All of them were crouching and disoriented, trying to see through the impossibly thick smoke in the pale, red morning light. I sprinted right between the two bodyguards and went into a baseball slide. The seller was hunched on the ground, likely trying to get away from the thick smoke and ducking from the errant and wild fireworks explosions. I slid right by him, reached out, and easily plucked the program from his hand as I did so.
And just like that, I was holding a small USB drive.
“The program!” I heard the seller shout. “I’ve lost the program!”
I turned to retreat toward the church when a hand grabbed my arm. It gripped it so hard that my hand went numb and the USB drive fell out and into the snow.
I looked up. It was one of the seller’s massive bodyguards. He scowled at me through the smoke, even though I doubted he could see me without antifog contact lenses. But it didn’t matter; his grip was like a cyborg’s. I struggled, but already I saw him drawing a gun with his other hand.
But then a leg came flying in out of nowhere. The heel from a black dress shoe connected squarely with the bodyguard’s jaw. He released me immediately and fell to the ground.
“Get the drive and go!” Agent Nineteen said, as he followed through on his kick.
He didn’t have time to stand there and chat with me, as he spun around and then dived for the bodyguard, who was already reaching out to grab the gun he’d dropped. I didn’t wait around to see if he got it back or not. Instead, I hit the deck and searched on my hands and knees for the USB drive.
I found it, snatched it up, and then sprinted back toward the old church and its many hiding spots.
A few seconds later, I heard gunfire. Lots of it. I had no idea if they were shooting at me or at one another or just into the air. It sounded as if it was coming from everywhere. There was shouting, gunfire, and the sound of more fireworks explosions.
I kept my head down and sprinted as I fired more smoke disks all around me. It was so smoky now that without my special contacts I’d probably have crashed right into the side of the old church and gotten a concussion at minimum, and more likely been knocked unconscious. But they somehow cleared the smoke from my vision just enough to give me time to react when the church came into view. I veered right and dived head first through a giant hole in the side of the ancient building.
After quickly scrambling to my feet, I ran down the center aisle, between rows of ancient pews. The back door was gone, which left a wide-open exit for me to continue my retreat. I headed toward it, still running as quickly as my tired legs would go.
But I had to hit the brakes suddenly as a large figure filled the doorway, blocking my path. I wasn’t able to stop in time, and stumbled on the slick cold floor. The figure stepped aside and allowed me to basically fall onto my face in the snow just outside the old church.
I rolled over and looked up.
Medlock stood over me, grinning. He pointed toward the USB drive still clutched in my right hand.
“Carson,” he said smugly. “Once again, you’ve proven yourself to be so very useful.”
CHAPTER 63
SOMEONE SAID BOOM
I HEARD HIS WORDS CLEARLY EVEN THROUGH THE GUNFIRE AND shouting that continued all around us. He stared down at me with that infuriating grin on his face. Once again he thought he’d outsmarted me. Used me to help him get exactly what he wanted.
But this time, he had actually played right into my hands.
So I smiled back.
“I’m glad you found me among the chaos,” I said, “since this is exactly what I wanted to happen.”
His smile twitched but didn’t go away. He removed the small device with the button from his pocket and held it up.
“Remember this?” he said. “Hand over the program, or I press the button. Agency headquarters will be no more.”
“I was hoping you’d say that,” I said.
Without waiting for any kind of reply, I calmly removed six large cherry bombs with shortened fuses from my pocket. They were taped together into a giant megacherry bomb. I sandwiched the USB drive between them quickly, more deftly than I’d suspected my shaking fingers could have moved.
“What are you doing?” Medlock asked, his smile finally gone. “I’ll press the button!”
I pulled out a small lighter and lit the shortened fuses, tossing the megabomb to my left almost immediately. Before it even hit the ground there was a relatively small pop. Had there not been a raging gun battle happening on the other side of the church, the whole thing probably would have been more dramatic. But as it was, the force was still strong enough to blow the USB drive into dozens of small pieces.
