Covert One 5 - The Lazarus Vendetta (19 page)

Three men sat at a conference table in one of the outer rooms. They were
going over the operational and experimental data gathered so far from the
“events” in Zimbabwe
and New Mexico.
Two were nanotech-nology specialists, among the most brilliant molecular
scientists in the world. The third, much taller and broad-shouldered, had a
very different set of skills. This man, the third of the Horatii, called
himself Nones.

“Preliminary reports from Santa
Fe indicate our Stage Two devices activated inside
roughly twenty to thirty percent of those exposed,” the first scientist
commented. His gloved fingers fluttered over a keypad, pulling up a graph on
the plasma screen display before them. “As you can see, that exceeds our
initial projections. I think we can safely assume that our control-phage design
modification is fundamentally sound.”

“True,” his colleague agreed. “It's also clear that the Stage
Two biochemical loads were far better balanced than those used at Kasusa —
achieving a significantly higher rate of tissue and bone dissolution.”

“But can you increase the kill ratio?” the tall man named Nones
asked harshly. “You know our employer's requirements. They are absolute. A
weapon which devours fewer than a third of its
intended victims will not meet them.”

Behind their masks, the two scientists frowned in distaste at his inelegant
choice of words. They preferred to think of themselves as surgeons engaged in
an essential, though admittedly unpleasant, operation. Crude reminders that
their work ultimately involved murder on a massive scale were neither necessary
nor welcome.

“Well?” Nones demanded. His vivid green eyes glinted behind his

acrylic safety glasses. He knew how much these men
disliked focusing on the deadly results of their scientific efforts. It amused
him from time to time to rub their ivory tower noses in the muck and the mud of
their mission.

“We expect our design for the Stage Three phages and their controls to
produce much higher efficiencies,” the senior molecular scientist assured
him. “The Stage Two sensor arrays were limited in number and type. By
adding additional sensors configured for different biochemical signatures, we
can greatly expand the number of potential targets.” The green-eyed man
nodded his understanding. “We have also been able to boost the yield of
each nanophage's internal power source,” the second scientist reported.
“We expect a matching increase in their effective life span and
operational range.”

“What about the field contamination problem?” Nones asked.
“You've seen the safety precautions being taken outside the Teller
Institute.”

“The Americans are being overcautious,” the first scientist said
dismis-sively. “By now, most of the Stage Two nanophages should have
deteriorated beyond usefulness.”

“Their fears are not relevant,” the green-eyed man told him
coldly. “Our employer's demands are. You were asked to produce a reliable
self-destruct mechanism for the Stage Three phages, were you not?”

The second scientist nodded hastily, hearing the implied threat in the
bigger man's voice. “Yes, of course. And we've succeeded.” He began
clicking keys, flipping rapidly through different design sketches on the screen.
“Finding the necessary space inside the shell was a difficult problem, but
in the end, we were able to — ”

“Spare me the technical details,” the third member of the Horatii
said drily. “But you may transmit them to our employer if you wish. I
concern myself solely with practical matters. If the weapons you are creating
for us kill quickly, efficiently, and reliably, I don't feel any need to know
exactly how they work.”

Chicago, Illinois

Bright arc lights turned night into imitation day along much of the western
edge of the University of Chicago's Hyde Park
campus. They were set to illuminate the tan-and-gray stone facade of the newly
built Interdivi-sional
Research Building
(IRB), a mammoth five-story structure containing 425,000 square feet of lab and
research space. Construction trailers still blocked most of the sidewalks and
green spaces along the south side of 57th
Street and the east side of Drexel Boulevard. Lights were also on
throughout the huge building, as electricians, carpenters, ironworkers, and
others worked around-the-clock to finish the enormous project.

Scientists from the University
of Chicago had played
crucial roles in the major scientific and technological advances of the
twentieth century—in everything from the development of carbon-14 dating to the
advent of controlled nuclear power. Now the university was determined to
maintain its competitive edge in the new sciences of the twenty-first century.
The IRB was the cornerstone of that effort. When it was fully up and

running, biological and physical scientists would
share the building's state-of-the-art facilities. The hope was that working
side by side would help them transcend the narrow and increasingly artificial
boundaries between the two traditional disciplines.

