Robert Ludlum's (TM) The Utopia Experiment (A Covert-One novel)

by Kyle Mills

  The next round was even closer and Grant scooted toward the boulder trapping him, contorting his broken leg into a grotesque shape in an effort to get as close as possible.

  “Randi!” she heard Deuce say over her earpiece. “The new toy. Can you use it?”

  “It got hit when I was running and I’m not sure I can even lift my head without it getting blown off,” she said, wiggling out of her body armor and holding it up high enough for Grant to see. He looked like he was on the verge of passing out from the pain but managed a dazed nod.

  She threw the heavy vest in his direction and it cartwheeled through the air, landing just behind him. He had barely pulled it in front of his chest when a bullet hit dead center, knocking him back with enough force to elicit an audible grunt. He was still alive, though. The multiple layers had absorbed the majority of the impact.

  “Deuce!” Randi shouted. “Get me the hell out of here!”

  Grant scooted toward the boulder again and tried to make himself as small as possible behind her vest, but there was still plenty of him exposed. And even if that weren’t true, the situation was quickly becoming a disastrous stalemate—a race to see who bled to death first.

  “Randi,” she heard Deuce say in her earpiece. “I’m going to draw this guy’s fire. When I do, run.”

  “Wait! I didn’t mean—”

  He ignored her and sprinted from cover as the Afghan opened up on him. Randi bolted from her position with equal speed, running east before dropping to her stomach at the edge of the debris field.

  Deuce made it to safety, but his effectiveness would be right around zero unless he could find a way to get to a more strategic piece of ground. She, on the other hand, was finally in a position to assess their situation. The Afghan was about seventy-five meters to the north, lying behind two boulders tipped against each other. The gap between them was low and just large enough to get his rifle through, making him impervious to gunfire from below, but affording him only a narrow field of vision.

  She saw a flash and Grant took another hit, rocking backward with the force of the round against her body armor. For a moment, she didn’t think he was going to be able to right himself, but he threw a hand back and managed to stabilize before flashing her a courageous grin. His teeth were tinted pink with blood.

  There was no way she was going to let him die. She’d lost too many friends already.

  Randi dropped her M16 and pulled what Deuce called “the new toy” off her back. There was a fist-sized chunk blown off the butt and she couldn’t help wondering what Heckler & Koch was going to charge to fix it. The combination of the XM25’s thirty-five-thousand-dollar price tag and thirteen-pound weight had made her consider leaving it at home, but Deuce convince her otherwise. It seemed that his sixth sense for combat had come through again.

  Randi was chambering the twenty-five-millimeter digital round when another shot sounded, quickly followed by the now-familiar thud of an impact against Kevlar.

  “I think that one cracked a rib,” Grant said just loud enough for her to hear. “I would really appreciate it if you’d kill that guy.”

  “Working on it.”

  The Afghan didn’t have an angle on her so she rose up and sighted through a scope that she prayed hadn’t been knocked out of alignment when the butt had been hit.

  A laser judged the distance to the boulders the man was hiding behind at seventy-nine meters. Based on the few inches of barrel she could see protruding from the gap, it seemed likely that the rocks were a little less than a meter thick and that he was lying straight out behind them.

  She clicked a button near the trigger and added one meter to the range, which would be right around his shoulder blades. Then there was nothing to do but see if the thing was worth the money the CIA had paid for it.

  She aimed just over the top of the boulders and squeezed the trigger, feeling the painful jolt of the broken butt against her shoulder. Inside the bullet, a computer calculated the distance it traveled by counting rotations and, at exactly eighty meters, it exploded, sending deadly shrapnel down to earth.

  Randi remained motionless, watching the barrel of the gun between the rocks waver and finally tip to the ground.

  “Did it work?” Deuce said over her earpiece.

  She panned the scope right and saw the telltale pockmarks in the dirt at the correct range, then scanned left and saw more. “Looks good,” she said quietly. “But I can’t guarantee anything.”

  “Only one way to find out,” Deuce responded and then ran back out into the open, sprinting to his previous position. The Afghan’s rifle remained motionless.

  “Can you cover me from there, Deuce?”

  “No way I can hit him from this position, but I should be able to kick up enough dust to throw off his aim.”

  “Do it.”

  She dropped the XM25 and drew her sidearm, running up the slope as Deuce fired repeatedly at the ground in front of the gap the man was aiming through.

  She slowed when she got within ten meters, watching her footing and trying to remain silent as she closed on the Afghan’s position. At five meters, Deuce stopped firing, concerned about catching her with a ricochet. She held her pistol in front of her, listening to the sudden silence as she edged around the boulders the Afghan was using for cover.

  In the end, her weapon wasn’t necessary. He lay motionless with his finger still curled around the trigger and his back riddled with the same tiny holes as the ground around him.

  26

  Central Marrakech

  Morocco

  GERHARD EICHMANN MOVED nervously through his home, retrieving a leaf from the ancient fountain in his entryway and checking for anything out of place.

