Deadly Intent: An Action Thriller (Adrian Hell Series Book 4) (31 page)

I place a hand on the door and gently push it open a fraction, revealing a slim glimpse of the corridor running off to the right. I see a couple of offices on the left, but can’t see all the way to the other end.

“Looks clear,” I whisper.

I push it open farther, but stop when I hear footfalls away to the left. I hold the door still, not allowing it to close. Whoever’s there might notice it’s slightly open; they might not. But they would
definitely
notice it move, so I play the numbers game and sit tight, holding my breath.

Two men walk into view, striding purposefully away from me with guns held loosely by their side. I signal to Raynor, gesturing with my hands what’s happening and to follow me. I ease the door open enough to fit my head through and quickly look around to my left. A quick movement, just a glimpse.

There’s no one there. I look right, to the end of the corridor, and see the door leading to the opposite stairwell. I hope Wallis and Clark have made it here unscathed. The two men stop at the far end, just in front of the door.

“Wait,” I hear one of them say as he reaches for a radio clipped to his belt. He picks it up and holds it to his ear, listening intently. His body language changes, and he appears on edge, looking around and shifting on the spot.

“We’re under attack!” he says to his friend. “Come on!”

They rush off to the left, out of sight, unblocking my view of the other door just as it opens a fraction. I see Wallis poke his head out, doing exactly what I’ve just done. Our eyes meet, and we give each other the ‘OK’ gesture with our hand. I signal to him to head down the corridor to his right, after the two men. I’ll head left with Raynor.

Keeping low, we all step out and check the immediate vicinity. Happy we’re clear for now, I move off to the left with Raynor close behind me. They know we’re coming, which makes things slightly harder, but it’s not exactly unexpected, so we’ll deal with it as best we can.

At the end of the corridor is a right turn, with an office on the left taking up the corner. I stop with my back against the wall on the right and peer around it. The layout seems to be a square within a square. I suspect the majority of the personnel are based toward the center, with the outlying offices reserved for management.

I see no movement, so I make my way around the corner, keeping beneath the windows of the offices, out of sight. It’s a large office—as you’d expect in such a large building. As I make my way along the left side with Raynor behind me, I realize exactly how big it is. It feels like the goddamn TARDIS!

I hear movement close by and stop, signaling for Raynor to do the same. There’s a low hum coming from up ahead, making it difficult to hear any footsteps. Just in front of us is an opening that leads inside the inner square, to the right. Must be another corridor running through the middle…

I edge slowly along the wall, keeping in a crouch, and stop at the intersection to take a quick peek. I feel my eyes widen at the sight before me. I was wrong about the layout… the inner square is open-plan, with a large bank of computers at the far end, in front of a huge display screen that runs practically the full width of the wall. It looks like something out of a NASA launch control center—which, I immediately realize, would make sense, given it’s from this floor where they run the Cerberus satellite.

In front of the console are three men and a woman, kneeling down with their hands behind their heads and their ankles crossed behind them. They’re smartly dressed and look terrified. I count maybe sixteen armed men scattered around the area, all tense and alert with fingers on the triggers of their assault rifles.

At the console, with their backs to me are three more men, all sitting, working feverishly away, pausing occasionally to look up at the big screen. Standing over them is Yalafi Hussein, leaning casually on the backs of their chairs, speaking in a language I can’t make out. Off to the right, directly across from me, sitting in the shadows is another man. I can’t make out his face, because of the lighting, but I can tell from the shape of him who it is.

Hamaad El-Zurak.

Every fiber of my being is screaming, urging me to jump up and put a bullet in him right now—end everything before any innocent life is lost. But there’s something, I guess it’s my voice of reason, telling me to wait, because I’d be killed in the process and would never learn the truth behind everything that’s been happening.

This voice of reason is a strange thing… a bit boring compared to my Inner Satan, but it’s undoubtedly smarter, and will probably live longer.

