by Jack Mars
Oh. No. The water was louder now. Much louder. That last tremendous crack must have been the inner wall, he realized. Which meant that in the darkness of the tunnel behind them, a deadly torrent was growing closer.
Reid clenched his jaw and righted the motorcycle as best he could in the dark. He had to increase their speed, no matter what the potential cost; the alternative was being swallowed by a wall of water and drowning in darkness.
You’re Agent Zero, he reminded himself. You dismantled Amun.
You stopped the world’s deadliest virus from being unleashed.
You took out two trains full of human traffickers.
This isn’t how you go.
With his thoughts elsewhere, his muscles and instincts did the work for him, making infinitesimal adjustments as they raced towards the exit. When he next dared to glance down at the speedometer, they were doing fifty through a few inches of water.
“It’s coming…” the little girl hissed in his ear.
He felt in control, steadfast, determined—though there was hardly anything about this situation that he could control.
“It’s coming!” she shrieked.
The light loomed closer. The rushing din of water edged nearer. Before he felt the sun on his face, Reid felt the wall of water smack against them from behind.
“Hang on!” he shouted. He didn’t know if his words were heard, or if they even managed to leave his throat. They tumbled forward, them and the motorcycle, as the water engulfed them. Reid let go of the handlebars and the bike was torn out from under him, but the thin arms were still around his neck. Then he felt her slipping as he rolled and swirled in the water, uncertain of which direction he was going in but clambering to hang on. His hands lashed out against the strong current until they found her, and he held fast.
They rolled and rolled in the forceful current of the wall of water, propelled upside down and around. Reid’s back bumped roughly against something—a car, maybe, but for all he knew it could have been the ceiling of the tunnel.
His lungs burned, begging him to suck in a breath, to taste air. Still the water pushed them forward. Both arms hugged the girl to him; he could not try to swim or fight against the current, even if he was strong enough to.
Suddenly he was aware of light. Reid hadn’t even realized his eyes were open in the crushing darkness of the water and the tunnel, but there was light, and then his body smacked painfully into what could only be pavement.
The torrent of water rushing from the tunnel pushed them the short distance towards the exit and out onto the sloping ramp of 495. Together they tumbled twice as the water broke on the asphalt like a wave on the beach.
Reid hefted himself to his feet, and her with him, finally and mercifully sucking in a long, rasping breath. He coughed violently, expelling river water from his lungs. He was standing knee-deep in water between two cars that had been pushed a few feet apart by the powerful breaker.
“Hey,” he said hoarsely. “Are you okay…?”
The little girl was limp in his arms.
“Help!” he called out as he dragged her from the water and up onto dry pavement. “I need help!”
“Zero!” Watson rushed towards him, two NYPD officers behind him.
Reid set the girl down and checked for a pulse. He didn’t feel one. Even as he continued to cough and sputter, he started chest compressions. “One, two, three…” His throat burned, but he pinched off the girl’s nasal passage and breathed into her mouth; her chest rose and deflated, and then he crossed his palms over her abdomen again and compressed.
Come on, Reid urged internally. We didn’t go through all that for nothing.
River water erupted from her mouth as she turned her head and coughed. Reid breathed a sigh of relief as she squinted in the sunlight, looking up at him.
“Oh, thank God,” Reid murmured. He fell back onto his haunches in the shallow water as the two officers reached him. They helped the girl to her feet and guided her towards the back of a nearby ambulance.
Watson stuck out a hand and helped him to his feet. It was the first time Reid had really looked up since they were shoved out of the tunnel—and he had been right. The city was in chaos. Cars clogged all four lanes of 495 to and from both tubes of the tunnel, mostly abandoned, causing a cataclysmic traffic jam that stretched as far as he could see. In the distance, horns honked and people shouted. MTA and NYPD attempted to direct what little traffic they could, urging drivers to mount curbs while simultaneously trying to stymie the flow of pedestrians fleeing in whatever direction they felt might be safe.
If it was this bad on the Queens side of the tunnel, he couldn’t imagine what was going on over in Manhattan. The city was likely on lockdown.
He leaned against Watson as he caught his breath, trying to will away the tears that stung his eyes as he realized the full gravity of what had just occurred. “Jesus, John, there were still so many down there.”
“I know.” Watson held onto him with one strong arm around his shoulders. “I know.”
He sniffed once and rubbed the water from his eyes. There was still a job to do. “Has the Coast Guard picked up anything more on infrared?” Reid asked. His voice was weak and hoarse.
Watson shook his head. “No, but they’re going to continue monitoring closely. They’ve got boats and aerial drones on the river. If there’s another threat, we’ll know.”
Reid shook his head. It hardly mattered; they had lost the Queens-Midtown Tunnel, and with it an indeterminate but undoubtedly substantial loss of life. He forced himself to consider how many they had saved with the evacuation attempt.
