Blown Circuit

by Lars Guignard

  I traced my fingers along the grooves in the sphere’s surface, searching for any kind of incongruity while my body draped over the rounded metal as though I was bent over a giant pipe. A gust of wind ripped in across the sea, and I grasped the nylon netting to hold on. Glancing up I saw the triggers resting on the walkway above me, along with Faruk and Meryem.

  “You will hurry,” Meryem called down.

  “I liked you better before you got political,” I said.

  “You will hurry or Azad will shoot.”

  I ignored the threat and carefully traced my fingers the rest of the way around the circumference of the sphere. Had it been a globe, I figured I was circumscribing a line of about fifty-five degrees latitude north. In my estimation there was a whole lot of componentry inside the sphere that would have required assembly. So the question was, where would Tesla locate the hatch to his invention? Somewhere accessible, I thought. Somewhere near one of the poles. But which one? If it was the South Pole, I was out of luck. I’d never be able to open a hatch on the bottom of the sphere. But the top might be an option if, of course, the wind didn’t blow me down first. I have to confess, at that moment, all I really wanted to do was go home.

  Home.

  Could it be that simple? Serbia, I thought. Tesla was a Serb. Would he put the hatch there, on the portion of the sphere where Serbia would lay, as a nod, a tiny wink to his homeland? It was worth looking. I pulled myself over, reaching farther down the sphere. If I remembered correctly, Serbia was located in the mid-northern 40s latitudinally. There was no set longitudinal reference point for me to count off of, but there was no reason I couldn’t check all the way around the circumference at that latitudinal level. I concentrated on the engraved grooves, careful not to be mesmerized by the castle courtyard spinning below me. Three-quarters of the way around the circumference, I found it.

  Exactly where I imagined Serbia would lay on a globe, the crosshatching of latitudinal and longitudinal lines was almost imperceptibly more pronounced, a silver screw in the intersection of the lines at all four corners. The hatch, as I saw it, was probably two feet square, just big enough for me to squeeze through. I wasted no time. I immediately grabbed my Swiss knife.

  “Five minutes, Michael,” Meryem called down. “Five minutes and Azad begins to shoot.”

  I reached down and began to cut through the netting. It was very tight in most places, but the net was too big for the sphere, which meant that it bunched up in a few areas to take up the slack. I felt the magnetic pull on the knife. Blood rushed to my head as I severed the nylon one string at a time. If I hadn’t held the knife tightly, the magnetic pull would have drawn it right out of my hand. Soon, however, I had a two-foot opening around the access door. I glanced up and Meryem smiled back down at me, tight-lipped, but beautiful. I still kind of liked her. Too bad she was a no-good terrorist.

  I flipped my knife blade shut and popped open the screwdriver. The Swiss Army knife, with its handle oriented at a ninety-degree angle to the bit, provided me with a nice, secure grip. I popped out the first screw and placed it inside my pocket. Then I worked my way clockwise around the hatch. I was able to remove the second screw just as easily. It was the third that was a problem. That screw was in an awkward location all the way at the bottom of the panel. I couldn’t keep the screwdriver plumb and I had already leaned over the sphere as far as I dared to go.

  Didn’t matter. I’d have to lean farther. I stared at the crowd in the square below as a gust of wind blew in, and the sphere started to rotate in the opposite direction. Then I leaned over even more with my head hanging upside down and the Philips head screwdriver perfectly plumb in the head of the screw. I twisted the driver just as a second gust of wind blew through. And that’s when I fell.

  I lost my grip completely and slid down the surface of the sphere. I let go of the screwdriver and grabbed at the netting. I almost got a finger under it, but the netting was too tight. I continued to slip. Not being afraid of heights is one thing. But I never said I wasn’t afraid of dying. And right then, death was on the menu. I plummeted at least nine or ten feet below the bottom of the sphere before the same wind that had tossed me, saved me. It blew the fat electric cord directly toward me like a big yellow beanstalk. I latched on with both hands, fearful of the charge within, even as I grasped at its rubbery surface for dear life. Between my hands and legs and a whole lot of will power, I managed to arrest my fall. Both Meryem and Faruk stared down at me from above.