Gunfire on the other side of the office space interrupts my train of thought. I peer around the corner again, and a man across from me falls into view, landing dead at El-Zurak’s feet. He screams something indecipherable and gestures to the nearest three guys on his left, who rush out and into the opposite corridor. I look on as more shouting and gunfire sounds out. Then, Wallis and Clark walk in at gunpoint, unarmed.

Shit!

I look back at Raynor. I see a look of apology on his face, which I don’t understand. But then I look up and see two men, one with his gun touching the back of Raynor’s head, the other aiming at me.

Double shit…

38.

11:58 EDT

One of the men shoves me in the back, jabbing me hard with the barrel of his gun to move me into the control center. I look over my shoulder at him.

“Boy, if you touch me again, I’m gonna break you in half—we clear?”

He smirks at me, but does nothing.

Everyone in the room turns to stare at the four of us as they position us into a line in front of El-Zurak. The man himself stands and walks down the line slowly with a look of disinterest on his face, before stopping in front of me. Our faces are mere inches apart. He looks into my eyes, staring at me like I’m nothing. I regard him in much the same way.

I examine his features and think back to my first impressions of him on the DVD Clara left me. I don’t know whether it was his eye patch, or just the circumstances at the time, but I remember feeling a little un-nerved by the look on his face as I watched him on the screen. But now, after everything that’s happened—everything I’ve been through… now, I’m finally face to face with him; I’m actually quite underwhelmed. I’ve met a lot of bad people in my time. Most of them have paid me to kill someone, I admit, but it’s almost like when you meet someone who’s famous—there’s this feeling, this expectation, that they’ll live up to their reputation.

This guy is the mastermind behind the largest terrorist plot in the history of mankind, but all I can think of is that I expected him to be taller. And that he looks a little like a pirate.

He’s wearing white robes underneath a dark gray sleeveless body-warmer jacket. His beard is long and streaked with gray, and his dark skin is like old leather. His right eye narrows at me.

“How do you feel, Adrian Hell?” he asks, speaking slowly and deliberately.

I shrug. “I’m alright,” I reply. “Could do with a drink, if I’m honest.”

His lip curls slightly but, in a flash, he hits me across the face with the back of his right hand. I didn’t even see it coming. My head whips to the left, and I’m speechless for a moment. I look back at him, my body tensing as the anger rises inside me.

“Clara was like a daughter to me,” he says.

“Well, I’ve already killed her biological father… might as well kill her adopted one as well—complete the set.”

“Your arrogance offends me. It is over, Adrian Hell. You have lost.” He turns and moves toward the console, gesturing to the large screen. “Soon, we will use your own satellite against you, to take control of the world’s nuclear weapons and purge the Western World—”

I interrupt him by over-exaggerating a loud yawn. He glares at me.

“Oh, I’m sorry—weren’t you finished?” I ask.

“Enough!” he yells, turning his back on me and speaking to one of the men at the console in another language.

Next to me, Raynor leans over. “I’m real glad you ain’t a politician, you crazy bastard,” he whispers.

I smile and look over at Wallis and Clark, who are both staring quietly at the floor.

“Hey, Hamaad,” I shout over. “Can I ask you something?”

He turns, his face a picture of annoyance.

“I’m just wondering, while it’s all well and good you hijacking Cerberus and blowing shit up, why are you doing it? I mean, all this talk of purging is a little stereotypical, don’t you think? What’s the
Western World
ever done to you?”

Before he can talk, a deep voice speaks out from behind us.

“I’ll answer that.”

We all turn and look over as General Thomas Matthews walks in; accompanied by a ten-man squad of anonymous CIA operatives, dressed in the same black outfit as the guys we took out on the stairwell earlier. He strides confidently into the room and stands beside El-Zurak. He regards him for a moment, and then extends his hand. El-Zurak looks down at it, as if hesitating, before shaking it.