Nearly $1 billion in corporate and individual donations had been raised to
pay for construction, purchase the necessary high-tech materials, and guarantee
funding for the first wave of new projects. One of the largest corporate grants
came from Harcourt Biosciences, to pay for a cutting-edge nanotech complex.
Now, in the wake of the destruction of its Teller Institute facility, the
company's senior management saw the IRB lab as an urgently needed
replacement—and a signal of its continued determination to pursue
nanotechnology. Inside the lab suite, technicians and work crews were busy
installing computers, scanning microscopes, remote manipulators, filter and air
pressure systems, chemical storage, and other equipment.

Jack Rafferty came on-shift with a grin and a
spring in his step. The short, skinny electrician had spent the commute from
his suburban La Grange
home adding up how much the overtime on this project was going to put in his
pocket. He figured he could pay off the twins' parochial school tuition and
still have enough left over to buy the Harley motorcycle he had been eyeing for
more than a year.

The grin faded as soon as he walked inside the lab. Even from the door, he
could see that someone had been screwing around with the wiring he had finished
putting in just yesterday. Wall panels were left hanging open, exposing
disarranged bundles of color-coded cables. Untidy coils and loops of insulated
electrical wire dangled from jagged holes cut in the brand-new ceiling tiles.

Rafferty swore under his breath. He stormed over to the shift supervisor, a
genial bear of a man named Koslov. "Tommy, what exactly is all this junk?
Did someone change the specs on us again?

The supervisor checked his clipboard and shook his head. “Not
that I know of, Jack.”

Rafferty frowned. “Then maybe you can tell me why Levy dinked around
with my work—and left all this goddamned mess?”

Koslov shrugged. “It wasn't Levy. Someone said he called in sick. A
couple of new guys were filling in for him.” He looked around the room.
“I saw 'em both maybe fifteen minutes ago. I guess they knocked off
early.”

The electrician rolled his eyes. “Nice. Probably
nonunion goons. Or maybe they're just connected.” He hitched up his
tool belt and settled the hard hat squarely on his narrow head. “It's
gonna take me half my shift just to clean this up, Tommy. So I don't want to
hear any bitching about being off-schedule.”

“You won't hear any from me,” Koslov promised, conspicuously
crossing his heart with one beefy paw.

Satisfied for the moment, Rafferty got to work, trying first to untangle the
rat's nest of cabling Levy's substitutes had left behind the walls. He peered
into one of the open panels, shining a flashlight into a narrow space filled
with bundled wiring, pipes, and conduits of all sizes and types.

One strand of loose green wire caught his eye. What was that supposed to be?
He tugged gently on it. There was a weight on the other end. Slowly, he reeled
the wire in, maneuvering it through the maze, using his long, thin fingers to
guide it past obstructions. One end of the wire came into view. It was plugged
into a solid block of what looked like some sort of gray moldable compound.

Puzzled, Rafferty stared down at the block for several seconds, wondering
what it could possibly be. Then it clicked in his mind. He turned pale.
“Jesus . . . that's plastic explosive—”

The six bombs planted in and around the lab complex exploded simultaneously.
Searing white light ripped through the walls and ceiling. The first terrible
shock wave tore Rafferty, Koslov, and the other workers inside the lab to
shreds. A wall of flame and superheated air roared through the corridors of the
half-finished building —incinerating every-

thing and everyone in its path. The enormous force
of the blast rippled outward, shattering steel-and-concrete structural
supports, snapping them like matchsticks.

Slowly at first, and then with increasing speed, one whole side of the IRB
shuddered, folded in on itself in a shrieking cacophony of wrenching, tearing
steel, and then collapsed. Masses of broken stone and twisted metal cascaded
down into the Science Quad. A thick, choking cloud of smoke, pulverized
concrete, and dust billowed skyward, lit eerily from within by the surviving
construction lights.

