Cosega Sphere (The Cosega Sequence Book 4) (15 page)

Rip stumbled away from his INU. Cira, their innocent child, was now in the hands of one of his mortal enemies. There had been no choice.

There’s always a choice
, he thought.
At least she’s alive.
Gale will be destroyed.

Booker had said he’d contact people in the Foundation to plead for Cira. “Just keep her stable. Save her eyesight,” he’d tell them. “Gale and Rip might make a deal, but not until the girl is healed. They couldn’t possibly do one now while it was unsafe to move Cira.”

It might work. The Eysen-Sphere was a huge bargaining chip. However, Rip had absolutely no doubt that the secretive trillionaire would never trade the Sphere, even to save his own child.

There was a strange glow emanating from the Sphere, the kind the full moon had on foggy winter nights. He’d never seen it look quite like that. Then the room filled with blue mist. Not just projected light, but actual cool, moist air. Rip lost the Sphere in the fog. For a moment, he wasn’t sure it was safe to breathe in the mist, but then he had to, and it entered his lungs through an involuntary inhale.

Everything went strange. He couldn’t tell where the floor was, or even where up was, lost in an avalanche of thick, colored, now purple, fog, having passed through deep shades of teal, indigo, and finally, violet. Then the rush of sound began, like a volcano, or as if ocean waves were crashing all around the skyroom. Rip had no idea where he was, no logical explanation for what was happening.

Minutes passed, maybe even hours. Explaining the event later, he would say that if he’d come out of that fog days later, it would not have surprised him. When absolute quiet overtook the roar of volcanic waves, he realized the mist had become black. It terrified him for an instant as he considered the vacuum in which he found himself. All that had happened must have been his death.
Seeing Cira captured was too much for me. In my overwhelming grief and stress, I had a heart attack and died. Damn it… I let my family down.

Then he saw a face. She was lovely, but the image before him did not belong to Gale or Cira. He did not recognize her; young, thin, with intelligent eyes. As she came more fully into his view, all that he could see was the woman and where she stood in a dark room, filled with stars and a large glowing planet.

But, that’s no planet
, he thought.
It’s the Eysen-Sphere!
Who is she? How did she get the Sphere? Is this a dream?

Rip was agitated. Nothing like this had ever happened. He knew the Sphere was able to show the future. He’d even been projected into the future, and the past, as a holographic figure. Those episodes had allowed him to interact with people of the time where he’d “gone.” The era’s inhabitants had mostly been startled, even afraid of him, but a few, on specific occasions, in both the past and future, had almost expected him.

But this didn’t feel like those situations.
It feels like now, immediate in the breath I just took,
he thought, alarmed, unable to see the Sphere through the fog. On those other “trips” he’d been completely immersed, able to see every detail as if he were a current resident of where and when he had found himself.

Pushing through the black mist, Rip tried to walk to the Sphere, but there was nothing firm under his feet. He dropped onto his hands and knees to what he believed was the floor, but he really wasn’t sure. It felt more like standing on a waterbed covered with silk and sand. Trying to crawl, then attempting to swim, to the Sphere proved futile. All the while the young woman stared into the Sphere in front of her as if seeing the most amazing images.

“It is now?” Rip shouted. He didn’t know how he knew it, but he did.
And she isn’t here on El Perdido. She has another Eysen-Sphere.
Is it Clastier’s? Or Malachy’s?
He didn’t know, but he knew where it had come from.

The Vatican. Booker had tried, ever since the Church collapsed, to locate and acquire artifacts related to Cosega and other items from their secret archives with little success. The Church had long seen the end coming and had prepared well: secrets hidden, treasures buried, waiting until the “second coming,” when the force of the Vatican’s concealed collections could empower those who would resurrect Catholicism. Rip knew too much about the next hundred years to know that was not going to happen, but beyond that . . . it was hard to say.

But the Catholic Church didn’t care about decades or even a few centuries. They dealt in millennia, and the world was a constantly changing creation. Anything could happen given enough time and the right circumstances.

Rip stood, at least that’s what he thought he was doing, shrouded in the blackness. Somehow he believed the woman could see him. The Spheres’ connecting with each other had been an early lesson, but he had searched and found nothing.

