The Seraphim Sequence: The Fifth Column 2 (23 page)

She needed to know more about this schedule. If Seraphim was about to hit full capacity soon, then any city in the United States was a target. The riots were already spiraling out of control, possibly caused by Seraphim; she hated to think of what a Seraphim riot ten times that size would do. The Fifth Column would have their police state in no time.

Sophia snapped to attention when Grace called her. She must have dozed off just minutes after lying down. She was still fully clothed, pistol in hand. She got to her feet and stuffed her pistol in her waistband, then opened the door into the adjacent room.

Grace’s gaze was fixated on the wall-mounted television. Schlosser was at the desk, watching over his glasses. Grace didn’t take her eyes off the screen, just pointed at it with the remote. Sophia walked over to get a look. Onscreen was Cecilia McLoughlin. The last person she expected to see. Mainly because she’d shot her dead.

‘This is old footage, right?’ Sophia said.

Cecilia stood before a glass podium wearing a lavender jacket over a navy blue top. Her hair was cut slightly shorter and her lips curled into a suspect smile as she spoke. There was no mistaking her identity.

‘When was this shot?’ Sophia said, rubbing sleep from her eyes. ‘How did it leak?’

Grace’s voice was low. ‘This isn’t a leak. Delayed broadcast.’

‘Delayed?’ Sophia said. ‘Months? Years?’

Grace shook her head. ‘A few hours.’

Sophia’s mind reeled. Her brain still felt sticky inside and it took her a moment to fully comprehend that Cecilia was staring at her through the television. Publicly visible. She felt a chill run across her arms and neck.

The title under Cecilia’s face read
FEMA Administrator
. She stood in a large control room littered with desks, computers, phones and blue office chairs. The wall behind her was mounted with a grid of televisions and two flags: the American flag and a blue and white Department of Homeland Security flag.

‘She’s talking about you,’ Grace said, thumbing up the volume with the remote.

‘Sophia is a messiah for the delusional,’ Cecilia said. ‘In times of great confusion, men, women and children look for hope, and they sometimes look in strange places. It is important we all understand that the man behind the Sophia fairytale, Gabriel Denton, has an extensive history of mental disorder and has received treatment in the past for his conditions. These stories are nothing new for him and should be seen for what they are.’

‘No,’ Sophia said. ‘That’s not possible. She’s not alive.’

‘She’s responding to questions about Denton’s speech on YouTube,’ Grace said.

‘I watched her die,’ Sophia said. ‘I killed her.’

Someone offscreen, a journalist perhaps, asked Cecilia a question. ‘Is there any truth to Denton’s accusations of a clandestine government that is not held accountable, that is unofficial?’

‘We must acknowledge the deep psychological underpinnings of someone who believes in conspiracy theories,’ Cecilia said. ‘And we must also understand that it is comforting to construct explanations for disasters, to weave a matrix beneath a series of innocuous events. Perhaps it is somehow reassuring for Denton, for Sophia and her simple-minded followers, to believe there is a clandestine institution pulling the strings in the shadows, rather than to accept that random devastation can happen for no reason. This is a terrible realization and not everyone has the courage to face that.’

Sophia felt her fingernails digging into her palms. She opened her fists.

‘No one from the Fifth Column’s ever shown their faces publicly before,’ she said.

‘Except Denton,’ Grace said. ‘And now her. What the hell’s happening?’

‘Sophia has herself undergone treatment for Oppositional Defiant Disorder, a recently formulated disorder that gives credit to Sophia’s mental state for its discovery. Sophia has a history of negativity, defiance, disobedience, anger, hostility toward authority, disrupting those around her with strange theories and frequent loss of temper. This disorder has been clinically diagnosed and goes some way to explaining her extremist views, paranoid mindset and her violent criminal behavior, as we have witnessed at the shopping-mall massacre in Manila.’

‘The bitch created a mental disorder just for me?’ Sophia said.

‘You should be flattered,’ Grace said.

‘Have they shown my photo yet?’

‘A grainy one lifted from a security camera,’ Grace said. ‘It wasn’t a good angle, but you should keep your head down all the same. Cecilia is rolling out a new security program in three days across the US.’

‘Did she elaborate?’ Sophia said.

Grace shook her head. ‘Not a word. You think it’s Seraphim?’

Sophia bit her lip. ‘I hope not.’

Grace looked at her. ‘Hoping won’t help.’

There was a knock on the door. Sophia walked over and checked the fisheye. It was Freeman.

