Tunguska, Russia - Latitude 61 degrees 52 minutes, longitude 94 degrees 10 minutes
A NEWFOUND OPTIMISM warmed Gordon. He felt confident that John had taken the bait. The U.S. Army would be forced to save Harper in his stead.
He threw down the worthless goggles, revved the snowmobile engine and raced back toward Fletcher.
As he sped along, a pestering thought hung in the back of his mind. If his plan failed, he could lose both of them. He pushed the pointless distraction from his head and focused on the trail ahead. The snowfall had picked up, allowing him only a few feet of visibility. He tucked his chin to his chest in an attempt to shield his unprotected eyes. The momentary lapse in focus was all it took. A bone-crunching thud was the last sound Gordon remembered hearing before waking up, face-down in the snow, at the foot of a large oak tree.
He couldn’t be sure how long he had been unconscious, but the tingling numbness of his ice crusted face told him it was more than just a moment. A cursory examination of his extremities confirmed everything was in working order. His neck was tender, but the helmet had surely saved him from far greater damage.
The snowmobile had not fared so well. It lay on its side a few feet past the large dark object Gordon had struck. What is that?
He wiped the remaining snow and ice crystals from his face and in the process, tore away the two large Band-Aids from his cheek. His wound re-awakened with exposure to the elements, but the searing pain brought him focus.
“Dammit.” He pulled the sticky bandages off his glove and tossed them to the ground. Standing proved more difficult than he had anticipated. His legs felt alien beneath him. Dizziness overcame him as he brushed the snow from his body. He leaned back against the tree trunk for support, as he pulled the GPS from his pocket. He was less than a hundred yards from where he had left Fletcher. He removed the heavy, open-face helmet and inhaled a few sharp breaths. His mother’s voice echoed in his mind, “One thing at a time, Gordon.”
He pushed himself upright from the tree trunk and took a moment to steady himself. His equilibrium slowly returned. He took one tentative step away from the tree and then another. His eyes narrowed in an attempt to bring the large black object into focus.
His heart sank.
It was a body. Fletcher’s navy parka. He ran toward the lifeless form, almost choking on the growing lump in his throat. Tears welled in his wind-burned eyes. No, no, no.
He stumbled and fell to his knees, as his strength evaporated like a mist in the Sahara. Every emotion he had failed to acknowledge over the last eleven days poured forth. He wept freely.
“Get it...together...Gordon,” he stammered through flowing tears, which had already begun to freeze on his cheeks. He wiped them away on his sleeve, and pushed himself upright. He walked the remaining five yards with leaden feet.
Gordon stood above the body, lying prone and half buried in the freshly fallen snow, contorted at an unnatural angle. He knelt down and gently tugged on the shoulder. The body had already begun to stiffen. He closed his eyes for a moment in anticipation of the dreaded unveiling.
“C’mon, Gordon.”
He lowered his shoulder and threw his full weight into the motion. The body awkwardly dislodged from its snowy grave. The vacant eyes of Ollie Kerr, tour guide, stared back. A huge smile blossomed on Gordon’s face as he broke out in nervous laughter. Was it wrong to find joy in a moment like this? Perhaps, but it did nothing to eclipse his complete elation.
He gently lay the tour guide’s body down, careful to place the parka’s hood beneath his head. Blood and brain matter colored the snow behind him, damage only a high-powered rifle could inflict. The scene was all too familiar. One bullet, straight through the temple. The similarity between Ollie’s and his father’s death were obvious. A chill ran up his spine.
Based on the contorted angle of the body and the blood splatter, Gordon deduced the shooter had been situated on a wooded crest about two hundred yards north of where he had left Fletcher.
He jumped to his feet. The adrenaline surge had all but wiped out the effects of his probable concussion. With a bent steering column and a green viscous fluid leak, he quickly determined the snowmobile would be of no further use. Wasting no time, he ran toward the location on the crest.
No plan. No fear.
•••
Harper had a plan. It was not her finest, and it involved far more unknowns than she would have liked, but given her current predicament, it would have to do.
As the last remnants of daylight lingered above the distant horizon, her room slowly slipped into darkness. It was time to act.
She turned toward the surveillance camera, waving to gain the attention of her watchers. With a pained expression, she clutched her stomach, doubling over in imaginary pain. No response. She repeated the motion. Still nothing. She walked across the room and stood directly beneath the camera. Impossible. The camera remained fixed upon the center of the room. In disbelief, she walked to the opposite corner. Same result. Seriously? No night vision? Her father had always said the Russians couldn’t organize a one-car funeral and the proof lay before her.
