Authors: Duane Swierczynski,Anthony E. Zuiker

Dark Revelations (41 page)

BOOK: Dark Revelations

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Dark grabbed Labyrinth’s face under the nose and around his chin and struggled to pry open his jaws. Nothing. His mouth was clamped tight, his muscles like steel cable, his jaw inflexible. Dark made a fist and snapped a tight, hard punch into Labyrinth’s face, rocking the man’s head backward. Still nothing. And whatever he had swallowed had already slid down his throat, because a weak smile appeared on his bloodied face.

chapter 83

LABYRINTH

W
ell.

This is good-bye.

For now.

I wasn’t anticipating the need for shutdown at this moment, but Dark is forcing my hand. I recognize that wild, righteous look in his eyes—the willingness to hurt me for what he needs to know. He thinks he’s being a hero. I know better. I’ve looked at the Sqweegel autopsy photos. Brothers, under the skin, latex or not.

There is no doubt that I could withstand anything Dark intends to dish out, but I do not wish to go through the tired old pantomime.
Ooh look, here’s your eyeball, look how perfectly oblong and squishy. Now shall we pop an eardrum, or cut out your tongue?

Boring.

So I take my medicine and prepare for sleep.

Just sleep.

Not death.

My medicine—which cost six million euros to develop—simulates a vegetative state, shutting down higher brain functions but maintaining breathing, heart rate, blood pressure. My body will go on autopilot. Nothing will be able to reach me. Not for six days, after which my brain will resume its normal functions. I will be back. No doubt I will be incarcerated in some kind of secret facility that America is so fond of. But escape will not be difficult. I have escaped from much worse.

And by then . . .

Everything will be different.

There will be a new world around me, and it will have a new leader.

A young, smart, ambitious, tenacious, and extremely malleable European Parliament member named Alain Pantin.

I’ve been conditioning him for years to step up onto the world stage at this moment, and he has not disappointed me once. He is the perfect man for the job.

Why raise an army when all you truly need is one charismatic man to engage the hearts and minds of those who will be all too eager to be led?

All Alain Pantin needs is the one gift that has yet to be delivered, and it is a gift that the entire world will be able to enjoy.

So.

This is good-bye.

But only for now.

chapter 84

DARK

“
F
uck.”

Dark checked Labyrinth’s pulse. Slow but steady.

“Is he . . . ?” Natasha asked.

“No,” Dark said. “He put himself into a coma.”

Natasha was on her cell to the special agent in charge, telling them where they were, what they needed, and that she’d explain more when they met up. When she hung up, the sad remnants of Global Alliance looked around at one another.

Dark asked O’Brian, “Can you stop this cyber-blitz?”

“Get me to where the hospitals keep the servers, and yeah, I can pretty much stop anything. How much time do we have left? I need deadlines, man. It’s how I work.”

“I’ll call you when I figure that out.”

It was quickly decided that Natasha would stay with the seemingly comatose Labyrinth—through surgery, through everything. Dark, meanwhile, turned his attention to the time. This amphitheater was meant to be Labyrinth’s stage. Dark had the riddle, and the artifact—the baby photos. But what about the timepiece? There were no clocks in this room. No wristwatches, no sundials, no calendars . . . nothing.

Only when Dark looked up at the shattered skylight at the top of the dome did it occur to him that the room itself was the timepiece.

The surgeons had to rely on optimal daylight, streaming in from above. Most procedures were performed from eleven A.M. until about two P.M.

Dark raced up to the third level to where Natasha had found the trunk full of baby photos. About two feet to the right—as he expected—a beam of sunlight burned softly on the wooden floor.

When the sunlight crawled across the floor and hit the trunk . . . the deadline would be reached.

Dark did some quick mental calculations, called O’Brian, who was on his way to the hospital’s server room.

“You’ve got about a half hour, give or take ten minutes,” Dark said.

“Thank fuck. I think I can do a half hour. Was worried you were going to say something like thirty seconds.”

“Do it.”

Natasha touched Dark’s face. “I’m going with him. Be safe.”

“You’re the one babysitting the monster.”

“You still haven’t invited me to your home for the holidays.”

