The Ancient Breed (50 page)

“That’s what Geronimo reported.”

“I take it that it wasn’t
your
force field?” Nick asked Glenna.

“No, I’m afraid it wasn’t, Nick.”

Nick paced between the sofa and fireplace. “I should’ve never sent Lisa with Crow,” he lamented. “If anything happens to her, I’ll never forgive . . .”

“Now, now, Nick, I’m certain she’s fine,” Glenna said consolingly. “If the shape-shifter is responsible for their disappearance, it won’t harm her as long as she’s with President Hanover.”

“That’s a large assumption. I hope you’re right,” he said. “But where could they be?”

Silence. No one ventured a guess.

Glenna looked at the grandfather clock again. “Time to go.”

“Go where?” Crow asked skeptically.

“To Gabriella’s house.”

Glenna, Nick, and Crow vanished from her house and appeared inside the vestibule of the Wolfe mansion.

“What are we doing here?” Nick asked.

“The shape-shifter has so kindly provided a small diversion for us,” Glenna enlightened them. “It has sent a band of terrorists here to kidnap Blossom and Clay. Insurance, I think you people in the FBI would call it. I have reinforcements on the way.”

“What!” Crow exploded. “Why would it want them? They’re not directly involved in our investigation.”

“But they are directly involved with us,” Nick answered grimly.

“Where are Blossom and Clay?” Crow asked.

Suddenly, Jill Sandlin, Blossom, and Clay appeared in front of them. Crow jumped, startled.

“Why don’t you give a guy some warning before you just pop people in and out like that?” he bristled.

Jill threw her arms around Crow’s neck. “Oh, thank God you’re here, Crow. I’m so scared. There are men hiding out back in the trees with guns.”

Crow kissed her, delicately pulled her hands from his neck, and drew his 9 mm from its holster. “Where’s Charlie Crowfoot?”

“He went out earlier. You just missed him. He said he had some hunting to do,” she replied.

“So do I,” he said gravely. “Like ambushing some terrorists.”

Nick raised a hand. “Not so fast, Chief. I’ve got an idea.” He pulled Crow aside and whispered his plan. Crow begrudgingly nodded his approval, and they rejoined the others.

“Jill, you, Blossom, and Clay are going with Crow.”

“But . . .” Jill started to object.

“No but’s,” Nick cut her short.

Jill faced Crow. “I’m not supposed to leave here. I promised Gabriella that I’d stick around till she came back.”

“She’ll understand,” Glenna interjected.

“Crow, where are we going?”

“A Holiday Inn,” he replied, and suddenly the foursome disappeared.

“Where
did
they go?” Glenna demanded.

It was Nick’s turn to be mysterious. “That’s part of
my
plan, Glenna, in case yours fails. Now, where are Hugo and Fritz?”

“Waiting for my reinforcements.”

Kamool, Gabriella’s familiar in the shape of a beautiful white Persian cat, scampered into the vestibule and leaped into Nick’s arms. In a heartbeat, he knew the identity of Glenna’s reinforcements.

“Looks like Kamool and his friends are ready to rock and roll,” Nick said. He pulled out his Glock with his free hand. “Where do I find your grandsons, Glenna?”

“In the forest behind the terrorists.”

“Kamool, we’re going to turn the tables on their surprise attack with one of our own.” He stroked its fur, even though he knew what a frightening creature lay within it. “Let’s go, buddy.”

And with that, he and the Persian faded from view, leaving Glenna alone in the vast mansion.

Hugo and Fritz were mildly amazed when Nick appeared with Kamool in his arms, but they remained silent. Nick placed the familiar on the ground and peered through the dense brush at the terrorists’ positions. Nick counted fourteen in all. They wore green, brown, and khaki jungle camouflage fatigues and were strategically spaced in a semicircle thirty feet from one another. They were obviously well trained, because their fanned formation made it strategically simple to repel an ambush from either flank. Each gunman cradled an AK-47 automatic assault rifle and was equipped with a mini-headset and throat microphone.

They watched the terrorists steadily advance on the mansion. The gunmen halted at the edge of the large lawn, dropped to their stomachs, and crawled over the grass with their rifles pushed ahead.