She approached the door.
“I’m sick. Need the restroom,” she barked as she pounded her clenched fist on the old oak door.
The familiar sound of Nika’s heavy footsteps answered.
Harper’s adrenaline surged, as her racing heart pounded in her ears.
The sound of the skeleton key clattering around in the keyhole seemed ten times louder than before. Her heightened senses tingled as time slowed.
After an agonizing pause, Nika stomped into the room, immediately reaching to the right of the door to flick the light switch on. The room remained in darkness. Harper laughed. Apparently her captors hadn’t bothered to check the only light bulb in the room either. One-car funeral.
“Chush’ sobach’ya,” Nika cursed under her breath, flicking the switch on and off in vain.
“I’m sick,” Harper whimpered as she bent over, clutching her stomach.
As Nika’s feet entered her line of vision, Harper shoved her middle finger down her throat, forcing herself to vomit. Her bodily fluids splattered all over Nika’s pants and shoes.
“Bitch!” Nika exclaimed in her heavy Russian accent as she looked down at the mess in disgust.
Harper stomped down on Nika’s left foot with her full weight. In her heightened state, she swore she could hear the tiny bones crack beneath her heel.
Nika reflexively bent down to grab her foot. Harper seized the moment, placing her hands atop Nika’s head as she yanked it down to meet her rapidly approaching knee. Nika tumbled to the ground clutching both her broken foot and bloodied nose. Harper drew her leg back as far as she could and issued the coup de grâce, a knockout kick to the head. Nika’s neck snapped back unnaturally as it slammed into the unforgiving floor.
“And don’t call me bitch.”
The room fell into silence, splintered only by the whistling wind from the storm brewing outside her window.
Harper froze. Had anyone else heard their scuffle? She held her breath in anticipation of discovery, but no one came. She glanced down at Nika, who was clearly out cold. Harper patted her down hastily, finding only empty pockets.
She walked over to the door and peeked out into the dimly lit corridor. A sudden burst of boisterous laughter drifted up the stairs, freezing her in her tracks. Judging by the sound, there were at least five or six men, clearly far too consumed by their own enjoyment to notice the disturbance above their heads.
The bathroom light at the end of the hallway beckoned. Harper exited the room, silently skating down the hall as if she were crossing a lake topped by paper-thin ice.
The laughter and merrymaking continued as she entered the bathroom and hurriedly rummaged through the medicine cabinet above the sink. She found two syringes of the scopolamine she had been dosed with earlier. They were both destined for Nika’s thick neck.
The cabinet beneath the sink harbored an ancient hair dryer, a few rolls of toilet paper, a filthy plunger, and a screwdriver. She instinctively reached for the screwdriver. She momentarily considered what it might feel like to plunge it into Nika’s neck.
She pushed the macabre thought from the forefront of her mind as she retraced her steps down the hallway to her room. She was no murderer.
Nika lay motionless on the floor, with the vulnerability of a sleeping giant. Harper administered both syringes of scopolamine, taking particular pleasure in jabbing Nika’s pulsing jugular.
She glanced over at the bed. It would require almost Herculean strength to lift Nika’s dead weight up onto the bed frame. First, she yanked the thin mattress from her bed and dragged it over to the window. Anything to cushion the fall.
A burst of wind rattled the pane. She gazed out at the dark stormy skies. Staying alive would require far more clothing than the cotton tee, hoodie, jeans and Chuck Taylors she was wearing. After some struggle, she managed to remove Nika’s wool sweater, trousers and boots. Everything was four sizes too big, perfect for layering.
She placed her hands under Nika’s sweaty armpits and dragged her bulging half-naked body to the bed.
Here we go. Harper stepped on top of the bare bedsprings, balancing deftly, as she threw her entire strength into lifting Nika. She managed to get Nika’s shoulders atop the frame, but quickly ran out of leverage room. Rather than allowing Nika to slide back down to the floor, Harper sat squarely on Nika’s face, leaning forward to grab her right leg. It was awkward, but Harper managed to lift the entire right side of Nika’s body up onto the bed. She hopped down, squatted at the bed’s side and pushed the remainder up onto the frame. She turned Nika’s body to face away from the camera and covered her in the thin quilt. Hardly a perfect body double.
Nika’s clothing easily slid on over her own. She even managed to wedge her shoes inside Nika’s gargantuan boots.
