Illarion rubbed at his silver stubble. ‘This happened in Kraków.’
‘So we were in the wrong city,’ Andrey said.
‘At least some of us were in the right country.’ Marina shot Olesya an irritated glance.
‘We wanted to be there,’ Ark said quickly.
‘Ark and Olesya weren’t cleared for operations,’ Illarion said. ‘This is not anyone’s fault. You all need to understand that.’
Olesya swallowed. Only Gleb knew where she and Ark had really been today. And that their secret mission had been a failure. She wasn’t even sure if the woman in the navy coat was the same woman Ark had been chasing. All they knew for sure was that at least one of them was a Fifth Column operative and they’d successfully snatched a Russian intelligence officer from the streets of Tallinn.
Illarion hit a key on the laptop and the image changed. Ark launched to his feet, eyes wide. His mouth opened, but he didn’t speak.
Now it was another image from a CCTV camera; a lone woman in a dark coat, moving fast across the market square in Kraków. Around her, people were running from something, looking back. But she was moving in a different direction. Only half her face was visible from the high angle of the camera, but it was enough. There was no uncertainty this time.
Val.
Olesya and Ark had been on the other side of Eastern Europe. And Val was right there. Right where they were supposed to be.
Ark took a deep breath and composed himself. ‘My sister.’
‘We believe so, yes,’ Illarion said.
‘How are we supposed to stop them if we’re given the wrong details?’ Marina asked.
‘We don’t always get intel on these operations,’ Illarion said. ‘We’re fortunate to have agents inside the Fifth Column who can supply any information at all.’
Andrey threw his hands in the air. ‘Our operation was a non-event. No bombs or attacks in Wrocław. Meanwhile you’re telling us there was a goddamn proxy shooting up civilians in Kraków?’
‘We should’ve been there to put that shooter down,’ Marina muttered to herself. ‘And his handler.’
Ark turned to her, eyes bulging. ‘That’s my sister you’re talking about.’
‘She’s not your sister anymore,’ Marina said. ‘She’s Fifth Column now, don’t you get it?’
Ark’s fist closed, but Andrey stepped between them.
‘You want to do the Fifth Column’s work for them and fight each other?’ Andrey asked. ‘By all means, knock yourselves out.’
Ark glared fixedly at Marina. ‘Don’t ever say that again.’
‘That’s what you Muscovites do, right?’ Marina said, hands on her hips. ‘Take them in all pretty and wrapped in absorbent cotton?’
Andrey turned to face her. ‘Is there something wrong with that?’
‘There’s something wrong, all right,’ Marina said. ‘There’s something very wrong with this, wouldn’t you say?’
Andrey fell silent.
‘Marina,’ Illarion said. ‘One more word and I’ll pull you off the team, do you understand?’
She fell silent.
Olesya folded her arms. ‘Let me guess, the shooter killed himself afterwards.’
‘Correct,’ Illarion said. ‘But there was one difference this time.’
‘What?’
Illarion cleared his throat. ‘The proxy was Russian.’
‘Shit.’ Olesya should’ve been there.
‘I bet the Western media are having a field day with this,’ Marina said.
‘Next image,’ Illarion said.
Gleb hit a button on his laptop. The image changed again. This time, there were two women standing outside a café in the same square. Ark’s gaze was transfixed on one woman, Val. But Olesya was focused on the other, whose back was facing the camera.
‘Who’s the other one?’ Marina asked.
‘Another operative,’ Illarion said. ‘We don’t have a clear shot of her face, but we’ll have her identity soon.’
The woman’s black leather jacket, the cut of her shoulder-length hair, her sneakers. Olesya knew her; the operative with the gray eyes. Sophia.
You bitch, you’re Fifth Column after all.
Sophia had to be behind the abductions. But Olesya couldn’t reveal her suspicion. Doing so would mean admitting she’d withheld information on the Moscow operation. She needed to be absolutely certain before she brought this to Illarion.
Illarion leaned over the table, across his map of Europe and the scattered photos of operatives. He’d taken the map with him from Moscow and now there was a new photo over Kraków, Poland. A photo of Val.
