‘Mathematical patterns?’ Ethan echoed. ‘Like a message?’
‘Precisely,’ Lysander agreed. ‘However I haven’t heard anything about the work since, which leads me to believe that it was rapidly covered up by the governments in question and the scientists involved in the work prevented from elaborating any further on what they had achieved.’
Ethan thought for a moment and then he thanked the doctor for his time and marched back up the shore with Lopez.
‘The Black Knight contained information,’ Lopez said as they walked, ‘that device inside it and the quantum computer that Hellerman’s been working on. This whole thing is connected to Majestic Twelve. Maybe this is what they’ve been working on the whole time?’
Ethan nodded in agreement. Ever since they had begun the seemingly endless task of attempting to bring Majestic Twelve down, they had seen connections with what appeared to be a vast conspiracy to cover–up a major discovery that had occurred some decades before, perhaps centuries even. Ethan had always felt that beyond their investigations, buried deep somewhere in archives so classified that even the President of the United States knew nothing about them, was a clue that could unravel the entire mystery and reveal just what it was that the members of Majestic Twelve knew and why they were so opposed to it becoming public knowledge.
‘What if everything they’ve been doing over the years is to keep this single big secret?’ he suggested. ‘Majestic Twelve were formed right after the supposed alien crash at Roswell, New Mexico in 1947, and they’ve had a presence at virtually every major paranormal or supernatural event that we’ve investigated.’
‘And they keep silencing people who are working on this stuff,’ Lopez agreed, ‘Lucy Morgan in both Israel and Peru and the site in Antarctica where we found the Black Knight.’
‘Most of what got them started seems connected to the ancient alien hypothesis,’ Ethan said, ‘those monoliths around the world, the Nazca Lines, everything pretty much ties them into some kind of knowledge about bigger things than we’ve been looking at over the past few years.’
Ethan reached the jeep and looked back down the rocky shore to where Lysander was busily collecting samples and examining them with a magnifying glass, already oblivious to Ethan and Lopez. The fact that so many scientists were involved in programs of one kind or another that Majestic Twelve had shown an interest in made him wonder whether any of their twelve members were themselves academics. He’d heard of various scientists who had become fabulously wealthy as a result of patenting their various inventions either within universities or as private ventures outside of them.
‘Has Jarvis released the names of all of MJ–12’s members yet?’ he asked Lopez.
‘Not so far,’ she replied. ‘They’re keeping it under wraps right now, presumably to prevent them from becoming aware that we know who they are.’
Lopez, while working with a former FBI agent in New York City, had been able in a previous operation to use a small robotic drone to hover in front of a towering hotel and snap a single image of the entire group assembled in one place. There had been twelve men present, plus one more, the Director of the FBI, a shocking revelation that had ended the director’s career and ultimately his life.
‘Twelve men, and one of them was Victor Wilms, right?’
‘Sure,’ Lopez agreed, and then caught onto Ethan’s train of thought. ‘Wilms is dead, so they’re one short.’
‘I wonder if their new member, Wilms’s replacement, is a geneticist of some kind?’
Lopez yanked open the door to the jeep and was about to climb in when Lysander hurried up the shore to them, a satellite phone in his hand and an amazed expression on his face.
‘It’s for you!’
Ethan blinked in surprise as he took the satellite phone from Lysander.
‘Ethan, it’s Jarvis. You need to get to the nearest airport immediately, I’ll have a plane meet you there.’
‘Where are we going?’
The reply chilled Ethan to the core.
‘Madagascar,’ Jarvis replied. ‘The extinction has begun.’
***
XIX
Rome
Waiting was always the hardest part.
The car was parked on a side street just a quarter mile south of the iconic Colosseum, which he could see now and which provided a handy datum for orientation in the city. He kept an eye on the shadows falling on the buildings on the opposite side of the street too, gauging both the time and direction.