She withdrew the screwdriver from her pocket, walked over to the window and went to work on the welded lock, her last remaining obstacle. Her palm blistered after just a few forceful jabs. The weld was going nowhere. However, she noticed the base of the lock had begun to loosen from the frame itself. She chipped away at the wood and eventually made a gap large enough to wedge the screwdriver into. She forced it in as far as it would go and torqued down on the makeshift lever with all her might. The lock splintered away from the old frame.
Do or die.
Harper slid open the window frame, allowing an arctic blast of air to rush past her as she popped her head out for one last look.
Snow. It was everywhere...on the ground, swirling through the air and covering the treetops for as far as she could see. Even with the added clothing, she could feel the cold’s tireless pursuit, like a bloodhound on a rabbit trail. It wasn’t a question of “how,” but “when.”
She lifted the thin cot mattress from the floor, folded it in two and slid it out the window. It would serve as both a cushion and a target.
Harper straddled the window frame and looked down. The mattress seemed so far away. She held onto the frame with a vise-like grip and swung her other leg out. As her anxiety peaked, the metallic taste of fear filled her mouth. Her hips easily slid off the frame, jarring her shoulder as she caught herself and dangled from the ledge by her fingertips. Now or never.
She plummeted to the ground below and instead of slowing, time seemed to accelerate. With her legs fully extended beneath her, she landed feet first. The pain was sharp and the accompanying sound unwelcome...a distinct crack.
Overwhelmed, her mind fell into a dizzy stupor. As she looked skyward, she thought she could make out what appeared to be a digital clock on the surface of the moon. It read 01:43:22 and was counting down with each second. Crazy. The world seemed to melt around her as her eyes closed.
•••
Tunguska, Russia - The Facility
Fletcher plummeted sixty feet down the exhaust ductwork, attempting to slow himself by leveraging his weight against the walls of the ducting as he fell. The impact acceleration was still enough to partially tear the peroneal tendon in his right ankle.
“Sodding hell,” Fletcher murmured to himself as he crouched down in the cramped space to massage his already throbbing injury. Between the ankle, the dislocated shoulder and the bullet wound, he was in sad shape for a battle.
That’s when he heard the gunshot. He gazed skyward. The tiny window of light above his head looked a universe away. He was well past the point of no return.
From his cramped crouch, he considered his limited options. The ductwork split off in three different directions from his location. An old children’s counting rhyme his grandmother had taught him, randomly popped into his head. Hickery pickery, pease scon. Where will this young man gang? He’ll go east, he’ll go west, he’ll go to the crow’s nest. Hickery pickery, hickery pickery.
“West, to the crow’s nest,” he thought aloud, glancing down at the digital compass on his watch. The display on his Timex Expedition rapidly shifted through a multitude of readings. He tapped the face a few times before pressing the reset button on the side of the watch. No change.
“Bloody Bermuda Triangle down here,” Fletcher mumbled as he committed to a direction. “Left it is.”
The ductwork offered just enough space to allow Fletcher to crawl on all fours. Thankfully, he had never been one to fear tight spaces. As he left behind his point of entry, the light dipped down dramatically. He pulled a small tactical flashlight from his parka pocket, illuminating his destined path.
Fletcher’s thoughts jumped wildly back and forth between his current predicament, and thoughts of Harper and Gordon. The odds were certainly against them all. He was not a religious man, but moments like this created believers. He prayed to a God he wasn’t sure existed.
With each movement, his ankle throbbed and his shoulder ached. “Way too old for this,” Fletcher grumbled as he crawled along. Finally, as he rounded a bend in the seemingly never-ending ductwork, a sliver of light beckoned.
Far too exhausted to feel anything but relief at the thought of exiting the human hamster tunnel, he eagerly approached the small exhaust fan. A familiar sound welcomed him. Running water. He beamed at the thought of finding himself directly above the women’s locker room showers. A teenage fantasy, about to come true. His catlike crawl quickened at the mere thought.
“You in here, Williams?” an American voice barked, shattering Fletcher’s fantasy.
“Showers,” Williams responded, in a heavy British accent.
Fletcher looked directly down through the whirring exhaust fan, which fragmented the scene below into discrete frames, like watching an old super 8mm film.
“Fifty says it’s D.C.”
“My very hefty paycheck is on New York. Shame they can’t target gents only,” Williams responded. “Consoling lonely women is one of my specialities.”
“I prefer to make them cry,” the American retorted.
