Chimera Code (Jake Dillon Adventure Thriller Series)

by Andrew Towning

  “So, what are you hoping to see now?”

  “In an ideal world, Kirill. But I’m not getting my hopes up. I’ll settle for a few of those Assassins; that will give us time and a window to get to the basket and up into the facility. After that... the hunt begins. We want answers to questions, like who are the Assassins and where did they all of a sudden spring from, and what was the reason for taking out Scorpion and a number of its crack squads?”

  There was silence, except for the occasional movement of deer on the lower slopes. Dillon scanned the mountain side carefully, moving the scope backwards and forwards with extreme precision so that he did not miss anything. After a moment he flicked a switch, and the scope went to heat seeking mode.

  “Well, look at this,” he said eventually.

  “What is it?”

  “Lots of movement going on inside that helicopter bay,” said Dillon quietly. “Listen, can you hear the Chinooks, their engine pitch has changed and they’re getting ready for take-off. Now, I wonder where they are heading to.” Dillon said, mostly to himself.

  Tatiana peered through powerful binoculars at Kirill’s facility. The outer screen of bullet-proof glass shimmered, blending with the ancient landscape.

  She gazed up from their position, keeping the Chinook helicopters in clear view as the first one lifted off from its landing pad, then the second, and lastly the third one.

  Dillon’s voice was calm and calculated, as he said. “Well, that’s a surprise. Look who’s just crawled out from under a rock.”

  “Who?”

  “Professor, bloody, Kirill. That’s who. What a most satisfyingly pleasant surprise.” Dillon adjusted his position behind the rifle sight, and Tatiana read the body language, understood it from the firing ranges she had been sent to while training for her current role at Ferran & Cardini International. He was getting comfy. Getting ready, ready to shoot, he wanted no mistakes...

  Dillon placed his hand around the grip. Red lights turned to blue, and then to green. The Nemesis had synchronised with Dillon’s grip and finger-prints - and was now ready to shoot.

  Dillon flicked the rifle’s safety to the off position. Rolled his head a couple of times to loosen the tension.

  “What are you going to do?” Asked Tatiana softly.

  “Do? I’m going to shoot that bastard, right between the eyes. Damn-it, he’s gone and disappeared again. He must have gone back inside the building.”

  Dillon watched as the only helicopter left on the landing pad, a much smaller six-man Robinson, started its engine and the rotors started to spin. He wondered why they were leaving such a secure facility, and where they were going to.

  “What I’d give for a cold pint of lager, right now.”

  “That’s about the hundredth time you’ve said that, Dillon.”

  Dillon looked round at her, and said nothing. But she was sure that he had made some sort of snorting sound, before returning his eye to the telescopic sight.

  They continued to wait in the cold and the damp. A northerly breeze was now blowing in and Dillon repositioned and adjusted the Nemesis to take this into account.

  Tatiana went back to the quad and returned with a bottle of water and two nutritional breakfast bars.

  “We’ve only two more water bottles left, after this one. So we’ll have to be careful with it.”

  “Really. You city girls haven’t got a fucking clue have you?”

  “I’m only pointing out that our water ration is getting low, that’s all.”

  “Bloody hell, luv. We’re in the Scottish Highlands, not the Sahara Desert. Every stream is a watering hole. The water up here is cleaner than the shit they pour into those bottles, believe me.”

  Dillon grinned, flashing her a dark look.

  He returned to the scope, scanning the surrounding countryside, before panning up in a wide arc to the landing area again. His eye caught a dark clad figure jumping down from the lone helicopter and moving around it, presumably carrying out its final pre-flight checks.

  Dillon calmed his breathing.

  The sight locked on.

  The Nemesis fired.

  The bullet took the pilot through the side of the neck; the slender figure slumped to the ground with blood pumping in a high arc across the fuselage of the Robinson helicopter. Then it was still. Dillon immediately swept the scope back and forth, looking for more targets to take down...

  Kirill emerged and moved towards the helicopter.

  “At last,” murmured Dillon.

