the Miracle Strain (aka The Messiah Code) (1997)

by Cordy, Michael

  "Dave, what do they have?" Karen Tanner asked the man to her right. Wearing shades and desert fatigues, Dave was studying an array of data on his laptop. Like all the men from the Delta Force team, he hadn't supplied his surname, and Tom wasn't even sure whether Dave was really his first name.

  "Sensor readings give us three men on the surface, but as for underground--that's anybody's guess. Given the data and what Tom's told us from the last time he came here, I believe the place relies more on secrecy than force for protection."

  "Well, they've lost their protection." Karen reached for her walkie-talkie and patted the pilot on the shoulder. "Chuck, get us down as close to the tallest rock as you can. Fast and low, okay?"

  Karen shouted orders into the walkie-talkie and all four helicopters immediately dropped in altitude, closing on their target. Tom felt his stomach contract as he looked down and saw two antlike figures running between the vehicles and the cave. His nervous excitement must have shown on his face because Karen gave him a tight grin. "You wanted to come along for the ride. Well, the ride starts now."

  Brother Bernard had only just stopped voicing his doubts when Ezekiel De La Croix heard the sound of running feet from the stairs. It annoyed rather than concerned him at first. He had expressly told the three men above and the guard outside the cavern to leave them undisturbed. The noise grew louder and he could hear shouts now. Then two sharp reports. Gunshots? What was going on? The other members of the Inner Circle were now exchanging worried looks.

  Brother Bernard stood. "I'd better investigate."

  Suddenly the doors burst open and a group of men in uniform flooded into the chamber.

  This couldn't be happening. Not here. Not now.

  Surprising himself with his own agility, Ezekiel leaped up and ran behind the altar, putting himself between Maria and the open door to the Vault of Remembrance. Reaching under the altar cloth he felt for the ceremonial dagger and slipped it into the cord of his ceremonial robe. The others still hadn't moved---couldn't move. Only Brother Bernard was standing.

  "Everyone, stay where you are!" ordered the auburn-haired woman in a blue coat with FBI emblazoned on the back. At least eight uniformed men stood on either side of her. "My name is Special Agent Karen Tanner of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation. And in co-operation with the Jordanian authorities we are arresting you on suspicion of abduction, multiple homicide, and conspiracy to murder." Behind the Americans, Ezekiel could see a squad of what looked like Royal Jordanian troops.

  His quick scan took in the Inner Circle: Bernard standing motionless, his eyes staring at the gun in the nearest FBI man's hand; Helix calmly shaking his head in disbelief; Luciano reaching for the sky like an outlaw in a John Wayne film; Haddad and Olazabal frozen, staring like rabbits into the headlights of a speeding truck.

  Blood pounded in Ezekiel's temples. This was a nightmare. It couldn't end like this. How did they find this place?

  Crouching behind the altar he began to pull the New Messiah toward him from the table, until her corpse fell with a dull thud at his feet. He had only one objective now--to protect the body. Nothing else mattered.

  "Don't move, sir!" shouted a tall blond soldier, raising his pistol and walking toward him.

  Then he stepped out of the shadows. And at that moment Ezekiel hated him more than any living thing. The atheist must have betrayed them on his last visit. The scientist had eluded Gomorrah and led these people here. He was going to ruin everything.

  Ezekiel watched Carter gesture to the soldier to back off, and then saw him walk toward him. Don't waste time on the blasphemer, he admonished himself. Concentrate on protecting the New Messiah--keeping her safe. He quickly checked behind him to see how far away he was from the open door to the Vault of Remembrance. Less than a yard. And next to the door he could see the rope pull hanging from the heavy wooden stake that jutted waist-high out of the stone wall. Maintained but unused since it had been first installed in the early years, the drastic precaution was to be used only in moments of extreme emergency. But surely this qualified.

  He forced his racing mind to remember the instructions he'd been given on his inauguration to the Leadership.