“No!” Medlock yelled. He pressed a button on his device. “You just destroyed the Agency, my little friend. It may take a few minutes for the reactor to overheat, but the explosion is inevitable now. The process is irreversible.”
“Good,” I said, and I meant it.
Medlock tossed aside the device and pulled out a handgun. He pointed it at my face and suddenly my joy at having the plan go about as well as could be hoped for evaporated in an instant.
“Now I will finally get to destroy you,” he said.
I closed my eyes and waited for the dark.
CHAPTER 64
THE FOURTH PARTY ARRIVES
I FIGURED I’D BE DEAD BEFORE I EVEN HEARD THE GUNSHOT. Which is why it surprised me when a sudden crack rang out. It surprised me even more when I was able to open my eyes a few seconds later. Was he really that bad a shot? Had he missed me entirely?
But then I saw that Medlock was no longer holding his gun. Instead, he was clutching a bloody hand to his chest, cradling it like a fresh puppy. The smoking remnants of his pistol lay on the ground between us.
That’s when I became aware of the sounds of a helicopter above me. A chopper was descending about twenty yards away. Hanging out of the open side door was NSB Agent Loften. He was holding a rifle with a scope, which he set aside as the chopper landed.
He and several other agents rushed over. Agent Loften helped me to my feet, while the other two began restraining Medlock, who seemed to be in a sort of shocked daze.
“Right on time,” I said.
“It was quite a challenge convincing my superiors to trust me on this,” Agent Loften said. “I can still hardly believe it myself. If it weren’t for the missing evidence, and the fact that your old principal really didn’t seem like any sort of evil mastermind, I probably would have hung up on you. But something about your school didn’t sit right with me; I hadn’t liked it from the moment I got there. I’m glad you still had my card and thought to call me.”
That’s when I noticed that the gunfire had stopped. The sounds of more helicopters and cars were all around us. Sirens blared, and men were screaming at people to drop their weapons and get down on the ground. Since we were on the other side of the church, I couldn’t see what was actually happening, but I knew those were the sounds of the NSB apprehending everyone else involved. I didn’t know what they’d do with the people from the Agency; the Agency’s existence was classified even from the NSB, so it would probably take a long time for them to sort it all out. A pang of guilt stabbed at my guts. But it had to be done. I knew that more now than ever before.
“Where’s the Exodus Program?” Agent Loften asked.
“Destroyed,” I said, pointing at the fragments of USB drive at his feet.
He frowned and then waved one of his fellow agents over.
“Bag it,” he said, pointing at the pieces. He turned back to me. “Come on, I’ll give you a ride back to town.”
I followed Agent Loften back toward his helicopter. The other two agents were escorting Medlock, one on each side. The damage to his hand from Loften’s shot was apparently too severe to handcuff him. Not that it mattered—he looked truly defeated, his head was down and he shuffled his feet along reluctantly but without much fight.
I looked back toward the exchange point again. Director Isadoris was on h
is knees, handcuffed and getting his Miranda rights read to him. He looked at me. And if eyeballs could fire bullets, my brains would have been all over Agent Loften’s jacket.
Director Isadoris looked back at the agent reading him his rights and began shouting something about how he would be sorry and he outranked everyone there and they were making a big mistake and all that sort of thing.
Next to him, Agent Nineteen was also handcuffed, but he wasn’t struggling or shouting or anything. He was actually smiling. Smirking at seeing Director Isadoris acting like such a lunatic. Then he looked right at me and nodded.
I nodded back.
Dillon and Danielle were near the helicopter, talking to a pair of NSB agents. When they saw I was okay, they smiled and waved. I smiled and waved back.
That’s when the ground began to shake. It rumbled so violently that everybody fell. The earth spun as I tumbled to the ground.
And I realized the truth: Agency HQ had just been completely incinerated.