  Tatiana had been lying on a rock, her weary eyes closed, and the fur-lined parka hood pulled up tight around her face. After hearing the crackof the rifle, she had scrambled over to Dillon and now peered through binoculars up at the helicopter. The engine pitch increased, the rotor blades became a spinning blur as it lifted up into the air.

  Again, there was a crack.

  Dillon released the electronic grip, and sighed.

  The helicopter rotated ninety degrees, pitched forward slightly, and then came gently back down onto the landing pad with a bump.

  The rotor blades stopped spinning and the only noise came from the wind. Calm...

  Dillon looked through the scope, and the sensation was sweet; Kirill’s panic in the cockpit. What to do? Where to run?

  The cockpit door opened slowly - but no one stepped out.

  Kirill’s head then peered fleetingly out, then immediately disappeared back inside.

  He was gauging the distance he had to run - no cover between the helicopter and the facility entrance that he had come through just minutes earlier.

  Where was the shooter? Dillon knew that would frustrate the hell out of Kirill. And he was also sure that Kirill was cursing.

  The man’s hand-made Italian shoes hit the ground and Kirill began to run, head low, as he sprinted at a speed that surprised Dillon greatly.

  “You’re fast for an old man! Running as if your life depended on it,” Dillon said calmly, a man relaxed, focused. He gently squeezed the grip. The Nemesis kicked, ever so slightly, and there was the crack as the round was discharged. “And of course, it does.” He smiled.

  Tatiana watched Kirill tumble forward onto the hard surface of the landing bay to remain there stunned. Or dead...

  “Tatiana. It’s at times such as these, I really love the work I do,” said Dillon, smiling. He pressed his eye into the rubber cup of the scope. Watched Kirill, his face contorted in pain, gather himself up to his feet and then stumble forward, blood flowing freely, towards the inner sanctum of the facility and safety.

  “Where did you get him?”

  “Right where it hurts, in the left cheek of his ass. And boy, will that hurt.”

  Dillon squeezed the grip once more. Kirill was knocked off his feet, crashed to the ground, and lay there.

  “Right thigh. That’ll stop that bastard from running away.”

  Dillon remained still for a while, watching, checking for any stray security guards. “Let’s go up and have a little chat to the man. He might be amiable to that now. What do you reckon, Tats?”

  Tatiana remained silent.

  * * * Kirill lay on the wet surface of the landing bay near to the entrance of the facility, wondering what the hell had hit him.

  And then he remembered the sound of the single heavy thwack, and an immediate loss of oil pressure as the large caliber round had smashed into the side of the Robinson’s engine casing.

  And then panic...

  Blind panic.

  He made a dash for the entrance. A searing pain, white hot, in the soft flesh of his buttock, pain like he’d never experienced before.

  And then the second round - right thigh.

  And tears of pain running down over his cheeks.

  He rolled over into a sort of semi foetal position and tried to examine the bullet wounds. The cloth of his expensive hand tailored trousers had turned crimson and clung to his brutalised flesh. Blood pooled on the ground around him, spreading viscously from the two wounds.r />
  Lots of blood...

  Kirill’s head snapped first to the left and then right, eyes searching the surrounding terrain in panic. Where was that damned sniper?

  And then the association...Could it be possible?

  Was it Dillon out there?

  He shook his head, almost in disbelief. This is becoming a nightmare, he thought. After everythingthat I’ve been through! And he also understood why he had been shot in the legs and not in the head. Whoever had sniped him wanted him alive and was most likely on their way up...

  Kirill rolled onto his belly and gritting his teeth, started to crawl. His clothing was ripped in several places and got covered in grime. His neatly groomed greying hair became flat against his scalp with the rain falling. His usually calm and composed face became a picture of panic, of comprehension, of time running out...

  Exhausted and in immeasurable pain, Kirill lay sprawled on the wet ground, his line of sight had the winch-house clearly in view. He listened to the powerful electric motor pulling the basket up. Kirill pushed himself on, dragging his smashed legs behind him, fingers clawing with broken nails at the hard granite surface...

