They reached an unmarked door. The lead guard unlocked it and led Alton inside. The pair of guards exited and locked the door behind them.
“Have a seat,” said Vaziri.
Alton contemplated making a break for freedom. But back in the cell, when the woman had stopped David, her long legs had proved to be as quick—and probably just as lethal, if desired—as Australia’s infamous death adder.
He lowered himself into an aluminum chair in the middle of the room, thankful for the chance to rest his weary leg, then eyed his unmoving adversary. “You’re not going to tie my arms to it?”
“Do I need to?” asked Vaziri. “I mean…look at you. You’re a mess.”
He probably was. Crawling through the outback’s red soil and running for his life through the Goldmine had surely left him as disheveled as he had ever been.
Alton folded his arms. “Maybe, but you seem smart enough to know not to judge a person by appearances. I could be full of surprises.”
Vaziri laughed. “You won’t surprise me.”
She walked towards Alton with deliberate steps until fronting him by only a couple of feet, then leaned down to peer into his face. “I don’t know what kind of people you’re used to dealing with, but I promise you’ve never dealt with someone like me.” She rose and cleared her throat. “You’re welcome to try to escape, but please wait until after I’ve questioned you, in case your vocal chords are crushed in the process.”
Alton said nothing.
“Tell me, Mr. Blackwell…what were you whispering to Mr. Gilbert back in your cell?”
Alton stared at her in stony silence.
“If it makes you feel any better, Gilbert spilled his guts big time. I doubt there’s anything you can tell us we don’t already know.”
As Alton’s silence lengthened, Vaziri’s mouth drew into a thin line. Her eyes blazing, she took a step closer and landed an excruciating punch to his right ribcage.
Alton gasped. He had scarcely seen the woman move when the pain arrived. He managed a weak smile. “That’s awfully aggressive for someone who’s already been told everything she needed to know.”
Vaziri smiled back in controlled anger. “I like to be sure. I’m thorough that way.” She flexed her shoulders. “Tell me what you said to Gilbert.”
This time, Alton was prepared for the attack. He blocked Vaziri’s second punch but left himself open to a roundhouse kick to his left ribcage. The breath escaped from his body like an astronaut exposed to the vacuum of space.
“I knew you’d be more work than Gilbert,” she said, circling behind Alton as he gasped for breath. “He’s soft. It didn’t take much to break him. But everybody cracks at some point. How long will you last, I wonder?”
She slashed down with the edge of her fist onto Alton’s right shoulder, close to the neck.
A bolt of pain shot down Alton’s torso, producing a wave of nausea. He closed his eyes, fighting the urge to vomit.
“This is the last time I’ll ask,” said Vaziri in a businesslike manner. “Then I’ll start with a taekwondo variety show like you’ve never experienced until you decide to answer.” Back in front of Alton, she connected a palm against his solar plexus, sending his chair tipping backwards onto the floor.
“Fine,” gasped Alton. He took a few seconds to recover his breath, then spoke from the floor. “I asked him if he had seen a way out of here. He had just started to tell me ‘no’ when you and your goons crashed the party.”
She studied Alton at length. “Has anyone ever told you you’re hard to read?”
“Must be all those nights playing poker when I was in college.”
“You look like you’re telling the truth, but my gut tells me you’re holding something back. And Killjoy told us you’d be obstinate. What haven’t you told me yet, Mr. Blackwell?”
She approached Alton’s prone figure. Rather than moving to protect himself, he closed his eyes and lowered his head to the floor’s surface.
Vaziri moved behind him, probably lining up a kidney shot.
Time to put his “combatives” Army training to use. Alton waited to hear Vaziri place her plant leg. As she did so, he shifted his weight, rolling onto his left side and sending a spinning kick into his attacker’s thigh.
Vaziri jumped back with a yelp. She rubbed the spot. “I deserved that. I let my anger distract me. But I promise, Mr. Blackwell, you’re going to deserve this.”