  “You’re not getting rid of me that easily,” I said.

  Then I started to climb back up the cord, grasping ahold of a piece of the bunched-up netting once I reached the sphere. My Swiss Army knife and the flashlight had each stuck to the sphere’s magnetized surface, and I grabbed ahold of them and followed the seam of excess netting back to where I had lain earlier atop the sphere. It was like bad déjà vu, but after a concerted attempt to hold the screwdriver plumb, I managed to unscrew the third fastener. After that one, the fourth screw was easy. Then, I lifted off the panel and peered inside the hatch.

  Chapter 62

  FROM THE MOMENT my flashlight beam scoured the interior of the sphere, I knew that I had made the right call. I had been operating on the assumption that the focusing array of a directed-energy weapon might be largely hollow, and I was correct. There was equipment in there, wiring and anodized conduit, but not so much equipment that there wasn’t room for me as well. I took hold of the other side of the hatch and lowered myself in, headfirst, my backpack scraping the threshold of the hatch as I climbed inside.

  “Michael, what are you doing?” Meryem called down.

  I didn’t answer. Not right away. I was trying to see what I was dealing with. The electric hum was much louder inside, the vibration more noticeable. I ran my fingers through my hair only to discover that it was standing on end, sparks of static electricity crackling around me. My feet were planted on a two-inch conduit bolted to the periphery of the sphere. There was a lot of wiring, but the most prominent feature was the smaller silver sphere in the center of the assembly. It hovered at the center of the larger sphere, perfectly balanced in its electromagnetic cocoon. I felt the Swiss Army knife in my hand pulled to the outer wall of the main sphere. A closer inspection revealed that there were hundreds of disc-shaped magnets covering the sphere’s inner skin. Had I been wearing chain mail, I probably would have floated in the air as well.

  “Michael!”

  “Relax,” I said. “Pass me the first trigger.”

  I saw where the triggers fit into the Device. There was an empty rack cradling the bottom of the main sphere. Room for both units to slide into place. I looked up and saw the thin wire snaking out of the top of the outer sphere alongside the fat cables. Easy mistake to make, I thought, thinking that the triggers should be positioned outside the Device, especially when the crates had been illustrated that way. But Bayazidi was a trickster. There was as much disinformation in that journal as there was information.

  I flashed my light back to the hatch. The first of the triggers was coming through. I reached up and grabbed it, feeling the magnetic pull. I placed the unit down by my feet and waited there for a moment while the soldier handed me the second trigger. Then I stared back down at the rack that they went into. The wireless router was still attached to the rear trigger which meant that what I was about to do was not without consequences. If I armed the sphere with an accurate targeting system, I was endangering a lot of lives. But if I didn’t do it, I was killing everyone in that square. Either way, it was a gamble.

  I hunched down and inserted the first trigger into its rack. It clicked into place like a fresh load into the chamber of a shotgun, smooth as glass despite its age. I reached behind me for the second trigger and slid it gently into place behind the first with a soft click. Then I plugged them into each other. The gyroscopes were installed. If Tesla’s invention was ever going to work, it was going to work now. I took a final look around and quickly checked my iPhone. So far the s
tatic charge in the air hadn’t shorted it out, and though the magnetic field had compromised my signal strength, it wasn’t enough to lose the connection. I was still tethered in.

  I emptied my backpack and poked my head out of the hatch.

  “It’s done,” I said to Meryem.

  Meryem returned to the cab of the crane. She had to. It was the only way to check whether the targeting system was actually functioning, which I hoped it was. Because there was no way Azad was going to release the hostages if it wasn’t. I hung my head out of the sphere while they conferred in the crane’s tiny cab. I could see Meryem and the crane operator from my position, the blue glimmer of the computer display casting its glow on them. She smiled as she got out of the cab.

  “Thank you, Michael,” she called out to me. “Now get out of the sphere.”