“I miss women. Real women, not the beakers down here. And sunlight. And Theakston’s Old Peculier. Kill for a pint right now.”
“Twenty-eight days and counting until we surface. Just in time for the Superbowl,” the American replied.
“My, my. You Americans truly are a naive lot. You really think when you get back up there everything will be just as you left it? Sports, recliners, super-sized soft drinks, cheerleaders? After today, the world’s going to be a different place, mate. Governments in chaos, anarchy, fear...war.”
“Maybe, but if things get too bad, I can always commit suicide by jumping off my wallet,” the American said, laughing as he rinsed his hair.
“This disappearing act does pay well,” Williams chuckled. “As long as we don’t end up on the Tetris wall of death, I’ll be a happy man.”
The American took pause, “You don’t think...nah...they wouldn’t.”
“We don’t even know who ‘they’ are and clearly ethics don’t factor into their thinking. Haven’t you noticed you can’t get any higher than level three with your access card?”
The two men exited the showers and migrated to the dressing area, escaping Fletcher’s field of vision. He pulled his trusty multi-tool from his pocket and began to loosen the exhaust fan, listening as he worked.
“Well, Dmitry seems nice enough,” the American said as he pulled on his crisp white lab uniform.
“He’s a shadow of his former self. I saw him speak at Oxford years ago. A vibrant, passionate man...nothing like the soulless automaton he’s become.”
“You’re making me a little nervous, Williams.”
“You should be. I am.” Williams glanced up at the large digital clock that rested above the locker room entrance. “Time to punch in.”
The two men departed the locker room.
Fletcher removed the final screw from the exhaust fan and glanced down at the floor below, weighing his options. The narrow opening would barely accommodate his shoulders and then he’d be left with a twelve-foot drop to the ground. Pain was inevitable. He took a deep breath, dropped his legs down through the opening, hanging onto the edge as he forced his shoulders through. He dangled for a moment, dreading the landing. One, two, three.
An intense bolt of pain shot up from his already bruised and swelling ankle. Fletcher grimaced. “Stupid git.” He hobbled out of the shower area into the main dressing room. A quick glance revealed nothing out of the norm -- a few rows of lockers, benches, a stack of clean towels and an overflowing laundry cart.
Fletcher grabbed his multi-tool and jimmied open the fixed combo lock on the locker directly in front of him. Empty. He tried another five lockers from different rows, to no avail.
He eyed the laundry cart. It will have to do. He rummaged through it in search of a pair of white pants, a shirt and a lab coat in his size. He disrobed and changed, throwing his things in an empty locker, taking only the necessities with him. Gun. Sunflower seeds. He had hoped to acquire the access card the two men had spoken of, but would just have to make do.
The clock was ticking.
•••
Tunguska, Russia - The Facility
A spent shell, footprints and a fresh snowmobile track confirmed Gordon’s instinct. The sniper had stood in this exact position.
Following the snowmobile track was easy; the difficult part was not knowing where or to whom it would lead. As he walked forward briskly, he re-played his call with Wilkinson over and over in his head, analyzing each nuance of their brief conversation. Had he taken the bait? Panic fluttered through him as he considered the weight of his decision. He would not be able to live with himself if something happened to Harper. And Fletcher...it would kill him.
A blast of icy air assaulted the bare wound on his face, jarring him back to the present. He paused for a moment to gather his bearings. As he watched the last glimmer of sunlight disappear behind the distant mountains, the temperature plummeted. Without shelter, he’d be dead by morning.
The oversized moon cast a breathtaking blue glow on the snow-blanketed world before him. The clock ticked.
The assassin’s trail continued on toward the base of the imposing mountain that rose up before Gordon. Recognizing the time for caution had long since passed, he quickened his pace. The icy touch of the steel pistol against his taut stomach was a constant reminder of what was to come. He thought of his father lying dead in the snow with the back of his head blown off. It was the only fuel he needed.
Gordon neared the base of the mountain. The path didn’t end at the mountain...it appeared to go right through it.
The door’s facade was seamless. Even under Gordon’s intense scrutiny, the only clue to its existence was the terminated set of snowmobile tracks. He scanned the immediate area, desperate to find a way in.
A sound interrupted his search, quiet at first, but gradually increasing in volume. Though muffled, it was a sound that Gordon had come to associate with death. The snowmobile.
He ran to a small outcropping of rocks at the base of the mountain, and ducked behind them for cover. He stole a glance as a twenty-foot section of the mountain opened as effortlessly as a suburban garage door. The snowmobile slowly emerged from the opening, pausing as its driver pulled on his gloves.