‘Val is one of them,’ Illarion said. ‘For now.’
Ark turned away, hand over his mouth.
‘This presents a problem for us,’ Illarion said. ‘The Fifth Column seem to have Val and the other kidnapped hunters under their control. We have to expect they now possess intimate knowledge of our operations and will be looking to exploit that.’
He slid the laptop over to Gleb, who removed the CCTV photo and switched to Polish news feeds. They played across the big screen with the audio muted.
‘So what happens now?’ Marina asked.
‘We’re assigned to deal with Purity, not the Fifth Column operatives,’ Illarion said.
‘What?’ Ark said. ‘We just found Val!’
‘He has a point,’ Olesya said. ‘You trained us to hunt operatives and disarm nuclear warheads. You didn’t train us to fight a bunch of street thugs.’
Illarion pointed to the screen. ‘That bunch of street thugs just won Poland’s presidential election.’
Onscreen, there was footage of Purity supporters celebrating their Purity candidate—a fragile man with wire-framed glasses and peppered hair—mouthing a silent speech.
‘Purity are a bunch of lunatics,’ Ark said. ‘How could they win?’
‘Their popularity is rising sharply across Eastern Europe and they have the public support of many governments around the world,’ Gleb said. ‘But they tap into a deep river of…’
Marina crossed her arms. ‘Racism?’
‘Fear,’ Gleb said. ‘Fear of outsiders, fear of those different to themselves. Fear of people who undertake gene doping or gene therapy.’
‘People like us.’
He turned up the sound and the Purity leader’s voice filled the room.
‘Our thoughts are with those who have suffered the loss of their loved ones at the hands of this radicalized Russian soldier. Amid our prayers and our outrage, we cannot deny this is a brazen assault on the territorial integrity of our country—a sovereign and independent European nation.’
The video switched to a grainy image of Val from the CCTV. Beside this image, a close-up of her face as a child. A subtitle read Accomplice in shooting—Russian spy program.
The President continued. ‘It is becoming clear to us that Russia’s ruthless genetic engineering program, inflicted on innocent children, is connected to this senseless act of aggression. What happened today is a violation of what makes us pure. We will do everything in our power to bring purity and justice to—’
Illarion hit pause. ‘You get the idea.’
Ark shook his head. ‘Is someone going to tell them who runs Project GATE?’
‘Yeah,’ Andrey said. ‘Because it sure as hell isn’t us.’
Gleb cleared his throat. ‘Purity are adept at attributing blame to a certain type of people. And right now, that’s you. And anyone else who is genetically … diverse.’
‘Let me make this clear,’ Illarion said. ‘Purity is our primary objective. The more power it absorbs, the more dangerous it becomes to us, and to the rest of the world.’
‘Even if the world supports them?’ Marina asked.
‘Yes,’ Illarion said. ‘It doesn’t matter how many people they enchant, if we don’t stop them, they will kill many more. Dismissed.’
The hunters slowly gathered their notes and filed out. Only Olesya remained with Illari
on as Gleb collected his laptop and notes. He gave her a brief nod as he left.
Alone in the room with Illarion, she turned to him. ‘Why haven’t we tried yet?’
The rings under Illarion’s eyes were darker than usual, his stubble a bit longer. ‘Tried what exactly?’
‘Tried destroying the Fifth Column,’ Olesya said. ‘We both know they’re financing Purity. Why don’t we cut off the serpent’s head?’
‘We don’t know that yet. And cutting off the head is not the solution.’
‘I know what you’ve been doing,’ Olesya said. ‘Your strategy, from the beginning. We’ve been on the defensive. Every time, we react. You’ve trained us to be more than just a reactionary force, and yet we never truly take action.’
‘Is that what you really think, Olesya?’
‘You freed Russia of the Fifth Column and now you’re so worried about them taking it back that all we ever do is sabotage their operations,’ she said. ‘We don’t have our own. And I think we should.’
Illarion clasped his hands behind his back. ‘What sort of operation are you proposing?’