  “Not so fast, Meryem.”

  “What?”

  “Your turn. Let those people go. That was our deal.”

  She shrugged.

  “I would very much like to let those people go, but I do not think it is time to do this yet,” Meryem said.

  “Let those people go, or I cut the cable,” I said.

  “All the power in the city of Bodrum runs through that cable. If you cut it, you will die.”

  I laughed, ready to duck my head into the sphere if I had to.

  “Not the power cable. The trigger cable. Two tiny wires.”

  I flicked open the blade of my Swiss knife.

  “You want to try me? Let them go.”

  Meryem consulted with Faruk. Then she just picked up her walkie-talkie. The next thing I heard was automatic gunfire, people screaming in the square below.

  “OK, OK!”

  The gunfire stopped. It was chaos in the square below, but I couldn’t tell whether anybody had been hit. Soldiers continued to man the exits.

  “Good choice, Michael.”

  I watched the ground below me as civilians crowded around the exits, unable to leave. Clearly, Plan A wasn’t going to work. Not that it was much of surprise that Meryem had gone back on her word, but that didn’t change the fact that if I disabled the Device, everybody in that square was as good as dead. Just shows, you can’t trust a terrorist! Time for Plan B.

  “Pull him up,” Meryem said, eyeing the soldier on the catwalk above.

  The soldier obeyed. He lay down on the catwalk, cantilevering his body outward and extending his hand. Meryem returned to the cab, Faruk watching her from mid-catwalk. It was my moment. Time to make it count. I poked my head and arms outside the hatch and took the soldier’s hand, clamping down on his palm tightly. Then I pulled straight down with all my strength.

  Chapter 63

  I PUNCHED THE soldier as he fell past me through the air. A hard-right straight to the jaw. I had hoped to knock him out, not because I was doing him any favors, but because I didn’t want him to scream. To that end, I was successful. After my fist connected squarely with his jaw, I didn’t hear a peep out of him as he plummeted to his death. But I wasn’t done. Faruk was the next order of business.

  I pulled myself out of the sphere and took hold of the rail of the jib, vaulting over it. Faruk was still facing Meryem in the cab. The question was, could I get to him before he turned? One way to find out. I leapt ahead, pulling my empty backpack in front of me.

  The falling soldier finally screamed, and when he did, Faruk turned. Faruk stared straight at me, the light reflecting off the white keloid scar below his eye in the glare of the crane’s work lights. He seemed pleased to see me. As if he’d been waiting a long while for the opportunity to mix it up. He drew his pistol with a wry grin, but I was close enough to reach ahead with my left hand and force his weapon up by the barrel. I struggled against his massive strength to hold the pistol above me.

  “So finally we fight, American.”

  “Why don’t we skip that part, and I’ll kill you now.”

  “Perhaps next time. I think, now, we fight.”

  We were each standing on the two-foot wide catwalk so I knew there wasn’t much room for a dance, or a brawl. At that point, I was wearing my empty backpack like a kangaroo pouch. It didn’t really interfere with my movement, but it wasn’t ideal either. It was going to have be a precision takedown and it was going to have to happen fast. But Faruk was a slippery opponent. I wasn’t counting on his blade.

  I didn’t have time to reflect on how much I hated knives, I just reacted. I feinted to my left as he jabbed the black steel combat knife forward. Then I pushed in close. Moving away in a knife fight isn’t a bad idea. But only if you have somewhere to go. I had nowhere. So all I could do was move in closer to eliminate his ability to brandish the weapon. I had to accept that I might get cut. What I wanted to ensure was that I didn’t get killed.

  Faruk pulled the gun’s trigger with his other hand. The pistol’s report ripped through the air, superheated gases escaping the chamber, but I didn’t feel the heat. Something hot like that, there’s a lag between touching and feeling. What I did was keep my hold on the gun with my left hand while I grabbed Faruk’s wrist with my right. I didn’t know whether I’d be as quick as the blade. Fortunately, Faruk’s focus was divided. I managed to get ahold of his left wrist and twist the knife away from me.

