Department 19: Zero Hour (61 page)

“A potential cure for vampirism?” asked the Prime Minister.

“Yes, sir.”

“Which would work on Dracula?”

“
If
it was perfected and synthesised,
if
we were able to locate him, and
if
it could be introduced into his system, then theoretically yes, sir.”

There was a long pause.

“Fine,” said the Prime Minister, eventually. “Forty-eight hours, Colonel. Then you’re going to find yourself one of the most famous men in the country.”

“I look forward to that, sir,” said Cal.

The Prime Minister laughed. “Do whatever you can,” he said. “I know you will, but I wanted to say it anyway. Do whatever you can to stop this.”

“We will, sir,” said Cal.

“I know,” said the Prime Minister. “Goodbye, Colonel.”

“Goodbye, sir.”

A long tone filled the room, signifying that the connection had been cut. Cal closed the comms window, and sat back in his chair.

He had told the Prime Minister the truth; they would do whatever was in their power to stop Zero Hour coming. But as he stared at the Blacklight crest in the centre of his wall screen, the Department’s motto emblazoned below it, he was forced to admit to himself that his hopes of success were almost non-existent.

The turning of Jamie Carpenter was a bonus, but was not the giant step forward that the first victim’s cooperation would have been. The Browning Theory suggested that Jamie would, in time, become an extremely powerful vampire, and that would certainly be useful. But he was never going to be the equal of the vampire who had bitten him, who had five centuries of power bubbling through his veins.

It was not the only disappointment to come from how DARKWOODS had ended. If the time ever came that it was needed, Jamie would not be able to help them launch PROMETHEUS, the strategic plan that was classified at such a level that Cal would deny it existed if asked by anyone, including the Prime Minister and Paul Turner.

For that, they had needed the first victim himself.

Cal got up from his desk, crossed the room, and unscrewed the cap on the bottle of Scotch. He was about to fill his glass for the second time when the incoming call tone rang through his quarters. He swore heavily, put the bottle down, and turned towards the screen, expecting to see the Prime Minister’s name; he had presumably forgotten something he wanted to say, or had changed his mind about the extension he had granted. Instead, the name of the NS9 Director glowed in a new window, above the words ACCEPT and REJECT.

Holmwood strode back to his desk and clicked ACCEPT. The window expanded and General Allen’s face appeared; his tanned skin looked pale, and there were bags under his eyes that were almost black. He seemed to have aged ten years since Cal had last spoken to him, barely two days earlier.

“Jesus, Bob,” said Cal. “You look like shit. Is everything OK?”

Allen smiled, and shook his head. “Not even close,” he said. “You?”

“About the same,” said Holmwood. “I’ve just had to talk the Prime Minister out of going public. The little prick is worried that people are going to be angry with him for not telling them about vamps until now.”

“Did you tell him he’s going to have bigger problems than that in a couple of days?”

“I tried,” said Cal. “He heard me. Whether he listened is another matter.”

Allen nodded. “I’m briefing the White House later today,” he said. “I’m expecting about the same from them. I should thank you for that, I suppose.”

“For what?”

“For letting one of your vamps go on TV and tell the whole world that they’re real. That was quality work from your boys, Cal. Great stuff, really.”

“Are you kidding me?” asked Cal. “Exactly how was I supposed to stop that from happening? The show is recorded live, in London. Nobody knew what they were going to do until it was happening.”

“You couldn’t shut it down?” asked Allen. “Once you saw where they were going with it?”

“No, Bob,” said Cal. “I can’t have a commercial television station taken off the air at a moment’s notice. And neither can you, so don’t even start with me.”

“Fair enough,” said Allen. “I suppose it was going to come out somewhere. There was probably no stopping it after McKenna’s article.”

“Are you going to give me shit for that too?” asked Cal.

Allen rolled his eyes, and smiled. “No, Cal,” he said. “I read the reports and I know you did all you could. It’s out now, so we just have to deal with it.”

