The Sacred Weapon: A Tom Wagner Adventure

by Roberts, M. C.

  She pushed the detonator into the plastic explosive, activated the timer, left the truck and closed the door behind her. Noah was trapped, with no idea how much time he had.

  68

  Avinguda de la Gran Via, Barcelona

  Hellen had no idea what she would do if the convoy carrying Palffy and the Pope stopped, and even less of an idea of what Palffy was up to. Why was he allowed to ride with the Pope at all? She was no expert, but that fact alone seemed to her extraordinary. She had been chasing the convoy of cars on the stolen motorbike for some time, and her mind was in overdrive. The convoy seemed to be heading toward Barcelona airport. Were they so keen to get the Pope to safety that they were going to fly him out of the country? What good would that do Palffy? Or was this all just one big masquerade?

  With these thoughts going through her head, Hellen realized that the convoy was drifting apart. The last car, which had been driving the whole time just behind the one carrying Palffy and the Pope, dropped back, as if trying to get to a safe distance. Hellen could not think her suspicions through to the end, however, because the center car suddenly exploded in an enormous fireball. Hellen managed to brake just as the inexorable shock wave reached her and knocked her off the bike.

  The shock wave and the heat of the explosion shattered the windows of cars and shops on both sides of the highway. People screamed and began running in all directions, and dozens of nearby car alarms started to wail. Flames leapt high into the sky. Hellen got to her feet and stared ahead at the blazing wreck—there was no way anyone in the limo could have survived.

  A car bomb to kill the Pope? Then why the sword? Had that been Plan B? Was Palffy not only the perpetrator after all, but also a victim? Was there a logical explanation at all? Her confusion only grew. Maybe she’d fallen for a diversion, and the real show was happening somewhere else?

  The scales fell from her eyes. The other two limousines had disappeared. She picked up the bike, took the next exit from the highway, and raced back toward the heart of Barcelona.

  69

  Crypt beneath the altar, Sagrada Familia

  Tom was finding it hard to breathe. The heat was getting worse by the minute. He checked his ammunition and made a decision. He took several deep, fast breaths, pumping like an athlete about to face the most important competition of his life. Two shots slammed into the wooden pew in front of him, followed by a click. Guerra was out of bullets. Tom let out a roar and leaped to his feet. Running on adrenaline, he lifted the pew and hurled it forward. Then he sprinted from cover and, using the seat and back of the pew as a kind of stairway, launched himself through the flames straight at Guerra, who was taken completely by surprise. Tom grabbed him in mid-flight, and the two men went down together, landing hard in the center aisle of the crypt. Exhausted, they both lay on the floor for a moment before Tom, bathed in sweat, his face twisted with pain, picked himself up and moved slowly toward Guerra, who was pushing himself up on the back of a pew. Tom kicked him in the face with all his strength. He waited for Guerra to regather himself a little, then swung back and slammed his fist against Guerra’s temple. Something snapped inside Tom and he saw red. He was blind to the fire raging around him. He beat Guerra mercilessly, barely managing to stop himself before he went too far. Horrified at what had come over him, he retreated from where Guerra lay bloodied on the marble floor. Guerra laughed. He spat out the blood that had collected in his mouth.

  “I’ve got another piece of advice for you,” Guerra said as he rose to his feet. “Finish what you start.”

  Guerra was standing upright in the center aisle. In his hand, he held the Glock that Tom had dropped when he leaped on him. He took aim at the obviously exhausted Tom. For a moment the two adversaries stared each other in the eye. Guerra laughed and said, “Give my regards to your parents.”

  He pulled the trigger.

  Click. Click, click, click.

  “Mine was empty too, asshole,” Tom said. “By the way, you’re under arrest. You have the right to keep your mouth shut, because nobody gives a shit about what you have to say, anyway.”