Even in the glow of the moonlight, Gordon recognized his father’s killer. His blood ran colder than the snow at his feet. A wave of nausea hit him. He spat out the acidic bile that welled up in his tightened throat and pulled the gun from his waistband. Stepping out from behind the rock, he had the gun pointed at his target. Whether it was the sound of his retching or that of the snow beneath his boots, it was enough to attract the attention of the driver, whose look of surprise was immediately followed by one of recognition. The assassin reached for his gun, just as Gordon’s went off.
The two men shared an intimate moment, holding each other’s gaze for what felt like decades. Gordon imagined he could see the bullet sailing just wide of its target. He felt certain he would soon meet the same fate as his father, at the hand of the same man. Surely it was destined.
The shared moment came to an abrupt halt as the assassin raised his handgun and swung it in Gordon’s direction, but before his trigger finger completed the all-too-familiar motion, a racking cough broke his momentum. A peculiar expression blossomed on the assassin’s face. He coughed again, this time splattering blood over the pristine white canvas before him. A third cough sent him falling to the ground.
An emotional stew of joy, regret, sorrow, fear, dread and hope, washed over Gordon, almost bringing him to his knees. He had always considered himself to be the unemotional type, immune to fleeting feelings that seemed to govern others’ lives, but this was different. A man’s life had ended at his hand and although his actions were justifiable, he feared that he was now no different from the assassin -- a weight he was sure to carry to his grave.
He approached the body, which lay sprawled out at the base of the snowmobile. The assassin’s head was pushed awkwardly to one side; his vacant eyes fixed on the middle distance, aglow in the light of the full moon. Gordon had seen far too many corpses in the last ten days, each illuminating Dmitry’s theory of Dusha in its own unique way. The haste with which energy departed the body was indeed intriguing. Surely it went somewhere?
He crouched down to pick up the assassin’s silenced pistol and noticed a security badge peeking out from the snow. He lifted it, brushing away the icy crystals, to reveal the assassin’s austere gaze. The name under the photo read Tatar Zakhaev; it was both an introduction and a farewell of sorts.
He felt hollow inside.
•••
Tunguska, Russia - The Facility
Fletcher exited the locker room with his head hung low, stealing brief glances as he shuffled down the stark white hallway under the glare of the overhead fluorescents. The mechanical sound of a tracking surveillance camera followed his every movement. It was unnerving.
Notably absent, were doors...and people. He hadn’t passed a single one of either since he’d exited the locker room. The hallway terminated about a hundred yards in front of him, with only one door leading in or out of the cavernous room that flanked him.
Everything about the environs made him uncomfortable. His right hand reflexively reached for the gun in his waistband. As his fingers brushed against the warm steel his jangled nerves immediately settled. A pacifier of sorts.
A loud buzzer broke the spell. The door at the end of the hallway opened, releasing two men into the corridor. Seemingly lost in conversation, they took no notice of Fletcher, who continued his approach. As they neared, Fletcher picked up the muted strains of a song he had long since banished from his memory.
“The final countdown, do-do do do, do-do do do do,” the older of the two sang, atonally.
“I hate you...really,” the other replied. “That virulent melody will likely infect my dreams tonight.”
“You’re welcome.”
As Fletcher passed the two men in the hallway, he brushed shoulders with the tone-deaf singer.
“Hey, watch where you’re going,” the man scolded as he spun around to catch a rear view of Fletcher receding down the corridor.
Not breaking stride, Fletcher raised his arm in apology, smiling to himself as he looked down at the security badge he had artfully pulled from the man’s lab coat pocket.
The smile faded as he gazed through the window of the door before him. “Bloody hell.”
•••
Operation Golden Boy caught the occupants of the farmhouse by surprise. The MH-X, Stealth Black Hawk’s whisper of a sonic footprint, was easily buried by the stormy winds, while its silver infrared suppressant finish and thermal masking allowed the MH-X to cross over into Russian airspace undetected. A ghost in the night.
Inside the aircraft were twelve Navy Seals from the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, commonly referred to as Seal Team Six, two pilots from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, and one Russian-American translator. Wearing full winter camo, each Seal carried a silenced Heckler & Koch MP7, silenced Sig Sauer P226 pistol, extra ammo, infrared goggles and a laminated photo of Gordon, codename Tesla. Their orders were simple. Bring Tesla back alive at all costs.
