The Dragon Factory (62 page)

“Only one of you.”

“Why?” she insisted.

“Call it a Darwinist experiment.”

“What . . . you’d use the murder of one to identify which of us had the greater survival instinct and then try to bargain with the survivor?”

Cyrus applauded. “You see, Otto? I always said that she was the smarter twin.”

“You miserable old prick,” growled Paris. His hand strayed toward his pocket.

Instantly Conrad Veder pulled his pistol and pointed it at Paris. The movement was so fast and fluid that the weapon seemed to appear in his hand as if by magic.

“Make no mistake,” said Cyrus, “Conrad will blow your head off if I tell him to. Now pull that dart gun with two fingers and throw it in the pond. You, too, Hecate. And tell your pet ape to stay exactly where he is.”

Tonton curled his lip. “That little popgun won’t do shit.”

Veder’s face was neutral. “There’s a simple way to find out.”

Cyrus chuckled. “Kill anyone who moves, Conrad.”

The Berserker held his ground. Paris carefully removed his gas dart gun and threw it away as ordered. It made a splash near the dead sea serpent.

“Father,” said Hecate, ignoring Veder’s pistol and the order to dispose of her own, “what do you want from us? Why come here? Why tell us all of this now? Why spring it on us rather than bring us in?”

“Those are the right questions, my pet,” said Cyrus, nodding approval.
“I’ll bet Paris didn’t even think to ask. This is quite simple, Hecate. You have to make a choice. The Extinction Wave is going to launch.” He fished a device from beneath his shirt, an oversized flash drive attached to a silk lanyard. “This sends the codes that will begin an irrevocable change. Truly only the strong will survive. Granted, you’re white and you’ve been engineered to be immune to any of the pathogens or genetic diseases we’re using, but afterward there will be war as I said. The strongest will survive. Otto and I have prepared for the war. We will survive. If you join with us—willingly join with us—then you can share in the benefits of our protection, and together, as one Family, we can usher in the New Order.”

“Join you?” said Hecate distantly.

“You’re fucking nuts,” said Paris. “You stand there and tell us that you started the AIDS epidemic. You brag about that? Then you say that you want to kill four-fifths of the people in the world?”

“More like six-sevenths,” Cyrus said.

“Jesus Christ. You think this is a frigging joke? You’re trying to destroy the world.”

“We’re not trying to do anything,” said Otto. “We are
going
to remake it.”

Paris spit on the ground in front of Cyrus. “I hate you,” he snarled. “I hate that I have your blood in my veins. I hate—”

“Shut up, Paris.”

Everyone turned toward the person who spoke.

Hecate.

Her blue eyes were laced with veins of hot gold.

“What . . . what did you . . . ?” Paris said.

“I told you to shut up,” she said. “Father’s right. When you open your mouth you embarrass yourself. You embarrass the
Family
.”

Paris stepped close to her but pointed at Cyrus. “Have you lost your mind, too? Are you subscribing to this bullshit? Are you saying that you support this fucking monster—”

Hecate struck him across the face. It wasn’t a slap. She punched him so hard and fast that he spun in place, his jaw knocked out of shape,
teeth flying from between his rubbery lips. He stood erect for a trembling moment and then he collapsed to his knees, blood gushing from his shattered mouth. His eyes rolled high and white and he fell forward onto the grass.

Everyone stared at her in shock. Hecate stepped over her brother’s body and walked over to her father and only stopped when their faces were inches apart. Veder shifted slightly to keep his weapon on her. Otto stood apart, his face still registering shock and uncertainty.

Hecate leaned close to her father until her lips were an inch from his ears.

“Father,” she said. “Why wait until tomorrow? If we’re going to burn the world down . . . why not start right now?”

And she kissed him on the cheek.

Cyrus Jakoby’s chest hitched with a sob that broke the stillness of the moment. He threw his arms around Hecate and crushed her to his chest.

“My pet,” he said, tears filling his eyes.

GRACE COURTLAND STEPPED
out from behind the waterfall and raised her gun in a two-hand grip.

“This is all bloody touching,” she said, “but you have two seconds to give me that bloody trigger device before I blow your twisted brains all over the landscape.”

AND THEN THE
lights went out.

The Dragon Factory

Tuesday, August 31, 2:24
A.M.

Time Remaining on the Extinction Clock: 33 hours, 36 minutes E.S.T.

The exit doors were steel and we made our stand there. The Russians kept coming. The hallway was choked with them, and the front rank held ballistic shields. They advanced as far as the hatch and then held their ground. It was clearly their target and they had the manpower to
take and hold it. I couldn’t see what they were doing, but I heard the whine of a high-power drill. I never did find out if they brought it with them or found it on the premises, but they were attacking the hatch.

I tapped my earbud.

“Cowboy to Deacon.”

“Go for Deacon.”

“We’re taking heavy fire and casualties.” I gave him the bad news about Grace. “There’s no way to know if the trigger device has been activated. If you have the cavalry out there, now’s the time to blow the bugle.”

“They’re already inbound. Three DMS teams are on the island. Quicksilver Team has taken the south beach. India and Hardball teams are on the docks. SEAL team Six is five minutes out.”

“The trigger device . . .”

“We can’t take any more chances, Cowboy. We have to take out the electronics.”

That would fry the active team communication as well, and we both knew it. But he was right. We were out of options.

“Do it!” I yelled.

Bullets hammered the metal doors and I had to shout to my men. “Church is launching the EMP. We’re going to go radio dark in a few minutes!”

It was not good news. In the dark with no radio, in a firefight where everyone was wearing black BDUs, friendly fire was quickly going to become as much of a threat as enemy fire.

