The Cardinal Rule

by C. E. Murphy

  The ventilation shafts in the building had been built to cut off any outside circulation in the event of nuclear war. Generators beneath the building, according to fifty-year-old blueprints, would keep the bunker's air fresh and provide heat to anyone lucky enough to survive the anticipated war.

  The ducts' narrowness had a secondary objective, not necessarily one that had been considered in the architecture of the building: to prevent exactly the sort of thing she was doing now. Few men—at least few men in a military organization that had height and weight requirements—would have fit through the cool narrow tunnels. There were places where Alisha regretted eating dinner.

  #

  There had been a few moments toward the end of that dinner where she'd considered whether General Hashikov might have been seduced—in mind, through open adoration, if not physically—by a fragile-seeming female. But she'd concluded he was too dedicated to his job—or at least being king of his own domain—to fall for that, and pushing it too far would have instigated outrage at a woman trying to invade his domain.

  So she simply had to invade it the old-fashioned way. Alisha rolled onto her back as she reached a ninety-degree upright connection in the ventilation tunnels. There was no room to stand, but thin grooves in the shaft walls—grooves that would rotate and fold closed in case of nuclear war—gave her enough purchase to slowly pull herself up through the walls. Her fingers trembled and ached with the effort, shivers of stress working down through her arms and into her shoulders. She took deep, deliberate breaths, making certain to get enough oxygen to the overworked muscles. The air tasted faintly of metal and dust, as if it had been tainted by long years of lingering in the ventilation shafts. It lay in the back of her throat, a sweet tangy taste like blood. There was barely enough room to pull in those cloying breaths, and each expansion of her ribs made her feel as if she would crush herself against the close-set walls. Her toes—clad in rip-stop nylon with tiny rubber pebbles on the soles, as were her palms—dug into the grooves, barely earning her any more purchase, and her ankle muttered irritation as she strained it. There wasn't nearly enough room to draw her legs up so she could wedge herself in the ventilation ducts.

  Brandon's research lab had to be in the bunkers beneath the old base. Not that it was impossible that his lab would be elsewhere, but the bunkers were by far the safest location in the base. Whoever funded his research would want to be certain their investment was well protected.

  The who was a question worth pursuing. She would have to ask Greg if he knew who was funding the presumably considerable cost of Brandon's development work. Anyone with that kind of money and the taste for building mechanical warriors was an inherent danger to the security of the United States and the world at large.

  The vents went a long way toward making certain whoever had put his money up wasn't in danger of losing the research he paid for. It was all but impossible for anyone to slip in that way. Twenty feet of upright metal to climb through before another right angle and finally a third would lead her straight down, as dangerous in its way as the upward climb. One slip and she would fall four stories. A broken bone in the shafts would finish her.

  Alisha pushed the thought away. There was never time for that sort of what-if-ing. At best it was frivolous and at worst it would get her killed. Besides, she had the backup she needed for the descent. Filament line trailed behind her, anchored just inside her bathroom's ventilation grate. Chances were that no one would physically check up on her during the night.

  She hoped.

  Concentrate. Alisha mouthed the word, inching higher. If she'd been discovered, she'd deal with it later.

  She inhaled sharply as open space gave behind her head. A glance upward ascertained the shaft ended above her. Alisha let go the breath again, squirming backward into the new shaft. For a moment the metal just above her face seemed to press down on her, squeezing the air from her lungs. Alisha closed her eyes, envisioning the space around her as larger, then squirmed backward into the claustrophobic tunnel. From there on out, it was a cake-walk.

  Even as she thought it, Alisha shook her head in a scold. Over-confidence led to mistakes. Still, it was a matter of minutes to drop the filament line, clip a pulley ratchet to it, and slide headfirst into the ventilation ducts leading down to the base's underground laboratories. She landed fingertips first, edging her way forward into the boxy shafts toward dim emergency lights that glowed in the room beyond.