She moved in and attacked with a combination of precision moves. Alton managed to block a few, but most found their mark.
Vaziri stepped back, her chest heaving with the exertion.
Alton pulled himself off the floor and collapsed into the aluminum chair.
“I told you what I said to Gilbert,” he muttered through mounting pain. “What more do you want?”
Vaziri studied Alton again but said nothing. She seemed undecided, almost confused, certainly an unusual state of mind for such a person.
“What’s your game, anyway?” said Alton. “What’s going on here that’s so important to keep secret?” Knowing Gilbert had already disclosed the NSA team’s level of intel, Alton realized he gave away no extra information by asking the question.
“Sorry, I’m paid to keep my mouth shut, even to someone like you.”
“Someone like me?”
“Yeah,” said Vaziri. “Someone who just volunteered to be the next lab rat.”
CHAPTER 67
Mallory gazed out the window of Kevin Lutana’s Corolla and studied the unfamiliar stars of the southern hemisphere. Even the heavens seemed out of sorts on this mission.
A shadowy figure emerged from one of the Goldmine’s eastern entrances and shuffled across the desert.
“Look,” said Mallory to her teammates. “Kevin’s coming.”
With a grey backpack slung over his shoulder, the guard kicked up a plume of dust as he made his way towards his vehicle. He climbed into the car and closed the door.
“What have you learned?” asked Mallory without preamble.
“Your friends are being held in there, all right,” said Kevin as he unzipped the backpack. “First, let’s pass out the food. You can eat while I talk.” He removed three sandwiches wrapped in wax paper.
Mastana took hers and peeled back the bread to examine its contents.
“Don’t worry,” said Kevin. “It’s roast beef. You were expecting vegemite, right? That’s what all the tourists say.”
“Ha! I was.”
“These are corn fritters,” he continued, drawing another bundle from the backpack. “And here’s some bottled water.”
Kevin turned to face the NSA agents. “One of the storage rooms in the Menagerie has been converted into a prison cell. The three intruders are being held inside it. I’m guessing those are your friends.”
“Yes,” said Mallory. “I saw them being dragged off into the Menagerie. But I don’t know what happened to them after that.”
“My mate Lucas works there. He said Tahir—I mean Safi—is holding them for questioning. Lucas was assigned to move a prisoner back into the cell. He said it looked like the guy had been roughed up.”
Mallory’s heart plunged to her stomach. “Did he say what the guy looked like?”
“No, just that he’d been in a separate room with Rala Vaziri for a while. She’s our resident Shaolin Monk, an expert in taekwondo.”
“And did Lucas elaborate on ‘roughed up’?”
“Not beat to a pulp, if that’s what you’re worried about—just sweaty, wincing, walked with a limp.”
“I see,” said Mallory, struggling to control her racing heart. “What’s going to happen to the prisoners?”
Kevin scratched his head. “No one seems to know. But there is something weird about this whole situation. The Goldmine already has prison cells. They were part of the security building’s original design. Why wouldn’t Safi take the prisoners there instead of converting storage space in the Menagerie? It’s bloody strange.”
The sinking feeling in Mallory’s gut returned. “Kevin, I understand you don’t know anything definite, but have you heard any rumors about what Safi intends to do with his prisoners?”
“Lucas joked that Safi was gonna use them as guinea pigs for his experiments. But I don’t know what he’s really—” He froze. “Bloody hell! You don’t think he’d actually do that? Test his drugs on them?”
Mallory spoke in a hoarse voice. “Why not, if it suited his purpose? He hasn’t shied away from murdering in the past. In a twisted way, it’d kill two birds with one stone: provide test subjects for his research, and get rid of troublesome intruders.”
Kevin shuddered and scanned the desert around the car as if ensuring their solitude. “Your friends in there could be in real trouble. What are you going to do?”
“Realistically, there’s not much my team can do on its own,” said Mallory, dropping her gaze. “But if we had the help of someone on the inside, someone who could get us through the Menagerie’s security measures and lead us to the prison cell…” She raised her eyes and looked at Kevin expectantly.
