The Red Pearl Effect (Sam Quick Adventure Book 1)

by Scott Corlett

  She grabbed one of the men’s dropped knives and attacked the binds securing Slater’s arms. The grad student sat up with her legs still bound, and Quick pushed the knife into Slater’s hand. “Finish freeing yourself and then your friend.”

  With the gag still in place, Slater could only nod vigorously in response.

  Quick wheeled around and crouched by the suitcase. The smartphone landed beside her. She glanced at the suitcase timer and then at the countdown flashing on the phone display, confirming that the bomb’s detonation was scheduled for the expected 8 A.M. Giving me exactly 27:17.

  She pressed a button on the phone, and its cracked screen displayed the jaggedly lettered but still readable disarming instructions. Then she firmly depressed the center button of the suitcase keypad.

  Behind her, Slater had sliced her leg binds and was now working the blade between the strap and her cheek, while Amanda continued squirming against her binds, and Solta lay watching the women.

  The strap broke, and Slater ripped the gag from her mouth. “And I’ve never been so glad to have my boss check up on me.” Then she jumped to Amanda and slipped the knife under the first bind, while Quick continued working the keypad.

  After several moments, a long beep sounded. The suitcase timer went black. But the phone continued its relentless countdown, flashing 25:23. Quick grabbed it and shot up. Behind her, Slater cut a final bind; Amanda spit out her gag and sprang up.

  “I don’t have time to explain,” Quick said, reaching down, “but during the next twenty-four or so minutes, I need to disarm two more of these suitcases.”

  She snatched up one of the dead men’s Micro UZIs and pushed it at Slater, while nodding at Solta. “Tie her up and then get yourselves out of here. And if her twin shows up, shoot first and make introductions later.”

  Quick turned and started moving, when the words came, at first faint and strangled by the gag-dried mouth but then rising in volume and intent, freezing the scientist in place: “I’m so, so sorry—I really fucked everything up this time.”

  Quick turned and stared at the dreadlocked woman.

  “I swear it was supposed to be one conventional bomb. That’s what they said, I swear.” Amanda looked from Slater to Quick. “You have to believe me. I didn’t know. The one in Madrid was supposed to be it—just a little explosion to scare people into waking up, that’s what Gabe said. Just one little bomb.” She appeared ready to collapse as if the admission had emptied her.

  “You knew about these suitcases—,” Slater started.

  Quick cut her off, “If I don’t find the other bombs in time, none of it will matter. Just get out of here. Now.” Quick turned.

  “Please find them. And stop them,” Amanda cried.

  “Don’t worry, I will—”

  “Amanda. My name is Amanda—”

  “Davies,” Quick finished for her.

  The dreadlocked woman’s mouth hung open. “How—”

  “Your mother is looking for you, Amanda,” came the echoing words from the down tunnel, where Sam Quick was disappearing around the curve.

  – 67 –

  Monday, 16 July

  Island of La Palma

  Con Dios 1949. Wooden crosses such as this riddled the Devil’s Throat, each one crafted from two simple boards nailed at a right angle, each one marking the site where an unfortunate miner had given his life while pursuing the red ore. Running by, Quick barely caught the faded name under the epitaph, and she had no idea why it, among the countless others, stuck with her, but it did: Poncio Díaz.

  Quick’s lungs burned. Her quads screamed. Sweat dripped from her body. The second suitcase and its timer lay dark one hundred yards behind her, bookended by two corpses with bullets in their heads, just like the men piled beside the bomb stationed by Kalia Slater and Amanda Davies. The result, Quick assumed, of the second set of shots that she had heard earlier.

  The shaft jagged left. Quick cornered. Just ahead was the junction with the main tunnel leading to the surface. A right turn would take her to sunlight. But she continued running forward without even a glance toward the outside world.

  Quick entered the section where the tracks lay partially buried by the rockslides, the webs of trickling water covered the stone, and the pitch-black openings to the elevator shafts dotted the walls. She would have preferred proceeding more stealthily given that Nin Zanin surely remained somewhere in the mine. But her only chance of success was finding and disarming the third bomb as fast as possible. And that meant running forward without regard for the noise she generated.