  The tiny tinks as the screws from the grate hit the floor sounded to her ears like a doomsday bell tolling, blaring an announcement of her presence to anyone with a care to hear. Alisha slid down the wall, still headfirst, then reversed herself, landing on the balls of her feet. The rubber nodes on her soles felt odd, wriggling slightly with the pressure of her weight against them. She collected the screws, fixing the grate closed so that it would pass a perfunctory inspection. The filament line remained coiled behind it, the lifeline she would need to return to her room. She closed her eyes briefly, pulling up the blueprints in her mind's eye, graying lines against grayer paper.

  There was a central control room overlooking a cavernous hub room, what would have been the eye of activity if nuclear war had broken out and the base evacuated to the below-ground bunkers. It should be two corridors to her right, on the same level. Alisha nodded, tight motion to herself, and ran silently on her toes through the bunkers, her ankle whinging at the speed.

  The walls were unadorned concrete, floors unmarred by the passage of feet, but also well cared for: there was no dust to betray her trail, nor, for several doors, any locks to inhibit her. Ancient surveillance cameras creaked in the corners, their sweep of the hallways so slow that she counted out the long seconds before darting to the next camera's blind spot.

  The last door was locked, a modern keypad set into the wall beside it. Alisha curled her lip, mouthing a curse rather than risking it aloud. At least it wasn't biometric. She shot a glance at the lugubrious camera at the end of the hall. Nine seconds. She slid a penlight out of the belt at her waistband, flicking it on. Ultraviolet brightened the keypad, illuminating fingerprints left on the keys. Seven seconds. Five keys were smudged: 1 2 8 9 0. Cold lifted the hairs on Alisha's arms as she stared at the numbers, grasping for a meaningful sequence. Three seconds.

  My life, she thought, is an endless countdown of numbers. The sequence popped into her mind and she punched it in without hesitating, 2101890. The door slid open and she stepped through, taking in the layout of the control room with a single glance. A surveillance camera clicked and began its rotation back toward her. She darted forward, folding herself into the space beneath a desk, making sure the chair obscured her. Only then did she exhale through pursed lips, as near a whistle as she dared make, and drop her head against her forearms for a moment.

  Two ten eighteen ninety. Groucho Marx's birthday, written European style: 2 October, 1890. Thank God for the shared humor between father and son. Alisha's heart slammed against her ribs, excited relief threatening to bubble into laughter. She allowed herself a fierce grin against her arms, then nudged the chair a few inches, studying the room more closely from her hiding spot.

  There was only the one visible camera from where she sat, but a second had been in the opposite corner. There was something wrong with their angles. Alisha closed her eyes, this time visualizing the sweep of the cameras. A few seconds passed before she tightened a fist in triumph and lifted her eyes to study the nearest computers.

  The cameras couldn't see their screens. There were distinct blind spots in the room; it was merely a question of navigating to them. Alisha offered thanks to whatever saint ensured the paranoia of great programmers, and skittered from one blind spot to another until she sat crouched behind one of the terminals, hidden entirely from the security cameras.

  Objective one: get the schematics. White letters on a black command screen blinked at her as she punched out commands, listing the files and directories on the mainframe. It was too much, far too much, to do
wnload it all. That was okay. The integral pieces were all she needed, enough to reverse engineer the prototype. The screens to her left and right hummed on, various stages of the prototype's development flashing by as she scanned through the files. There were half a dozen that seemed promising before stalling out. Alisha gnawed her lower lip, resisting the urge to bounce with impatience. Too much movement would put her in the cameras' line of sight despite the dimness of the room, and she couldn't risk being seen.

  There. A schematic flashed up and held, blue-white lines against the screen catching her attention. The drone she'd seen in action that afternoon, Prototype Alpha-10-Gamma. Alisha clenched her fists in triumph and fished a USB stick out of her belt. A truly paranoid programmer would have computers without USB ports at all, and passwords to keep people out of files that weren't their own. Brandon's programming team were clearly trusted: she found a port and got the stick into it on only the second try. A handful of quick commands started the download, though Alisha noticed herself baring her teeth as she typed, as if threatening the computer itself into behaving.