“How bad is it over there?” asked Cal.

“Not too bad yet,” said Allen. “Your show got picked up and it’s running non-stop on the news networks, but we’ve refuted it as much as possible. We’ve had some violence in the cities, some reports of hoarding and looting. I’ve got the National Guard standing by, so we’re playing wait and see. But it’s going to get worse. I’ve had half a dozen of my retired Operators get in touch with me today and tell me they’ve had journalists asking them to go on the record about NS9. Their records are all sealed, classified at the highest level. But the news media tracked them down in less than a day.”

“They pay well,” said Cal. “For information. Someone will take their money, Bob. Prepare yourself for that.”

Allen nodded. “Anyway,” he said, “this isn’t why I called you, Cal. Can you tell me what happened in Romania?”

“Not much,” said Holmwood. “I’m sorry to hear about Tim Albertsson, Bob. But I don’t have a report from Larissa yet.”

“Why not?” asked Allen. “I had to hear about Albertsson from the Germans. They heard it from their Operator, after the first victim flew them out of the forest. The actual first victim, who they found, Cal. Although I presume you already know that?”

“Larissa got back here half an hour ago,” said Cal. “With Lieutenant Carpenter, who was bitten by the first victim. Dealing with that hasn’t left me much time to make calls.”

Allen frowned. “Jamie was bitten?”

Holmwood nodded.

“Are you transfusing him?”

“No,” said Cal. “We’re not.”

“Jesus,” said Allen. “That’s cold, Cal. I’m glad I didn’t have to make that call.”

“Jamie made it,” said Cal. “He insisted that we let him turn. He understands what’s at stake.”

The two men fell silent. Holmwood stared at his American counterpart, refusing to drop his eyes; he would not be made to feel bad about the decision that had been taken in the infirmary, a decision that he and Paul Turner had agreed on their way down to Level C that they would have made for Jamie had he not made it for himself.

It’s for the greater good,
he told himself.
There’s no time left for sentiment.

“How’s Larissa taking it?” asked Allen, eventually.

Cal shrugged. “How do you think?”

“I’m honestly surprised she let it happen.”

“She made her objections known,” said Cal, remembering Larissa’s threat to kill everyone on the active roster. “Let’s just leave it at that.”

“All right,” said Allen. “Let’s talk about something more cheerful. Did Browning report back to you?”

“Preliminary,” said Cal. “He said he’d discovered an anomaly in Adam’s blood. And then he told me that one of your Operators tried to kill him.”

Allen grimaced. “You heard about that, huh?”

“I did,” said Cal. “Have you spoken to Aleksandr?”

“He called me,” said Allen. “Is it terrible that I didn’t find it hard to believe?”

Cal shook his head. “It was a bad time,” he said. “At least he told us. It’s not that long since the SPC would have destroyed the files and left the remaining Safeguards in place. Are you cleaning house?”

“We were about to anyway,” said Allen. “Our ISAT launches the day after tomorrow. We think that’s what set Simmons off. One of my Operators reports having discussed it in his presence, not long before he flipped.”

“It wasn’t common knowledge?”

Allen shook his head. “Only a few people knew.”

“That’s it then,” said Cal. “It’s the same as Brennan. He knew that ISAT would uncover him, so he made a pre-emptive move.”

“So it would seem,” said Allen. “I can’t really process it, Cal. I’ve known Rich Simmons for fifteen years.”

“It’s not his fault,” said Cal. “You have to remember that. The SPC programmed him.”

“So many secrets,” said Allen, and sighed deeply. “So many lies.”

Cal nodded.

“At least nobody was hurt,” continued Allen. “Apart from Simmons, that is. Browning is already asking when he can come home.”

“Tell him I’m sending the
Mina
II
for him,” said Holmwood. “It should be there within eight hours.”

“I’ll tell him,” said Allen. “He’s a smart one, Cal. He makes me feel like I should have paid more attention in school.”