How did she locate me?
And then he panicked.
Who is she working for? Does she know where I am physically?
He thought about stopping Gale from coming.
Agents could be heading to El Perdido at this very moment!

As Kruse lunged out of the crew’s quarters, he saw the bodies of the two now unconscious federal agents, bound with zip-cuffs . Gale followed closely, and saw, even before Kruse did, that two other men were keeping the crew and passengers down and quiet.

“Kruse, this way,” one of them yelled.

“AX agents,” he mouthed to Gale, as they started briskly down the aisles. Dread quickly replaced Gale’s brief sense of relief, imagining the gauntlet that lay ahead.

Two more AX agents waited at the front of the plane, where the door was already opened and joined to the gate’s gangway.

“How did you get here?” Kruse asked.

“We were on the plane the whole time,” one of them answered. “The boss doesn’t like to take chances. But we were unarmed, and had to wait until they rushed the door to act.”

“Just in time,” Kruse said as they ran down the gangway. “Thanks!”

One of the agents stayed on the plane to stop an immediate rush of panicked passengers toward the exits. The other three hurried Gale and Kruse to the restroom, one remaining in the hall for cover as the others all dashed inside. Kruse remembered this room and its tunnel from Booker’s instructions.

“The pilot and one of the feds had both called in from the plane,” one of the agents said as they used the code to unlock the maintenance door.  “We may be only ninety seconds ahead of an army of pursuers.”

Once in that tunnel, they were only fifty yards from freedom. Rounding the last turn before the exit which led to Booker’s plane, they ran into a security guard. Kruse barreled into the man, instantly knocking him down.

The security guard seemed oblivious to the fact that he had just stumbled upon one of the world’s most wanted people, but was upset to be knocked over. “Hey!” he yelled as he tried to get up. Just as his radio announced the highest-level emergency code, one of the AX agents put him back down on the ground, where he would stay until medical attention arrived.

Kruse and Gale burst through the door and raced for the plane. Its engines were on, and the plane was already slowly rolling. They expected to be dodging bullets, but all seemed clear. They timed their steps and Kruse helped Gale jump onto the folded, extended staircase as the plane picked up speed. She heard Kruse land behind her, then he was pushing her up toward the entrance.

As she reached the top step, about to duck inside, she turned around and realized that it wasn’t Kruse behind her. It was one of the other AX agents. She glanced around and saw Kruse sprinting back into the airport.
One last fight
, she thought, as the agent shoved Gale into the plane and pulled the hatch shut.

“Happy you could make it,” the pilot said. “We’ve been cleared for take-off.”

“It still might get rough,” the AX agent said to Gale. “Better buckle up.”

“Where are we going?” Gale asked, still afraid to trust anyone.

“El Perdido,” the man replied. “I believe Rip is waiting there for you.”

Gale smiled as she buckled up, but she worried about Kruse. Although furious at what he had done, she knew she owed him her life many times over, and there was a very good chance that he would not live through the day.

—O—

Murik and Rathmore watched in disbelief as images streamed into the NSA situation room in Fort Meade, Maryland.

“That’s Gale Asher,” Rathmore said. “No question about it. What the hell is she doing in Hawaii?”

“Leaving in a hurry,” Murik said, pointing to satellite footage of the plane that security video had just showed her climbing into, now rolling toward takeoff.

“Bang-bang, you’re dead, fifty bullets in your head,” Rathmore said. “She’s not going anywhere. I’ll have that runway blocked in less than a minute.” He began shouting orders into another line, but the Conductor interrupted.

“Let her go,” she said.

“Are you crazy? I’m not letting her go!” Rathmore argued. Then he had to clarify his order to federal agents at the airport.

“Where do you think she’s going?” the Conductor asked calmly from the backseat of a black SUV racing toward Honolulu International Airport. It was her operation, but Rathmore had the final say.

“How the hell should I know? She’s running for her life. I can’t believe she flew to US soil in the first place, and on a commercial airline!” He laughed. “Maybe she
wants
to get caught.”