  Or proving to the computer that she was brave enough to face it. Accessing the mainframe was dangerous, too easily trackable. If anyone was watching, they'd see the spike that indicated her subterfuge.

  Second objective: destroy the schematics. Alisha took one rough breath to steady herself and turned to another computer. A second USB went into its port, and she reversed the transfer protocol, now uploading a new file to the servers. A seventy-two hour Trojan; once set, it would lurk in the mainframe, silent for three days before a simple command—accessing one of the text editors on the mainframe—would set it loose. All data on the servers would be destroyed before anyone had a chance to react. And it would happen days after she was gone, more than enough time for her to disappear completely. Brandon might be forced to suspect her, as one of the few outsiders the base ever saw, but the development servers were strictly off-limits: no one except authorized personnel should have access. Alisha flashed a tight grin at the screens, watching percentages of uploads and downloads scroll by. It was a tidy job, and she was already proud of it.

  File transfer complete. Alisha tightened her fingers in triumph again and reached for the first USB, the one with the newly downloaded schematics. Excitement shivered over her, an almost sexual pleasure of another move in the spy game well played.

  "I don't like making contact when there are strangers in the base." Brandon's voice came through the door, muffled.

  Alisha had time to think, oh,fuck, before the door slid open.

  Chapter 7

  Nowhere in her job description was it written that when in trouble, a refrain of, "Fuckity fuck fuck," more or less to the tune of "Here Comes Santa Claus" should play in her head. Alisha doubted anyone else had ever come near that particular idiosyncrasy, and it wasn't the sort of query she'd ever wanted to put to anyone. She made herself a solemn promise that she would at least ask Greg if he'd ever done such a thing, if she got out of the base unscathed.

  She slid under the desk, stomach muscles bunched with contained nausea and excitement. The lights were still off, and her black suit would help hide her, but there was no way out without betraying herself. A shadow passed beside her hand, Brandon's footsteps sounding flat against the concrete floor as he walked between the desks.

  "I'm losing you. I'll put the internet phone through in a second." He sat down, a chair creaking. Alisha closed her eyes, a hot shudder of relief making her shoulders sag momentarily. She snaked her fingertips out, reaching for the nearest USB stick, then hesitated. If the virus hadn't finished uploading yet—Alisha bit her lower lip, withdrawing her hand. The second stick was too far away to be reached from beneath the desk. The computer beeped, making her flinch, and she snaked her hand out again, trusting the sound had been the file finishing its transfer. USB sticks made almost no noise going in and out of their slots, but the tiny pop of release sounded like a thunderstorm in Alisha's straining ears. Brandon's chair creaked as he turned, but he didn't move.

  "Security system's on a loop," he said a moment later. Alisha almost laughed despite the danger. The scientist had spoken to his contact, whomever it was, even out in the hall. The security system had to have been looped for at least a few minutes. Her dramatic sneak across the computer lab had been for her own benefit. Ah well, she thought: there was no way she could have known.

  "We're clear," Brandon added. Alisha squirmed beneath the desk, searching for a crack that might allow her to see him as he spoke.

  "How did the demonstration go?" The new voice came through one of the computer's speakers, mechanically distorted so Alisha couldn't tell if it was male or female. A thin break in the soldering on the desk's corner allowed her to watch the conversation, Brandon's shoulder turned toward her. He lifted it slightly, a shrug that betrayed faint tension.

  "A hitch or two. The protocols were still set to live targets. Rafe covered it. Otherwise, not bad. Tomorrow we've got another demo, this time with appropriately live targets."

  Alisha turned her palm up, staring at the black stick in her hand. The faintest bit of light reflected off it: she would have to carry matte-covered data sticks from now on. Its dim reflection of light swam in her gaze as she assimilated Brandon's words: still set to live targets. Who had the targets been? Alisha set her teeth together, racing through possibilities in her mind. The words implied either tests run with live targets—the more innocuous choice—or that the drone had actually been used already in real-world scenarios. If the latter was true, there was more urgency to her mission than she'd known. Maybe even more urgency than Greg or Director Boyer had known. Alisha mouthed a curse and turned away from the crack, eyeing the second computer.