The MH-X hovered forty feet above the ground just fifty feet behind the blue farmhouse. Eight Seals fast-roped to the snowy ground below. The MH-X pulled up and flew into position above the farmhouse. The remaining four fast-roped down to their rooftop infiltration point.
Within twelve minutes of their arrival, Team Six killed five armed men, discovered one deceased female and captured an unarmed Swiss national by the name of Peter Grumman.
“Where is he?” Lieutenant Commander Chip Harrow shouted as he held a silenced Sig Sauer P226 pistol to Peter’s temple.
“He?” replied Peter. “I’m afraid I’m the only ‘he’ left. Surely you mean ‘she?’” Peter calmly replied, his pulse barely elevated.
“The woman upstairs is dead,” Harrow barked. “You have ten seconds before you join her.”
“Women. There should be two women upstairs,” Peter replied with a bit more urgency. A smile slowly crept across Peter’s face. “She did it. She jumped.”
The Seals found Harper face down in the snow...she was ice cold to the touch and her right leg had rotated one hundred and eighty degrees so that her foot was now pointing skyward.
Navy Seal Lieutenant Michael Collins plucked her ID from her back pocket. “What the hell? US citizen. She’s from LA. Crisp. Harper Crisp.” He bent down to feel her pulse. “Barely.”
“Get her and Swiss Miss to the bird, stat,” Harrow directed, “and put her in a hypo-wrap.” He looked down at his watch. Running time on the mission was Twenty-two minutes and thirty-seven seconds. Time to deliver the bad news to Washington.
•••
Tunguska, Russia - The Facility
Fletcher held the hijacked badge up to the door’s security panel, triggering its green glow of approval. As the door buzzed open, he entered the tubular ballistic glass-walled capsule, which offered an expansive view of the achromatic chamber before him.
He had never seen anything like it.
The brilliant bleached light pouring from the room assaulted his tired eyes, beating them into a submissive squint. He blinked in disbelief, as if the simple gesture would somehow either validate or invalidate the inconceivable sight before him. The surreal shifting wall contained what appeared to be hundreds of bodies, harnessed in haloed head braces. The kid’s right. They’re harvesting the energy of the soul.
Fletcher checked his watch. With less than an hour remaining before the depopulation of a major American city, he exited the capsule and stepped into the sepulchral chamber.
With their attention fully dedicated to their handheld computers, not a single one of the six other men in the room looked up when the door opened. Scientists. Odd bunch. Able to spend their lives buried in microscopic particles, but blind to the life-size humans around them.
He spotted Dmitry immediately. The others buzzed around him like worker bees to the queen. Fletcher continued his approach, still formulating his nebulous plan with each step.
It was Dmitry who noticed Fletcher’s presence first. A fly in the ointment. The moment their eyes met, Fletcher knew the ruse was over. He ripped the Sig Sauer Sig P226 from his waistband and pointed it directly at Dmitry’s head.
“Drop ‘em,” Fletcher shouted. The five scientists surrounding Dmitry complied immediately, allowing their devices to fall to the floor.
“Now get on the ground, face down. All of you except for him,” Fletcher barked as he held aim on the center of Dmitry’s forehead.
Dmitry defiantly continued to type away on his device. “Drop it now or die, Dmitry.”
“And you would be?” Dmitry asked as he glanced up.
“The guy who’s going to end your little science experiment.” Fletcher motioned the gun toward the device Dmitry still held in his hands. “Now.”
“I wouldn’t recommend that,” Dmitry remarked, pointing to the gun.
“And why’s that?” Fletcher asked, stepping over a scientist, as he approached Dmitry.
“Just one bullet will set off a chain of events which may alter the very course of mankind,” Dmitry calmly stated as he entered one last code into the device, before throwing it to the ground, where it shattered into a dozen pieces.
A red light on the upper corner of the wall of death began to blink rapidly and a large LED clock next to it began the countdown.
“Event initiated. 90, 89, 88… “ A computerized female voice spoke calmly from an overhead speaker.
The jarring reminder of his abbreviated operational timeline was the only excuse Fletcher needed. He had come too far and given up too much to fail. As he thought of Harper, the side of his pistol slammed against Dmitry’s pronounced cheekbone, sending a spray of blood across the floor.
Unfazed, Dmitry slowly turned his head back to meet Fletcher’s fiery gaze. Blood flowed freely from his gaping laceration. “Are you finished?” Dmitry’s eyes were empty. No fear, anger, pain, joy, regret. It was the look of a man who was unreachable and Fletcher knew it.