“She’s trying to get to Gaines,” the Conductor said.

“Right,” Murik agreed. “Why Hawaii? She could have flown in
any
direction. She’d lost us. She was
free
. Why fly into Hawaii, even if she didn’t know about the massive presence of agents and military personnel? It’s the United States, and she isn’t crazy.”

“She’s going to Gaines,” the Conductor repeated. “Gaines was here yesterday. He may not be far from here.”

“Maybe she thinks he’s still in Hawaii. Maybe he still is,” Rathmore said as Gale’s plane moved closer to the runway. Trucks were on standby to block it, military jets ready to scramble.

“That Gulfstream was waiting for her,” the Conductor continued. “She wasn’t planning to stay here, she was just switching planes. Let her go.”

“Oh,” Rathmore breathed, finally catching up to her thinking. “Let her go and she’ll lead us to Gaines.”

“That’s the idea,” the Conductor said. “She’s our best chance to find him and the Sphere.”

“I completely agree,” Murik added. “We can have half a dozen Navy jets in the air tailing her from a safe distance. Let’s see where she goes.”

Rathmore didn’t like to gamble. He knew getting Gale Asher to talk would not be easy. He already had authorization to torture her if necessary, but the moment she was captured, Gaines would most likely flee his current location, knowing she might crack.

Then again, Rathmore couldn’t resist the chance to finally be ahead of the leech. They could lock this down and have the situation wrapped up in a matter of hours.

“If this goes bad,” Rathmore said, looking from Murik to the Conductor on the monitor, “you are both sharing the blame when the Director wants blood.”

The Conductor nodded. “What about King?”

“I have my own director to deal with,” Murik said, referring to the CIA Director, but the NSA had the lead on this one because of HITE. Back in the late forties, and through most of the fifties, HITE had belonged to the CIA. Under the Kennedy administration, it was moved to the NSA. The Eysen-Sphere was the most advanced piece of technology ever known, and the NSA believed that the future stability of the world depended on who possessed it. Booker and the Foundation knew for a fact that it did. The Sphere owned the future, and both were determined to keep it out of the other’s hands.

“No one outside this room needs to know yet,” Rathmore said, answering all their questions. He motioned to the Vax analyst. “Track everything. If any data about Gale Asher, airplanes, or even the State of Hawaii moves, I want the report. Clear?”

“Yes sir,” the analyst said.

“If we’re lucky,” Rathmore began, “we’ll get Asher. If we’re not, at least we’ll flush out the damned leech. Now let’s do this!”

Harmer had done everything possible to avoid leaving Cira without actually endangering the child. Now she sat, dejected and bruised, on a private plane speeding toward Hawaii and Foundation interrogation. Harmer knew where the rendezvous point was. She had lived with them on El Perdido in those early years. The Foundation would eventually employ torture experts to extract the information from her. Booker would know that, and he would have BLAX, the dark ops section of AX, come for her.

If they can’t rescue me, they’ll make sure I’m dead before I can talk,
she thought.
It’s for the best.
Thinking of Booker brought her some inner peace.

Taz had excused himself to check the update. Cira was an issue. Booker Lipton had already been in touch with top Foundation members to make a case for leaving her put, but Stellard and Taz knew the NSA would be there soon, and if the little girl were still there, they would take her. The Foundation needed Cira because her parents, like most parents, would do anything to save their child. But if the Foundation caused her permanent blindness, that would make things more difficult.

Still, she wouldn’t be dead,
Taz thought,
and that’s better than nothing.

Stellard and Taz agreed to utilize the same strategy that AX had used: hide the girl behind the phony supply closet. In the meantime, they would rely on their contacts within the NSA and the CIA to warn them if the agencies were close to moving on the hospital. Wattington would also work to promote a diversion that would transfer attention away from Fiji. A fabricated but reliable Gale Asher sighting should do it.

But who would report it, and where?
they wondered
.
Developing a plausible story became a top priority.

Taz apologized to Dabnowski, who was growing impatient with him. Dabnowski believed Taz was “in way over his head.” If it weren’t for Dabnowski’s need to have the cooperation and protection of the Foundation, he would have already left.