‘We bring the fight to the Fifth Column. We destroy them.’
Illarion surveyed the map and the operative photos scattered across it, some pinned, some unsorted. ‘This doesn’t sound like the Olesya I know.’
‘The Olesya you knew hadn’t lost ... as much.’
‘The Fifth Column are much weaker, far more depleted, than they were when we severed our ties with them, that’s true,’ Illarion said. ‘But they are still very powerful and they hold sway over many of the nations on this planet. Destroying something like that is no simple task.’
‘But we have to start somewhere,’ she said.
‘As a matter of fact, you can start by avoiding all Fifth Column operatives,’ Illarion said.
‘What? Why?’
‘We’re receiving reports of operatives being selectively upgraded.’
Olesya chewed her lip. ‘Upgraded with what?’
‘Gleb is preparing a full briefing for everyone, but the Fifth Column call them HAC operatives,’ Illarion said. ‘Human Artificial Chromosome.’
‘What, so there’s a whole new chromosome now?’
‘A microchromosome. Imagine an operative with the strength and power of a full-body exoskeleton—without the exoskeleton.’
The bruises Olesya picked up from her encounter in Moscow still ached. ‘That does explain a few things.’
‘Until we learn more, you keep your distance,’ he said.
Olesya shook her head. ‘This doesn’t change the fact we need to hit them hard. We need to destroy the Fifth Column once and for all. We’re still picking up the pieces after their attacks in the Middle East. Not to mention they’ve been terrorizing Western populations for decades. It will take generations for people to recover from this.’
Illarion frowned. ‘I don’t deny it, but taking on the Fifth Column … even if you win, you lose.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘The Fifth Column is run by the most cunning psychopaths on this planet. Denton is middle management at best. Or at least he was.’
‘I don’t understand. How do we lose?’
Illarion gestured across the map, over every continent. ‘Let’s say we put everything we have into fighting the Fifth Column. And we crush them. Let’s say the psychopaths in power face certain defeat at our hand. Tell me, what do psychopaths do when they face certain defeat?’
‘They get desperate.’
‘And desperate psychopaths are the most dangerous kind. Rather than lose the game, they’ll burn the entire chess board.’
‘With us still on it,’ Olesya whispered.
‘If we destroy the Fifth Column, we face the psychopath’s endgame,’ he said.
‘They’ll go nuclear.’
‘Precisely.’
Olesya exhaled slowly. ‘So we just let the Fifth Column run the world because we’re too scared they’ll destroy it? That’s the plan?’
‘Psychopaths of all strains have run empires and nations on this planet for thousands of years,’ Illarion said. ‘I’m sorry, but evil has prevailed in our world for a very long time, and that won’t change just because you want it to. At least not yet.’
Anger burned through her. ‘How can you say that? You rescued me from the Fifth Column. You told me I could make a difference!’
‘You still can.’
Olesya turned her back on him. The rest of the hunters—Ark, Marina, Andrey and Nika—were watching the argument through the windows. Her cheeks reddened.
‘There has to be a way,’ she said.
Leaning on the map, Illarion breathed for a moment. Without warning, he tore the map from the table and hurled the table across the room. It hit a wall, the photos fluttering in the air like confetti. ‘If there is, I don’t know it.’
Olesya’s rage cooled. She felt only despair now. ‘I’m sorry, I was just frustrated…’
‘Do you think I asked for this?’ Illarion inhaled sharply. ‘Do you think I asked to mentor a bunch of kids in some long-shot hope of saving the world?’
‘We’re only long shots?’
Laptop in hand, Illarion strode for the door. ‘That’s the thing with long shots. They don’t all work out.’
Chapter Thirteen
Vilnius, Lithuania
‘Nice of you to drop in.’ Sophia led DC into the kitchen. ‘To what do we owe the honor?’
Before DC could reply, Ieva shoved a mug into his hands. ‘Tea?’
He took the drink, and Ieva offered him a seat before tending to the other mugs.
DC sipped his tea. ‘How you holding up?’
‘Not bad, considering,’ Sophia replied.
