The Chimera Vector (45 page)

‘Protesters?’ Denton whispered.

Gunfire erupted in front of them.

‘Contact!’ Denton said.

It was Denton doing the firing. Jay stood to shoot over Denton’s crouched figure, but it was too late. Whoever it was had disappeared before Denton could drop them.

‘Right,’ Denton said. ‘So the escorts know we’re coming.’

Jay checked over his shoulder again. No one had come near the security door. He hoped whoever it was didn’t have access.

‘OK, this corridor moves in an oval shape,’ Denton said. ‘Damien, you’re with me. Jay, advance and hold back until we’re in sight.’

‘Fine,’ Jay said. ‘Hurry.’

He watched them move forward, then dart to the left, branching off into the other side of the headquarters—or administrative level or whatever the hell this place was. He wiped sweat from his forehead, slowed his breathing and moved forward. Slowly this time. He shifted to the right wall and kept his knees slightly bent. With every step he tried to minimize the bounce in his aim, half-expecting someone to appear around the corner and open fire.

The whole level seemed to have been evacuated, or at least the secure section of it. There was just lots of glass and plastered wall. The floor was white marble, or fake white marble. He couldn’t tell which.

Why was Denton really doing this?

Denton and Damien were in position much quicker than he expected. Denton was in the lead, two steps from the corner Jay supposed the escort had appeared from. He moved up to the end of the corner, checked the chamber on his carbine. He nodded to Denton.

Denton counted off.

Together they turned into the new corridor.

No one.

The corridor was quite short, with just a double door at the end.

Denton shifted closer to Jay. ‘Conference room on the other side.’

Jay nodded. He knew Damien would have heard even from a meter back.

Denton turned to Damien and tapped his ear. Damien nodded and moved silently forward.

Denton and Jay took up back-to-back positions while they waited. Jay was facing Damien. He saw him move in close to the door and put his ear to it. He remained there for a moment, then retreated. Instead of speaking he held up his fingers. One thumb, two fingers. He could hear three people.

Denton tapped his carbine and raised his eyebrows.

Damien pointed to the ceiling with one thumb and one finger. He extended his arm up high, indicating carbines, not pistols.

Denton nodded, reached for his fancy flashbang gadget.

Counting it in, Jay checked his chamber and took a deep breath. Damien opened the door just enough. Jay watched their back while Denton tossed the grenade in. No one was immediately within his field of view, so Jay retreated. He let his carbine hang by its shoulder strap, shut his eyes and covered his ears.

The sound wasn’t too bad, but the flash—even through his eyelids—blinded him. He dropped to his knees, the light searing his vision. He opened his eyes slowly, but all he could see was white.

He could hear Denton and Damien moving into the conference room. There were two short bursts of gunfire. Had they cleared the conference room or had they surrendered?

Jay heard someone approach and pull him to his feet. The white flash slowly faded, revealing Damien’s concerned face.

‘Are you OK?’ Damien said.

‘Yeah,’ Jay said. ‘Must’ve gotten too close.’

He followed Damien carefully into the conference room. It had a high ceiling with six domed lights. It was like the Knights of the Round Table in here: everything was expensive oak and fancy black and white marble-tiled floors. It reminded him of a chess table. Two Blue Beret bodyguards lay in dark pools of their own blood, one on their immediate right, the other near the third man, who sat comfortably at the table with a glass of wine and a laptop. A pistol lay on the marble between the man and Jay’s trio.

Damien closed the double doors behind them and secured them with two pairs of plasticuffs, which should stop anything short of a battering ram.

Denton aimed his carbine at the man at the table. ‘Where are they?’

The man lowered the glass of red from his mouth. ‘I know why you’ve come, Denton, but I’m sorry to say your sojourn may be in vain.’

He moved the bottle so he could study his new guests. Jay peered closer at the bottle: Château Margaux
.
He moved forward so he was standing beside Denton.

‘Who is he?’ he asked.

‘The only six-star general in existence,’ Denton said. ‘Commander-in-Chief of the Fifth Column. And he was supposed to be in company.’

The General laughed. ‘Do you really think I would be entertaining guests at this . . . volatile location? Especially men such as the Benefactors.’ He sipped his wine. ‘All in one place. That would be far too dangerous given the current circumstances.’