  Tom, breathing hard, failed to notice that one of Guerra’s henchmen, the one he’d shot in the chest, was not dead after all. Behind Tom, the man struggled painfully to his feet. He picked up the sword and crept slowly, silently toward Tom. Guerra immediately saw what his partner was up to. He flung the empty pistol at Tom, who ducked. Then Guerra rushed him, snarling. The stupid act of a beaten man, Tom thought. He dodged Guerra’s charge easily, and with a deft spinning kick took advantage of Guerra’s momentum and kicked him in the back with all his strength as he flew past. Tom was startled by what followed, and he wasn’t the only one.

  Guerra’s henchman had been about to run Tom through with the sword. Instead, he drove the blade through Guerra’s body up to the cross-guard. Despite the roaring flames, Tom heard the horrible sound of the sword slicing through Guerra’s solar plexus. A gush of blood spilled from Guerra’s mouth onto the shirt of the swordsman, who promptly released the heft and stared in wide-eyed horror at Guerra. Guerra staggered and stumbled, trying to stay on his feet, but he no longer had control of his movements. He staggered against a blazing pew and his trousers caught fire. Seconds later he was completely engulfed in flames. He collapsed with a hideous scream.

  Tom stood and stared into the flames. He no longer feared them. But Ossana’s words flashed in his memory: Noah, his best friend, needed his help. He raced back up the stairs.

  70

  Atlas Mobile Command Center, a park behind the Sagrada Familia, Barcelona

  Noah knew he didn’t have much time. As soon as Ossana had closed the door, he hoisted himself up and tipped himself out of his wheelchair. He was about twenty feet from the door. Not far for most people, but the floor of the truck was strewn with corpses. Ossana had gone through like a hurricane, leaving five bodies, three toppled office chairs, a laser printer that had fallen off a desk, and sundry other objects scattered across the floor in her wake. For Noah, it was a special challenge, his personal Mount Everest. With his eyes fixed on the flashing timer attached to the C-4, he pushed past the first body.

  Cloutard had finally battled his way through the stream of panicked people fleeing the basilica. Outside, he ran to the first security guard he saw.

  “Where is the Atlas Command Center?”

  The man was clearly overwhelmed, but pointed to the back of the church. “Back there,” he shouted over the screams of the fleeing people. He had braced himself against a steel barrier and was doing his best to direct the panicked masses. Cloutard nodded and ran off, jumping over several barriers and ignoring the shouts of the guards who tried in vain to stop him.

  He turned a corner and there it was: the futuristic, high-tech truck.

  A police barricade surrounded the small area where the enormous vehicle was parked. Cloutard dodged through the crowd and was about to climb over the barricade when he saw the rear door of the trailer open. Ossana stepped out and closed the door behind her.

  Was he too late?

  “STO-O-O-P!” he bellowed.

  Ossana turned at the sound of his shout. Surprised to see him, she nevertheless managed a small smile. She blew him a kiss, swung herself elegantly over the police barricade and disappeared into the crowd.

  Cloutard, zigzagging through the crowd, stayed on her heels. “Stop her!” he shouted, but no one took any notice. Everyone was looking out for themselves. Then a man running collided with Cloutard from one side and he momentarily lost sight of Ossana. He kept jumping in the air to see over the swarming people. Nothing.

  “Merde!” She was gone.

  Out of nowhere, a searing pain shot through his back and he collapsed. He’d been struck in the kidneys, and when he fell to his knees in pain, Ossana’s knee came up and hit him in the face. He crashed onto his back. People ran over him without stopping.

  Then Ossana appeared in his field of vision. She had her silenced gun pointed at him, but, unusually for her, no
t at his head.

  “I’m glad my people in Tabarka didn’t kill you. The world is so much more fun with you in it, François. But right now, I don’t need you following me. For your own sake, do me a favor: get away from here as fast as you can.”

  Cloutard had propped himself on his hands and merely nodded. Ossana slipped the gun in inside her uniform, turned and jogged away.

  “I’ll get you one of these days,” he shouted weakly after her.

  Cloutard picked himself up again and watched as Ossana trotted past several fire trucks and emergency vehicles that were just pulling up. She disappeared into the subway. Cloutard took a deep breath. His nose was bleeding, and his back still stung.

  “Did you get Ossana?” Tom cried, emerging from the church and running toward Cloutard.