  He glared at the unarmed Dr. Carter coming closer and closer, seeing his own anger at betrayal reflected in the man's blue eyes.

  "Be careful, Tom!" he heard Tanner shout when the blasphemer reached the front of the altar, less than four feet away. The scientist was directly between Ezekiel and the crescent of armed men, almost on the white flame, momentarily shielding him from their guns.

  Now was the ideal time to make his move.

  Seeing Ezekiel De La Croix standing over Maria Benariac's elaborately shrouded corpse brought a cauldron of emotions to the boil in Tom. To think that he had eaten with this man, dealt with him, even felt sympathy for him--when all the time he had been biding his time, waiting to finish what his bloody Brotherhood had started in Stockholm. This wizened, black-eyed dwarf had killed his wife as certainly as Maria had. In many ways he was worse than Maria; if she was the foot soldier obeying orders, then he was the general who had given them.

  Tom could guess why they wanted him dead, but he wanted to hear this man tell him. He needed to understand what warped rationale the Brotherhood used to order a man's death simply because he had dedicated himself to saving lives. No doubt it had something to do with that fanatical bullshit Maria had spewed at him in the GENIUS laboratory: tampering with God's work; undermining the divine order or some such crap. But he needed to understand why a whole organization committed to finding and protecting a Messiah they believed would save mankind also saw fit to kill people--to kill him. He needed to know this to make sense of Olivia's assassination.

  He stepped closer to Ezekiel and sensed, rather than saw, the agents train their guns more intently on the Leader of the Brotherhood. He had been impressed by how speedily they had dispatched the guards. Two on the surface had tried to fight back with handguns, giving the third time to close the concealed door to the Great Stairs. But the attack had been too fast and too fierce. The helicopters hadn't even landed before agents were streaming across the ground. The three men had been incapacitated in minutes, all wounded but none killed. The guard below had taken more time, because Karen's team hadn't realized he was alone. But the man hadn't even known they were under attack and he was soon overpowered. Carter had only been a bystander but he'd felt the adrenaline rush as he'd followed the team into the Brotherhood's lair.

  Now he was face to face with the man who had changed his life irrevocably.

  "So you think Maria's coming back, do you?" he asked as he walked past the Sacred Flame, his hands within reach of the altar cloth.

  Ezekiel didn't answer him, just crouched behind the altar like a cornered rat, black eyes staring with unconcealed hatred.

  "This was her idea, wasn't it?" Tom probed. "She thought that because she'd saved an allergic girl from bee sting poison she could save herself. Didn't she?" He could see Ezekiel's eyes narrow and knew he was right.

  "Don't get too close!" warned Karen behind him.

  "It's okay. I just want to ask the man a few things."

  "Let it wait! You'll have all the time in the world to ask him later."

  But then Ezekiel moved, and Tom knew he wouldn't have any time later. With unexpected speed the old man suddenly leaped back and reached for the stake jutting out of the wall that Tom had asked about on his first visit, and began to turn it clockwise.

  "What you might call a final precaution"--isn't that what he'd called it? What kind of precaution? Tom asked himself as he clambered over the high altar, not realizing he was obstructing the line of fire. All he knew was that he must stop Ezekiel.

  In the seconds it took for him to climb over the altar, he became vaguely aware of a commotion behind him; Karen shouting at him to get out of the way; Ezekiel pulling the stake out of the wall, throwing it defiantly on the floor, grabbing Maria's corpse under the arms, and dragging her through
the opening to the Vault of Remembrance.

  Tom moved toward him, but suddenly his ears were filled with the terrible grinding of mighty levers and cogs, and the groan of heavy rock moving high above him.

  He didn't see Brother Bernard use the distraction afforded by Ezekiel's sudden move to wrest away the gun from the FBI agent standing over him, and lumber to his Leader's aid. Tom had eyes only for Ezekiel. He had to get to the old man before he could drag Maria beyond the stone door and close it behind him. Tom remembered the old rope ladder in the ancient vault. He wasn't about to let the old man wriggle out that way.