CHAPTER 65
WHEN A TWO PERCENT CHANCE OF SURVIVAL SOUNDS PROMISING
THE NEXT THING I REALIZED, I WAS PROPPED UP ON MY ELBOWS, the world still spinning. My vision blurred and I noticed that most everyone else was still on the ground, unconscious. My first thought was the utter horror at realizing just how violent the explosion must have been to have shaken the ground all the way out here. I was suddenly having visions of an eight-city-block crater in the middle of Minnow, a hole in the earth that had swallowed hundreds of homes and thousands of people. And it was my fault. What had I been thinking?
But that’s when I noticed that one person was on his feet, running toward the helicopter. It was Medlock, his two NSB escorts still on the ground in a daze. I watched in horror as he reached the chopper, leaned over and grabbed Dillon’s body and then climbed inside the cockpit, taking him along.
Every part of me screamed at me to stay down. The violence of the earthquake had rattled every joint and organ in my body. But the sight of Medlock getting away with my best friend washed all that away.
I was on my feet before I even realized what was happening, sprinting toward the helicopter as it began rising off the ground. I got there and put everything I had into a massive running leap.
Somehow, I just managed to hook an arm on one of the chopper’s landing skids. The helicopter rose off the ground with me dangling from it. I told myself not to look down, and for once, I listened. Instead, I just focused on pulling myself inside the back of the helicopter. But I couldn’t budge. I locked my right hand around my left wrist, hugging the landing skid.
I had no idea how high we actually were now, but the cold wind whipping across my face told me we were definitely moving fast. And so if I let go, I’d surely be as good as dead.
That’s when I felt a pair of hands grab my arm. I looked up and saw Danielle’s face close to my own. She nodded at me and then pulled me up inside the helicopter.
Once inside, she held a finger to her lips and ducked behind the bulkhead where the pilot’s seat was. I followed, crouching next to her behind the divider.
“I saw him grab Dillon and so I hopped aboard,” she said.
The noise of the helicopter was so loud that we could talk without fear of being heard up front. In fact, we could barely even hear each other, even though we were shouting, and our faces were only a foot apart.
“Me, too,” I shouted. “What’s the plan?”
Danielle shrugged. “I just jumped on. Thought we’d figure that part out later.”
“Well, we have to do something,” I said.
I leaned back slightly and looked up front. I saw Dillon slumped in the passenger seat. Blood matted his forehead. He must have hit his head when he fell during the earthquake. The good news was that I saw his chest rising and falling, so he was still alive.
When I turned back, I saw that Danielle was gone. I spun around and then saw her holding a huge wrench, creeping her way up toward the cockpit. I lunged forward to stop her, to remind her that if she knocked out Medlock, none of us knew how to pilot a helicopter. But she was already aware of that, because instead of hitting him with the huge wrench, she merely threatened him.
“Take us back down or I’ll smash your face!” she screamed.
Medlock turned, looking startled for only a moment. Then he actually smiled.
“I should have known that I couldn’t get away from you,” he said. “Even up here!”
Then he quickly pitched the helicopter to the side. Danielle stumbled and had to drop the wrench to keep from falling out of the helicopter through the open side door. I also slid across the floor but grabbed a pouch on the back of the passenger seat.
Medlock leveled the chopper again and then pointed a finger back at Danielle.
“Don’t move again, or I will crash this thing!” he yelled. “Don’t think I won’t. I’d rather be dead than in prison.”
He clearly had no idea I was also onboard. Danielle nodded at Medlock and then sat down, her arm wrapped around a safety handle to keep from falling out. She glanced at me quickly, a signal that it was up to me now.
I crawled slowly over to the wrench. I wrapped my hand around the hard metal. There were three choices facing me:
1. Pick this thing up and just knock out Medlock without warning, leaving one of us to fly the helicopter. Probability of fatal crash: 97.4 percent.
2. Try to threaten Medlock again, testing his promise about crashing it on purpose. Probability of fatal crash: 99.3 percent.
3. Just stay low and out of sight and go along for the ride. Probability of death at the hands of Medlock after landing somewhere where his henchmen were waiting: 100 percent.