  The winch motor suddenly stopped. Kirill heard the clankof the locking mechanism engage, and then the sound of boots on the timber floor inside the small building, and he willed himself to move forward; he did not look back, felt no curiosity whatsoever, just the basic raw animal instinct to survive... to stay alive... to stay ahead. There came a metallic click: the sound of a bullet slipping neatly in a firing chamber. Kirill let his muscles relax, exhausted, his adrenalin spent. He could taste the bitterness of failure. He didn’t even have the strength to roll over onto his back...

  The sound of boots grew nearer. They stopped.

  The tip of the Heckler & Koch barrel prodded Kirill in the back.

  “Haven’t you bled to death yet, you son-of-a-bitch?”

  “I’m still alive,” said Kirill softly. “I knew you’d come here, Dillon. I knew it from the look in your eye in the kitchen at my house in Cornwall...”

  “I don’t like being set-up,” snapped Dillon.

  “It was a necessity.”

  Kirill felt strong hands grab him roughly and roll him over. He looked up into Dillon’s face - much more battered than the last time they had met, the nose more twisted, cuts and grazes marking the skin. Dillon’s eyes were dark, brooding, unforgiving... Beyond Dillon’s palpable hatred stood Tatiana, a Glock in one hand, and an Uzi minisub machine pistol in the other. She appeared through Kirill’s haze of pain, to be jumpy, on the edge, twitchy as she looked around to see if there was anyone else about that might have spotted them... Whereas Dillon was totally focused, dark eyes boring into Kirill’s sole, like a tungsten drill.

  “How many are still here?” He demanded.

  Kirill smiled.

  “You nervous, Dillon?”

  “Nervous? Hell no, but you should be. We want answers, and you’re going to give them to us.”

  “Or what? You’re going to kill me? I’m already a dead man, Dillon. Chimera works, but not one-hundred percent. This makes me a condemned man awaiting execution… But now, now you are too late.” He started to laugh.

  Dillon shook his head. “I worked for a while with this guy, in Northern Ireland. He was ex SAS; worked as a freelance interrogator for British Intelligence and the CIA. He had a reputation for making the toughest men squeal like pigs at a trough. His preferred method of torture was the ancient art of Chakra. I learned a lot from him, about keeping a man alive whilst inflicting insurmountable pain. The trick is in keeping the person conscious at all times, that was the point.” Dillon glanced over at Tatiana, then at the vast vista of mountains beyond the perimeter of the facility. There was no sign of activity near or far...

  “You keep an eye out for any movement whatsoever, Tats. While I get this old man inside. Make him ready for our little chat.”

  “Chat?”

  “You ever seen the look on a man’s face when his internal organs have been messed with a little. And that’s only for starters. The best is kept for the very last minute, but let’s keep that as a surprise. But you’ll find out soon enough, Professor...” Dillon started to drag Kirill across the landing bay towards the doors of the facility - which automatically slid back as he approached it. Dillon peered carefully into the brightly lit interior, the Heckler MP5 held aggressively, then dragged Kirill into the warmth of the temperature controlled environment of the Government establishment.

  He dumped Kirill on the dark granite slab floor, then immediately took a look around. He moved warily, checking every corner until he was completely satisfied that they were alone. He spun round as the outer door opened with a hiss, and Tatiana came into sight, each hand held an automatic pistol gripped firmly. He smiled over at her and she responded with a wan smile, her face showing pain and fatigue.

  “Anything moving out there?”

  “No. There’s nobody else in the helicopter, and only a couple of dead Assassins on the far side of the landing bay.”

  “Okay, any sign of the Priest and the others?”

  “Nothing. If they are here, then they’re remaining a little shy, aren’t they?”

  “Which is unlike the Priest? I think it’s time to go get some answers.”

  “Dillon.” She placed a hand on his arm. “You’re not really going to torture him, are you?”

  Their gazes met. He saw that she was in pain; saw the look of humanity in her eye. “No,” he lied easily. “I’m bluffing him. But he doesn’t know that.” Dillon winked and smiled. He then walked over to where Kirill was half sitting, half laying, his hand pressed against his trouser leg, over one of the bullet wounds inflicted by Dillon.

  “So Professor. Time is running out, and I’m still none the wiser why I was set-up. Why did you try to kill me in Cornwall, eh?” Dillon slowly unrolled a soft leather roll, and removed a long slender knife; the highly polished blade glinted under the artificial lighting.

