Splicer (A Thriller)

by Theo Cage

  Jayne slipped on the dusty sheet metal deck. She understood now why Quinn had held back with the scoop on Shay and Grieves. He was trying to protect his investment. De-railing the sale of GeneFab could cost Quinn a fortune. But whomever he had told, had led someone straight to Shay. He was in it up to his money belt now. "Maybe we can negotiate with them?" She pointed down the hallway behind them.

  "What do you have that they want?"

  She stopped, her hand on the smooth sidewall. "I don't know what they want. Do you?"

  He ignored her. "How do we get out of this fucking tin box?"

  She leaned back. The roar of the air in the plenum made it impossible to tell if they were being pursued or how close they might be. Their voices might be drawing them. "If you don't have any ideas, I do."

  Grieves had his legs splayed to keep his balance. "Then management is always open to new ideas."

  "At the end of this hallway is a larger room. A nexus. With a big high-speed fan. The suction is so great, once you’re inside, you can't get out again until the fans are shut down.

  He looked anxiously ahead. "They open outward?"

  "For safety. If we could lure them into there, they would be trapped."

  Grieves laughed harshly. "What do you suggest? Peanut butter and crackers?"

  "Us."

  He shifted the handgun from one hand to another. His jacket collar was whipping his cheek, which was a deep shade of pink.

  "Then what?" he asked.

  "We get out. We put some space between us."

  "What have we got to lose? One condition though. Once we're out of here you and your client get out of my face for good."

  Jayne cocked her head to one side, her eyes hidden by her hair. "We've made a mistake. They're coming fast. I can hear them now. This is a one way street and they've only got one way to go."

  Jayne began to run, out of instinct. Grieves followed clumsily. The walls were vibrating with the roar of the giant six-foot fans pulling the stale air out of the building and feeding it into the air conditioning and heating chambers.

  At the next turn, with the column of air in the plenum as taut as the skin on a drum, they discovered that the tunnel ended. A door, a pressure-sealed curved steel apparatus looking like a small version of a bank vault door, faced them. Clearly displayed on the side panel was a warning, an image of a multi-armed blade with a red circle around it. On each side of the door stood a large louvered grill, the sound of the blades spinning and the air rushing over the louvers making speech almost impossible. Grieves staggered over to the door and attempted to pull it open slightly. He struggled with the welded steel rod that held it shut and was able to create just enough of a gap to generate a shriek of air pressure around the seal that wailed like a siren in the close quarters of the nexus. He let go of the handle and the gap was instantly closed with a sharp thump of metal against metal.

  "We're screwed!" He barked. "We're going nowhere." He turned to the hallway they had just entered from, aware that at any moment one or more of their pursuers would jog into view. This was as good a place as any for these mercenaries to carry out their assignment. The roar of the fan blades would cover the sounds of gunshots or Grieves' feeble attempts at yelling for help.

  Grieves looked to see what McEwan was up to. She was staring into space.

  CHAPTER 70

  Mohta scampered over the threshold of the last section of tunnel with his gun leveled in front of him. He was tired and angry with himself for letting a bunch of civilians make him work so hard. You always underestimate amateurs because their actions were often so unpredictable. When you expect them to run, they fight. Expect them to cower, they take the offensive. And they often showed signs of desperation early - far before a jaded professional would ever considers a last ditch tactic. Anger wasn't good either. Being mad screwed up your judgment. But he was mad all right. He wanted these two.

  The sealed door into the fan system took a pry bar and all of the strength he had to lever it open. Of course, Pierce, with his wrecked arm, was no use at all. They also had to be careful when they squeezed in through the door that it didn’t slam down on their hands. The pressure was enormous.

  It was with some surprise then that Mohta entered the last section of the tunnel to find it empty and featureless except for a door and a number of small air grills. He came to a smooth stop and was about to investigate the shining wall of louvers in front of him when he saw a scrap of material wedged into the seal of the plenum door. He moved closer. It was dark blue. The sleeve or back hem of the coat of the programmer.