“Stop the countdown...now.” The edgy tone in Fletcher’s voice slowly transmuted to one tinged with anxiety.
“Mine seems to have broken,” Dmitry replied as he gestured toward the shattered device lying at his feet.
“77, 76...” the voice announced from the speaker, immune to the unfolding drama.
“Why are you doing this? Money? Power? What did they promise you?”
“As you might have guessed, they promised me the world,” Dmitry chuckled. “But that’s not the reason I do it. I do it simply because I can.”
“What would Sarah think of you now?” Fletcher challenged.
“Sarah is, now...nothing but a figment of my imagination,” Dmitry retorted, coldly. “That card has already been played and I lost.”
“61, 60, 59...”
Fletcher thought he caught a slight shift in Dmitry’s resolute stare. He had opened a window that had long been closed.
“I lost my wife too.” Fletcher’s voice cracked slightly as the words spilled from his mouth. “Buried her at the bottom of a whiskey bottle.”
“How poetic. Is this the moment where we share our histories and forge a friendship based on common ground?”
“No, I can see the only common ground we share is resting beneath our feet. This is the moment where we lose our footing. Stop the countdown or I will shoot us all into oblivion.”
Dmitry stood as still as the stars above.
“38, 37, 36...”
Fletcher looked down at the five scientists. “Is there an override?”
An older male scientist lifted his head off the ground as he addressed Fletcher, “Yes, but he’s the only one who can initiate it. He’s not lying about the gun.”
“Is that a safe room?” Fletcher asked as he gestured toward the tubular capsule.
“In theory, yes, but --“
The question would remain half-answered. All of the scientists’ heads fell to the ground at the same moment. The remote-triggered cyanide release killed them within seconds.
Dmitry grinned as he looked up from the bulky watch he wore on his wrist. “Did they really believe the RFID implants were for solely for identification purposes? Money-drunk fools.”
Fletcher threw a booming right hook, sending Dmitry plummeting to the ground.
“They’re no better than me,” Dmitry remarked, as he pushed himself back up to his knees.
“Perhaps not, but they’re entitled to a trial by peers, not by a psychotic boffin.”
“15, 14, 13...”
“And me?”
“You? Well, you would be the exception. I’m afraid I’m your judge and jury. Any closing arguments?” Fletcher asked as he slowly began walking backwards toward the safe room.
“They’ll get what they want, one way or another.”
“8, 7, 6...”
“But they won’t get you,” Fletcher responded as the flexor tendons in his trigger finger tightened.
•••
Tunguska, Russia - The Facility
The explosion of blue light impregnated the night sky, illuminating the remote wilderness for hundreds of miles, followed, moments later, by a deafening sonic aftershock which rattled Gordon’s bones to their very core. Concussed, he stumbled back, tripping over the assassin’s corpse that lay at the base of the snowmobile. He landed awkwardly, face to face with the man he had killed. The assassin’s skin had begun to take on a ghostly blue tint and his eyes were frozen open, staring right through Gordon. Horrified, he shoved the man’s body, which rolled stiffly to the side.
Fletcher.
Gordon scrambled to his feet, staggering toward the mountainside entrance with a primal determination. His vision was blurred and a high-pitched tone rang in his ears. The blue light lingered in the upper atmosphere, painting the evening skies with an eerie otherworldly glow. The countdown on the moon had ceased.
He entered the stone-walled alcove cut into the mountainside, which housed a handful of snowmobiles and ATVs, as well as a high-tech surveillance hub.
A security booth lined with a wall of LCD screens rotated through a series of live shots from both inside and outside the facility.
Gordon’s eyes darted rapidly back and forth between the shifting screens, looking for any sign of Fletcher. For that matter, any sign of life at all. The endless corridors on each level were empty, the locker rooms were empty, the dormitory was empty, the bizarre looking cavernous white room was empty...not a soul anywhere.
Gordon took off down the corridor, double-checking each of the four levels in the facility.
It was an empty gesture, but one he felt obliged to make.
They were all gone.
He approached the door at the end of the very last hallway and turned the doorknob. It was locked. He pulled the assassin’s ID card from his pocket and held it up to the door’s security panel. The buzzer startled him and he practically leapt into the tubular capsule. The thick glass walls were now sheathed in undulating tendrils of violet light. The effect reminded him of the treasured plasma globe that had entertained his younger self for hours at a time. He held his hand to the glass, half expecting the tendrils to converge upon it.