‘You look ready to kill someone,’ he said when she let him in. ‘A bit sooner than I expected.’

Grace answered for her. ‘You will be too. Take a look.’ She nodded toward the television.

‘Who’s with you?’ Sophia asked Freeman.

‘Nasira will be,’ he said. ‘She’s next door with—fuck me dead. That’s not old footage, is it?’

Grace shook her head. ‘I’m afraid not.’

‘Where has she placed herself? FEMA?’

‘Officially,’ Grace said, closing the door behind him and locking it.

‘Why would she go public?’ Freeman said. ‘Bloody hell.’

Schlosser was watching the screen intently now. ‘Is this bad for us?’

Sophia nodded absently. ‘I can’t imagine it improving our situation.’

‘Who is she?’ Schlosser asked.

‘The brains behind Project GATE,’ Sophia said. When she realized Schlosser was just as confused as before, she explained further. ‘The project that activated pseudogenes in our bodies. It’s where the Chimera vectors came from.’

‘You mean the bio-terrorist attack?’ Schlosser said.

Sophia rolled her eyes. ‘That’s what they’re telling people now?’

Freeman shrugged. ‘It’s the story they ran with. You’re a bio-terrorist, apparently with an extensive history of mental disorder.’

‘Right, of course.’ Sophia returned her attention to Schlosser. ‘The Chimera vectors: one activates genes that assist in enhanced regeneration from injury and disease. The other sterilizes those who possess the psychopath genes, whether the genes are active or latent.’

‘There are genes for psychopaths now?’ Schlosser’s mouth hung open.

‘Not really a new thing,’ Freeman said. ‘According to Cecilia here, they’ve been around since Neanderthals mixed with Cro-Magnons or comets rained viruses on us. Something like that.’

‘You put these two Chimera vectors together and the regeneration goes into overdrive,’ Sophia said. ‘Increases your life expectancy twofold, threefold—we don’t really know how long for humans.’

‘Immortality?’ Schlosser said.

‘Not quite, but it does switch on a gene—DAF 16—which is more or less like an elixir of life. Sends a nice little package of instructions for repair and renovation of genes. Your supply of natural antioxidants goes up, damping down the free radicals.’

‘I thought the elixir of life was a fantasy,’ Schlosser said.

‘Far from it,’ Sophia said. ‘It boosts compounds that improve skin and muscle-building proteins, and the immune system gets an overhaul. It becomes incredibly proficient at fighting cancer and infection—which can be problematic when your fast regeneration is healing wounds before you can get to a hospital in time to clean them.’

Grace was looking at Sophia. They were both thinking the same thing.

‘Cecilia—’ Grace began.

‘She took the Chimera vectors,’ Sophia said. ‘Before I shot her. Two rounds through the heart. That must be how she survived.’

Freeman blinked. ‘How is that even possible? A gunshot wound, that’s pretty devastating to the body, the trauma—’

‘She could if she took both,’ Grace said. ‘Her body could heal the damage from the wounds, replenish the lost blood. Depending on whether Sophia’s rounds severed her spinal cord.’

‘They were 45-caliber rounds from a pistol,’ Sophia said. ‘Not likely.’

‘You would need sophisticated medical equipment on hand within minutes for someone who hadn’t injected the Chimera vectors,’ Freeman said.

‘And someone with?’ Sophia asked.

He shook his head. ‘Maybe ten minutes, fifteen?’

‘Someone must have helped her,’ Sophia said. ‘After we all left. After Denton left.’

‘Why didn’t he just put an extra round into her head?’ Grace said.

‘I suppose he had other things on his mind,’ Sophia said. ‘Like getting out alive.’

She paused, turning scenarios around in her mind. Everyone was silent, probably doing the same.

‘I don’t think Denton’s worked for the Fifth Column since,’ she said.

Grace nodded. ‘I’m willing to bet he’s rogue now, just like us.’

‘Is that good or bad?’ Schlosser asked.

‘Depends,’ Sophia said. ‘A psychopath like Denton will destroy you instrumentally if you’re in the way of something he wants immediately. But he’ll forget you once he has a new desire that doesn’t involve you.’

‘Cecilia’s different,’ Freeman said. ‘She can think abstractly, plan far into the future. Something most psychopaths can’t do. Cecilia will destroy you if you threaten something long-term.’

Grace’s watch beeped. ‘Sixteen hundred,’ she said. ‘I’m clocking out.’

Freeman gave her a curt nod. ‘Grab some sleep next door.’

‘I might get some food first, I haven’t eaten today,’ she said.