Jay walked down the steps to the round table and raised his carbine at the General. ‘Here’s the deal. You tell us the truth and we’ll be on our way.’

The General’s eyes, set in a lined, exhausted face, lingered on him. ‘I don’t deal in truth, young man. And I certainly don’t make deals with toy soldiers.’

‘But you deal in reality,’ Damien said, coming to stand beside Jay. ‘Reality is what you say it is, right?’

The General’s lips grew taut. ‘If you like.’

Jay shook his head. ‘There’s not a chance in hell you’ll be able to keep Project GATE secret. Not forever.’

‘And why is that?’ The General grinned, a fissure in his otherwise granite expression. ‘We developed the first atomic bomb in complete secrecy. Hundreds of thousands of employees, dozens of facilities, the equivalent of tens of billions of dollars. For Christ’s sake, son, if we can keep that a secret we can keep
anything
a secret.’

‘You miserable son of a bitch,’ Jay said. He felt anger boiling inside him, but didn’t want to give the General the satisfaction of seeing it. ‘What gives you the right?’

The General exhaled. ‘We don’t need the right. We don’t need anything.’ He looked over at Denton, still standing near the double doors. ‘Not the brightest operative, is he?’

Jay felt his fist close over. ‘I’m not an operative. That ship has sailed.’

‘No,’ the General said. ‘At this rate, you’ll likely be a dead one.’

‘Speak for yourself,’ Jay said.

‘I speak from experience,’ the General said. ‘People like us run the world not just by chance but because we’re the only ones capable of doing it. We know your flaws. We know you better than you know yourselves. Our sense of honor compels us to take command, to guide the weak through times as dark as these. And our sense of humor compels us to enjoy it.’ He started to laugh.

Jay leaned over the round table. He could smell the man’s cloying cologne. ‘The times are dark because you made them dark,’ he said.

He turned to Denton, who seemed to be enjoying the show too much to say anything. ‘Aside from putting this sick bastard out of his misery, why did you really bring us here?’ Jay asked. ‘What’s the point?’

‘You wanted to know about your past.’ Denton walked down the steps towards the table. ‘Perhaps you’d like to show the young man the debrief of his first operation?’

The General didn’t say a word. He exhaled slowly, with disappointment, then pulled up the debrief on his laptop.

Denton leveled his carbine at the General. ‘I want to see every keystroke.’

The General sighed and turned the laptop screen so Denton could look over his shoulder at a five-meter distance. Once he was done, he shoved the laptop across the table. Denton picked it up and returned to Jay and Damien, placing the laptop before them. The screen displayed a list of files—records from Project GATE.

Jay recognized them as a complete list of his operations. This’ll be interesting, he thought. He scrolled down to the first operation and opened it.

OPERATIVE 0134: JAY CARDOSO

OPERATION PACIFICADOR

DATE: 2007–12–29

TARGET/S: ASSASSINATION JESUINO CARDOSO; MARCELA CARDOSO

OPERATION NOTES: FRAME ASSASSINATION TO APPEAR AS BOPE RAID

EQUIPMENT: x1 IMBEL 9X19 PARABELLUM DESIGNATED M973

OUTCOME: SUCCESSFUL. OPERATIVE 0134 PROMOTED FROM RECRUIT TO OPERATIVE STATUS

Jay could feel his fingers shaking. His chest trembled as he breathed. He wanted to take that bottle of wine and punch the end of it through the General’s windpipe. He didn’t know how long he could suppress the urge to drive the cartilage from the General’s nose right into that twisted brain of his.

Instead of shooting the General in the face, he retreated, sat down on the cold marble floor, head between his legs, fingernails digging into his scalp.

‘Is this some sort of sick joke?’ he said.

‘Every operative’s first operation is to kill their parents,’ the General said. ‘It’s the only reliable way to test your programming.’

Jay forced himself to stand. He locked gazes with the General.

The General turned to Denton. ‘And why are you here? Surely not just to put these grunts out of their misery.’

‘You’re a liability, General,’ Denton said. ‘And you’re getting sloppy. Two years ago, I would never have caught you here with so few soldiers to ensure your security. Of course, you’re probably going to tell me you wanted me to make it this far so you could entrap me.’

‘So you say.’ The General leaned back in his chair, hands clasped.