A flock of winged creatures suddenly gathered overhead like a foreboding thunderhead and eclipsed the summer sun. As Nick expected, they descended at a terrific speed and attacked the stunned terrorists. Dozens of gargoyles, their great leathery wings and keen jade claws glimmering in the late afternoon light, easily shredded the screaming men before they could rise and defend themselves. Sporadic rifle bursts, mixed with the terrified shrieks and throaty gargoyle growls, reverberated throughout the forest.

Four survivors slipped past the gargoyle ranks and retreated into the forest where Nick, Hugo, and Fritz waited impatiently. The terrorists plowed through the undergrowth like charging bull elephants. There was no need for a quiet withdrawal; their cover was blown. The lead terrorist reached Fritz’s stakeout. The human spark plug jumped out from behind a bramble bush, collared the shocked terrorist, and on a full run, rammed his spine into a tree fifteen feet away. There was a sickening crack, and the lifeless terrorist slumped to the ground.

Nick holstered his Glock, because he wanted to take at least one of the gunmen alive. Another terrorist flew by Nick’s position, but he didn’t get far. Nick tackled the man from behind, sending him and his AK-47 sprawling in different directions. The gunman recovered quickly. He rolled, leaped up, and nailed Nick’s jaw with a karate kick. As Nick staggered backward, the man slipped a serrated combat knife from his boot and charged while Nick was still dazed.

Nick deflected the man’s first few thrusts before diving at his legs. They tumbled to the ground and struggled for control of the knife. The terrorist managed to yank his knife hand free and plunged the weapon toward Nick’s heart. But the blade harmlessly penetrated the soft ground. Nick had vanished beneath the gunman, and before the shocked man could gather his wits, Nick reappeared behind him and brought the butt of his Glock down on the back of his neck. The terrorist crumpled to the ground, unconscious.

Hugo stepped out from behind a thick oak, wrapped an arm around the next terrorist’s throat, and broke his neck. The fourth terrorist ran past them and headed deeper into the forest. Nick was about to give chase when Fritz waved him off.

“Don’t bother,” he said. “The man’s as good as dead.”

A white blur caught Nick’s eye as he watched the retreating gunman disappear into the thick underbrush. It was Kamool giving chase. A moment later, hysterical screams echoed in the forest. Then, silence.

Nick smiled. “I see what you mean.” He grabbed his prisoner by the belt and dragged him back to the mansion. He ordered Gabriella’s magical house to restrain the prisoner until the FBI arrived from Columbus to take him into custody. Later, when the terrorist awoke, he found himself imprisoned in a cage with thick, hissing snakes for bars. The terrorist scooted to the center of the cage and hugged his knees, not daring to move.

Glenna hugged each of them upon their return. “Wonderful job, boys, but that was child’s play compared to what’s in store for us tonight,” she warned.

Suddenly a tall, sinewy Indian appeared. “Where’s Crow?” he demanded.

“He’s running an errand,” Nick replied vaguely. “You must be Charlie Crowfeather. I thought you were supposed to be guarding Jill, Blossom, and Clay.”

The big man grunted. “I was out front eliminating a few terrorists the old-fashioned way.” He pointed to the four freshly scrubbed shrunken heads dangling from his rawhide belt.

“How did you . . . ,” Fritz began but was interrupted by Glenna.

“Don’t ask, Fritz,” she ordered sternly. “Some things are better left a secret.”

Charlie nodded in her direction. “Thank you, ma’am. Now it appears that my work is done here.” He turned to Nick. “If you need my help again, just tell Crow, and I’ll know.”

“Will do,” Nick answered.

The formidable Charlie Crowfoot exited the house before anyone could thank him.

“Just what is in store for us tonight?” Fritz asked his grandmother.

“A confrontation with the most powerful life-form seen on this Earth in the past four thousand years,” she replied bleakly.

Fritz shivered, but Hugo’s countenance was dead calm.

Nick spoke up. “Glenna, I think I might’ve figured out why your ancestors never found the cages in that spaceship for the small killer creatures.”

Her brows arched. “Really?”

“From what Crow told us, I believe those little creatures are the Cumalodin’s offspring.”

Her eyes widened in fear. “In that case, we could very well be facing an army of those monsters tonight.”

Nick sighed. “I’m afraid so. . . with Neo stuck right in the middle of the action. I sure hope you know what you’re doing, using him for bait like that. It’ll practically be impossible to rescue him.”

Glenna paled. “I didn’t count on facing more than one Cumalodin. Oh dear! We might be in for a tougher fight than I bargained for. I just pray we’re up to the task.”