  After covering another three hundred yards, she burst into the hexagonal chamber with its rotating platform for redirecting ore carts. Fallen rocks and splintered timbers still partially covered the wooden circle as during Quick’s last visit. But now, directly in the platform’s center, beside a yellow arrow and geospatial coordinates spray painted on the planks, lay the third and final suitcase.

  The chamber echoed with the thud of her boots against the old timbers. Quick knelt beside the suitcase; the Walther P99 and the smartphone landed with thunks on the wood. The phone’s timer flashed 12:13.

  Close. But still time.

  Her finger stabbed the center square of the keypad and then jagged around the matrix, moving from memory, with the smartphone’s instructions no longer necessary.

  She completed the first third of the disarmament sequence, when she heard it behind her—the voice she had been expecting.

  “Please, Dr. Quick, don’t touch another key or be so rash as to reach for your Walther.”

  Quick glanced at the old man’s gun. Then she slowly rose and turned to face the voice. “I figured the sulfurous odor was simply the Devil Throat’s off-gassing. But, of course, I should have recognized it was Eau de Nin.”

  “Well put yet again, Dr. Quick.” The Beretta Bobcat slinked from a dark tunnel mouth, with its mistress swaying closely behind. Entering the chamber, Nin Zanin surveyed the space, while the Bobcat maintained its aim at the American’s head.

  Nin’s eyes landed on Quick. “Your tenacity is impressive, I must say. It’s a shame that your allegiance to your nation is so clear, because otherwise, Sergei would have great use for a woman of your talents.”

  “A job offer about as tempting as a glass of battery acid.”

  Nin moved in, smiling. “However, this time, Samantha Quick, you lose.” She glanced at the suitcase and the flashing timer. “And soon, your beloved country will lay wasted.”

  Quick returned the smile. “I’d think again if I were you.” She nodded toward the tunnel beyond Nin’s left shoulder.

  “Really, you expect me to fall for that simple trick—” Stone crunched behind Nin. Her head whipped around, but the Bobcat’s muzzle remained locked on Quick. A uniformed officer stepped forward with his gun aimed at Nin.

  Then Nin’s laughter filled the chamber. And the Spaniard’s gun swung to Quick’s chest. The police officer moved directly beside Nin, with a grin smearing his handsome face. “Hola, Dr. Quick.”

  “You see, we befriended certain members of the local authorities, anticipating just such a contingency,” Nin said.

  Quick shrugged. “Apparently, you’ve thought of everything.”

  “I do try.” The flashing suitcase readout caught Nin’s eye. She sighed. “I am afraid time precludes further banter, Dr. Quick. I must rearm the other bombs and gather my sister—”

  “Let me save you the trouble.” Kalia Slater marched out from a tunnel, pulling along a stooped Solta Zanin by the hair, which was wound around Slater’s arm as if it were a mountain climber’s rope to safety. In the Hawaiian’s other hand, a Micro UZI drilled into Solta’s temple. Behind the conjoined women, Amanda Davies quietly followed, her dreadlocks deflated, caked in red mud.

  Slater stopped at the circle’s edge. She glanced at the Spanish officer, who was staring at her with his jaw muscle twitching just like the day in the mine yard with Manuelo. A lifetime ago. “Come to give us another of y
our friendly warnings?” She briefly held his stare. Then her gaze landed on Nin. “Now lower your guns or I blow your sister’s head off.”

  The room froze dead silent as if every assembled body had morphed into the red rock that surrounded them, with lines of sight locked, except for Amanda’s, which flitted from weapon to weapon, stopping between each firearm on the flashing suitcase.

  Finally Nin’s lips curled: “Go ahead. Kill her.”

  Then her Bobcat exploded at Quick, who was diving for the Walther. Slater swung her Micro UZI. Nin’s gun locked on Quick’s position.

  Amanda, shrunken behind Slater until this point, rose up and rushed forward, grabbing Solta and shoving the woman ahead of her like a battering ram aimed directly at Nin.

  Another shot blasted.

  Then two more.