  Mohta smiled. He stepped back from the door carefully and slid over to the grill. Between the louvers and in the unlit space beyond he could make out the vague shape of several large churning blades in the far wall. He could feel the strident pressure of the warm air being sucked over the slats of the grate. He couldn’t make out a human shape in the next room - nobody kneeling down in a corner. They must be behind the vent wall, below the louvered area. Mohta's anger was pulling at him and roaring in his ears like the angry vortex of the air swirling through the tunnel. He heard the thump of his partner's feet breaking stride as he careened into the room.

  Mohta motioned his partner over to the singular door, pointing at the louvers. He raised two fingers. Two he mouthed. Then he pointed at the scrap of fabric. Since Pierce could not muster the strength to hinge the door open, Mohta handed his gun to him and pressed him up against the wall near the door, then placed both hands on the handle and pulled. The door inched open reluctantly at first, the sound of air whining though the narrow opening loud in their ears above the dull roar of the fans. The suction was intense but the door began to move more easily as the gap increased. Mohta strained, wondering how the two of them, the woman and the pudgy programmer, were able to pry this open. Obviously they were caught by surprise when it slammed shut again, catching the fabric of the short man's coat. It would be just as easy to lose a hand or a leg.

  When the door was ajar by roughly a foot, vibrating in his hands like a power tool, Mohta moved closer to the frame ready to signal his partner to fire into the corner where he believed the prey must be. At this point, two things happened. Mohta's partner, his right arm useless and swollen, reached up with his left, a 9mm revolver in his purple claw-like grip. He moved toward the open space of the door where the force of the current of air pulled him bodily forward into the actual opening. He buckled over, aware that he was exposing himself to fire from within the fan room, yet unable to stop himself. The pull of the fans sent him forward over the lip of the doorframe.

  The injured agent reached up instinctively with his right hand to grip the edge of the door - the pain of contact against the shattered bones and torn ligaments of his fingers excruciating. Mohta saw in his partners face a look of surprise and agony, but there was little he could do. He let up on the door slightly to close the opening, but this served to increase the air pressure and knock him off center.

  Pierce went down in a heap, struck the shiny metal floor of the inside chamber and slid awkwardly towards the six foot churning blades of one of the fans. Mohta tried to squeeze into the narrow opening but only served to trap himself between the door and frame, his clothing tight against his body in the relentless tug of the airflow. His partner continued to slide forward on the steel flooring, his face a mask of agony and surprise, trying to pull himself up with a hand that was twisted out of shape. He struck the blades with his arm raised in front of him. In a flash the aching fingers were gone, then the hand up to the wrist, a white denuded bone protruding from the sleeve of his black leather jacket.

  Mohta heard Pierce grunt above the thrum of the blades. Then he saw the springy bones of Pierce's forearm slap against the heavy blades. Within seconds the agent’s horror was ended when the arcing arms of the fan worked up to his shoulder and slammed into his skull. The blades slid to an angry stop. A froth of pink and dark bits of marrow were streaked along the sides of the housing. What was left of Pierce lay
still. The huge suspended motor groaned and complained; the space filled with the sharp smell of ozone and burning insulation.

  Finally the motor went silent, the drone in the room now the single hum of the remaining fan.

  Within seconds, the rush of air and the booming noise of the fans subsided. Mohta turned, his face flushed, feeling the weight of the door diminish. Then he heard a slight popping sound and the material of his light jacket jumped under his arm. He looked down at it curiously. He felt heat grow across his chest. Across the room, a grill cover was kicked away and his quarry was crawling from a small vent, gun in hand. He then realized he had been shot. Grieves had the weapon pointed at him. Mohta squeezed his fingers around his forearm feeling blood well up between his fingers. The little weasel had him. This fucking amateur. He would have his balls on a platter before the day was through.

  The woman crawled out behind the programmer, her blond hair across her face. Mohta couldn't make out her expression, but her body language showed no fear. Grieves waved him into the inside chamber of the room where his partner lay dead. He stepped back mutely, his jaw muscles tight. Then Grieves closed the door on him and slammed down the locking bar.