■

An hour later and ten blocks away, the three leaders of a Chicago-based
Lazarus Movement action cell met hurriedly inside the top-floor apartment of a Hyde Park brownstone. Still visibly shaken, the two men
and one woman —all in their mid-twenties—stood staring at a television in the
living room, watching the frantic reports being broadcast live on every local
and national news channel.

Sets of construction company coveralls, hard hats, tool kits, and fake ID
cards they had laboriously assembled over four months of intensive planning
were heaped on a table in the adjoining dining room behind them. A manila
folder sat on top of the pile. It contained IRB floor plans downloaded from the
University of Chicago Web site. Tightly capped jars of
foul-smelling liquids, cans of spray paint, and folded Movement banners were
packed in boxes on the hardwood floor next to the table.

“Who would do that?” Frida McFadden asked out loud in confusion.
She chewed nervously on the ends of her straight mop of green-dyed hair.
“Who would blow up the IRB? It couldn't have been any of our own people.
Our orders came straight from the top, from Lazarus himself.”

“I don't have any idea,” her boyfriend answered grimly. Bill Oakes
was busy buttoning up the shirt he had thrown on when their phone first rang
with the terrible news. He shook his long fair hair out of his eyes
impatiently. "But I do know one thing: We've got to dump all the stuff we
were

planning to use for our own mission. And soon. Before the cops come pounding on our doors."

“No shit,” muttered their heavyset companion, the third member of
their action cell. Rick Avery scratched at his beard. “But where can we
get rid of the gear safely? The lake?”

“It would be found there,” said a quiet mocking voice from behind
them. “Or you would be seen throwing your materials into the water.”

Startled, the three Lazarus Movement activists spun around. None of them had
heard the locked front door open or close. They found themselves staring at a
very tall and very powerfully built man gazing back at them from the central
hall separating the living and dining rooms. He was wearing a heavy wool coat.

Oakes recovered first. He stepped forward, with his jaw thrust out
belligerently. “Who the hell are you?”

“You may call me Terce,” the green-eyed man said calmly. “And
I have something to give you —a gift.” His hand came smoothly out of the
pocket of his coat. He pointed the silenced 9mm Walther pistol straight at
them.

Frida McFadden cried out softly in fear. Avery stood frozen, with his
fingers still tangled in his beard. Only Bill Oakes had the presence of mind to
speak. “If you're a cop,” he stammered, “show us your
warrant.”

The tall man smiled politely. “Alas, I am not a policeman, Mr.
Oakes.”

Oakes felt a shiver run through him in the last second before the Walther
coughed. The bullet hit him in the forehead and killed him instantly. He fell
back against the television.

The second member of the Horatii swung his pistol slightly to the
left and fired again. Avery groaned once and went to his knees, clutching
fu-tilely at the blood pumping out of his torn throat. The big auburn-haired
man squeezed the trigger a third time, putting this round squarely into the
bearded young activist's head.

White-faced with horror, Frida McFadden turned and tried to run for the
nearest bedroom. The tall man shot her in the back. She stumbled, fell
awkwardly across a futon sofa, and lay moaning, writhing in pain. He

shoved the pistol back in his coat pocket, stepped forward,
cradled her head in two powerful arms—and then yanked hard, twisting sharply at
the same time. Her neck snapped.

The green-eyed man named Terce surveyed the three bodies for several
seconds, checking them for any signs of life. Satisfied, he went back to the
front door and pulled it open. Two of his men were waiting out on the landing.
Each carried a pair of heavy suitcases.

“It's done,” the big man told them. He stood back and let them
past. Neither wasted any time looking at the corpses. Anyone who worked closely
with one of the Horatii soon grew used to the sight of death.

Working fast, they began unpacking, setting out blocks of plastic
explosives, detonators, and timers on the dining room table. One of them, a
short, stocky man with Slavic features, indicated the clothing, maps,
chemicals, and paint stacked on the table or packed in boxes on the hardwood
floor. “What about these things, Terce?”