she left? Desh knew she intended to go through
the adjoining room and out the other side of the motel. Her planning had been
extraordinary. Just as she had expected, the attackers were only watching the
door on the front side of the motel, thinking it was her only exit.

“What
if he lied?” said Desh in desperation. “What if they have a sniper watching the
back as well?”

“He’ll
miss,” she said simply. “I’m covered head to toe by a jumpsuit, goggles and a
ski mask, all designed to completely block my heat signature. I’ll be invisible
to thermal imaging, from snipers or from the air.”

Desh
shook his head. “That’s impossible,” he insisted. “The military has been trying
for years. There
is
no such technology.”

“There
is now,” replied Kira smoothly.

Desh’s
eyes widened. Could it be true? If she could be believed, she had dramatically
enhanced her own intelligence. Had she turned her amped-up genius to the
problem of defeating thermal imaging technology? If this were true, it would go
a long way toward explaining how she had managed to remain in the US and elude
the manhunt for so long.

As
this was flashing through Desh’s mind, Kira approached him and quickly sawed at
his restraints with a knife until his hands were free, retreating from him
rapidly once they were, despite being armed and having the advantage of sight.

“I
have to go,” she said hurriedly. “I’ll leave the knife and gun in the bathroom
of the adjoining room. By the time you shuffle over there and remove your ankle
cuffs, I’ll have gotten the head start I need.”

Desh
allowed himself to breathe again. Would she really let him go?

“Damn!”
she fumed again. “There’s much more to tell. We should be leaving together as
allies!” Kira gathered herself. “They’ll know I took the risk of kidnapping
you,” she mumbled rapidly, “but it’s unclear how they’ll interpret this. They
may decide to kill you or they may decide just to use you. I don’t know.” She
paused. “I know you’re still not sure about me. But even if you think every
word I told you was a lie, your survival depends on believing this: don’t trust
anyone. Be prepared for anything,” she warned anxiously.

Kira
gathered her bag and rushed into the adjoining room. After a ten second detour
into its bathroom, she unlocked the room’s outer door. “We’ll have to finish
our conversation at another time,” she called to Desh through the doors between
the two rooms.

There
was a slight pause. “Be careful, David,” she added earnestly. “I hope you’re as
good as I think you are.”

And
with that, Kira Miller opened the door and stepped out into the night.

PART THREE

Fountain

15

Desh
moved the instant the outer door of the adjoining room was shut. He scooted to
the other side of the bed and reached out cautiously, probing for the lamp on
the other end table. It was identical to the one whose cord had been ripped
from the wall. His hand connected with it and he fumbled for the switch at its
base, managing to find it and flip it on. Although the lamp was on the dim
side, after several minutes in darkness he was forced to squint until his eyes
adjusted.

The
door frame at the room’s entrance was shattered where the lock had been, and
the door itself hung awkwardly from a single hinge; a splintered mess. The two
intruders were awkward heaps on the thin carpet, and neither was moving. Desh
slid from the bed and pressed two fingers into each of their necks in turn,
feeling for their carotid arteries and signs of a pulse. Both were still alive.
Satisfied, he shuffled as quickly as he could to the adjoining room, his ankles
still bound. Making sure not to turn on any additional lights, he entered the
bathroom, unsure of what he might find there.

He
waited until the bathroom door was closed and flipped on the light. No use
sending out a beacon to any onlookers that would remind them of the possibility
of front-to-back adjoining rooms. True to Kira’s word there was a Browning
semiautomatic, its clip full, and a combat knife lying on the floor. Desh was
shocked to also find the keys to the Ford and what must have been a spare pair
of night-vision goggles next to the weapons. She knew he would be coming after
her, despite her brief head start, so why arm him and provide him with
night-vision and a car?

Desh
frowned. Because she was confident it wouldn’t matter. She knew he couldn’t
catch her, even still. She wouldn’t have planned an impeccable ambush and a way
to exit the motel undetected without planning an escape route as well. He had
no doubt she had another car ready to go, parked and waiting for her just on
the other side of the stretch of woods that abutted the motel.

Desh
pocketed the gun and keys and made quick work of his ankle restraints with the
knife. It was a relief to have complete freedom of movement again. He strapped
the goggles on his head and grabbed a neatly folded towel from a small shelf in
the bathroom. He rushed back to the wounded man as he lay unconscious, wrapping
the towel tightly around his thigh.

The
men had carried identical guns that were now lying on the floor near them. Desh
picked one up and examined it, surprised that he didn’t recognize the make. As
he pulled the clip his eyes widened.
It
was a tranquilizer gun
. Designed to shoot darts instead of bullets.