  The din of moving rock above him was rolling thunder, but as Tom threw himself at Ezekiel he could just hear Karen's yell: "Look out, Tom! Behind you!" And at the same time he saw Ezekiel glance up from Maria's body shouting: "Kill him, Brother Bernard! Shoot him!"

  Then he heard two gunshots and felt an impact in his back, spinning him, slamming him into Ezekiel. Then he, the Leader of the Brotherhood, and whatever or whoever was on his back were rolling through the stone doorway with Maria's corpse, a writhing tangle of bodies and flailing limbs. Tom panicked. He thrashed out wildly with his arms and legs, desperate to get away from the beady eyes and pouting mouth only inches away from his face. It took him a good five seconds to register the blood on his hands and realize he was fighting a dead man: Brother Bernard had a gaping bullet hole in his back.

  He eased the dead man's bulk off him, and rolled onto the cold, stiff body of Maria. The cloying reek of death, oils, and herbs invaded his nostrils. Recoiling in revulsion, he pushed himself away and rose to a crouch. Gasping to catch his breath, he looked up to find he was in the small room between the Sacred Cavern and the Vault of Remembrance. Ezekiel stood four yards away by the second lever that opened the door to the vault. In his right hand he held a dagger, his forearm bloody, obviously wounded by the second bullet. Tom considered rushing him, but could barely find the breath to speak, let alone fight. Instead he kept his distance while he struggled to regain his breath. They both stared at each other for a moment, Maria's inert body marking the no man's land between them.

  Tom wondered where Karen and the other agents were, and why they hadn't come in after him. Then he felt the vibration as a boulder came crashing down to the cavern floor outside the antechamber. Edging to the doorway, he looked back to the altar and beyond. The FBI men, Jordanian troops, and the rest of the Inner Circle were all looking up at the now quaking pillars, backing away toward the far doorway that led to the Great Stairs. Only Karen was standing her ground, but even she had her eyes locked on the shifting rock above. The myriad of candles and torches that illuminated the cave were falling from the walls along the cavern like shooting stars, throwing the golden glow into a murky gloom, making the white fire of the Sacred Flame appear to burn even more brightly. When Ezekiel had pulled the stake from the wall he must have released tons of loose rock and boulders penned up in the granite above--no doubt positioned there by the Brotherhood's early engineers, to ensure that the secrets of their cave had the ultimate protection--total destruction.

  "Karen!" he shouted across the fiery gloom, beckoning frantically with his arms. "Get out of here before the whole goddamned place comes crashing down. Hurry!"

  "What about you?" Karen yelled back.

  Tom was torn. Ezekiel had now opened the door to the blackness of the vault, and was dragging the inert Maria into it. He guessed the vault with all its precious treasures would have been designed by the engineers to be safe from their rigged Armageddon. But he couldn't be sure. The idea of Ezekiel escaping made him sick with anger.

  "Come on, Tom!" Karen shouted, moving back toward the Great Stairs.

  Tom waved her away, yelling as loudly as his empty lungs and bruised ribs would allow. "Don't worry! I'm coming."

  Then the first pillar fell in front of him, crashing down onto the altar. He couldn't see Karen anymore, or any of the others. They were lost in the dust and flying splinters of rock. Tom just stood for a moment, miraculously untouched by the debris, seeing his only route to Karen and the Great Stairs closed to him. He saw a section of pillar slide off the shattered altar and roll onto the stone on the other side, sealing the hole through which the Sacred Flame burned, denying the subterranean gas its escape. Concealing its fire.

  Retreating into the relative safety of the antechamber, Tom stepped over Brother Bernard's body and moved toward Ezekiel, just as he disappeared into the blackness of the vault with Maria. Then the door to the vault began to close.

  Tom's ribs ached, and it hurt to run. But he forced himself into the stale darkness before the door closed on him, wishing he could remember where the light switch was, his only bearings the sound of Maria's body being dragged on the stone floor.

