Memoria (25 page)

"Hold tight!"
the coach pressed his
thumb
against the handbrake button
. He
pushed the gas pedal to the floor
and let go of the brake.

The ti
res screamed. The speedometer hit red. T
he li
mo shot forward like a
catapulted missile.
It
rammed the patrol car
pushing it
aside.
The pilot
tried to raise
t
he damaged chopper
higher
but not high enough. Its
chassis hit the roof of the police vehicle. The chopper
banked again
, str
aightened up and swayed aside. The
cabin door opened. The pilot jumped onto the road, followed by the men
in the cargo bay. T
he cabin went nose
up. T
he
tail boom clattered along
the tarmac and broke off, the impact causing
the turning
r
otor to collapse.
A flash blinded Frank.

'Get
down!"
Max
pushed a button on the
dashboard. A
set of metal blinds shuttered the windows.

The interior
went dark. An explosion followed. Debris showered the car.

"Get out!"

Fra
nk thought he misunderstood his coach.
His ears were ringing from the blast.
Max
had already opened his door and left the car, rifle in hand.

"Follow me, quick
ly
!"
his voice
resounded loud and clear as if
Frank's
ears were unplugged.

Attaché
case
in hand
,
Frank
scrambled out of the car. The flames burned his face
. He shielded it with his elbow. The coach was advan
cing to a nearby house. Rifle at
the ready, he had the chopper in his sights.

"Frank! The door won't open!" he heard Maggie's voice from inside the car.

"I'm coming!"

Rancid smoke clouded the street. His eyes running, Frank pulled the back door handle. Nothing.
Squinting
from
the smoke, h
e looked inside through the front door
.

"How about the other side?"

"It's jammed, too!"

"Come out here!"

He grabbed her arm and helped her
to squeeze herself between the seats and through the front door. The moment she stepped onto the ground, shots
rang out
from their left.
Max
was firing at a large black-clad figure
that had appeared from the
stinking
smoke. The man didn't stand a chance and collapsed without even raising his weapon.
Another scrambled out of the smoke. Engulfed in flames, the
already silent
man wobbled to the car
, stumbled over the
first man's
body and slumped
down
on top.

"Here, quick!" the coach ran past the bodies. Frank and Maggie ran up to him.

"Open it!"
Max
kicked the side of a manhole
cover, forcing it to
jump its seating
. The rifle in one h
and, his eyes not leaving the bu
rning chopper, he h
anded
Frank
a
knife
.

They must have driven quite a distance away from t
he Presidential route: this manh
ole wasn't sealed as the security regulations demanded.
Frank slid the edge of the knife under the lid and moved it to one side.

"You first," he turned to Maggie wishing her to
finally escape to safety
.

"No," the coach said. "You go
first, Frank."

He obeyed and sat on the edge, h
is dangling feet fe
eling
the
rungs beneath. Maggie handed him
the
attaché
case
.
Shots snapped again, but Frank didn't see who
Max
was s
hooting at this time. He was cli
mbing down.

The
shaft
ended. Frank jumped down onto the sewer bottom.
Here, the damp air was warm; it clung to his teary eyes worse than the smoke had. But at least he could breathe
and no one was shooting yet
.

Judging by the sound of
the
running water, the
sewer
had to be near. Either that, or there was a leak
somewhere
.

Maggie jumped off the ladder. Frank helped her to get up. He wanted to look around but the coach on the ladder overhead moved the lid back into place.
Darkness filled the shaft.

K
irk
Dickens
was
a
good foot shorter
than the prisoner strapped to the
chair.
He
could
whack him in the ribs
without even leaning forward.
T
he man's
broad
face
was beaten to pulp
.
One eye was completely swollen; the
nose turned to one side like a misshapen tablespoon; his lips bleeding, his left cheekbone one large
bruise.

Now the man didn't resemble
Memoria's chief executive
.
A crimson spot g
rew on his bandaged right thigh.
Dickens'
soldiers
had shot the
man
as they stormed
Binelli's office
, but even after that
, they had lost two more men. On
ly then had they finally b
roken the man's defense and brought
the
upper floors under control.