He pushed open the heavy steel door and entered the main chamber. It was unlike anything he had ever seen.
A sci-fi morgue. Death hung in the air like a sickly sweet perfume.
He did it. Dmitry really did it.
The realization spun his thoughts in a million different directions. Was it proof of an afterlife? If the soul existed as an energy beyond the life of its host, it certainly became a possibility.
A blood stain on the otherwise pristine white floor caught Gordon’s eye. He crouched down and ran his finger through it. Still wet. Next to the stain lay one final clue.
A sunflower seed. His heart sank.
A piercing red light flashed above his head, followed by an announcement over the intercom.
“Code red initiated. 30, 29, 28...,” a computerized female voice announced.
Gordon’s eyes scanned the room. He picked up one of the scientist’s handheld computer devices and randomly pushed a few buttons. The screen remained unlit. Nothing. He tried another. Same. He tucked the device in his waistband and ran from the room.
As he sprinted down the long corridor, the countdown continued. “25, 24, 23...”
The four flights of stairs passed by in a moment. Staggering from exhaustion, he stumbled back into the alcove.
“12, 11, 10...”
Gordon jumped on the snowmobile closest to the exit. The keys were in the ignition. It turned over. He throttled out of the cave, as the countdown continued in his head – five, four, three, two, one. A massive fireball, followed by yet another ear-shattering boom, blasted out from the opening, singeing his back as he sped away.
With the mountain behind him and the wide open tundra ahead, he felt the immensity of the universe and his small place in it.
•••
One Month Later - Pasadena, CA- Pasadena General Hospital
The last month had passed by like the countryside through a bullet train window. It was all a blur to him.
With Wilkinson at his side, Gordon had undergone a taxing series of debriefings and formal inquiries. It felt like every three-letter US government agency wanted a piece of him, yet none of them asked the right questions. They all seemed captivated by the minutiae of the moment and blind to the bigger picture. The what, where and when of it all was far too obvious for Gordon’s booming intellect; it was the who and the why that demanded his attention. And sure, it was easy to pinpoint Dmitry as the mastermind, but he certainly wasn’t the grand architect.
And the moon? The moon was the elephant in the room. Government lips were sealed. What had begun as whispers about a hollow moon had turned to exclamations, but the public’s interest in the subject lasted only as long as the headlines. The few who persisted were quickly labelled and discarded as conspiracy theorists. It astonished Gordon, how easily the public psyche could be manipulated. His psyche was a different story altogether. An unanswered question was a challenge, one that would not go unheeded. He picked up bits and pieces of information here and there, but it was apparent that he was a mere cog in a gargantuan machine.
The last conversation he shared with his father echoed in his mind:
“Can I trust John?”
“John is a pawn who thinks he’s a king. He’s stuck in the middle of a much bigger battle that he knows nothing about.”
“Is that a ‘no’?”
“It’s a ‘don’t trust pawns’...or kings, for that matter.”
Trust no one. It was a tough principle to live by.
Flowers in hand, Gordon walked down a busy hallway in the Pasadena General Hospital.
He hated hospitals.
At the tender age of seven, he’d fallen ill with a sky-high fever and severe abdominal pain. A visit to the Fort Huachuca base hospital ensued. After a quick once-over, Gordon’s family doctor requested a urine sample. A urine sample? Gordon’s limbs froze as the doctor offered him a clear plastic cup. He had never heard such a preposterous thing in his life and was absolutely appalled at the thought of having to carry out the repulsive request. He imagined himself slowly walking back from the bathroom with urine sloshing over the cup’s sides, and nurses, doctors and patients laughing in his wake. He responded with a firm, yet teary refusal. His mother and the doctor both looked on with amusement at the early display of his unwavering constitution. He had never cared much for hospitals, doctors, or urinating on command since that day.
Room 213. Gordon checked the number twice. The moment had played out in his mind an embarrassing number of times. His heart fluttered and stomach quivered with anticipation. He stole a quick glance through the window. She was awake and sitting up in bed. He knocked lightly before entering.
Her eyes. They were so like her father’s.
Gordon opened his mouth, but no words issued forth. On the bedside table sat an open bag of jumbo salted sunflower seeds.
No, it can’t be.
“Are those yours?” Gordon uttered impulsively as he pointed to the bag.
Harper’s knowing smile said it all.
“You must be Gordon.”
<<<The Beginning>>>