Aaron Mitchell had little time for modern technology, preferring instead to rely on his wits and years of training. Electrical gizmos had a nasty habit of failing when the batteries ran out, or glitching at crucial moments. The beautiful golden glow of the sunlight hitting the ornate buildings on the opposite side of the street reminded him of an operation deep inside a frigid town in southern Bosnia, where the snow and ice was encrusted around the shelled fragments of what had once been a town house. Mitchell had crept through the shattered interior of the building in search of two men who had been gunning down civilians passing through the area and robbing them before erecting the corpses on stakes in streets nearby.
A low sun made visibility difficult, bright beams of misty golden light passing through bare windows and gusty corridors littered with debris and chunks of fallen masonry. Mitchell had advanced with all due caution, but sometimes all the skill in the world was no match for sheer bad luck and the unpredictable.
He had eased around the corner of a corridor to see a remote machine gun emplacement staring straight at him, likely installed by mercenaries paid to take down whatever Serbians or Croats their employers had decided no longer had the right to life. Sunlight glowed in beaming shafts through mortar holes in the corridor wall and fell onto the ugly black barrel, damp with moisture that glistened in the light. He had seen the operators a moment later, huddled excitedly over some little black box that controlled their new toy and tucked safely out of easy shooting range around the far end of the corridor. Mitchell had heard the motors of the machine gun whine and the barrel shift slightly to the right, and then he had heard the laughter as the two operators pressed the fire button. The empty click that had echoed down the corridor revealed the flaw in trusting one’s life to circuits and electrodes: the bitter cold had caused ice to form on the machine gun’s attached auto–trigger circuitry, breaking up the flow of electrons and denying the signal when the sunlight had hit the weapon and melted the ice.
Mitchell had lunged forward, yanked the machine gun round to aim back down the corridor and pulled the trigger himself. A deafening few seconds later and the opposite side of the corridor was peppered with rounds that punched easily through the crumbling walls, long since exposed to the elements. Mitchell had passed by what was left of the two operators sprawled across the corridor with a deep mistrust of such gadgets and a conviction never to fall prey to their lure of an easy kill.
A distant bell chimed and woke Mitchell from his reverie. He cursed himself silently, aware more now than ever that his advancing years were blunting his skills and his senses, that he would not much longer be an effective asset in the field. That, of course, meant that sooner or later a younger, fitter, more able man would be the one pulling the trigger on Mitchell. He recalled his being bested by Ethan Warner not much more than a year ago, in Nevada. He had barely escaped from that encounter with his life, and once again only good fortune had been on his side – without it, he had no doubt that Warner would have finished him for good.
Movement on the opposite side of the street, and again Mitchell cursed his drifting mind as he saw four men exit an exclusive restaurant. Suits, shades, broad shoulders, glances cast carefully up and down the street. It amused Mitchell sometimes that the security teams wealthy men assembled to protect them were also the very thing that drew attention to them: a man walking alone, ironically, was much harder to spot from a distance than somebody who walked with five bodyguards to protect them.
Mitchell watch
ed as one of the guards opened the door to a glossy black Mercedes, and then a man walked from the restaurant. Perhaps fifty years of age, smartly dressed, empowered by money but not by honor. Mitchell glanced at a high resolution photograph in his hand and confirmed that this was indeed the mark he had followed from Dubai.
Time to go to work.
The Mercedes pulled smoothly away from the restaurant, a second vehicle moving into view to follow it a few car lengths behind. Mitchell knew that this would be the vehicle carrying two of the security team, with the other two driving the Mercedes. There would likely be a third vehicle that would now have pulled out somewhere ahead, which would have two further agents inside who would recon’ the route ahead, looking for obvious trouble spots like traffic bottlenecks or perhaps unplanned roadworks which would signify a possible assassination attempt.
Majestic Twelve were worried, Mitchell realized, and smiled.