  He strained his ears but the only sound he could hear was his own ragged breathing and the hellish destruction being wrought beyond the thick walls in the Sacred Cavern. Feeling to his left and right, he tried to make out shapes he could recall from his last visit. If he remembered correctly, the concealed niche holding the relics of Christ should be at the other end of the vault, directly in front of him, and the huge sword he'd so admired should be on his left. If he could reach that, then despite its weight he would at least have a weapon. Hugging the left-hand shelves, he edged his way along the side of the vault as quietly as possible, his hands blindly feeling parchment, boxes, and metal objects as he went. When he came to the break in the shelves he reached to his left, to the wall against which the sword should be leaning. His searching fingers found nothing but rough, dry stone. Shit! Where was it?

  At that moment he felt the first tremor beneath his feet. It wasn't the same vibrating shockwave he'd felt from the falling boulders. More like the rumblings of something beneath the rock floor trying to escape. Dust and debris fell around him, and the objects on the shelves rattled like loose teeth. He fell forward against the wall and banged his knee against steel. The sword.

  He reached down and touched its hilt, just as the second tremor rippled its muscles beneath him. Of course, he thought, the gas; it must be the gas that fed the Sacred Flame. Denied its escape valve, it was seeking a new opening, some weakness in the rock through which to vent its mounting pressure. With all the rock crashing down in the cavern outside he was sure the gas would find a weak point soon. But he wondered if the Brotherhood's ancient engineers had factored gas pressure into their calculations for keeping their precious Vault of Remembrance safe.

  He hefted the sword off the ground and turned his back to the wall, trying to keep his breathing as silent as possible. He had a weapon now. So assuming the engineers did know what they were doing, then he should be relatively safe in this black womb.

  Suddenly he felt a hand on his shoulder, and foul breath on his face. For one terrifying, irrational moment he thought it might be Maria, come back from the dead.

  He whirled around, bringing the sword's huge blade level with his waist and felt it hit something; he heard a grunt of pain. He leaned back against the wall so as to support the sword's weight better, holding its blade against whoever still had their hand on his shoulder.

  Suddenly he felt the stale breath on his face again, only this time it was accompanied by a cold blade against his neck. Angling the sword he pushed its point against his invisible attacker just as a third tremor, quickly followed by a fourth and fifth, rocked the foundations of the vault.

  "I think this is stalemate, Dr. Carter," Ezekiel spat out of the darkness, his unseen face only inches away. "I wonder if your friends got away. I doubt it."

  "If they did, they'll be back, and you can say good-bye to your secret Brotherhood. What about your precious Inner Circle? What if you killed them too?"

  A small laugh in the dark. "They are expendable. We are all expendable. As for the Brotherhood, once Maria awakes, its purpose will have been served. The Final Judgment will come and everything will end. The Brethren will be saved, because we found the New Messiah in time."

  "But she'
s dead," said Tom. "You missed the boat again."

  The dagger bit into his flesh; warm blood trickled down his neck. "She will be resurrected," said Ezekiel, his voice thick with hatred. "She has the power."

  "No, she hasn't. That's not how the genes work."

  A contemptuous laugh. "Liar. As a child she could perform miracles. She cured my ulcer. She has the power."

  "Not on herself, she hasn't. I told Maria that on the day of her execution. And from her reaction I think she believed me."

  The dagger cut deeper into Tom's flesh and he was powerless to defend himself. He tried to push Ezekiel away with the sword, but it was too heavy. He had to distract him. Allowing the pressure of Ezekiel's own body to hold the sword's weight, Tom moved his right hand off the hilt. Then he reached for the old man's injured left arm, where the second gunshot had hit him.

  "I know how the genes work," Tom said softly into the dark, "because I used them to save my daughter." He gently placed his hand on Ezekiel's arm, feeling for the wound. "I injected myself with Christ's genes. So I now possess them too."