  With the fan running at half-pressure and the airflow reduced, Jayne and Grieves were easily able to open the nearest hatch and escape back into the maintenance halls. They loped down a green corridor until they came to an exit sign. Jayne pushed open the door and ran headlong into a man with a pockmarked face dressed in a dark flight jacket. He looked surprised at first but when Grieves emerged through the door he cleanly brought his fist down on the programmer’s right arm and with the other hand scooped up the weapon. Grieves nursed his elbow and groaned as the team leader spun Jayne around and pressed the gun into the small of her back.

  "March," was all he said.

  CHAPTER 71

  The underground maintenance tunnels, the study halls and student warrens, the washrooms, the undergraduate study spaces tucked up against plumbing stacks and water pipes, all converged at a series of stairs which rose into side doors at the hub. During a busy afternoon there was a steady procession of students pouring through first one set of doors and then another; some exiting into the mixed currents of the ground level traffic, others pouring into the lower levels like fish schooling for prey. Tonight though, the hub was empty. And Rusty would have said there was no sound. But when the main set of ventilation fans went down, the concrete floor of the hub seemed to vibrate and a low rumbling background noise began to climb down the register, lower and lower until it disappeared. Now the silence was absolute. A cliché line came to Rusty - the calm before the storm. But this wasn't a calming silence. It felt like his world had been chilled down to absolute zero. Even the molecules of the air seemed suspended.

  Then the door, a steel blue slab, third from the right, slammed open. Into the silent hub poured Jayne McEwan, looking crumpled and staring suspiciously around her, followed by a limping Malcolm Grieves. From his vantage point outside the hub, behind a glass self-closing door in one of the hallways, he saw another man suddenly emerge, press up behind Grieves before he had a chance to react and almost with a movement that reminded him of a magician's slight-of-hand, disarmed him. Within seconds he was leading them away out of the same set of tunnels they entered a few hours before.

  Sensing that they were headed for the parking lot to the east, Rusty pushed through the doors into the hub, this way making his way up into the stairwell that would take him to the surface. If he couldn't help Jayne at least he could follow her. As he crashed out onto the outdoor steps he realized that he had less time than he guessed. These men wanted Grieves. For whatever reason, with an image of Shay laying in her own fresh blood nagging at him, he sensed they were looking for the key that would turn on the damn Splicer. If it was only a word or a string of letters and numbers, how close were they to it? How long would it take to force it out of Grieves? And then when they had it, would they let him live? Why bother. It was clear now. Jayne and Grieves were as good as dead. Months ago, he would have marveled at the kind of mind that could so boldly and cold-bloodedly construct this kind of killing ground. But the game they were playing was a dark and dangerous one - gene manipulation for the sake of money and power. Jeff must have known of the deep currents he was setting up, must have begun to feel it tugging on him during his first meetings with representatives of the military. Maybe it was the quiet hunger in a General's eyes that first warned him. But he couldn't stop it, nobody could. Now Rusty felt completely overcome by the staggering forces around him. Like an ant braving a trek across a busy expressway.

  He headed across the lawn feeling the dew soak into his tennis shoes. Would they kill them right here on campus? If they took Jayne and Grieves to another location it might give Rusty time to raise the police. But as he thought about it he realized waiting only reduced the odds. He could lose them in the traffic. They could roar off at high speed and his tired Cutlass would be no match. He had to do something now.

  CHAPTER 72

  The team captain wondered what had happened to his two agents. They were known for speed. He had worked with them before. But no matter - he had the programmer. He would wait with these two at the van for Mohta or perhaps he would assassinate the woman in front of the man immediately. That would loosen the programmer’s tongue.