The two vehicles moved off, and Mitchell pulled out into the traffic flow and followed them a discreet distance behind. The security team, if they were sharp, would have noted his vehicle among all of the others and would monitor their presence, looking for some sign of a tail. Mitchell’s vehicle plate began with the letters Delta Echo Zero Four, easy to memorize for a keen–eyed agent and pick up again if he was seen too often following the Mercedes.
Mitchell had a map of the city open beside him, and he began noting where the Mercedes was headed through the city. The airport was in the opposite direction so his target was not intending to leave the city today. Having just eaten would mean that a social engagement was unlikely at least until the evening. That meant a likely route was to one of the exclusive hotels, of which Mitchell knew they would pick only the absolute finest. Sometimes, men of power revealed their hands far too easily, their love of luxury an Achilles Heel. Mitchell had already circled the three most expensive hotels in the city, and now he identified one of them in particular as being the most likely destination. He could be wrong of course, but the closer they got, the more likely his judgement was correct.
Mitchell followed and waited, all the while glancing at the map and plotting an alternative route to the hotel, one that would allow him to park up and observe from afar. When they got within a mile of the hotel, he turned into a side street and left the Mercedes and its escort, driving his car through a maze of narrow back roads until he found the spot he was looking for and eased into the sidewalk.
Aaron Mitchell, an African American standing six foot three and two hundred forty pounds, was not at his anonymous best in an urban environment in daylight. He remained in his car on the Via Della Minerva, where he had deliberately parked behind a goods vehicle to help conceal his location and his vehicle’s license plate.
Before him across a large, square open plaza was the Grand Hotel de la Minerva, one of the city’s most exclusive. Milling crowds of tourists further helped conceal his presence as he saw three vehicles move into view. The first was a non–descript white sedan, which Mitchell realized was the recon’ car and noted its number immediately. The Mercedes followed a moment later, and finally the rear guard vehicle. As Mitchell watched, his target exited the Mercedes with two men swiftly flanking him and walking with him through the hotel’s large double doors.
Mitchell turned and looked at the buildings surrounding the Palazzo Severoli. Most looked inaccessible, but one stood out to his right: The Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy’s doors were open, and as Mitchell looked up he could see that its rooftop terrace stood just a little higher than that of the Minerva Hotel.
Mitchell got out of his car, a briefcase in his hand as he walked across to the academy. The interior visible from outside was as luxurious and decadent as he would have imagined, neoclassical Italian architecture and art transformed into hallowed halls of the Roman Colleges of the Catholic Church. Mitchell neither knew nor cared much for the faiths of the world, and had merely used his burner phone to discover that the academy was dedicated to the priesthood’s diplomatic Corps and the secretariat of State of the Holy See.
Mitchell walked with a purpose, one of the key skills provided to field agents when they began their training. If you look like you know where you’re going, nobody thinks that you don’t and therefore you do not stand out. None the less, Mitchell kept his face away from the hotel across the plaza as he walked not into the Pontifical Academy but into a small trinket shop right alongside it.
There was little chance of Mitchell getting through such a building as the academy without raising the alarm, much less escaping again. But the rows of little shops nearby provided a second route, built as they were into the same massive edifice shared by the academy.
Mitchell ducked inside the shop and closed the door behind him, a small bell tinkling to alert the shopkeeper to the presence of a new customer. Mitchell turned the door’s “chioso” sign to show out to the street outside as he saw an elderly man hobble out to greet him with a smile.
‘Buongiorno signore,’ Mitchell intoned as he set the briefcase down beside him. ‘Avete accesso al tetto?’
The shopkeeper’s smile faded into confusion as he wondered why this new customer would want access to his roof.
‘Sissignore,’ he replied and then switched to English as he detected Mitchell’s American accent. ‘But you can’t go up there because it’s owned by…’
Mitchell’s hand was faster almost than the old man’s eye. He scythed the blade of it across the shopkeeper’s throat, just below the thorax, in a loose blow designed not to kill but to incapacitate. The old man staggered backwards, both hands flying to his throat as it collapsed in the wake of the blow and he wheezed as he tried to suck in air. Moments later, his legs gave way beneath him and he collapsed to his knees.