  Then I lowered my body on my left leg and powered up into a groin-busting strike. Faruk gasped as the top of my knee connected with him. It must have pissed him off because he fired the gun again, but we were still in the same position. It would be a stalemate until I could get him to drop one of the weapons and both of us knew it. So I stepped ahead and let him have it. I focused and drove all my weight forward and up in a massive head-butt. His nose crumpled like a paper airplane, blood flooding down his face. It was a testament to Faruk’s tolerance for pain that he was still standing, but he did drop the gun. It tumbled from his hand over the side of the crane.

  By some feat of focus, however, Faruk managed to keep hold of the knife. I immediately grabbed onto his knife hand with my other hand. I was looking for the Valley of Harmony—the fleshy V between the thumb and pointing finger of his hand. When I found it, I used one hand to hold his wrist and the other to pinch down with every ounce of strength I had. The Valley of Harmony is an acupressure point. Pinch it lightly and you can relieve headaches and other ailments. Pinch it like you want to kill the guy and you can inflict a massive amount of pain.

  Faruk dropped the knife. I heard it clank down to the catwalk below. I was pretty sure I had him beat at that point. I was already mentally moving on to my next target. But then he tried to strangle me. His lightning-fast hands encircled my neck, threatening to collapse my windpipe. I needed to make a move, any move, but Faruk held me there, starving me of oxygen. He squeezed harder still, a self-satisfied grin on his lips, and once again I saw the metal glinting in his mouth. He had me exactly where he wanted me.

  It wasn’t like when I had had the garrote around my neck. I reached for his hands, but I couldn’t remove them. He was like a human boa constrictor slowly squeezing the life out of me. I swear that I felt my feet leave the ground as he lifted. My eyes must have been bulging at that point. All I could think was that I wanted to bring him down. I wanted him to crumble so he couldn’t squeeze me anymore.

  I took a chance and reached for his collarbone, poking my fingers deep into his flesh until I found his clavicle. The long horizontal bone was like a handle. I used it to pull him off balance, getting him to ease up slightly as he recovered, dropping me back down to the catwalk. Then I twisted my hips. My neck stayed where it was, but I retracted my right leg, throwing all my weight into a kick aimed squarely at Faruk’s left kneecap.

  The side of my foot connected with his knee and I heard it blow out. It shattered backwards, bones and cartilage smashing until it drooped inward on itself. The result was immediate. Nobody can take that amount of pain without showing it. The body just doesn’t have the resources. Faruk immediately had to take all his weight on his right leg, and as he did, he loosened his grip o
n my neck a little more. I could barely breathe, but I could still kick, so I retracted my leg again and powered into his other knee.

  I heard the same crack of cartilage and bone, and this time he collapsed onto both broken knees, releasing his grasp entirely. I gasped, sucking in the fresh air. There was only one move left. Gravity. I retracted my right leg and aimed for his midsection in a massive side kick. I aimed for his torso, because I wanted to move all of him, his entire body off the catwalk. And it worked. Faruk crumpled backward, under the rail and off the crane.

  But even as Faruk plummeted to his death, my problems were far from over. Because when I looked up from the catwalk, I was once again staring down the barrel of a gun.

  Chapter 64

  MERYEM'S GAZE WAS almost as hard as the black steel of her pistol. She aimed her SIG at me in a two-handed stance, the crane operator already descending the ladder behind her. My palm hurt where it had gripped the barrel of Faruk’s pistol. I was sure that I had a nasty burn that would swell and blister later.

  “You should not have done that,” Meryem said.

  “Like you said, I didn’t have much of a choice.”

  I heard the thump of Faruk’s body as it hit the courtyard floor below.

  “It was you on the ship that exploded, wasn’t it?” I said.

  “Yes,” Meryem said. “It was me on the Green Dragon ship. The Dragons asked us to destroy it. To cement our partnership.”

  “Why? Why did they want to blow that boat up?”

  “Perhaps to destroy evidence. Perhaps to destroy you.”