  Silence.

  Kirill simply stared up at Dillon, a blank emotionless glower.

  Dillon knelt down, roughly ripping open Kirill’s trouser leg, and then gently pressing the cold stainless steel against the flesh just behind the knee cap. “Now listen up, old son. You start talking, or I’m going to slice off your knee cap.” Blood started to flow freely as Dillon pressed just a little into the soft tissue.

  Kirill grinned, showing his aging tobacco stained teeth, and then sat up slowly.

  “You could never understand, never understand.”

  “Try me.”

  “There’s not enough time.”

  “We’ve got as much time as it takes.”

  “Wrong answer,” said Kirill. “You have precisely twelve minutes and -” he checked the cracked face of his gold watch; “- and thirty

  -three seconds. At which time the hi-explosive charges that have been placed strategically throughout this facility will detonate. That is to say, they will detonate simultaneously, along with the small nuclear device that I have positioned deep within the facility. The top of this mountain will be one massive firework, and you’ll be sitting right on top of it.”

  “You’re bluffing, Kirill.”

  “Why should I? After all, it’s not as if you can’t go and check.”

  “Dillon,” said Tatiana. “If it’s true, we’d better get the hell off this mountain.”

  “I came here for answers and I’m notleaving until I have them,” said Dillon. “And if there really is a mini nuke up here, then the Priest will be able to disable it. You see, Kirill. There isn’t a device worldwide that the Priest hasn’t been able to deactivate.” Dillon said arrogantly.

  “He can try,” said Kirill softly. “But this particular device has been designed without the off button.” Kirill’s condescension was met with Dillon pulling the Glock from his pocket, and pressing the muzzle under his chin. Kirill’s eyes widened, and he hissed. “You cut the power, everything blows. This was a one-off, Dillon
. There was never a soft option. Ever...”

  “Where’s the master switch?”

  Kirill did not reply.

  Dillon slipped the safety catch off, and adjusted the angle of the muzzle. “Ever seen a man with half his face blown off. You won’t die, but hell would be a happy release. You’re just going to have to take my word for that, Kirill.”

  Kirill met Dillon’s dark gaze. He swallowed dryly.

  “Over there, behind a maintenance access panel in the central pillar.” Kirill’s words were weary, filled with pain - and a touch of fear. But there was triumph there as well: an ultimate triumph. Kirill believed that he had won - no matter what Dillon did to him, no matter what pain was inflicted upon him.

  Both Dillon and Tatiana sensed this.

  Dillon led Tatiana towards the pillar, keeping his voice low.

  “Where the hell is the Priest when you want him?”

  “I’ve sent three messages to his phone since we arrived here. None of them have been acknowledged.”

  “Damn. Well we’d better take a look at this master control, then...”

  Dillon knelt, and released the cover to the maintenance panel.

  The multiple LED’s flickered at him. There was no visible countdown - but then, why should there be? Whoever set such a device working already knew the risk they were taking and the time they had to vacate the area.

  Dillon analysed the master control keyboard. It wasn’t the usual, QWERTY layout; instead each letter had been substituted with a symbol. And the detonation of the nuclear device was handled by this processor. He scratched at his stubble.

  “Shit.”

  “What is it? And what are those strange symbols on the keyboard?”

  “I’ve only ever seen symbols like these, once before. This is a Masonic Cipher. Also known as a Pigpen Cipher, because when the symbols are arranged in a coded message, they often look like the layout of a pigpen.”

  “Masonic Ciphers - pigpens?”

  Dillon studied the keyboard, and then looked up at Tatiana.

  “A quick crash course in the Masonic Cipher, then. Firstly, you see these grids on the screen, looks like a game of Naughts and Crosses, doesn’t it. Well, everything revolves around the grids. It’s a variety of a substitution cipher - in each of the nine boxes is a symbol, which is a substitution for a letter. The trick is knowing what association a symbol has with a letter. You can create the code symbols in a way that makes it very easy to remember how to construct and re-create the key. Understand so far?” Tatiana nodded.