  He’d restored the derelict riad almost twenty years ago, combining it with two others and leaving most of the rooms open to three interior courtyards. There were no windows to the outside, creating a surprisingly profound sense of privacy and security in a city choked with shops, hawkers, and tourists.

  He’d sent Hafeza to visit her family in the mountains and it was the first time in years that she hadn’t been there to take care of him. Despite the fact that he’d been in Morocco almost as long as she’d been alive, he was still helpless—with only a rudimentary grasp of French, no Arabic, and a tendency to get lost in the maze of alleyways that tangled the city.

  Eichmann pushed through a set of intricately carved wooden doors to confirm that the two chairs he’d set up next to the pool were still shaded and that the ice packed around the champagne hadn’t melted. All was in order. Just as it had been the first three times he’d checked.

  The thick stone walls still radiated the cold of the night before, but did nothing to keep the perspiration from beading on his forehead as he polished a smudge off the copper facade disguising a much more modern—and secure—door beyond. Where was the key? Had Hafeza moved it when she was cleaning? Would his guest want to enter?

  Eichmann took a deep, calming breath. No. There would be no reason. The computers inside were all idle now. They had completed the initial analysis of almost a quarter century of data with no surprises. Further parsing of the information would undoubtedly yield unseen and fascinating details, but would in no way change the overarching conclusion. The questions posed so long ago had been completely and finally answered.

  The bell rang and he rushed to the door, heart pounding as he reached for the massive metal ring centered in it. How long had it been since they’d been face-to-face? Before the fame. Before the billions. Could it be thirty years?

  Eichmann pulled the heavy door open and found Christian Dresner standing on the other side. His smile seemed to carry a deep sadness and his skin was looser and more mottled than the television and Internet suggested. Behind him stood two athletic men with earpieces and dark jackets despite the heat. They gave him a brief, suspicious glance before going back to scanning the rooftops and people passing the quiet spur that his door opened onto.

  To his surprise, Dresner t
ook a step forward and embraced him. “Gerd. My good friend,” he said in the language of their lost youth. “My only friend.”

  The guards seemed content to stay outside. Eichmann pushed the door closed as Dresner looked around at the carefully preserved architecture. “I remember when you told me you were moving here. I have to admit that I didn’t understand it until now. This is truly magnificent, Gerd.”

  Eichmann nodded self-consciously and led Dresner to the poolside chairs. As his guest sat, Eichmann fumbled with the champagne cork, conscious of Dresner watching him with an enigmatic, barely perceptible smile playing at his lips.

  “It’s hard to express how good it is to see you, Gerd. I can’t believe it’s been so long. Sometimes I look back on my life and wonder where I lost control of it. How it could have passed so quickly.”

  “I’m sorry about the circumstances,” Eichmann said, finally getting the cork out and pouring.

  “It’s not your fault. A good scientist can only follow where the facts lead. I take it your analysis is complete?

  “The initial pass. But it’s a lifetime’s worth of data. There is so much to learn.”

  “Not the things we wanted to learn, though. And not things that can ever be released to the public.”

  Eichmann averted his eyes and gave a short, obedient nod. The chiding was gentle but clearly intended. He’d hoped to publish a few properly veiled tidbits in minor psychology journals but, deep down, he’d known it would never be allowed. Anonymity was a small price to pay for the life he’d been allowed to lead. Everything—his quarter-century study, the house he lived in, the food on his table—came from Dresner.

  While the academic community would never share in his discoveries, it was enough that he had made them. It was enough to know the truth, even if that truth would die with him.

  He finally sat, if a bit stiffly, and held a thumb drive out to Dresner. “My detailed conclusions. And the Afghanistan video. Though I don’t know if any of it matters anymore. If it was worth you coming all this way.”

  Dresner slid the drive into his shirt pocket without bothering to look at it. “That’s not why I came. I’m here because, in many ways, my life is coming to a close. There will be no more breakthroughs. No more discoveries. I’ve done what I can with the time I was given.”

  Eichmann opened his mouth to protest, but fell silent when his friend held up a hand. “I find myself mired in the past more and more, Gerd. I suppose it’s the inevitable nostalgia of old age. I think a great deal about our youth and the dreams we had. I’m here because you’re the only person who understands…”

  “You’ve succeeded beyond almost anyone in history, Christian. Sometimes the dreams of young men are just that. Dreams.”

  “Grand ones, though, eh, Gerd?”

  “You underestimate the contribution you’ve made. LayerCake’s feedback loop is a powerful behavioral tool—the ability to immediately determine lies, to see how our actions affect the way other people view us. And that’s only the beginning. How can anyone—even you—imagine what will be built on your platform? What it could mean for the world?”

  Dresner took a sip of champagne and squinted into the reflection coming off the pool. “I told myself that same thing for years. But now I’ve come to understand that it’s a naive view. My work is no different from anyone else’s. Powerful men will find a way to twist it into something that serves their purposes.”

  “But the Internet can’t be controlled. There—”

  “It can be controlled, Gerd. Everything can. How long will the freedom of information last if it becomes inconvenient to the wrong people?”

