Dark Revelations (16 page)

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Authors: Duane Swierczynski,Anthony E. Zuiker

BOOK: Dark Revelations
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When Dark’s mind was fixed on a case, there was little else he could do. It was almost as if he went into a fugue state, the movie theater inside his mind playing flashes of the crime scenes
(the bloody river, the alarm clock, the gold watch, the blown-out interrogation room, the finger, the sketch of Bethany Millar)
on an endless loop while the logical part of his mind tried to piece them together. Some sick fuck out there had obsessed over these same objects....
So where had his mind gone next?
What was Labyrinth obsessing over now?
Before the pieces came together, however, the killer struck again.
 
AP News
 
 
Breaking: Reports of a new Labyrinth riddle in South Africa.
 
Global Alliance gathered in the conference room, everyone bleary-eyed except for Dark, who hadn’t been asleep anyway.
“We headed to South Africa, then?” O’Brian asked.
Blair shook his head. “We don’t go anywhere until there’s confirmation.”
O’Brian chased down the rumor online, trying to find its origin. They all agreed that it was more than possible Labyrinth himself was starting the rumors, fanning the flames before actually delivering his package. Meanwhile, Hans Roeding prepared the plane and loaded his weapons. The man was a natural born hunter who smelled blood in the air. Natasha monitored the South African media closely, looking for any suspicious thefts or missing persons reports that could give them an early lead.
Dark, meanwhile, brooded in his unlit room, attempting to fit the pieces together. From Los Angeles to Dubai to South Africa—what was the pattern? He couldn’t help but feel like they were being nudged to jump through another hoop.
He’d dealt with killers who used geography as a chessboard, and patterned their crimes from a God’s-eye point of view.
Was Labyrinth doing the same?
No . . . he’d be using a maze.
With himself at the center, like the Minotaur of ancient myth. All roads would lead to him. He would delight in seeing everyone else stumble around the musty corridors lost, unable to see the pattern he could so clearly discern....
 
Within hours, the rumor was revealed to be real. A new Labyrinth riddle, written in Afrikaans, had been delivered to a police station in one of the most crime-ridden neighborhoods in Johannesburg.
Blair stood behind Natasha as she took notes from the South African Broadcasting Corporation’s news report while waiting for her call to her police contact to be patched through. Two objects were said to have been included with the riddle, but government officials were refusing to detail them until further investigation.
“I’ve got it,” Natasha said, after a short conversation with her liaison. She typed quickly and put the riddle on the first of three huge flat screens mounted on the conference room wall:
I’M THE PART OF THE BIRD THAT’S NOT IN THE SKY.
I CAN SWIM IN THE OCEAN AND YET REMAIN DRY.
WHAT AM I?
 
 
LABYRINTH
“What were the objects?” Blair asked.
“The police are sending us digital images, and they’re downloading right now,” Natasha said, “but it appears to be a book and a sundial.”
“What kind of book?”
“Early edition of a British school primer. At least a hundred years old, in mint condition. An old-timer there says it was one of the first to be distributed under British rule. They’re analyzing it for hidden messages, explosives, toxic substances . . . everything.”
“The objects aren’t the murder weapons,” Dark said. “They’re wasting their time.”
Everyone in the room turned to look. Dark stood in the doorway, eyes transfixed on the three screens as the images on the second and third began to appear.
Blair said, “We know that—but they’re playing it safe, considering what happened in L.A.”
The image on the second screen began to materialize: the sundial.
“Can you sharpen the resolution?”
Wordlessly, Natasha tapped the touch pad and zoomed in closer on the image.
“What’s that?” she asked. “Is that . . . blood?”
“Tell the South African police to bring it outside,” Dark said. “That’s the only way we’re going to know how much time we have left.”
“He really likes to change up his timepieces,” said O’Brian. “Gold watches, sundials . . .”
“He wants us to know he’s thought of everything,” Dark said. “And that he’s adaptable. Take away his tech, and he can still get at us, with something as primitive as a printed book and the oldest timepiece in the world.”
Natasha relayed the message to the South African police. Sundials depend on global positioning—adding minutes here and there, depending on your location. But soon word came back:
They had approximately ten hours left before Labyrinth struck again.
chapter 27
 