Nick cleared his throat. “You told me earlier that you volunteered me to be the monster slayer tonight, but I’m not sure I could knock off one of those bad boy Cumalodins, much less an army of them,” he confessed.

Glenna put an arm around his waist. “Why Nick, dear, I wasn’t referring to the Cumalodin. I was referring to the shape-shifter.”

62

C

row and his entourage arrived outside the entrance to the
Old Mother Hubbard
’s secret computer center that was cleverly hidden in a small copse of maples and oaks. After locating the camouflaged access keypad to the underground facility, Crow neutralized the complex security network. In addition to being one of the most sophisticated electronic-security surveillance and counterattack systems in the world, it was a low-tech lattice of trip wires, pitfalls, and snares.

Crow punched in the access code, and the ground behind the keypad dropped away from them. A sloped, concrete walkway appeared that led down to the facility’s uppermost floor. The top level of the complex was barren concrete, except for a pair of elevator doors and another keypad.

When everyone was safely inside, Crow entered a second code, and the elevator doors slid apart and the opening above them closed. The four rode the swiftly descending car into the bowels of the complex. After what seemed like an eternity, the elevator braked and the opening doors revealed a brightly lit, cavernous maze of antiseptic, white corridors. Crow led them around the corner to the right, and they walked nearly a quarter of a mile before they reached a door stenciled with a single word:
Geronimo
.

Crow unlocked the door and admitted them into what appeared to be the heart of a computer. Three walls were stainless-steel and blanketed with beeping, blinking LCD lights, text and numeric diagnostic screens, and an army of printers. The fourth wall housed twenty various-sized, color plasma monitors. A solitary, ergonomically designed leather chair and a pedestal keyboard resembled a lonely outpost in the center of the vast room. A gridiron of recessed lights beamed down on the amazed visitors, with the strongest illumination directed on the vacant chair and keyboard.

“What a setup!” Jill exclaimed, who liked the feel of Crow’s arm wrapped around her waist. “You really created all this?”

He smiled modestly. “It was nothing. As a kid, I used to help Grandfather build teepees, so this was a piece of cake,” he quipped.

They welcomed the opportunity to laugh and release their tension. The stress from the summer’s terrible events strained their civility and sanity. Blossom’s high, exotic cheekbones were drawn and pale; her passionate, fiery eyes were reduced to dull, smoldering embers. Clay, still in the early recovery stages from his near-fatal bullet wound, was experiencing regression, not progression. Only Jill Sandlin remained enthusiastic, an upshot of her love for Crow.

Blossom examined the monitors. “Can we listen to this one?” she asked.

Crow obliged by verbally ordering Geronimo to increase the volume for the screen displaying CNN.

“. . . and all of Europe is in mourning for Germany’s late Chancellor Wilhelm Gerhardt and France’s late President Jean-Luc Vaugirard, as well as the plunging Eurodollar. Now, with the attack on the White House and President Hanover among the missing, the Americans have joined the world’s chaotic fraternity. At an unscheduled press conference moments ago, officials at the Pentagon just gave notice to the world that our defense readiness has been raised to DEFCON 3. This is a clear warning to our enemies that we remain in a state of readiness for any hostile strikes against the United States during this time of crisis, and we are ready to respond with deadly and decisive retaliatory measures.”

The CNN news anchor continued. “The White House has assured Americans that Vice President Donaldson is prepared to lead the country if the worst fears concerning President Hanover’s well-being become reality. We’ll have more on that press conference in a few minutes from our Washington correspondent, Leslie Kifer.

“Turning to the rest of the world, political unrest and financial turmoil are severely impacting the Far East, too, where . . .”

“Turn it off!” Blossom shouted, trembling. “It like the end of the world!”

Clay hugged her close as Geronimo muted the monitor.

Crow kissed Jill. “Geronimo and I have a lot of work to do before sunset,” he told her softly. “If you wouldn’t mind, could you take Blossom and Clay next door to the lunchroom and brew us all some coffee? It could be a rough night.”

She pecked his cheek. “Good luck, honey,” she whispered and guided the couple out of the computer command center.

When Crow parked himself in his leather chair, a large, retractable monitor rose out of the floor until it was perfectly positioned behind the pedestal keyboard. He gazed directly at the supercomputer’s programmed, Indian warrior face.