  “It will be a constant battle,” Eichmann agreed. “But not different from the one we’ve been fighting for millennia. Some people will try to spread the truth and others, lies.”

  “Eventually the liars and destroyers always win.”

  Eichmann didn’t respond and his old friend seemed content to sip at his drink for a time. It was strange to have him there. The years they’d spent together when they were young didn’t seem real anymore. It was hard to associate what he’d become with the much more human figure he’d been in his youth.

  “My father was religious for much of his life,” Dresner said when he finally spoke again. “Even the concentration camp and the Soviets couldn’t take that from him. Slowly, though, he began to question how it could be that we were made in the image of God. Eventually, he came to believe that we were just another of God’s animals—no greater or more favored than any other.”

  He tapped the thumb drive in his pocket. “But it took you to show me that even this was a fantasy.”

  “You’re reading to much into my conclusions, Christian. It would be arrogance to think that my work has allowed either of us to see into the mind of God.”

  “The mind of God,” Dresner repeated quietly. “I’ve wasted more than a billion dollars trying to find some spark in us that would prove—or even just suggest—his existence. No, we’re nothing more than computers made of meat. And not even well-designed ones at that—ones haphazardly slapped together over millions of years to deal with random environmental changes.”

  “But ones capable of great…and terrible things.”

  Dresner shook his head. “Even the most virtuous brain functions are just an illusion created to help our species survive. We don’t love our children because of nobility or God. We love them because people who felt compelled to care for their offspring spread their genes more effectively. The illusion of fear makes us avoid dangerous situations. Greed keeps our bellies full. Violence and hate allow us to protect what is ours. Nothing we see or feel is anything more than millions of neurons fabricating a universe that doesn’t exist.”

  Eichmann wasn’t sure how to respond. While it was true that Dresner’s conclusions were much more drastic than his own, it was also true that he was probably right. Giving up entirely on the idea of reality—accepting that everything was just a chimera created by selective pressures—was a step into a very dark and very lonely abyss. What was certain, though, was that humans were creatures much more of instinct than of culture and education.

  People were born who they are and little could be done about it. Intelligence, personality, and behavior were largely programmed into every individual at birth.

  “And the experiments at the North Korean facility have confirmed your beliefs?” Eichmann said, probing. He’d been indirectly involved in designing the general controls for some of the work done there, but was largely in the dark as to what that work was. Perhaps now he could finally get his old friend to speak of it.

  “There are no more questions to answer,” Dresner responded, his gaze turning distant. “The facility is being dismantled.”

  27

  HARDER!” RANDI SHOUTED over the sound of rotor blades chopping the air behind her. Deuce and the medic threw their full weight on the levers dug in beneath the boulder pinning Billy Grant and raised it a few critical centimeters.

  “Sorry about this,” she said, grabbing him beneath the shoulders and heaving back. He let out a stifled scream and looked like he was finally going to lose consciousness from the pain, but she managed to get his leg clear before the boulder slammed back into place.

  Arterial blood spurting from his leg suggested that they’d done the right thing leaving the stone in place until the evac arrived. Randi dropped to her knees and pressed a hand against the wound while the medic put a tourniquet in place.

  “I’ll clamp it when we’re in the air!” he shouted, indicating for them to lift the injured man. “Now let’s get the hell out of here!”

  Randi felt the same guilt she always did when one of her people was injured and remained silent as they slid him through the open door of the chopper. The leg would never be the same, assuming the docs were even able to save it. She should have anticipated the grenade. She should have held Billy back…

  Deuce jumped in behind the medic and Randi looked up at him for a moment before
backing away a few steps.

  “Where are you going?” he said. “Get in the chopper!”

  She shook her head. “You guys go. I’ll find my way back.”

  “Now, hold on, Randi. We were under orders to get the sons of bitches who attacked your base. And by my count, the asshole behind that rock was the last one.”

  “Yeah. But there’s something else I want to check out.”

  Deuce rolled his eyes and said something she couldn’t hear over the accelerating rotors, then jumped out with his gear.

  “Seriously, Deuce—go with Billy. I’ll be fine.”

  He waved at the pilot who immediately lifted the aircraft off the ground and began gaining altitude. They watched it recede into the horizon, not speaking until it was out of sight.

  “So what the hell am I doing here, Randi?”

  “I said I could handle it.”

  “Yeah, like I’m going to go back and tell everyone I just left you. If you got killed, I’d never live it down. Now tell me what we’re interested in here, because it looks like the middle of nowhere to me.”

  She didn’t respond immediately, instead turning her gaze to a cliff about twenty kilometers away. The sheer rock was pockmarked with tiny caves starting at about the sixty-meter mark and becoming more plentiful above. She focused on the largest and highest of them, finally pointing.

  “Remember the survivor from Kot’eh I told you I caught up with?”

  “The one you took down outside his village?”

  She’d given Deuce—and everyone else—a less-than-honest report about what had happened. When Fred Klein was involved, it was always better to let go of as little information as possible.

  “He told me—”

  “Hold on. You talked to him?”

  “Did I not mention that?” she said innocently.