DARK
 
B
lair wasted no time springing his team into action.
“You’ll be headed to South Africa immediately. According to Dark, we’ve got ten hours; the flight will take half that time. Local authorities will be uploading a complete set of photos and 3-D imaging of the contents of the latest package. In flight you can analyze those contents so that when you land, you’ll be ready to pounce. He’s daring us to catch him. So let’s oblige him.”
“It’s a mistake,” Dark said.
Blair blinked. “Excuse me?”
The three other team members stared at Dark. Apparently they were not used to hearing someone question the powerful and almighty Blair. But Dark didn’t care. He’d spent the past few sad years of his Special Circs career following someone else’s orders instead of his gut.
“A mistake,” Dark repeated. “Labyrinth sets the cheese, and we all go scurrying after it like mice. Is that how we’re supposed to catch this guy? By following his little maze, just the way he’s set it up?”
Blair smiled ruefully. “He’s testing us. He wants to see if we can operate on his intellectual level. The only way to catch Labyrinth is to play his games and then outthink him before the deadline passes. He thinks he’s smarter than us, and I know he’s wrong.”
“Here’s what bothers me,” Dark said. “Can it be coincidence that he’s given us
just enough
time to reach the scene and watch another person die?”
“You make it sound like this is personal. Labyrinth has no reason to know of our existence. For all he’s aware, we were ordinary outside investigators, called in to assist the Dubai Police. We operate in secret.”
“I have a feeling he knows,” Dark said. “A sick fuck like this guy will be paying very careful attention to who follows him. That’s what the whole game is about.”
O’Brian laughed. “So . . . what, Dark? What’s your answer? We just let this monster kill someone else? We don’t even try? Is that your solution?”
“No,” Dark said. “We focus on the next package. The one he hasn’t sent yet.”
Natasha’s eyes brightened. “Have you picked up a pattern? Something we’re missing?”
Everyone turned to look at Dark and waited expectantly.
“No. Not yet.”
Blair stepped forward. “You know the answer to the riddle, don’t you?”
Dark replied, “Yeah, a shadow.”
Blair says: “So you have the pieces. Why not work with what we were given?”
“For that very reason,” Dark said. “We were given it. Spoon-fed. It’s not this riddle I’m concerned with. It’s the
next one
that interests me. He’s already planned this fucking thing so far out in advance, if we stick to the riddles at hand we’ll always be chasing behind. The items he’d sent had to have been stolen or purchased long in advance, and there’s no reason to think that he’s not thinking ten or twelve moves deep at this point.”
Blair strolled the room, seeming to think it over.
“Fair enough. O’Brian, I want you and Roeding to lead the investigation in South Africa. Dark, you and Garcon stay here and game out Labyrinth’s next move. Let’s see if there’s anything to Dark’s theory. At the same time, I want you both working on the current package, and share everything with O’Brian and Roeding. Understood?”
The team nodded and split up. As Dark made his way to the door, he found Natasha blocking his path.
“I hope you know what the fuck you’re doing.”
chapter 28
 
LABYRINTH
 
T
he cheerful assistant stops Labyrinth in the hallway, touches his arm as she asks,
Can I help you?
In that lovely South African accent.
Labyrinth says,
Why, yes, you
can
help me.
Labyrinth has a face that people trust, as well as a demeanor that disarms them. Which was why the assistant doesn’t even flinch as he reaches into the breast pocket of his suit jacket and removes a sealed plastic bag containing a human finger. Her mouth opens slightly as he tells her,
My name is Labyrinth, and I want to confess.
Oh look at her.
She knows the name. She’s read the news stories. She’s watched the footage on cable news. She’s media-savvy. She knows that even if this man is not the real Labyrinth, then he is most likely some nutter and that might be just as bad.
Not so eager to be
helpful
now are you?
Eyes
Mouth
Muscles
Tits
Cunt
All tense.
Come on, keep breathing, young thing, you can do it, it’s not like it’s
your
finger in the bag.
And it’s not her finger, of course.
If you were to take a fingerprint from the severed digit, a subsequent fingerprint analysis would reveal that this ring finger used to be attached to the hand that used to be attached to the rest of one Mr. Charles Murtha.

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