  But Amanda could not be stopped. She slammed Solta into her twin sister. Quick jumped up with the Walther. The officer aimed for her. But three rounds from Slater’s UZI demolished his pretty face. The Spaniard collapsed. Amanda, Solta, and Nin landed in a pile.

  Quick and Slater had no clear shot without risking killing Amanda. Quick jumped the suitcase and reached into the writhing mound and hauled out the first body she grabbed: Solta’s. The 110-pound frame hung limp in her hands.

  From under Amanda, a strangled scream filled the chamber—Nin seeing her twin sister riddled by bullets from her own gun. The sound lasted only a second.

  Until Slater’s UZI cracked against her head.

  Quick lowered Solta’s body to the ground, as Slater managed to say between jagged inhalations, “I know you said to go topside. But we thought we could lend a hand.”

  Quick nodded, gulping air and grabbing for the smartphone. “I’m glad you did.” The timer pinged 4:17. They would make it.

  Beside Quick, Slater gently turned over Amanda. The woman’s face was slack, almost childlike, with the dreadlocks splayed lifelessly across the adjacent chest of the unconscious Nin Zanin. A large red stain was spreading from Amanda’s right shoulder. Slater moved to clamp the wound. But Quick seized her arm.

  “Leave her.” She pressed the battered smartphone into Slater’s hand, as the screen flashed 3:55. “Run, Kalia, run as fast as you can to the surface and use the preset number to call Molly Matson. Tell her we disarmed the bombs, and the threat is ended. And then, when help arrives, show the medics the way here. I’ll take care of Amanda.”

  Slater nodded, took a last look at Amanda, and then jumped up and starting running, clutching the phone as if it were a baton in an Olympic relay.

  Quick crouched beside the suitcase. She glanced at Amanda’s lifeless body, still heaped on the unconscious Nin, with the red stain now spread twice as large across the young woman’s shirtfront. Amanda would need her immediate attention when she finished with the bomb. She resumed entering the disarmament sequence, starting from the exact point where she had left off. The suitcase’s electronic chirps and beeps replaced the dying echoes of Slater’s retreating footfalls.

  After several more taps, Quick’s finger paused, its tip tracing the embossed numeral for a split second. Then it plunged. The suitcase gave a long, final squawk. The timer display froze and then blanked out. The last bomb was neutralized.

  Quick turned to attend Amanda’s wound. But the young woman’s body had shifted. The dreadlocks now rested on the arm of the police officer as if the dead Spaniard had gathered the young American for a kiss.

  Quick lunged for the Walther. Wood exploded inches from her face. Splinters and shrapnel tore into her neck like a fusillade of tiny daggers.

  Another explosion; the pistol flew from her reach with a shower of sparks. Quick scrambled forward, chasing it. She had nothing to lose.

  A click sounded behind her.

  She reached the gun. The stock was mangled plastic and metal. But the slide and barrel were intact.

  Another click behind her.

  Quick whipped around, arcing the Walther before her.

  Another click. Another.

  Nin’s Bobcat was empty.

  Sam Quick found Nin Zanin standing motionless over her dead twin, looking from her useless gun to her opponent, her lip curled in a sneer. Quick fingered the Walther’s trigger. The damaged gun might explode in her face. But she did not care. She had started this expedition governed by the laws of science, rationality, cold facts. But now rage and raw emotion—so carefully and methodically channeled for all these days into finding order from violent chaos—were her masters. Her barrel synced with the beauty mark high on Nin’s check, just below the almond-shaped eye.

  Then from the generator shed, Inspector Reyes, his headache finally gone, summoned his grandchildren home for dinner by doing what he always did: switching off the lights.

  – 68 –

  Monday, 16 July

  Moscow

  The door of the salon exploded open. The chair rotated. Sergei Sokolóv—again the harassed brothel owner: his shirtfront stained with food drippings; cheeks rough with gray stubble; hair askance—leaned forward and rested his arms on his desk.

  Heavy boots clomped on polished wood. Men, none in uniform but all armed, filled the room. An array of Kalashnikovs parted. A cycling red glow led an older man into the chamber, with the smoke of his cigarette curling behind.

  “Ah, the Comrade General comes to collect his due,” Sokolóv growled. Sokolóv jumped up and pounded his fist on the desk. His face was roiling borscht—deep red, veins contorting, chin quaking.