Under the hotel owner’s specific instructions, these rooms were not to be disturbed by staff, not even with room service. If anyone wanted food, two people needed to go downstairs to retrieve it.

‘Take Nasira, she’s next door. Her shift starts and she needs the energy,’ Freeman said.

‘Roger that.’

Sophia watched Grace leave. ‘It’s my shift, I’ll watch Schlosser,’ she said. ‘Did you make contact with the skipper from the submarine?’

Freeman nodded. ‘We’re lucky. The sub was near the surface for communication. They’re already on their way, they’ll be here by sundown.’

He handed her a piece of paper printed with the words
YOUR FEEDBACK IS MOST APPRECIATED
. Under it, he’d scribbled GPS coordinates in blue pen. ‘They’ll be waiting at this location for forty-eight hours.’

‘We’ll need some scuba gear. And a boat,’ Sophia said. ‘We should do this tomorrow night.’

Freeman’s mind was back on Cecilia. ‘She has to be running Project Seraphim,’ he said. ‘She wanted Schlosser dead.’

The scientist was still watching the television even though it had changed to a news update.

‘They have just made America a no-fly zone,’ he said. ‘I didn’t know they could even do that.’

‘Doctor,’ Sophia said, walking over to him, ‘is there anything else you know that Cecilia doesn’t want us to find out?’

He pinched his nose and dug out a plastic card from his wallet. ‘This.’

Sophia took the card. It was an access card. ‘What does this get me into?’ she asked.

‘Nothing any more.’ Schlosser’s shoulders slumped. ‘I do not know if it is of use to you, but it used to give me access to the Seraphim installation in Alaska.’

Sophia thought of Benito’s Interceptors, which were in DC’s daypack.

‘It still might come in handy,’ she said. ‘This card was able to get you to the transmitter controls?’

Schlosser nodded. ‘Radio frequency identification. But I think they would have revoked my access by now. The card will be dead. Sorry I cannot give you more.’

It occurred to Sophia that Schlosser might have an RFID implanted under his skin. The Fifth Column commonly injected them into operatives and employees alike, and she doubted they removed them when employment ended. She reached for the pressel switch on her radio, under the collar of her T-shirt.

‘Nasira, I need you right now,’ she said. ‘Center room.’

No response.

‘Grace, is she with you?’ Sophia said.

‘Negative,’ Grace said. ‘Getting dressed.’

‘Can you get her?’ Sophia said.

She seized Schlosser’s left arm and felt along the underside with her thumb. Freeman was moving for the door. She found a tiny lump, like a hard grain of rice.

‘We have an RFID,’ she said.

Freeman paused, the door open a crack.

‘My knives are next door,’ Sophia said to him. ‘Sterilize one.’

‘You got it.’ He stepped through the dividing door and locked it behind him.

Schlosser’s eyes were on her now. ‘Phoenix,’ he said. ‘The men who took me.’

‘I’m sorry?’ Sophia said.

‘They want the Phoenix.’

‘What do you mean?’ she said. ‘What’s—’

Schlosser’s face shattered. The crack of a rifle reverberated outside, rolling off the sand and the treetops. Sophia dropped back into a ball.

She uncurled behind the bed. Blood covered her hands and face. Schlosser lay slumped in front of her, half his head torn off. Her heart went into overdrive. It took an extra second for the adrenaline to hit her bloodstream, but when it did she was ready. Her fingers shook. She flexed them. One hand was already reaching for her pistol. Her stomach was twisting in panic. She couldn’t see properly, Schlosser’s blood burned in her eyes. She forced back the need to vomit, heard a small bang from outside. Det-cord on the front door.

She moved on her elbows to the end of the bed and aimed at the intruder. With her hands still shaking, she went for center of mass. Nothing. Except the two grenades that landed in front of the other bed, between her and the front door. They weren’t smoke or flash. If she stayed here, it would be the last thing she ever did.

She considered throwing them back, but there were two, and this had to be a shocktrooper. The grenade would be cooked. She had two seconds at most. The balcony was closest. The safety glass had already shattered from the round that killed Schlosser. There was a chance the shooter was covering it. It came down to weighing up the risks.

She ran through the door with a low kick. The glass buckled and peeled as she pushed through. She jumped the balcony, letting her pistol drop; there was no time to fidget getting it into her jeans. Her fine motor skills were gone. She gripped the railing and hung on, checked the distance below. There was only one balcony below her and then the ground floor. She needed to—

The grenade detonated.