He
patted both men down. While neither possessed any personal items or
identification, which didn’t surprise him, they each carried semiautomatic
pistols along with the tranquilizer guns. They had possessed lethal firepower
but had been intent on taking their quarry alive. Interesting. But who were
they, exactly? And what were they doing here? Kira Miller’s explanation that he
was being followed by his own people was the most likely, but still didn’t make
sense. It wasn’t as though he couldn’t be trusted to report back once he had
found her.

What
now? He could charge after her, but he was certain he wouldn’t catch her. Desh
knew he didn’t have much time before the police would be arriving. The man she
had shot may have been lying about the sniper, but it was just as likely he
hadn’t been. And Desh didn’t have her supposed ability to become invisible to
thermal imagers. He wasn’t about to be the first heat-emitting humanoid to rush
out the front door. Still, he had to regroup, and the last thing he needed was
to be in the room when the police came calling. This left only one choice: he
had to leave out the back, through the adjoining room, as she had done.

Kira
Miller had told him to trust no one, and regardless of what he might think of
the veracity of anything else she said, this was sensible advice. He was in far
over his head, and until he had a much better sense of what was happening and
who the players were, he wasn’t prepared to trust his own shadow.

Desh
pocketed the shorter man’s cell phone and tranquilizer gun and wrapped the
other tranquilizer gun and the two pistols in a towel. He moved into the
adjoining room, tossed the towel on the bed, and closed both doors, plunging
himself yet again into darkness. He felt for the dead-bolt, locked the
adjoining door on his side, and then flipped open the cell phone he had taken. The
phone’s glow provided enough illumination with which to dial and navigate the
room. He had memorized Jim Connelly’s private home number and dialed it
rapidly.

The
phone rang three times while Desh waited anxiously.

“Hello,”
rasped Connelly sleepily.

“Colonel,
it’s David Desh.”

“David?”
mumbled Connelly in surprise. “Jesus, David, it’s three in the morning,” he
complained, but then began to awaken more fully as the significance of the call
registered on his barely conscious brain. His voice picked up strength as his adrenaline
levels spiked. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,
but I need to know something,” said Desh in hushed tones.

“Are
you under duress?” said Connelly carefully, now fully alert.

“No,
I’m alone.”

“We
need to get to a secure line,” insisted Connelly. “I know you remember our
discussion. I hadn’t expected to hear from you,” he added pointedly, as if Desh
needed reminding that Connelly had given him explicit instructions not to call
him and to stay well clear of military channels.

“Yeah,
we wouldn’t want to tip off our quarry,” said Desh sardonically. He paused and
then added, “Unfortunately, it’s a little late for that.”

“She
knows you’re on the case?”

“You
could say that,” replied Desh. “In fact, you could say that I was just
abducted,” he continued. “And it
wasn’t
by aliens.”

“What?”
whispered the colonel in disbelief. “But why? It makes no sense.” He paused in
thought. “Unless she thought you were getting close.”

“She
didn’t, and I wasn’t,” continued Desh hurriedly, acutely aware that the police
could arrive at any moment. Worse still, the two men in the adjoining room
could regain their consciousness, or their sniper friend could lose his
patience with his colleagues and come to investigate. “She tried to convince me
she was innocent. I have very little time, so I’ll tell you about that later. But
I need to know something. Two military types crashed the party and ran her off.
Were they yours?”

“I
didn’t know about the party, so I sure as hell didn’t send the party crashers,”
he replied.

“Did
you set them up on their own recognizance to tail me?”

“Why
would I do that?” said Connelly, genuinely confused. “You aren’t the target
here, and I have every confidence you’ll do your job and then call your
contact.”

“Then
who are they?”

There
was a long pause. “I have no idea,” came the uneasy reply.

Desh
nodded. “I have to go, Colonel. Do me a favor. Investigate this entire Op from
top to bottom. Something’s not right. Starting with the party crashers. Make
sure you have the straight skinny on this deal.”

“After
what you’ve just told me,” said Connelly, “you don’t need to ask.”

“Good.
I’ll be in touch,” said Desh, ending the connection.

Desh
pocketed the phone and pushed aside just enough of the curtain to be able to
peer out of the window. The coast appeared clear, although this guaranteed
nothing.

Desh
heard heavy footsteps coming from the adjoining room and jerked his head away
from the window, his senses hyper-alert.

“Holy
Shit!” bellowed a man in the other room, his shocked voice easily carrying
through the wall. “Are they alive?”

“I’ll
check,” said another man. “You call for back-up,” he added anxiously.

Desh
guessed from their reaction to the two unconscious men they were uniformed cops
with no military experience, which was somewhat of a relief. Even so, he didn’t
wait to hear more. He opened the outer door and cautiously stepped outside,
crouching low and keeping to the darkness.