As his men had worked
over
the prisoner,
he
hadn't uttered a word.
He hadn't answered
Dickens'
questions, either. The man
bared his bloodied teeth and spat trying to
hit
Dickens'
face. He'd done so, the very first time, driving
Dickens
to
distraction
.

Having
battered the man
beyond recognition
,
Dickens
sent for some water. He poured a bucketful over
the prisoner
but the man remained unconscious.
Dickens
gave the order to bring him round
with drugs, then delive
r him
to
William Bow,
who'd been
urgently summoned from his laboratory
, and his
mnemo
tech
team. They had to scan the man's memory and retrieve the information needed.

A
techie
in a
lab
coat
raised the man's chin and turned his head to the light.
With his little finger, h
e
pulled an eyelid up, then released it
. The prisoner's head dropped onto his chest. The
tech
felt the man's neck for
a
pulse.

"
We need
to take
him
in
to intensive care."

Dickens
paused. "Fine. When will he be able to speak?"

The man in the
lab
coat shrugged.

"Do whatever is necessary. I need him to
tal
k."

Dickens
walked out of the room. He meant to call
Claney
. But he
didn't need to:
Claney
was waiting in the hallway
. In a far corner, sat a pale William Bow, his eyes scared.

"We have problems,"
Dickens
answered
Claney
's silent question
as he
unrolled his shirt sleeves.
His shirt was splattered with blood.
Dickens
spat on his finger and tried to
rub the spots off, but
only smeared them over the once-
white fabric.

"What did Agent Archer say?" he asked.

Claney
didn't answer.
Purse-lipped, he
watched
Dickens
rub the blood off his shirt.

"Sir?"
Dickens
looked him in the eye.

"Please
stop,"
Claney
lowered his head pr
etending he was adjusting a thic
k gold ring on his finger. "The Feds won't interfere. For the time being."

Dickens
clenched his hands behind his back. He didn't want to
embarrass the Congressman with his grated fingers and bloodied sleeves.

"You said, problems,"
Claney
reminded and shoved his hands d
eep in
his pockets.

"The prisoner won't talk."

"Can't you,"
Claney
turned to Bow, "c
an't you use chemicals
?"

"Impossible,"
Dickens
answered for the researcher. "
The old fart will kick the bucket."

"Old fart?"
Claney
's saliva spattered
Dickens'
face. "This, as you say, old fart has slaughtered half our force!
Shelby's on the loose again! TV channels start to doubt whether the person on their footage could
have
act
ed
on his own. We won't be able to fool them for much longer! And you
...
"

Claney
shook his head and composed himself.
"I don't care how you do it,"
he drawled.
"
He can die for all I care, but not before he tells us all he knows.
Who helped him, where they hide, what they know. Don't just sit here, Bow,"
Claney
stepped to the door. "Do your job. Give him a serum shot. The prisoner
gave
Binelli one, didn't he?"

"Impossible,"
Dickens
remained calm. "The prisoner has a neurostimulator
installed."

"Pardon me?"
Claney
turned to him.

"A neurostimulator,"
Dickens
repeated. "They install this little thingy into the aorta.
When it reacts with the truth serum, it bursts the artery before the victim can open their mouth."

"What're you going to do, then?"
Claney
stepped away from the door.

"Do a memory scan."

"Bow?"
Claney
asked without looking at the researcher.

"Possible," he answered.

"It'll take time,"
Claney
glanced at his watch.

"We don't need to do a full one,"
Dickens
suggested.
"It'll take eight hours or so."

"And this neurostimulator, won't it kill him?"

"I
t can't
," the reasercher said.

"But we won't get
the
full picture."
.

"Don't forget we have some answers already,"
Dickens
said.

The Congressman squinted
waiting for him to go on.

"Shelby was assisted by
some
Maggie
Douggan
of the secretarial department
,
"
Dickens
came to Bow and motioned him to get up
, then lifted his jacket off the back
of the chair
.
"It's possible Shelby has known her for some time. They could have met through Kath
leen
Baker.
They've filmed the contents of her disk and smuggled
it
out of the building.
" H
e put the jacket on and smooth
ed it out. "In order to infiltrate the building, they kidnapped Joe Binelli and
extracted
his
computer password, then used his car to enter the
premises
.
"