Clearly, surviving this would be a miracle. But, even still, there was the one option which was slightly better than the rest.
And so I stood up and swung the wrench toward the cockpit in one swift motion. It was a lot heavier than I expected and suddenly I was worried that it might actually kill Medlock. As much as I hated the guy, I didn’t want to kill him. Part of me still felt kind of bad for him—it sounded like he was an okay guy before the Agency drove him to madness.
But it was too late, the wrench too heavy to pull back now. It connected with the back of Medlock’s skull with a solid crack. He slumped forward and then I looked at Danielle and our eyes met and we both knew we were screwed.
Neither of us had any idea how to fly a helicopter!
CHAPTER 66
NOBODY WANTS TO DIE IN THE RAT RIVER
THE HELICOPTER DIDN’T ENTER INTO A FREE-FALLING TAILSPIN death dive right away. Instead it just sort of lurched and shuddered.
I clambered up front, next to Dillon. Danielle hovered between us and the pilot’s seat. She didn’t lecture me for knocking out the only pilot. Instead, she calmly grabbed the yoke and tried to hold it steady.
But we could still feel the helicopter begin to descend rather rapidly.
“What do we do?” I shouted.
“I don’t know!” Danielle shouted back.
And that’s when Dillon woke up and spoke.
“Grab the collective!” he shouted.
“I think he has a concussion!” I yelled over the whirring blades. “He’s talking crazy!”
“No, I’m not, grab the collective,” he repeated, sitting up.
“What’s that?” Danielle asked.
“It’s a handle on the left side of the pilot’s seat,” he shouted. “It controls the throttle and the lift. We’re losing altitude because Medlock’s hand must be pressing it down!”
I climbed over Medlock’s body to find the collective.
“Since when do you know how to fly a helicopter?” Danielle asked her brother.
“Well, I don’t technically,” he said. “But I read a helicopter manual once, since I thought it contained a coded message about where to find Forrest Fenn’s buried treasure.”
“Who’s what now?” Danielle asked.
“Guys, it doesn’t matter!” I shouted. �
�I can’t reach the collective.”
I leaned back and grabbed Medlock’s shirt. Danielle and I pulled him into the back, while Dillon slipped over into the pilot’s seat without needing to be told. We tied Medlock to a nylon net bolted to the wall of the helicopter, to make sure he wouldn’t fall out. He had blood on the back of his skull and I truly hoped I hadn’t killed him.
Danielle and I joined Dillon up front again. The helicopter felt steadier, but we were still descending, and wobbling like a toddler’s first steps.
“Guys, I don’t think I can actually land this!” Dillon said. “I’ve never flown one before. I mean, I theoretically know how to use the pedals, and collective, and yoke, but that’s about it . . .”
He trailed off as he saw what Danielle and I had just noticed ourselves. We were flying over the school. Except . . . there was no school. Where Erik Hill Middle School used to be was now just a massive hole in the earth, filled with rubble and concrete and debris. The school had completely caved into the ground at least a hundred feet.
But I was relieved to at least see that the destruction was limited to just the school grounds.
A sudden warning chime brought our attention back to the dire situation at hand. I’d nearly forgotten that we were in the middle of crashing a helicopter.
“I can’t . . . I don’t know what I’m doing!” Dillon shouted as he continued to struggle with the controls.
“We feel pretty steady,” Danielle said hopefully. “We’re not, like, spinning wildly or plunging toward the ground in a fireball.”
“Yeah, well, just the same I promise it will be a bumpy landing!” Dillon said.
“There!” I pointed. “Aim for the wide bend in the Rat River. If we’re going to crash, better to do it on water, right?”
Dillon nodded and did his best to steer us toward the quickly approaching river. Seemingly every year, some guy fell through the thin ice and drowned in the Rat River. And every time it happened thousands of people like me called them idiots for walking on a frozen river too early in the winter. Which is why nobody ever wanted to die in the Rat River.
Crisis Zero Page 20