Top leaned close to me. “If those Spetsnaz sonsabitches get through that hatch . . .” He left the rest unsaid.

“We saw guards come up from downstairs,” said Bunny. “Maybe there’s a way to flank these bozos.”

I grabbed Redman and pulled him close.

“Hold this position. I’m going to take Echo Team downstairs and see if we can come up on the far side, catch these assholes in a cross fire. DMS and SEAL teams are on the island and have been apprised of your position.” He started to protest, but I cut him off. “Protect your wounded
and hold this end of the hall. We have to get back to that hatch. Everything depends on it.”

“Don’t stop for coff ee on the way, Captain,” said Redman.

I gave him a wink and dashed down the stairs with Top and Bunny on my heels.

WE WENT DOWN
two flights of metal stairs, going so fast that we pushed the envelope of safety on the corners. We knew our backs were protected, so all of us had our M4s pointed down. When a guard actually did step out we cut him to ribbons before he got off a single shot.

The security door on the next landing down was locked. Bunny tried to pick it, but even though the tumblers moved, the door held fast.

“Must be a drop bar or something,” he said.

“Let’s go one more level down and if that doesn’t work we’ll come back up and try to blow the door.”

We moved down two more flights into the underbelly of the building. Maintenance level. Poorly lighted, the ceiling crisscrossed with pipes, big generators rumbling with subdued thunder. It was hot and moist down here, and water dripped from the ceiling. The maintenance floor had a security door, too, but it was propped open with a chair. An ashtray and a copy of
Popular Mechanics
lay on the floor. God bless the lazy janitors everywhere. Once inside we found a second door that was similarly blocked, but there was a draft here and the sound of distant gunfire. I shined my flashlight up and saw a long concrete utility ramp that went all the way to the surface.

“Wait here,” I said, and ran up the slope. There was a heavy grilled outer door set with a pivoting drop bar, but the bar was in the upright position and the door stood up and open. I peered out and saw the backs of at least fifty Russians engaged in a firefight with some other force. From the ramp I couldn’t tell if they were fighting the Dragon Factory guards or our own boys, and I was in no position to participate in this fight. So I retraced my steps and found Top and Bunny.

They stood back-to-back, pointing their guns into the bowels of the maintenance area, their bodies tense and alert.

“What is it?” I whispered.

“Don’t know, Cap’n,” said Top. “Heard something weird.”

“Weird?”

Before he could answer there was a
clickety-click
sound somewhere near. Like toenails on concrete.

“Guard dog,” Bunny said.

“He ain’t barking,” Top said.

“Not all of ’em do.”

I sighted down the barrel and did a slow sweep. Suddenly something moved from left to right, breaking cover from behind the steel case of a big blower and darting behind a row of stacked crates.

“What the fuck was that?”

“Dog?” Bunny said, but this time he made it a question.

“Didn’t look like no dog to me,” Top said.

I had to agree. The silhouette was all wrong. The body was big, about the size of a mastiff, with thick shoulders and haunches, but the head shape was wrong and the tail was . . . weird. Too big and curling all the way over its back to beyond its snout.

The scuttling sound came again. This time to our right.

“Two of’em,” Top said.

Then we heard it behind us.

“Three,” Bunny said.

I turned. “More than that,” I said. At least four of the weird shapes filled the darkness of the ramp that led outside. They ran toward us with frightening speed.

“Jesus Christ,” Bunny said, and I turned as one of the creatures moved through a patch of light.

It was a dog. Or it had started out that way. God only knows what you’d call it now. The body was as broad and solid as a bullmastiff, the hair midnight black. The face was a twisted parody of a dog’s, but the snout and head were covered with what I first thought was some kind of armor like they used to put on fighting dogs centuries ago. I could have dealt with mastiffs in armor. That was scary, but it wasn’t nightmare stuff.

But as the creature moved back through the lamplight I saw that the armor ran all the way down its back and covered its sides, where it eventually thinned and blended with the dog’s natural fur. The armor plating gleamed like polished leather. But what sent a flash of horror all the way down through my brain and heart and guts was what rose above the dog’s back. It wasn’t a dog’s tail. The appendage that curled over the massive back and shoulders of the dog was a huge, segmented scorpion tail.

There were at least a dozen of them now . . . closing on all sides.

The one in the spill of light paused, its tail trembling above it, the stinger dripping hot venom. Its muzzle wrinkled back to show rows of sharp white teeth and it glared at us with eyes as black as the Devil’s.

With a monstrous howl of unnatural hate, the creature ran at us.

And then the others rushed at us from all sides.

The Chamber of Myth

Tuesday, August 31, 2:28
A.M.

Time Remaining on the Extinction Clock: 33 hours, 32 minutes E.S.T.

There was a sharp crack, and a bullet cut through the darkness so close that Grace could feel the heat. She threw herself to one side and crashed into a row of thorny shrubs. Needles jabbed her and plucked at her clothing as she rolled over the shrubs and scrabbled to find solid ground. She kept her pistol by sheer luck and was glad of the lethal promise of it as she fumbled her way through the absolute blackness. All around her exotic creatures screamed in voices never before heard outside of nightmares.

“What happened to the lights?”

“It’s a fail-safe,” Hecate said. “If there’s gunfire in the building the whole facility goes into a forced lockdown.”

“Did you hit her?” someone asked. Grace thought it was Otto.

“I don’t know,” came the reply. Both voices were off to her right, so Grace kept moving to her left. The ground sloped under her and she crouched low, using her free hand to feel for obstacles.