‘And that probably would’ve worked too. But I’m not the only one gunning for you, General.’ Denton smiled. ‘Cecilia McLoughlin has plans for you also.’

The General appeared mildly surprised. ‘So she’s alive. Interesting.’

‘Cecilia and I don’t agree on much,’ Denton said. ‘But what we do agree on is that your decisions are irrational and your tactics are far from subtle. You’ve had me create as many terrorist groups as there are terrorist acts; you’ve ordered me to kill bin Laden four times. I’m pretty sure no one believed the last one. You’re desperate, dysfunctional and you need to be removed.’

‘The Benefactors will not look kindly upon your transgression,’ the General said.

‘What about me?’ Jay squeezed the trigger on his carbine and blew the General’s brains across the marble floor.

‘Job well done, Jay,’ Denton said. ‘How do you feel?’

‘Like I’ve been hit by a truck.’

‘That’s the truth for you.’

Denton pulled out a knife, walked over to the General’s body and cut off a finger.

‘What the fuck are you doing?’ Jay said.

‘What does it look like?’ Denton said.

Damien looked up from his own records on the laptop. ‘So that’s it then? You brought us here to show us how we killed our own parents.’

‘You wanted the truth,’ Denton said. ‘I owed you that much.’

‘You owe us nothing,’ Jay said.

Denton pocketed the severed finger and walked up the steps towards the double doors.

‘Where the fuck are you going?’ Jay realized he was shouting.

Denton paused at the doors. ‘If you boys want to stay alive, I suggest you hurry along.’

Chapter 51

Benito had been stowed inside a Speedhawk with Nasira, to be shipped to God knows where for God knew what. The last he saw of Sophia was a hood and earmuffs being thrown on her as she was hauled into the back of a separate helicopter. Smoke choked his nostrils. He couldn’t see because of the blindfold, but it sounded like he was in the middle of a war zone.

He felt warm blood slide down his neck. It smelled coppery. Someone collapsed on top of him, knocking his blindfold off one eye. One of the Blue Berets. He reached for the man’s weapon, a compact little submachine gun. He didn’t know how to use it but he held it tight for now.

He pulled away from the dead soldier. The Speedhawk was on its side. Its tail had destroyed a section of chain-link fence that was mounted in concrete barriers. Benito saw movement on the left edge of his vision. He lined up the submachine gun to fire, then recognized Nasira staggering towards him.

She unsheathed a knife from the fallen Blue Beret and severed her plasticuffs, then moved to cut his, noticing that he was holding the submachine gun. At precisely the same moment, he noticed something as well. Off to his right. Someone else with a submachine gun. Adrenaline gushed through him. He pointed his weapon and punched the trigger. It bucked in his hand, kicking rounds high into the Speedhawk’s spine.

Nasira pushed his weapon down. He peered through cloudy vision. A body convulsed on the sidewalk outside, stomach glistening. Black fatigues, helmet. Blurs of people rushed past the body, screaming and yelling.

He turned to Nasira, offering her the submachine gun. Clearly, she’d do better with it than he would. She took it carefully, motioned for him to stay low as she moved outside.

Benito dropped down just as a round cracked over his shoulder. It sounded like someone was attacking him with a whip. At least he wasn’t deaf.

They were in the middle of a war zone. Soldiers in pale blue helmets shuffled together in bursts of movement while men and women threw rocks and bottles at the soldiers. What the hell was going on?

Nasira got his attention, pointed for him to follow her along the Speedhawk and between a crashed helicopter and crumpled gates. He did exactly as he was told, his legs jittery and his heart thumping in his ears. Out on the street, protesters were fighting police officers. He looked up at the shiny buildings that reached into the sky and realized the Speedhawk had brought them to New York of all places. That explained the extended flight time.

‘Where’s Sophia?’ he yelled at Nasira.

‘Back! Back!’ she shouted, pulling him in beside the toppled Speedhawk.

The soldiers in blue helmets had retreated further, pushed back by protesters. He could see some of the civilians were armed with pistols. They were firing them at the soldiers. One of the protesters was lying on the ground holding his stomach. A pool of blood gathered around him. Benito wanted to throw up. But Nasira pushed him through a gap in the protesters and between some white Land Cruisers and a tank-like vehicle.