  Cloutard shook his head. “No. She took me by surprise. My hand-to-hand skills are limited to horizontal wrestling.”

  “What about Noah?” Tom asked.

  “Noah?” Cloutard said, and his eyes opened wide. “My God, I hope we’re not too late!”

  “Fuck!” Tom cried, and he ran for the truck.

  Sweat dripped from Noah’s forehead. Between him and the bomb was one last overturned office chair, but its back had become wedged under the shoulder of one of his dead colleagues, and neither the chair nor the corpse would budge. Noah’s strength was fading. His arms burned and he was on the brink of surrendering to his fate. Even if he made it to the door, Ossana had attached the C-4 charge to the handle—out of his reach, he knew, even as he managed to push the office chair aside with a powerful jerk, using up the last of his strength. The sweat trickling into his eyes stung like pure salt. He looked up. The timer was counting down the last ten seconds. There were only inches between him from the detonator. With a final heave, he reared up, arching his back as far as he could. He was stretching for the timer when the door abruptly opened, and the C-4 brick fell to the ground. Tom saw the danger instantly and yanked the timer leads out of the detonator. He looked at Noah in astonishment.

  “You lose something? Or is that your version of the ‘downward dog’ pose?” Tom asked with a grin as he looked down at his friend on the floor of the truck.

  “Just going out to stretch my legs,” Noah shot back, no less sardonic, but obviously relieved. “Did you get the bitch?” Noah looked up at Tom and Cloutard expectantly.

  “I’m afraid not,” Cloutard said. “She got away. But she told me to get away from here as fast as I could. What do you think she might have meant?”

  “When she left me here, she said she had something more important to do,” Noah said.

  “I last saw her going into the subway station. She’s probably long gone by now,” Cloutard said.

  “The subway? But the subway’s not running today, not here. Security shut down all the stations around the Sagrada Familia,” Noah said.

  “Damn it, I forgot to tell you. Tom, she drove through half of Europe in a car with the logo of the Barcelona public transport system. I could kick myself for losing her. If I had stayed on her, we would know more,” said Cloutard.

  “All the more reason to find out what she’s up to. I suspect that killing the Pope was only part of the plan,” said Tom. He grabbed a pistol lying next to Noah on the floor of the truck and threw another to Cloutard. “Come on, François. Looks like we’re not finished yet.”

  71

  Subway service tunnel under the Sagrada Familia

  “Where’s Guerra?” Ossana asked the three men standing by the service vehicle. All of them wore uniforms with ‘Autoritat del Transport Metropolità’ printed on the back. One of the men shrugged and unlocked the door to a service room for her. The case was still inside, just as she and Guerra had left it a few hours earlier. She placed her thumb on the fingerprint scanner on top of the case. “Access granted” appeared on the display and a faint click signaled to Ossana that the case was now unlocked. She lifted the lid and looked inside.

  “Where is that asshole? This was his fucking job.” Ossana shook her head angrily, and her voice echoed through the tunnel. She took a deep breath and focused on the job before her. Not even she activated a bomb like this one every day. She set the timer and started the countdown.

  Tom and François ran through the empty subway tunnel.

  “She could be anywhere,” said Cloutard.

  “What do you think Ossana is up to down here?” Tom asked.

  “A bomb, maybe?” Cloutard said. “She used my organization’s network to have a package sent across Europe to San Marino, where she picked it up herself; it also fits her warning to me to get away from here. Bottom line: probably a bomb.”

  Tom thought about that for a moment and nodded. “Whoever dreamed this up wants to make a bigger statement. It’s not enough for them to behead the Pope with the Sword of Saint Peter for all the world to see, now they want to blow up the Sagrada Familia and thousands of people with it?”

  He paused. His arm shot out to the side, stopping Cloutard in his tracks.

  “Do you hear that, François?”

  They had reached a junction. On their right, a service track disappeared around a bend; they heard voices from that direction. They crept cautiously along the wall and saw first the service vehicle, then two uniformed men leaning against it, sharing a cigarette. A door abruptly opened on the left, and Ossana and a third subway worker came out. This was obviously a service tunnel for the subway technicians.