Holmwood smiled. “I know exactly what you mean, Bob. Put him on the plane for me as soon as she arrives?”

“Of course.”

“And don’t tell him about Jamie. He doesn’t need anything else to worry about.”

Cal nodded. “I won’t tell—”

The NS9 Director disappeared, his face replaced by the words EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS SHUTDOWN. Cal had time to frown before the general alarm, deafeningly loud and horribly familiar, burst out of the speaker above the door of his quarters.

Paul Turner grabbed the phone from the desk, typed in four numbers, and demanded an immediate report from the Security Division watch commander. He listened carefully, then ordered the general alarm to be stopped. When the screaming two-tone siren fell silent, Turner pulled his radio from his belt, entered his override code, and spoke quickly into the microphone.

“Operators,” he said, his voice emerging from every speaker in the Loop. “This is the Security Officer. There has been a perimeter breach, which is being investigated by the Security Division. Carry on with your duties as normal. Out.”

He was standing in one of the offices at the rear of the infirmary, waiting for the doctor who had been about to transfuse Jamie Carpenter to return. He had sent him to the Science Division to collect data on the turn, and on the hunger; he did not want Carpenter to suffer any more than was absolutely necessary when his transformation began in earnest. The door to the office flew open and the doctor entered, carrying a stack of files and folders.

“I heard the alarm,” he said, breathlessly. “Are we safe?”

“We’re fine,” said Turner. “I need to go up to Security. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes, at which point I’ll expect a report and a treatment plan.”

The doctor nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“Good,” said Turner. “Thank you.”

He left the man frantically leafing through documents and strode across the infirmary. Kate and Larissa were still huddled round Jamie’s bed, chatting softly; as Turner passed, Kate glanced over at him and raised her eyebrows inquiringly. He gave her a tiny shake of his head.

Nothing for you to worry about.

Turner walked down the Level C corridor, his radio pressed to the side of his head, the handset tuned to the Security Division frequency.

“Is it the damn protesters again?” he asked, as soon as he heard the Duty Operator’s voice.

“We think so, sir. It was a single breach, less than a second. We think they threw something over the fence, or fired something over it, worst case. There’s a brief heat signature on the thermal tracking, but no explosion. Perimeter patrol should be onsite now, sir.”

“Keep me informed,” he said. “I’m going out there.”

“Yes, sir,” said the Duty Operator. “Out.”

Turner cut the connection, placed the radio on his belt, and fought back a momentary urge to scream with frustration. He simply didn’t have time to deal with the protesters and their increasingly regular attempts at mischief; there were
so
many more important things that required his attention.

He knew exactly what had happened out at the fence; after the two deaths the previous day, the protesters had mourned their dead, then returned with even greater outrage burning within them, and thrown something over the fence, something designed to shock, to make their point. Turner was expecting to find a burning effigy dressed to look like an Operator, or something equally juvenile.

On a gut level, he respected their right to protest, and would, if pushed, allow that there was merit to some of their arguments. Despite that, what he wanted to do more than anything in the world at this particular moment was drive out to the camp, bang the heads of the leaders of the movement together, and tell them all to go home before they got anybody else hurt. He wanted to explain to them that there were events in motion that were simply beyond their comprehension, and that despite the arguable nobility of their intentions, they were only making things worse.

But of course he couldn’t do that.

He stepped into the Level C lift and pressed 0. When the doors opened again, he walked quickly down the corridor and through the double doors that led into the hangar. He scanned the wide semi-circular space, and froze.

Standing in the middle of the hangar, smiling warmly at him, was Valentin Rusmanov.

Turner stared at the vampire, his eyes wide, his entire body reeling with shock. Valentin was wearing a long coat and floating a few centimetres above the concrete floor, an elegant travel bag resting beside his feet. As he slowly began to accept that he wasn’t imagining it, the vampire really
was
standing in front of him, his shock gave way first to surprise, then to a profound sense of gratitude.