Survivalist - 22 - Brutal Conquest (21 page)

And then they were past this house. Emma Shaw’s voice came again, saying, “I think that’s the house, Doctor.”

Indeed it was.

The house itself was much larger than the previous structures, in the shape of a squared-off letter C. A fountain of considerable proportions was set in a graveled driveway, which ran through a wide grassy area, dotted with palm trees.

The house had two full stories and a third floor along the center, between the two legs of the C. Toward the north of the main structure was what appeared to be a guest house, a sprawling single-story, that was otherwise an architectural match to the main house. The driveway branched off between the main house and the guest house, leading to a garage that appeared designed to hold at least a dozen cars, a swimming pool, tennis courts, a building that his computer’s video map indicated was a stable, and a wooded area.

The entire compound was fenced in.

Although he could have read the same thing from the screen, he remembered the colonel telling him, “The house was once the home of the Trans-Global Alliance, before that was moved to Switzerland about thirty-five years ago. It was built with enough meeting rooms, bedrooms, kitchens and recreational facilities to handle well over three dozen personnel, not to mention a staff which sometimes exceeded fifty people. Most of the staff lived in the guest house structure, except for those who might be required during the night—chief of security, night buder, night cook, and the like. Then, when the Alliance moved its headquarters, the place was bought by a German corporation. We never thought twice about it.”

The helicopter arced away from the property, Emma Shaw apologizing, “If we make too much out—”

“I know,” Rourke said, cutting her off.

He’d seen enough… .

“A fortress that doesn’t look like one,” John Rourke said

quietly, spreading his hands over the horizontal screen that filled the center of the planning table in the security bunker.

Michael, Natalia, Annie, and Paul were here, and he felt better, somehow.

The marine colonel whose security personnel John Rourke intended to utilize asked, “What are you planning, sir?”

“It goes back to what we were saying earlier, Colonel. Computer-generated scenarios can be anticipated. So can military operations, because basic military operational techniques are all but universal, aren’t they? I imagine that someday, if mankind is that fortunate both to survive and be in the right place at the right time, should we encounter intelligent otherworldly beings, we’d likely discover that if the concept of a military is not unknown to them, the tactics would still be similar.

“What we want to do,” Rourke went on, “is the unexpected. With your permission, Colonel, I’d like to plan this out in a totally different way. We’ll require surveillance, penetration teams, and a lot of luck.” John Rourke looked at the colonel, then at Lieutenant Commander Washington.

“Agreed, sir,” the colonel said.

The facade of the building, that happened to be on Rourke Boulevard (something John Rourke tried to ignore), was of a synthetic that looked and even felt like marble. The showroom floor and walls were of the same material, a highly polished black that looked positively elegant.

The showroom for Lancer Firearms reminded John Rourke of some of the elegant shops he’d seen on New York’s Park Avenue when, away on business, he would hastily and guiltily shop for presents for Sarah and Michael and Annie.

But rather than overpriced baubles, the Lancer showroom was the most fully equipped weapons emporium he had ever seen, reminiscent of the great gunhouses like Abercrombie & Fitch or Chicago’s Sundeen’s, the staff knowledgeable, each item displayed impeccably presented.

“I am Walter Sutherland, sir. You may recognize the reproductions of many of your own firearms here, sir. Meeting you, I must say, Dr. Rourke, is an experience I shall treasure.”

Walter Sutherland was a tall, very trim man, narrow shoulders accentuating his height, a receding hairline (baldness had been elective for the last century or so, Rourke understood, as it was now so easily prevented or

corrected) heightening the thin, bony quality of his face. He wore a dark grey turtleneck and a black ..suit, the jacket without lapels in the once-again popular Nehru style.

All that was missing to give Walter Sutherland the image of the perfect aristocratic retail merchant were striped pants, a morning coat, and a white carnation in the lapel.

“Your facility is magnificent.”

“I would love you—and your entire family—” Sutherland gestured toward Michael, Natalia, Paul, and Annie. T would consider it a great honor should your schedules allow that you tour our manufacturing facilities just outside the city.”

“I’d really enjoy that,” John Rourke said sincerely. “And Fll surprise you one day and turn up on your doorstep. You have no idea how pleasant it is for a man from my era to find something like this.”