“Congratulations on carrying out the mission, Hamaad,” says Matthews before turning to me. “Adrian Hell, you’ve been a colossal pain in my ass from day one.”

“Thanks,” I say.

“That’s not a compliment, you little prick!”

I smile but say nothing.

“You want to know why we’re all here?” he continues. “It’s like I said to you before—sometimes you gotta do things you don’t agree with to get the result you want.”

I shake my head in disbelief and confusion. “You’re the director of the goddamn CIA!” I shout. “How did a piece of shit terrorist recruit
you
?”

Now Matthews looks confused. Then he laughs.

“Son, he didn’t recruit me… I recruited
him
.”

And there it is.

His words hang in the air as the four of us exchange looks of shock and further confusion, as we piece everything together.

The CIA recruited El-Zurak to carry out this attack. That explains, well, pretty much everything. It explains why the Armageddon Initiative was able to get so big and stay so secret for so long. It explains why the whole world thought we were the bad guys—the CIA was feeding everyone false information. And who would question intel that came from the CIA, right?

I let out a heavy sigh, realizing that not just me, but the world has been played.

“Triple shit…” I mutter to myself.

Matthews is all smiles in front of me. His men remain emotionless at the back of the room, but the terrorists are laughing among themselves.

“Don’t feel bad, Adrian,” he says. “You were never supposed to be involved in the first place, but even though you were, you were never going to win. This is bigger than you. Bigger than GlobaTech. Bigger than all of us.”

I massage the bridge of my nose with my right hand. “Just explain it to me,” I say. “If we’re gonna die here, that’s fine, but for my own peace of mind, can you just fill in the blanks using simple words, please. Why do this?”

The general paces over to the console, pausing to look up at the big screen before pacing slowly back toward me.

“President Cunningham has created a glorious nation,” he explains. “We now live in a time of prosperity unrivaled in the last fifty years. His larger vision is to use our great country as a blueprint for other nations on the planet, so that they too can enjoy this new world we live in. But other global leaders don’t have the same drive, the same dream, as our president. They merely look on with jealousy and resentment as we try to help them, seemingly content with their own miserable existences, yet still eager to have what we have. They want the thriving economy, they want the low crime rate and the high approval ratings, they want legal whores and legal highs, but the narrow-minded sons of bitches want it all handed to them on a silver platter! They don’t want to work for it, they want us to hand our wealth and decadence over to them, no questions asked, and that’s not how the world works. President Cunningham is… disheartened, to say the least, so I took it upon myself, as director of the world’s most powerful intelligence agency, to do what needed to be done. If other people don’t want to work with us voluntarily, then something needs to be done to
force
them, to make them see that our way of life is the only way that actually
works
. If everyone did things the way we have, this world would be a better place.”

“You’re fucking insane…” says Wallis. “This is just bat-shit crazy!”

Matthews looks over at him. “This isn’t insane, Agent Wallis, this is necessary. It’s what needs to be done for the greater good. If people aren’t willing to work at change, then it’s our responsibility, as the most powerful nation on this planet, to reset those ways of life and help them re-build from scratch.”

“Is it me,” I say, “or does all this sound eerily familiar?”

Matthew looks at me, confused.

“I’m pretty sure a German guy a few years back tried something like this… and later, a group of people not dissimilar to ol’ Hamaad here.”

He scoffs. “They were narrow-minded idiots and dictators. We’re visionaries!”

“Wow… General, seriously—that’s a thin fucking line you’re walking there, buddy.”

“This has to be done!”

“Says who?” I ask. “Who gave you the right to be judge, jury, and executioner for the entire world? You’re nothing but a glorified office boy.”

“I have the president’s ear and enough experience fighting for this world to feel justified making this decision on behalf of it.”

“So why hide? Why not say everything you just said to me?”

“Because I’ve had enough years in politics to know how the public mind works. The masses are shortsighted and will only see the initial change, not the long-term benefits. There’ll be an outcry, and it’s much easier to give people someone to blame—someone to hate.”