‘Just her ribs.’ Czarina said. She’d inspected Sophia for any critical wounds and found remarkably few.
‘They’ll heal,’ Sophia said.
‘You’re lucky that you heal fast.’ Ieva sat down with a mug of her own.
The sun set over the forest, casting a golden tint through the window. DC squinted and shifted his chair while Ieva’s reaction was to produce her phone and take a photo. She had a library of sunset and dog photos. Right now, the dog photos were winning by a slight margin. Sophia didn’t mind, as long as the shots were stripped of metadata and didn’t reveal anything about their headquarters.
‘She certainly knows how to throw a punch,’ Sophia said. ‘Have you crossed paths with her before?’
DC shook his head. ‘If I had’ve known she was jacked up like that, I would’ve left it to you.’
‘Why would you do that?’ Sophia asked.
Czarina stifled a cough. ‘He was joking.’
‘I knew that.’
DC slumped in the chair and exhaled. ‘I’ve seen a cloaked operative, I’ve seen an immortal operative, I’ve even watched a limb grow back. But this is something else.’
‘Wonder Woman.’ Ieva giggled. ‘Because we’re all sitting here wondering. Get it?’
‘That was terrible,’ Czarina said.
Sophia failed to hide her smile. ‘The operative’s accent,’ she said. ‘It was American in the beginning, but then it changed.’
‘She was tagged on the Fifth Column Assetrac system,’ Ieva said. ‘We all saw it.’
‘My deprogramming commands didn’t work on her,’ Sophia said.
‘What did they change this time?’ Ieva asked, her fingers poised over her phone, ready to note the new phrases.
Sophia shook her head. ‘Everything. I couldn’t get in at all. It’s like—’
‘Like she wasn’t programmed?’ DC said.
‘What about that operative in Berlin?’ Czarina asked. ‘You told him about that?’
He looked at Sophia. ‘What happened?’
‘We ran into three operatives,’ Sophia said. ‘They kidnapped a civilian. Russian. His name was Evgeny Sporyshev.’
DC’s shoulders stiffened.
‘Do you know him?’ she said.
‘Doesn’t ring a bell,’ he said. ‘So the Fifth Column have him now?’
Sophia nodded. ‘We killed one operative and captured the second, but the third managed to get out of there with Evgeny.’
‘What happened to the one you captured?’ DC asked.
‘She didn’t make it,’ Sophia said.
‘The deprogramming seemed to work,’ Ieva said, in a hopeful voice. ‘In the beginning.’
‘I got into the outer layer. I must have triggered something I shouldn’t have.’
DC leaned over the table. ‘What did she do?’
‘She killed herself.’
‘Ah, right,’ DC said. ‘Did she ... say anything before that? Give you anything at all?’
‘Something about an operation in Eastern Europe with massive collateral. She used the word destiny.’
‘Then she went bananas,’ Czarina said.
‘Does that mean anything to you?’ Sophia asked him. ‘Destiny?’
‘No. You need to find a way through their new programming, and fast.’ DC stood and excused himself from the table. ‘Thanks for the tea.’
‘And what are you doing?’ Sophia asked.
He stood in the center of the kitchen for a moment, silhouetted by the sunset. ‘Shake a few trees, see if anyone knows anything. I’ll be in touch if I get lucky.’
Sophia already had her suspicions. The Russian agent from the subway—the one who lied about being FSB—had to be linked to this Kraków operative in some way and she was determined to prove it.
DC paused in the doorway. ‘If you find anything more on that upgraded operative, let me know. But please, don’t go after her. She’ll kill you.’
‘Not if I can deprogram her,’ Sophia said.
‘Even that’s not a sure thing anymore,’ he said.
‘Wait.’ Sophia held up one of their modified iPhones. ‘You should take one of these. Join the twenty-first century.’
He waved his little black Nokia. ‘I like the Snake game.’
‘You can play on mine,’ Sophia said. That sounded awkward.
‘Um, I’ll be in contact soon.’ He disappeared down the creaking staircase.
‘Oh, be still my heart,’ Czarina said.
Helix, Episode 3 Page 6