  "As opposed to inappropriately live ones." Despite the alteration, the dryness of the speaker's tone came through clearly. Hair stood up on the back of Alisha's neck, a warning of familiarity that she couldn't place. She twisted back to frown through the slit, Brandon's shoulder no more revealing than it had been. The screen beyond him had a graphical interface, but no image to go along with the video chat. Alisha set her teeth together in soundless frustration.

  "The Russians are sending a man in," the mechanized voice said. "He'll be there in the morning."

  "Dammit!" Brandon's hand came down with a sharp crack. Alisha flashed her hand out, moving beyond the dark safety of the desk to snatch the second USB under the sound of Brandon's anger. "I don't like having even one agent here at a time! Two's a disaster!"

  Ice formed deep in Alisha's belly, spreading through her in such clear increments she felt as if she was watching frost grow on a window. It froze her motion, fingers stretched toward the USB stick. A knot of cold lay in her throat, catching her repetition of the word agent there before it could be uttered aloud.

  "You couldn't expect the Russians to hold off when a Middle Eastern conglomerate has moved in. They send in an agent, the Russians send in an agent."

  "And what about the Americans?" Brandon demanded. Alisha relaxed, the chill draining away from her bones. Agent didn't necessarily mean CIA. But just because you're paranoid, she thought, doesn't mean they're not out to get you.

  "You are the Americans." The distorted voice sounded chiding. Alisha's shoulders went back, her head turning toward the source of the conversation again. Brandon's response was abruptly weary.

  "Yeah. Some days it's hard to remember."

  "Others it's hard to forget." Chiding faded from the computerized speaker, as if the speaker felt sympathy, or even empathy. Alisha had a brief, unsubstantiated conviction that the speaker was a woman, and rejected it: she couldn't know that with the weird, flat edge to the voice, and women weren't the only people who could feel sympathy. Whomever they were, they'd say you are the Americans. Not according to Greg or Brandon's CIA files, he wasn't, and the idea that there was more going on than she knew set Alisha's teeth on edge. She had far too many questions and absolutely no answers. Nor could she contact Greg to find out wh
at the hell was going on. Until her scheduled departure, she was on her own.

  On her own and possessed of two very dangerous pieces of material. Still listening to Brandon and his contact—they were discussing when the Russian agent would arrive—she turned her gaze upward, studying the room for exit points. Knowing the security cameras were temporarily disabled left her considerably more freedom, though she didn't want to make her move until Brandon was gone.

  "The live demo's at ten. If he's not here by then—"

  "Then you'll do it again when he arrives. This isn't just about the Russians, Parker. It's about the Sicarii."

  "Son of a bitch," Brandon said so mildly Alisha checked the impulse to peek over the edge of the desk to see his expression. The very low-keyness of his delivery made her feel it hid much deeper emotion. "All right."

  Curiosity itched at the back of Alisha's mind, her palms tingling with adrenaline. Sicarii. It meant nothing to her, though she thought it sounded Italian. The need to escape the computer lab began to pound at the base of Alisha's skull, a throb that said her body felt as if it had been put into a danger zone well beyond what she'd prepared for.

  She crept forward, trusting the conversation to be her cover. A staircase spiraled up into what the blueprints indicated was a ready room of some sort, above the computer lab and overlooking the enormous hub room. Brandon continued talking, more deferential than he'd been before. Alisha hesitated at the end of the row of desks and computers, frowning at the windows that made up the larger part of the room's front wall. Lights were on in the hub room beyond it; her reflection would go unseen if she risked the stairs. But it would put her on a new level, one she might not be able to access her escape route from so easily. She closed her eyes, building the blueprints in her mind again, tracing the route in the air with a fingertip.