Although everything was a reproduction, of course, there were fine English doubles—double rifles, rimfire-free pistols, single-actions in all the standard and the more exotic barrel lengths, even muzzle-loading flindock and percussion rifles and pistols. Of edged weapons, there were designs Rourke remembered, as with the guns like long-ago friends once thought lost forever. Reproductions again, the touch of Crain, Crawford, Randall, and the other great knife makers of the Twentieth Century was everywhere in evidence.

Mr. Sutherland was saying, “With our edged weapons as with our firearms, sir, we strive to duplicate not only the design but the materials, every nuance of construction. In some cases, we have only scanty written records to go on, the occasional photograph, but at other times we have the original weapon to measure, to test, to reproduce. We do our humble best.” 1

John Rourke stared into a case of Detonics .45s. He looked up from the case and into Sutherland’s face. “Your liumble best,’ Mr. Sutherland, is peerless.”

“Would you care to examine—”

John Rourke only smiled. He now understood the meaning of the old expression “happy as a kid in a candy store.” “Of course,” he almost whispered.

While Mr. Sutherland and John talked guns, Natalia merely inspected the cases. They had come here not for recreational purposes, although indeed it was pleasant, but to pick up whatever additional firearms they might require for the upcoming operation. She was not terribly taken with the “modern” firearms, either the caseless cartridge weapons or the energy weapons.

Certainly, these had their applications, and her taste in weaponry had always been eclectic. But she was wedded to the “older” guns, those from her own epoch. She remembered a story John had told her once, concerning the near-legendary western gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok. Long into the cartridge era, Hickok clung to his cap and ball revolvers, usually 1851 Navy Colts.

At the time, she had failed to understand why a man of such consummate skill at arms would reject the new in favor of the old. But John had told her that story over six centuries ago.

In the case before which she now stopped was the weapon she’d sought, her favorite large capacity 9mm pistol. “May I show you something, Major?”

She looked up into the face of a man who seemed almost cut from the same mold as his superior in the company’s hierarchy, Mr. Sutherland.

“Yes. The SIG-Sauer F226, please.”

“Certainly, madam.” And he began to open the case.

John Rourke had finished his tour of the showroom.

Mr. Sutherland said, “I understand that you and your family have some requirements. The government has offered to pay us, of course, but I would consider it a personal privilege to provide what you might need—in exchange for a small favor.”

John Rouffee looked at him. “Yes?”

“I would like the opportunity—at your convenience, of course, and under your eye, as it were—to examine your Detonics Combat Masters. We have duplicated the various Colt semi-automatics and the Detonics Scoremaster and Servicemaster, and we’ve tried with the Combat Masters, but I’ve never quite felt we had the details properly in mind, with no actual firearm to work from.”

John Rourke drew back the sides of his battered brown leather bomber jacket, exposing the twin stainless Detonics .45s in their double Alessi shoulder rig. “At your convenience, sir, after this matter at hand.”

“Certainly. I understand. Now, what can I help you with?”

John Rourke began walking along the showroom floor again. He stopped before a wall display. “The twelve-inch barreled Remington 870 Witness Protection shotgun with the pistol grip.”

“With the fold-down fore-end piece?”

“No, a bit too bulky, I’m afraid.** Rourke walked on, stopping again. “And my Steyr-Mannlicher SSG is in storage in a safe house at Eden City. I’m afraid 111 be without it for a time.”

“I wish we could help you, Doctor, but we—”

“Would you like to make one?”

“I’d-“

“After I’ve retrieved it, you can borrow it if you like.”

Sutherland’s eyes positively beamed. “But I fail to see what we could provide—”

Rourke nodded his head toward the wall display. “Is that H-K 91 an accurate duplicate internally?”

“To the last detail, sir. Two of the originals were discovered twenty years ago in an abandoned survival bunker in Montana. I’m afraid they were smuggled out of Eden,” Sutherland confided. “I wish we had available one of the sniper versions of the G-3, but none has turned up—not yet at least.”

“If the 91 requires trigger work, can you perform it?”

“Certainly, sir.” Rourke nodded.