  “Does the Comrade General understand this happens with or without me? It’s too late to stop the events that will raise Russia to its rightful place!”

  The general responded as gently as if he were correcting a wayward grandchild, “But Sergei, you don’t understand. That is why I am here. The Americans have already stopped you.”

  The cigarette ground into the floor, and the voice turned to ice. “President James sends his hope that good health blesses the Falcon.”

  The general turned. His retreating footfalls echoed in the salon. And the Kalashnikovs closed ranks with the synchronized clack of a dozen safeties.

  Sokolóv looked around the room. Then, finally, he stepped forward. He stopped before the credenza laden with the decaying remains of his nation’s finest caviar. He stared at a painting hanging on the opposite wall, into the eyes of Russia’s last imperial Tsar, and raised his hand in salute. The slugs tore through his body and into the red wall behind him. Sergei Sokolóv fell backward onto the hutch, his blood drenching the rotting roe.

  After a moment, the Falcon reared up. He stood for several seconds, his tired cells consuming their last oxygen. Then his knees crashed to the floor. Then his gargantuan stomach. Finally his right jowl. His stare remained fixed on the Tsar.

  ∞

  2000 miles away, the launch tubes closed, and the U.S.S. Maryland silently sank back into the deep.

  – ALCHEMY –

  Friday, 19 October

  South Florida

  Wet footprints approached from the opposite direction and then turned and climbed the steps of Building B-38. Molly Matson followed the puddles down the long hall and stopped at the familiar doorway. She rapped the doorframe, provoking a chorus of “shhhhs” from inside the lab.

  The geologist quietly stepped inside. Outside the wall of windows, the Atlantic was peaceful, dazzling blue with gently curling ribbons of white falling to shore. The trays of colored vials covered the lab bench to new depths. While the corner potted palm had finally admitted defeat and was now just a collection of barren stalks surrounded by crumbling fronds.

  Along the far wall, a trio gathered at the ventilation hood. Kalia Slater stood at one end. Her tan had faded, and short sleeves revealed a tight scar running the length of one forearm. Beside her, Eric Hunt leaned into the hood, with cream-colored elastic bandages peeking out from the T-shirt adorned by the red skull and crossbones, the one he had worn all those months ago while collecting samples at the mine. Beyond Hunt stood Sam Quick, with
her hair dripping and uncombed, and her tank top and shorts soaked through by the underlying wet swimsuit, with a slick of ocean water gathering at her sandaled feet.

  Matson approached, and Slater slid over, motioning the older scientist to squeeze in between her and Hunt. Slater nodded at Matson, while Quick and Hunt ignored her, remaining transfixed by the simple set up under the vent hood. A metal ring supported a large, two-neck boiling flask. A rubber stopper skewered by a thermometer plugged one neck. A sensor arm—similar in shape to what might be plugged into a car’s cigarette-lighter receptacle to charge a cellphone—filled the second neck, with a curly wire tethering it to a tablet computer. Two inches of black sludge covered the flask’s bottom, while a thicker band of translucent tan broth floated above this muck, like vinaigrette that had separated into strata of dark balsamic vinegar and lighter olive oil.

  The flask’s contents appeared lifeless. Then a single colorless vesicle formed on the upper edge of the sludge layer like a blister on burnt flesh. After expanding for several moments, it broke free and rose through the pale liquid until it breached the surface, into the air space above the broth. A beep sounded from the tablet.

  Then another bubble erupted and rose to the top, followed by another beep. Then another. And another. Then two at a time. Then four. Then ten, with the bubbles soon merging into a steady, frothing stream, and the beeps, into a continuous, monotonic squawk.

  The four scientists looked at the each other. Then Sam Quick let out a yell, followed by Molly Matson and Eric Hunt and Kalia Slater.

  ∞

  Saturday, 20 October

  Key Biscayne, Florida

  Citrus trees shaded the table. Dropped lemons sunned on the patio’s hot bricks. In the pool, stray fruit bobbed atop the turquoise water like misshapen tennis balls. Beyond the terrace lay a low wall, then the golf course, and finally, the sea.