“You were saying?” Taz prompted. “About the Sphere?”

“This is not a latent artifact created by some afore-unknown advanced prehistoric civilization,” Dabnowski said, pushing his eyeglasses up on the bridge of his sweaty nose. “I mean it is that, of course, but it is infinitely
more
. It proves everything that we do not know. It didn’t just show us the
Cosega
part ‘before the beginning,’ that what people believed about the Bible, about religion in general, was false. It showed that our
whole
history
was false. Everything we thought we knew about where we came from, who we are, what we are, it’s all wrong.”

“I get that much.”

“Good,” Dabnowski said, allowing the brief beginnings of a smile. “I doubt you’ll ‘get’ much more than that.” He tried not to sound or appear condescending, but the truth was that Dabnowski, an astrophysicist, and his peers, some of the greatest minds in the scientific community, also had a hard time with the rest of it. “Because as mind-boggling as all that is,” Dabnowski continued, his face lighting up, “it’s the
Eysen
aspect of the Sphere, the ‘to hold all the stars in your hand’ part that really bends reality, distorts time, and connects
everything.”
 

Taz looked at him, wondering if this nut would ever get to the point. “I know the Sphere is amazing. Why do you think we’re moving heaven and Earth to get the damned thing?” Taz wanted to move along and either get something that would help him locate Gaines and the Sphere, or, barring that, go pursue another lead. “So tell me about the telescopes. You never finished that.”

“Is there someone else I can talk to?” Dabnowski asked, exasperated. “No disrespect, but if you don’t understand what it is you’re after, how can you ever hope to find it?” Dabnowski asked this knowing that there was no chance in the world a person like Taz could ever “understand” the Sphere, but someone at the Foundation obviously had a sense of the awesome significance of the Eysen-Sphere, and that was the person Dabnowski needed to speak with.

Taz’s phone went off. He glanced at it and saw Stellard was interrupting again. “Sorry, but I have to take this.”

Dabnowski shook his head, sighed, and contemplated another way to save the Eysen-Sphere.

“We’ve received a gift from the gods. No diversion necessary,” Stellard began. “Word just came in. You’ll never believe where Gale Asher is at this very minute.”

“Could you just tell me?” Taz asked, looking back at a very impatient Dabnowski.

“Gale Asher just landed at Honolulu International!” Stellard said happily, actually clapping his hands as he said it.

“I can be there in fifteen minutes,” Taz said, already heading to the car. “What the hell is she doing in Hawaii?” He was sprinting now. “Do you think that means Gaines is still here?”

“I have no details yet,” Stellard responded. “Just get to the airport and hope we get to her first!”

As soon as Taz opened the car door, his driver pointed back at Dabnowski, who was standing, staring back at them with his hands on his hips.

“Damn, I forgot about him,” Taz muttered. “I’ll just be a second, and then we’re returning to the airport.”

He ran back to the astrophysicist.

“Sorry, we just got a major lead,” Taz said, panting. “We’ll need to finish this another time.”

“No,” Dabnowski said. “Here, take this.” He pushed his briefcase into Taz’s gut a little too hard. “If you find the information in there useful, if you can even
comprehend
what it is and you have questions, then get your boss or, better yet, whoever is in charge of the Foundation, to contact me.”

“Hey man, I said I’m sorry, but this is a big deal, and I’m being pulled in a few directions,” Taz said, nearly fumbling the briefcase.

Dabnowski looked around nervously, and then directly back into Taz’s sunglass-shielded eyes. “I can assure you that nothing you’re doing, no one you’re chasing, is as important as what the documents in that case will tell you.”

Taz looked down at the worn leather straps of the satchel, wondering why the astrophysicist hadn’t put the information on a flash drive. “Okay,” Taz said in his most conciliatory voice. “Thanks for your help. We’ll be back in touch.”

Dabnowski took one last look around, then, without a word, walked back the way he had come. Taz, baffled by Dabnowski’s attitude, turned and darted back to his waiting car.

“Nothing is more important than getting to the airport and finding Gale Asher,” he said to himself as he tossed the battered leather briefcase on the backseat and called Stellard for an update.