  With any luck, he could have the password before the other two agents even arrived. He enjoyed that thought for a while, noting with satisfaction that both of his charges were now tired and docile, worn out by the chase. If he could make it back to their vehicle without being seen that would be a bonus, but not a necessity. His experience with the public was that they left well enough alone. He could probably carry out an execution of these two on the center lawn of the Campus Administration Building and not even raise an inquiring look. People were basically sheep and that suited him just fine.

  He held the woman by one arm with the gun pressed up against her spine. The programmer was walking in front of her. He told him that if he ran, he would shoot her, then him, and it didn't matter if they had witnesses. He had killed in crowded street markets, hotel lobbies - once the balcony of a sold out theater. He didn't care. The programmer seemed resigned to his fate although he showed little fear or concern for the danger his female companion was facing. This troubled the hostage-taker only minutely. He was an excellent shot and the limping bulk of the little man would be an easy target.

  Ahead of them, he could see the orange sodium lights of the sports arena spilling into the foyer. From those doors they would cross the lawn by the arena, then circle the large outdoor complex and head into the vast visitor parking lot. As they neared the set of double glass doors, three students entered from the outside. They were all uniformly large, but one, the center man, was over six feet six. He was broad shouldered, wore a blond crew cut - had the handsome features of a small town sports hero. All three wore green football jerseys - a bunch of jocks finishing up a late night practice. But instead of looking tired and ready to rest, they appeared wired and jumpy. The biggest man was flexing his fingers as if about to tackle the opposing team's quarterback and his eyes had an angry set to them. Behind the three stood a smaller man in a leather jacket, his red hair in his eyes and his hands in his pockets, the same man the team leader had seen earlier.

  The professional realized immediately that something was wrong. His only concern though was the number of bullets he had in the chamber of his gun and how precisely he could place them. He had the added challenge of the programmer. He couldn't kill him yet. If necessary, he could fire into his lower legs. That might slow him down enough.

  The football tackle, his eyes eager, stepped up in front of Grieves and barred his way. They stopped.

  "Let the lady go," growled the student. The other two players flanked their teammate, looking anxious for a fight.

  Using his strongest voice, the professional decided to take one stab at talking his way out.

  "You've got the wrong g
uy, friend. We're just going for a stroll."

  "That's not what I hear," answered the jock, cocking a thumb back at the redheaded man behind them, by the exit doors. "I hear she doesn't want to go with you. Let's hear what she has to say!"

  Jayne felt the hard end of the gun being pressed against the area low on her spine. The intrusion angered her. She squirmed, fully expecting to feel a blast against her back, then the concussion and the heat. Would it hurt right away or would shock mask the awful destruction of her spine, her essential organs? She had seen death reports on injuries of that sort. Survival meant living as a quadriplegic. But why worry about that, survival was the remotest possibility. So she tried the only thing she could think of, she pretended to faint.

  The professional felt his hostage go limp and drop. He was tempted to end her life there but realized that she was of little value to him dead and only wasted a valuable bullet. Instead, he let her fall to the ground in a heap.

  The sight of the falling woman seemed to enrage the three football players. The largest lowered his head and charged. The first bullet entered his chest and exploded out of his back with the force of a cannon. But his strength and his weight carried him forward with surprising speed.

  The professional coolly fired again and again, already aware of his mistake. He was being tackled by three highly trained young men in their prime. The larger jock’s momentum was truly staggering. He folded into the killer like a big powerful lion hungry for a meal, almost unaware of his injuries. The three of them piled on the team leader who continued to fire into the assemblage of arms and legs.

  The biggest man was already dead but his weight had pinned the assassin while the other two, both suffering gunshot wounds, punched at the struggling man repeatedly. Grieves had made a break for the door but froze when he saw Rusty standing outside on the step. Rusty's expression looked so haunted, so full of open revulsion, that Grieves was momentarily unsure of what to do. When he turned, he saw Jayne struggling to her feet. He knew now, by the look in her eyes, that the faint was not real. Did she realize how the sight of her collapsing to the floor had instantly thrown these young men to her rescue? She could have derived the same effect by screaming out or crying, but that may have precipitated a bullet in her back for her efforts.