“Wait…I’m sorry, but I can’t. You saw how many guards came running out of there a few hours ago. It’s a bloody army.”
Mallory’s gaze bore down on the lad in silence.
“Look,” said Kevin in desperation, “it’s great that you want to help your teammates—”
“Not just teammates,” interjected Mallory. “My husband is in there.”
“And my father,” added Mastana. She leveled her soft eyes on the youthful guard and moved her hand to rest atop his. “Kevin…Before you answer, I want you to think about what you will be doing five years from now. Do you have an image in your mind?”
He paused. “Yes.”
A lonely breeze sighed against the windowpane. “Good. Now I want you to imagine that you are looking back on this moment, a time when you had to decide whether to fight an evil man or hide while the evil man killed good people. Can you imagine that?”
“Yes,” said Kevin, swallowing.
“Good. Let me ask you…if you decide to hide, how will you feel, looking back to this time?”
“Bloody rotten.”
“And you would feel better if you chose to help rescue innocent people who are trying to stop a murderer?” asked Mastana.
“Yeah, of course.”
“That is how I would feel, too.”
“But it’s still dangerous.”
“Many things are dangerous. Every day, we must decide if following the right path is worth the price. I have not known you for long, but I can see you are a good person. I think I understand you enough to know what your decision will be.”
Kevin jerked his head around to stare out the window, as if trying to divine the answer from the stars. He glanced back at Mastana’s expectant face. After a moment’s hesitation, he shook his head and flashed a lopsided smile. “It’s always the bloody women that get me in hot water.” Turning to Mallory, he added, “I can see you’re the chief of this outfit. What’d you have in mind?”
CHAPTER 68
The door to the Menagerie’s prison cell swung shut with a clang. A sliding bolt on the door’s exterior rumbled through the room.
“Holy crap!” said David as Alton collapsed onto the nearest cot. “Are you okay? Looks like they worked on your face pretty good.”
“I’m all right,” mumbled Alton, drawing a deep breath. “Could have been worse.”
“Really? You don’t look like you’re up for doing much of anything but lie there, dude.”
His heart rate slowing, Alton sat up on the edge of the cot. “It was like Gilbert said…Vaziri didn’t want to do too much damage. I figure she might get in trouble with her boss if she renders the guinea pigs—us—unusable for his tests.”
“That’s a comforting thought,” said David.
“But true,” said Gilbert. “The more traumatic the injury, the greater the release of the body’s inflammatory-response chemicals—kinins, prostaglandin, histamine, and the like…and the more certain germ-fighting cells, like macrophages and neutrophils, are produced. Once you get too much of that unusual biochemistry going on, you can’t trust the lab results.”
“Well, hell,” exclaimed David. “Maybe we should beat each other up.”
Alton snorted. “You first, buddy.”
“Al,” said David, growing serious, “did you tell them anything?”
“There wasn’t anything new to tell.” Given the possibility of their conversation being monitored, Alton couldn’t divulge the truth. In fact, throughout the questioning, he had withheld all information about Mallory and her companions. Today's torture was brief, whereas the potentially lethal consequences to Alpha team of such a disclosure could have tortured him for a lifetime. Had Vaziri not been reluctant to inflict too much trauma, perhaps he would have eventually crumbled and disclosed this truth.
“What happens now?” asked Gilbert.
“Vaziri didn’t say,” replied Alton. “We have no choice but to wait.”
Mallory spotted Kevin trudging across the moonlit desert towards the car. She glanced at her digital watch. The 3:00 a.m. hour seemed the perfect time to execute their rescue plan. DTI would have minimal guards on duty, and the ones they had would be battling fatigue. But first, they’d need the final briefing from Kevin to ensure no tactical changes were needed.
Kevin climbed into the Corolla.
“What’s the word?” asked Mallory as her teammates leaned in close.