“We have some fine scopes: Kahles, Schmidt & Bender-“

Rourke shook his head. “Ill prefer the iron sights with the proper ammunition.” Then Rourke walked toward one of the several display cases given over to fighting knives. “This is a reproduction of the OSS sleeve knife H.G. Long of England, produced for the American firm Ek, isn’t it?”

“Indeed it is, Doctor.”

“Then, if I may, I’d like it. But I would be more than happy to pay for these items. I’m told that I have one hundred and twenty-five years of brigadier general’s pay and allowances banked away for me at interest. And you can still borrow the guns.”

“No, sir. I insist. Consider this our way of saying thank you to you, sir, for what you have done and what I suspect you are about to do.”

“Try,” Rourke corrected.

“There is one thing.”

“Certainly,” Rourke said, smiling.

“Your knives. I’ve read about them—the Crain knife

and the A.G. Russell knife. I would love to duplicate them.”

“Consider them available whenever you like, again following our immediate business” Sutherland extended his hand. Rourke shook it.

It was marvelous how some images stuck in the mind.

All the while John Rourke paced the balcony area outside the security offices, he kept expecting to see the actor Jack Lord, or at least someone who looked like him. Because the raid on the former Trans-Global Alliance headquarters, now a private home at Sebastian’s Reef, was taking place in a civilian area, the Honolulu police were being brought in to assist. Although Sebastian’s Reef was on the far side of the island, it was administered by the city of Honolulu.

Rourke thought that a fine idea, but at the back of his mind, as he looked through the picture window dominating the entire balcony and onto the grounds where military and civilian personnel went their way, he kept expecting to hear a craggy voice from behind him telling a young assistant to book a just-busted felon. Rourke didn’t share his observations with the marine colonel who was in charge of security or with anyone else at the moment, either.

Television programs from more than six centuries ago weren’t frequent topics of conversation.

He heard the footfalls first, then the voice, but by that time John Rourke was already turning around. The man he saw was a vigorous-looking late fifties or early sixties. With a life expectancy these days of around one hundred

years, being in one’s fifties or sixties wasn’t anywhere near old.

The man was about five-feet-nine or so, broad-shouldered, barrel-chested, and stocky. His face had the “map of Ireland” all over it. “You’re Dr. Rourke! What a pleasure, sir!” The man extended his right hand and John Rourke took it. “I’m Inspector Shaw … Tim Shaw, Doctor. I command Honolulu’s Tactical Squad.”

“The pleasure’s mine.” The name struck a familiar chord. “Shaw. Any relation to a pilot, Commander Emma Shaw?”

Tim Shaw grinned, white teeth flashing, his florid cheeks a litde more florid-looking for the moment. “My daughter. Not only a damned fine pilot, but a looker, too. Emma’s my girl.”

“You should be very proud of her, Inspector.”

“Tim, please.”

“John, then.”

“John,” Tim Shaw nodded. They released hands. “Are you gonna be in on this, John?”

“The meeting, definitely.The raid, too. It’ll be good to have you and your people with us. I view this as a police-style operation rather than a classic military job.”

“Then before we go inside,” Tim Shaw began, “maybe you should fill me in a litde. I was told there was a joint operation coming up—all on the sly ‘cause it was top secret—and to get my rear end over here.”

John Rourke plucked a cigar from the pocket of his shirt, then remembered his manners. “Cigar?”

“You bet,” Tim Shaw nodded, grinning. Rourke gave Shaw one of the thin, dark tobacco cigars, then lit them both in the blue-yellow flame of his Zippo. “Good cigar,” Tim Shaw said, exhaling.

“Here’s the job as I see it, Tim,” Rourke told this man for whom he felt an instant liking. “We have Martin

Zimmer, the leader of Eden, a prisoner here… .” “Whoa!”

“Exacdy,” Rourke nodded, exhaling. The smoke ricocheted off the glass, dissipating into the ventilating system. “My son—and myself, for that matter—bear a remarkable resemblance to Martin Zimmer.”

“Should I read somethin’ into that, John?”

“It’s a long story, but Martin Zimmer is also my son. Ill explain it when there’s the time. Suffice it to say, my son Michael can pass for Martin. He got away with it in Eden City itself.”