Spiral (46 page)

There are serious implications for national defence, and experts are blaming freak solar activity, possibly in the form of a subsonic or stratospheric radiation that has never before been detected by military sensors.>>#

C
arter opened his eyes.

Natasha was smiling down at him, pressing a cold cloth against his head, dabbing at the coagulating sluggish flow of blood from his recently broken nose. He looked up into her eyes and saw the understanding there.

‘I am sorry ...’ he whispered.

‘Shh.’ She placed a finger against his lips. ‘Don’t speak.’

‘It wasn’t me.’

‘I know, Carter, I know ...’

Carter smiled weakly. Then he flinched as pain smashed through the centre of his skull and the wound in his side, through his ribs and his nose and his broken finger and his whole battered bruised frame—

He gasped.

And swam on a sea of pain.

Natasha looked suddenly worried. ‘Carter?’ She shook him. ‘Carter, what’s wrong?’

He opened his eyes.

He smiled up at her, squinting.

‘Kade must have been taking away - absorbing – my pain. That’s why we’ve got as far as we have. Now the bastard has given it back; all of it.’ He coughed, writhing in agony for a moment. ‘Fuck, that hurts. Have you any painkillers?’

‘Sorry, Carter.’

‘That’s OK. We need to get to Langan for the meet.’

‘Yeah.’

She helped Carter to his feet, and he stood panting for a moment in the dawn light.

Then, with a great effort of will, he grunted, lifted the BMW and climbed aboard. Natasha jumped on behind him and he fired up the engine, closing his eyes for a moment as he composed himself - not just for the journey ahead, but for the realisation that Feuchter was dead: and that the
quest,
as it was, the fucked-up journey he had to make—

It was not over.

It was far from over.

The BMW moved off, bumping along the dirt road and then punching out across the rolling sand dimes and towards the narrow dirt road that fed Spiral_Q ...

‘Durell,’ muttered Carter. And, grimacing, he screwed the throttle round viciously.

Jessica Rade drove hard and fast. The Land Rover had a powerful motor and sped through the darkness, the suspension absorbing the bumps with ease, the headlights scything the pre-dawn desert.

I’ve done it, she thought triumphantly.

I’ve got away.

With the QIII schematics. The ability to create another QuanTech Edition 3 Cubic Processor; to copy the only working model in existence. The only model just recently uploaded with WorldCode Data.

Jessica Rade smiled; and then decided that she might be being followed and the smile fell from her face as she checked her mirrors. But only blackness swept across the desert behind her, deep and impenetrable. Before her, blood smears on the glass did nothing to calm her fluttering heart.

Jessica wiped her sweating hand on her pyjamas; and then remembered the blood. She glanced down at the crimson streaks and her stomach turned. And then she remembered her friends and colleagues from Spiral_Q who had been murdered and loaded into trucks and helicopters, and her stomach did a triple flip. She swallowed her fear.

She was free.

She could make a difference ...

She could flood the world with the schematics, with designs of how to construct and set up the QIII; she could reveal how WorldCode worked; she could reveal how it could predict the future using pure mathematics, formulae, code. She could blow the secret.

Spiral_Q would be stung, and stung bad.

Jessica needed to get to a powerful mainframe, and she realised the danger of her predicament. She was going to ruin their plans; they would want her dead ... but then they wanted her dead anyway, right? Did they realise she had the QIII schematics? She doubted it - after all, they had been about to blow the building - and surely that had been the purpose of the bomb. To halt any possibility of pirating the cubic chip. But then, she could not rely on that, she could not rely on
anything...
she had to assume that they knew she had copies of the schematics.

But something confused Jessica. Why should Spiral -who she had always thought of as a brilliant organisation to work for - why would they kill a large group of their own employees? And why would they destroy their own building? Why would they blow up the QIII operation?

Something in the reasoning was flawed. Something was not quite right - like Feuchter planting the bombs, like the Nex assassins walking the Spiral_Q corridors.

She could not understand why Spiral would do such a thing.

Unless Spiral had been betrayed!

Jessica rubbed at her eyes and moved closer to the windscreen and the bullet hole that reminded her of how serious these people were - whoever they were. They knew that she was alive; they would have the airports covered for sure ... so how could she get out of Rub al’Khali? She knew that Spiral_Q had the backing of the Saudi regime and that meant untold resources if they really
needed
to find her—

She racked her brains. What to do?

Prioritise, focus, she thought.

Get away from the Spiral_Q facility.

Dump the vehicle.

Find a disguise.

The engine stuttered, half-heard. Jessica felt a vibration on the accelerator pedal. Her eyes flickered to the dash and the orange light that indicated she was out of... fuel.

‘What? You bitch,’ she muttered. ‘How is that possible?’

The engine stuttered again, and then stalled. She coasted to a halt on the dirt track, tyres crunching on small stones. She opened the door - and could immediately smell petrol.

‘Shit. Shit!’

She looked around the inside of the car for anything that might be of use to her. There was nothing. She pulled the key from the ignition and, her feet jabbing painfully against stones, she moved to the back of the car and opened the boot. There was a canister. She unscrewed the top and sniffed: water.

‘At least I won’t die of dehydration,’ Jessica muttered sourly, slamming the boot shut. Grabbing her small rucksack, and pausing for a moment to take several deep breaths and brush a few specks of fluff from her pyjamas, she bit the bullet of panic and set off down the road. Stones stabbed her toes again and she cursed herself for her disorganisation, her bad luck and, most of all, for choosing to work for fucking Spiral_Q Division in the first fucking place.

Carter returned from the outcropping of rocks, the Barrett in one hand, a canteen of water in the other. He yawned.