Dark blinked. “I didn’t know you . . .”

“I like to skip to the best part.”

She kissed him once before jogging away to follow the procession out of the operating theater.

Dark sat down on the wooden stairs as a pair of EMTs began to work on his arm and hands. He glanced over at Blair’s lifeless body. EMTs were trying to work on him, too, but he was long gone. The man had spent his life telling himself he was doing good, only to be punished for it at every turn. He’d let the monster out of the box and struggled to stuff him back inside.

For the first time since he’d met him, Dark realized he half-admired Damien Blair, after all.

New York Times

Breaking: Thousands of hospitals worldwide notified of possible birth records hacking; latest Labyrinth threat.

AP World

Breaking: “Labyrinth” arrested; identity unknown, but one threat remains.

Reuters

Breaking: Birth records breach averted; latest Labyrinth plot “goes nowhere,” say officials.

chapter 85

DARK

O
utside the hospital in the freezing cold, Dark looked around at the old colonial-era houses. Everything seemed unreal, like something from a dream. He didn’t know the last time he’d slept. All he could think about was hopping one last plane—over the past two weeks he’d grown to hate planes more than anything else in the world—so he could be at home in L.A. with his daughter. Tomorrow was Christmas. He hadn’t played Santa Claus, but it didn’t matter. He just wanted to hold her, smell the sweetness of her hair, try to push the riddles, the death, the bloody splatters . . . everything . . . away. For even a little while. A small break. A rest. A calming-down period while he pondered his next move, now that his would-be employer was dead.

“Mr. Dark?”

Dark turned to see Blair’s driver, holding an attaché case in his hands.

“This just arrived, addressed to Mr. Blair. I thought you should have it, considering . . .”

Dark took the case, which was heavier than it should be.

Somewhere else in the world, in a storage locker, a timer came to life with a faint beep. It had been sent a signal from an online cloud, which in turn had been activated by a remote command uploaded from Labyrinth’s watch, which had been monitoring his vital signs.

Labyrinth had slipped into a coma, which triggered the fail-safe.

Just in case he wasn’t awake to deliver his final package.

Kneeling on the cold sidewalk, Dark hesitated before the case intended for Blair. If Labyrinth wanted revenge, then of course he would deliver the final blow to the man who’d tried to kill him. Whatever was inside was most likely designed to shock or kill.

But not right away. Labyrinth was never that direct. Dark remembered Natasha’s fearlessness. If they had all waited to analyze the trunk, it would have been too late. So fuck it. Dark flipped the latches with his thumbs and opened the case. Inside was a letter with printed block letters on what appeared to be a piece of Damien Blair’s personal stationery. The font style and coloration of the paper suggested it was at least two decades old. Blair would have no doubt recognized it, had he been alive to open the package.

The riddle:

I AM TERRIFYING AND FEAR INSPIRING, AND THE PHYSICAL WORLD CANNOT TOUCH ME. WHEN I’M FINISHED, YOU MAY NOT EVEN REMEMBER ME. WHAT AM I?

LABYRINTH

The final Labyrinth riddle. Delivered to Damien Blair personally, from his longtime nemesis. His own personal . . .

All at once, Dark knew the answer.

. . . nightmare.

They were beyond metaphors now and into the literal. This was meant to be Labyrinth’s final gift to the world, the final turn in the maze. The world would see that the center contained not cheese but a literal
nightmare.

Dark lifted the page. Below the riddle was a heavy atomic-powered clock, the kind you’d buy at a high-end specialty shop for the man who has everything. These types of clocks guaranteed accuracy within a millisecond. The face showed a digital deadline, ticking down to less than twelve hours from now—midnight on Christmas.

The when.

A nightmare . . . in a little less than half a day.

So who?

Who would be the final victim?

Blair was already dead.

Perhaps the answer was in a small glass vial, secured by a leather loop sewn into the side of the attaché case. Dark carefully slid it out of the loop with his bandaged fingers, then held it up to examine it. There was dark red fluid, no more than an ounce, filling half of the vial.

Blood.

Dark had seen enough of it to know the real thing by sight. Was this the final victim’s blood, maybe?

The clock was ticking. He needed a lab—
now
.