  “Arrêtez!”, Cloutard shouted, opening fire, but his bullets missed their mark and struck the side of the vehicle beside the smoking men. They were taken so completely by surprise that the one with the cigarette almost swallowed it. But they wasted no time drawing their own weapons and returning fire. Simultaneously, the third man also began shooting at Tom and Cloutard, positioning himself between them and Ossana to give her cover.

  “Are you crazy? Are you trying to get us killed?” Tom yelled as he ducked for cover behind an electrical cabinet, pulling Cloutard in behind him. Bullets slammed into the cabinet.

  “Hello darling,” Ossana called. “Didn’t I tell you not to follow me? Now you and your new friend will die down here, just like thousands of other people.”

  Tom sneaked a look around the corner of the cabinet and saw the men bundling Ossana into the service van. He squeezed off three rounds in their direction as the car started to move, accelerating toward Tom and Cloutard. They pressed themselves against the wall behind the electrical box as the car shot past. Cloutard ran after it and emptied his magazine.

  “Come on, Tom! What are you waiting for? We have to stop them.”

  “No, let them go. We’ve got to deal with the bomb.”

  Cloutard came back and they ran to the service room.

  “Tom, can you hear me?” Noah was in Tom’s ear again. “I’ve got our comms up again.”

  “I’m a little busy just now,” Tom replied, and with a violent kick, which Cloutard was just able to dodge, Tom broke open the door. Their fears were confirmed in the worst possible way. In the service room on a small table stood a locked flight case. On the display at the top, a timer was counting down:

  14:57.

  14:56.

  14:55.

  “Isn’t that a little small to destroy the Sagrada Familia?” Cloutard wondered almost in a whisper.

  “Not if it’s . . .” Tom was so appalled at the idea that he wasn’t able to finish the sentence.

  “. . . nuclear?” Cloutard did it for him.

  “What?” said Noah, who had overheard.

  “Mon Dieu. We have to get away from here.”

  “And do what? Run away? Let them vaporize half of Barcelona and hundreds of thousands of people? Make the greater Barcelona area uninhabitable for decades? No way.”

  Tom had already grabbed the case and was running through the tunnel, heading for the exit.

  “Noah, we need the bomb squad,” he shouted into the headset.

  “I’ll come your way,” Noah replied.

>   “Meet me at the subway entrance. If necessary, you’re going to have to disarm the thing. We have thirteen minutes and 26 seconds left.” He and Cloutard ran up the stairs and immediately saw Noah rolling up in his wheelchair.

  “Doesn’t look good,” said Noah, taking a closer look at the case. “It’s got a biometric lock. We can’t get in, at least not fast enough.” He pointed to the display, where the seconds ticked away inexorably. “Even the bomb techs won’t be able to do anything about it.”

  The bomb disposal technicians had arrived in the meantime and nodded their agreement.

  “Well we can’t sit around picking our noses,” Tom said, thinking hard. “Somebody has to do something.”

  “Evacuate!” one of the disposal technicians threw out, fear on his face. No one replied. They just looked at him and shook their heads.

  “I’ve got an idea.” Tom hoisted the case and ran.

  “Tom!” Cloutard and Noah shouted in unison. “What are you doing?”

  “I’ve gotta get this damned thing out of here.”

  Stunned, Cloutard and Noah watched Tom disappear into the crowds.

  “Where’s Tom?” Cloutard and Noah spun around and saw Hellen. She had just jumped off the motorbike and was standing behind them.

  Noah could not meet Hellen’s eye.

  “Tom’s . . .” He hesitated. Hellen turned pale.

  “Tom’s what?” Hellen snapped.

  “. . . he’s got a bomb . . .”

  “A nuclear bomb,” Cloutard corrected.

  “Yes, he’s got an nuclear bomb, and he’s taking it away.”

  “A nuc—what!? My God! I just watched the Pope and Palffy get blown up, and now there’s a nuclear bomb? Doesn’t this nightmare ever end?”