Mitchell locked the shop door and gently pulled down a blind, then turned and walked across to the old man, who was gasping for air. The shopkeeper raised a hand defensively to protect himself from Mitchell, terror in his old eyes. Mitchell grabbed the old man’s hand, and then gently lifted him up onto his feet and spoke softly.
‘You are in no danger,’ he said. ‘You will not be harmed, and I need only a few moments of your time.’
Mitchell turned the old man around and used a length of fabric from a nearby rack of scarves to bind the old man’s wrists before he walked him out into the back of the shop and sat him in a chair. Moments later, the old man was bound in place. Mitchell rested one giant hand on his old shoulder and squeezed gently.
‘I will be a few minutes,’ he said. ‘Don’t try to escape, understand?’
The old man looked into Mitchell’s eyes, and what he saw there made him nod slowly, conveying that he did indeed understand that the consequences of disobedience would be severe.
Mitchell retrieved his briefcase from the shop out front, and then walked past the shopkeeper and out toward a storeroom out back. It took him only a few moments to find an old door behind stacks of tinned goods that had been likely sealed decades before. Access to other sections of the same original building would also be in place, but Mitchell knew that he had only one direction in which to travel.
Up.
He slipped a small leather case from his jacket, and within a minute had picked the lock of the old door, hardly a major task given its antiquity. Mitchell tried the lock, and to his delight it opened, the owners not having sealed the door from the other side using more robust locks. It was possible that they did not even know of its existence, furthering Mitchell’s advantage.
The door opened onto a stone staircase, one that had probably once climbed between rooms in the now separate buildings. He could smell damp and dust, stale air cool on his skin as he closed the door carefully behind him and climbed up the stone stairs to a small landing where two more doors awaited, one to each side, both locked.
Mitchell knew that the academy likely awaited on both sides, occupying all of the upper floors, so he tackled the door to his right in the hopes of avoiding the main building. Mitchell waited for a few mi
nutes, listening intently, and having satisfied himself that whatever awaited on the far side of the wall was devoid of human presence, he picked the lock as quietly as he could and then opened the door.
A wide staircase faced him, climbing ever up toward the roof.
Mitchell shut the door behind him and eased silently upward.
***
XX
Grand Hotel de la Minerva,
Rome
Felix Byzan strode into the penthouse suite of the hotel as though he owned the place, which of course he could at any moment he chose, if he actually had liked the city. Rome, to him, was a city built on the foundations of a former glory that it had never recaptured: an icon, a relic to something that had once been great and was now forgotten in all but school text books and historian’s libraries.
The doorman opened the room’s windows for him to allow a breeze to drift across the sumptuous furnishings, and then waited beside the open door for Felix to tip him. Felix looked him up and down for a moment, and then smiled.
‘Giornata piena, Signore?’
The man smiled to be spoken to in fluent Italian, and replied in perfect English.
‘Very busy sir, the tourist season is beginning.’
Felix handed the doorman a fifty Euro note. ‘Buona fortuna.’
‘Grazie, Signore.’
The door closed, and Felix slipped out of his jacket and tossed the three hundred dollar garment across the leather couch as though it were trash, then unbuttoned his collar and pulled off his tie. The fresh air was welcome and he could see from his balcony the view across the plaza below, and the small obelisk that dominated the square. He had seen similar obelisks across the country, even in front of the Vatican itself, and marvelled again that so many people could worship here when the country’s history of Egyptian and other civilization’s presence even now told the true story of Italy’s heritage. Rome had long since been stripped of all reference to its mighty imperial past, the museums filled instead with the religious iconography that the church believed the people wanted to see. Felix himself had been deeply disappointed to find that even the famed Colosseum was devoid of any true history, stacked instead with cheap religious trinkets.
The Extinction Code Page 13