“All the guards are on alert. Some of them are on special patrols, looking for you ladies,” he replied. “The story is that you’re engaged in corporate espionage, trying to get your hands on the Razor project.”
“Makes sense,” said Mallory. “Probably most of the Goldmine’s support staff doesn’t know about the Tears of God project. A good cover story would keep it that way. Do the guards know the truth?”
“Not all of them. I didn’t. But Safi has a special unit assigned to the Menagerie, the EGs—stands for Elite Guard. They’re the only guards who serve inside the Menagerie itself. They must know.”
“Agreed,” said Mallory. “The big question is will the plan we discussed earlier still work?”
Kevin raised an eyebrow. “Let’s just say it’s not any riskier than it was in the first place.”
Silva turned to Kevin. “Didn’t you say you’re off shift for the next couple of days?”
“Yeah.”
“That could be a problem. All of this site’s defenses are focused on the perimeter wall. With the guards on alert, how are we going to get through any of the entrances? It’s not like you can say, ‘It’s okay. They’re with me.’”
Kevin rubbed the back of his neck. A smile crept onto his face. “I know the other guards pretty well, especially Benny, the guy who relieved me at my gate a few hours ago. I think I have an idea.”
CHAPTER 69
From the Corolla, Mallory watched Kevin approach the guard shack and wave to an indistinct form inside it. A skinny figure popped his head outside the door and waved back.
“How ya going, Benny?” called Kevin.
“Yeah, good.”
“Heard about the shitstorm earlier?”
Benny shook his head in disgust. “Yeah. And I’m stuck here guarding a bloody doorway.” He swept a hand up and down the guard enclosure.
“I feel ya,” said Kevin. “Listen, I’m heading up to the canteen for a beer. You want me to bring you back a stubby? Might help ease the boredom.” He grinned.
“That’d be great. Thanks, mate.”
Kevin disappeared inside the Goldmine. In Mallory’s heightened state of anxiety, the interval seemed endless but was probably no more than a quarter hour.
He reappeared holding a crumpled brown bag. Stopping at the guard shack, he handed Benny a large, brown bottle. Mallory cupped her hands over her ears to make out the conversation.
“Ta. That’ll go down well, especially on a night like this. Thanks
.”
“No worries. See ya later.”
Kevin headed back for his car and climbed in.
Mallory studied the man. “It’s nice that you gave your bored friend a brew, but how does that help us?
A broad smile crossed Kevin’s face. “Did you notice what a beanpole that lad is? He’s a two-pot screamer. Give him thirty, forty minutes, he’ll be off in the weeds taking a leak.”
“I thought the guards weren’t supposed to leave their post,” said Silva.
“Yeah, it’s against regs,” said Kevin, “but someone would have to notice him leaving for him to get in trouble. And this gate is the arse-end of the Goldmine. No one comes over here.”
“Sounds like a good plan,” said Mallory. “We’ll give it a few minutes before we move out there.”
The group fell into silence for a few minutes.
Kevin turned to Mastana and gave a smile of encouragement. Inexplicably, the gesture seemed to bring the teen more pain than pleasure.
“What’s wrong?” asked Kevin. “You’re not getting cold feet, are you?”
“No. It’s not that,” replied Mastana with a sigh. “It’s just…I am sorry I lied to you about who I am. I do not like to do this kind of thing.”
“No worries. I understand why you had to do it.” Kevin studied Mastana’s eyes and spoke in a softer voice. “When we talked at my gate over the last few days, before all this, you always seemed kind of sad, somehow. Or bothered by something. I figured it was because you were stuck here when you were supposed to be on vacation. But now I think I know why.”
Finally, Mastana smiled, cheered by her new friend. “I am glad you understand.”
Mallory glanced at her watch. “All right, team, let’s go ahead and deploy against the outside of the wall. The moment Benny leaves, we need to be ready to move inside.”
They pulled on jackets to protect themselves from the chilly night air and stole across the desert in silence.
Tears of God (The Blackwell Files Book 7) Page 24