In a weird way, I’m actually impressed at how they managed to pull this off, even if I don’t agree with it. But I still need to find a way to stop it. I’m hardly an advocate of diplomacy, but even I know that starting a third World War in the interest of peace on Earth is all kinds of fucked up.

And therein lies my problem… A CIA unit and a dozen armed terrorists surround me. I have no weapon, and I’m nowhere near the computer that can stop this. And let’s be honest, even if I was standing next to the damn thing, I wouldn’t know what to do with it.

For the first time in my life, I feel a genuine spark of fear inside me. Not because I’m almost certainly going to die here, but because I physically cannot make things right. I can’t stop the people responsible, and I can’t prevent the loss of any innocent life.

I’m helpless, and it feels like drowning and I don’t like it. I think Matthews can see it in my eyes, because that sick, twisted sonofabitch is smiling at me like he’s already won.

“So what now?” I ask, clenching my jaw muscles to suppress the anger bubbling away inside me.

“Now?” he replies. “Now, we change the world.”

He turns and walks over to the console, speaking to one of the men sitting in front of it. El-Zurak moves to his side, and Hussein joins them from across the room, where he’s been watching the scene unfold in silence.

“Execute Cerberus protocol Alpha-Zero-Niner,” he says. “Authentication code Foxtrot, Zulu, Eight, Seven, Delta.”

After a few moments tapping away, the man announces he’s done as the general ordered. The large screen flickers, and trajectories start appearing all over a topographical map of the world.

There are a
lot
of trajectories.

“Holy shit…” I murmur.

Raynor leans over to me again. “I hope Josh was able to do something clever down there,” he says.

I shake my head. “Honestly, John—I can’t imagine he’d have been able to stop this. I mean, look at it… it’s a fucking NASA control system. How can you hack that with a laptop in the backseat of a car?”

Wallis and Clark look over, silently imploring me to do something,
anything
, to stop this. But I don’t know what. They’ll gun me down in seconds if I make a move.

I need to stall him.

“There’s still something I don’t understand,” I say to Matthews, who turns to look at me. “What was with all that
Ares
crap? Surely you could’ve used any number of methods to move weapons around for these crazy bastards… Why illegally fund the only cartel left? Did you not think it’d raise too many questions?”

He glances at El-Zurak, nodding discreetly, and then walks over to me with a look of regret on his face. Behind him, El-Zurak moves over to the console and leans forward, talking in a hushed voice to the operators.

“That was a bit of bad luck, I’ll admit,” Matthews says to me. “When we found out the extent of your involvement, we had to act quickly to get you out of the picture. We re-routed you to Colombia because I had a unit close by who could be ready on short notice to take you out. When you convinced one of my team to start questioning my orders, I was forced to take drastic measures, which, unfortunately, led to you being on the run. It was pure fluke that you stumbled across Vega’s operation. Everyone knows the cartels don’t exist anymore, which was why it was perfect to use one—no one would think to look for them. Vega moved guns and technology all over the world—wherever El-Zurak and Hussein needed it.”

“Jesus…”

Clark takes a step forward, which surprises all of us. “What I don’t understand,” he says to Matthews, “is that you went to all this trouble to hide America’s involvement in this, only to have us blow the shit out of half the world, essentially admitting blame all along.”

Matthews smiles and shakes his head. “Why, the United States isn’t launching an attack on anyone, Mr. Clark... As you can see from the screen, it’s China, and North Korea, and Russia, and Pakistan…
they’re
the ones launching an attack. We’re just the victims of a heinous act of terrorism.”

Clark looks at me wide-eyed, and I see the realization of defeat hit him as it did me moments earlier.

This is what Cerberus does—it protects our nuclear weapons while having the ability to steal everyone else’s.

Matthews turns away and looks at the screen. “Fire when ready, gentlemen,” he says.