‘How you feeling?’

Carter smiled, wincing at pain from a variety of locations. He glanced at Natasha; over the last few days she seemed to have aged incredibly. Lines and deep bruises of exhaustion circled her eyes. Her mouth had lost its customary upturned corners. Her body seemed ... Carter searched for a word.

Deflated.

Pushed beyond the boundaries of normal human endurance.

‘I feel like a camel danced on my head for an hour. What about you? You look wasted, girl.’

‘I’m all right.’ She smiled weakly at him. ‘I need this break.’

‘Me too. It’s been a tough few days.’

‘You could say that,’ sighed Natasha.

After a brief break, and having made sure that they were not being pursued after the destruction of Spiral_Q, they climbed wearily back onto the BMW desert-bike and once again set off across the sand and stones. They travelled for an hour, until Natasha spotted something and tapped Carter on the arm, pointing.

‘You see it?’

Carter glanced up. ‘That’s Feuchter’s vehicle,’ he said. ‘The Land Rover I took out with the rifle ...’

‘Wonder who nicked it?’ said Natasha. They exchanged glances, and both reached for their guns as the desert-bike crunched to a halt a few feet away from the stationary vehicle. They did not say the word
Nex
but the possibility was at the forefront of both their minds.

Carter climbed warily from the bike, eyes scanning the deserted horizon and the sand-blown vicinity. He moved around the Land Rover and saw the key in the boot. There was nothing inside on the seats and floor; he checked the boot. Also empty.

‘Can you smell fuel?’

Natasha nodded. ‘You think a Nex took it?’ she said finally.

Carter glanced around. Natasha noted that now - in a possible conflict situation - he gave no sign that he was injured: all pain had been shunted aside, all agony wiped clear by adrenalin for the moment.

‘Not sure,’ muttered Carter, still scanning, the familiar heft of the Browning giving him little reassurance. ‘But I don’t like it out here - it’s too open and we’re still too far from Langan.’

‘Come on, then.’

Carter jumped back onto the BMW and they crawled past the Land Rover, tyres growling on the dirt road. Carter kept the Browning in his hand and stayed vigilant as they set off down the desert track.

They drove with heightened awareness for the next hour as the sun climbed steeply up the sky and smashed its rays down on them. They passed no traffic in that time, and saw no other living being. It was like being on the moon... albeit with a much warmer climate.

It was Carter who spotted her.

‘Look. To the right, following a line parallel to the road.’

The woman hunkered down behind a small outcropping of rock when she spotted the BMW desert-bike. But by then it was too late - Carter’s sharp piercing eyes had spotted
her.

They halted and climbed from the bike.

Carter moved out onto the sand. ‘Show yourself.’ he called.

Nothing moved...

Carter pointed the gun at the rocks. ‘If you piss me off by making me come in after you, I guarantee you a slow execution. You have three seconds. Three, two, one ...’

The woman stood, slowly, arms above her head. She wore pyjamas and carried a small rucksack. Carter gestured with the Browning. ‘Over there, where I can see you clearly.’

Carter moved closer, checking to see if she was alone.

The woman had long, curly brown hair and bright young eyes. She looked frightened, terrified even, and licked her lips nervously. ‘Don’t shoot me, please,’ she said as Carter came closer.

He stopped, looking her up and down.

‘How the hell did you get out here dressed like that?’

‘It’s a long story,’ she said, smiling weakly. Slowly she lowered her arms, but Carter waved them up again. He stepped in close and checked her for weapons, sweat beading on his forehead under the sun’s intense glare.

He stepped back. ‘What’s in the bag?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Show me.’

Jessica opened the rucksack; she showed him the inside which was indeed empty.

‘What about the front pocket?’

Jessica unzipped the pocket. Slowly she withdrew a small silver disk and instantly Carter aimed the Browning 9mm at her face and her eyes went wide. Tears started to roll down her cheeks.

‘Here, take it.’

‘What the fuck
is it
?’ barked Carter.

‘So you’re not from Spiral_Q?’

Carter smiled grimly. ‘Well, we had a brief association with a man called Feuchter.’

Jessica jumped at the name. ‘Where is he?’

‘Dead. Are you going to answer my question?’

‘It’s the schematics for the QIII processor. So you’re not here to kill me?’

‘Don’t even know who you are, love. Come on, walk over to the bike, you look like you’re suffering from heat exhaustion.’

Jessica walked, with Carter a few paces behind her, a predator checking warily all around. When she reached the BMW Natasha smiled warmly, and Jessica was finally allowed to lower her hands.

‘She’s got the schematics for the QIII processor,’ said Carter.

Natasha’s eyes widened. ‘You’re fucking joking!’

‘No.’ Turning to Jessica, he said, ‘I assume you worked there?’

Jessica nodded. ‘Feuchter had a large section of the workforce murdered. I managed to escape ... I took the processor schematics hostage. So you’re really not from Spiral_Q?’

‘If I was going to kill you,’ said Carter softly, ‘we wouldn’t be talking. ‘Come on, squeeze on the bike. I assume you need a ride out of here?’

Jessica nodded, and climbed up behind Carter, followed by Natasha, squeezing onto the tail-end of the bike, beside the stealth-exhaust pipes.

Carter fired up the engine.

‘Where do you want dropping? Or alternatively, you can have this bike in about two hours ...’

‘Just get me out of Rub al’Khali,’ Jessica said wearily.

‘See what we can do,’ said Natasha, smiling kindly.

They had paused for a break from the searing sun, shadowed by a low plateau of rounded rocks that had been smoothed by the blasting sand of the desert. Carter sat, head back, allowing a cool trickle of water to moisten his lips.

‘We’re running out.’