Watson shook his head as if reading Reid’s mind and said, “You know as well as I do that we can’t save everyone—”
“Don’t,” Reid snapped. He didn’t intend to sound as harsh as he did, but he didn’t want to hear it at the moment. “Besides, it’s not over. Not while they’re still out there.”
He heard a digital ringing and reached instinctively for the satellite phone in his pocket. But it wasn’t his; the phone was waterlogged, dead and useless in his hand.
Watson held out his own red sat phone. “It’s Johansson.”
Reid took it and answered quickly. “Maria, where are you?”
“Kent! I’m borrowing a boat. I’ve got a location. How fast can you get to Hunter’s Point South?”
“Two minutes,” he told her.
“Meet me.” She hung up.
He handed the phone back to Watson. “Keep up with the MTA and the Coast Guard. Call Maria’s phone if there are any developments.”
“Where are you going?”
“After them.” Reid glanced around quickly and spotted a vacant police cruiser, the driver’s side door hanging open. It likely belonged to one of the officers that had helped the girl. “And tell your friends in the NYPD I borrowed their car.”
CHAPTER FORTY FOUR
Reid slammed the gas and switched on the sirens, whooping loudly overhead as he drove over a curb and veered sharply onto Borden Avenue. He spun the wheel expertly to avoid running pedestrians and swerve around stopped cars.
Hunter’s Point South was a mixed-use development, part waterfront park, part promenade, and part apartment complexes. A wide, circular swath of green grass separated Center Boulevard from the East River, but Reid did not bother stopping. He bounced violently over the curb and tore right across the grass, taking the shortest possible distance to the river’s edge.
He slammed the brakes and the cruiser skidded sideways, very nearly striking the metal railing that separated the recreation space from the water, and jumped out. A concrete embankment kept the East River at bay, an approximate eight-foot drop over the edge to the surface.
He heard the high-pitched whine of the motor before he saw it. A moment later, a twelve-foot speedboat skidded around the corner of the protruding south point, sleek and white and hurtling in his direction from the northern side of the piers. Maria stood at the wheel, easing back on the t
hrottle lever to slow her approach as Reid climbed over the railing.
As the boat drifted directly beneath him, he jumped, landing flat-footed on the deck. He grunted as pain shot up through his hurt knee. Maria shoved the lever forward again and the boat was off like a shot, forcing Reid to grab onto the bow’s railing to keep from toppling over.
“Why are you wet?” Maria shouted over the loud motor.
Reid shook his head. “There was a third drone. We lost the tunnel.”
Her throat flexed. “Casualties?”
He could only nod in response. “Where are we going?”
“When the Parasite ported to the first drone, it locked onto an approximate location of its source,” she explained. “Bixby tracked the coordinates by satellite. The source is a small freighter southwest of here. It’s on the move, towards New Jersey, traveling at about eight knots. We should catch up before they reach Upper Bay.”
Reid nodded. If the Brotherhood was fleeing, it likely meant they were out of weapons; the three drones were their payload. But he and Maria had no idea what was in store for them when they reached the boat.
“Your phone?” he asked.
“Back pocket.”
He reached behind her and tugged the satellite phone from her pocket, and then pressed a finger to one ear as he called Watson. “Alert the Coast Guard!” Reid shouted over the motor’s din. “The Brotherhood is on a small freighter heading southwest towards Jersey!”
“Kent, where are you?” Watson asked. “I can barely hear…”
“We’re on the river!” He repeated his message, though he knew that he and Maria would get to the freighter first. Still, they might need backup—especially if they couldn’t handle the situation alone.
He hung up and pushed the phone back into Maria’s pocket, and then he pulled out the Glock 17 Gen 4 that Bixby had given him. Semi-automatic, seventeen round cartridge, four-point-eight-inch barrel. Biometric trigger lock. And, he hoped, waterproof.
His Ruger LC9 was gone, ankle holster and all. It must have been torn away when he was caught in the swirling water of the tunnel.
He replaced the Glock in his shoulder holster as Maria called out to him. “Kent!” She pointed ahead and he followed it to see a small cargo ship, no more than sixty feet long with its hull painted green. The wheelhouse was elevated at the bow of the boat and, as they sped closer, it didn’t look like there was anyone on the deck that Reid could see.
“Get up alongside it!” he told Maria. “I’ll board first!”
She nodded tightly and turned the steering wheel slightly. The small speedboat bounced in the white-crested wake of the larger ship as Maria piloted them closer. As they veered alongside it she pulled back on the throttle to match the freighter’s speed.
The gunwale of the ship was about six feet over Reid’s head. He put one foot on the speedboat’s silver railing and pushed off, heaving himself into the air and across the small span that separated the two. Both hands grabbed onto a black rubber tire tied around the ship’s hull. He hung there for a moment, making sure his grip was solid before Maria tossed him a line from the speedboat’s bow. Reid looped it through the tire loosely, just enough to keep their boat from drifting away, and then he clambered up to the freighter’s gunwale and threw himself over the side.
He tucked into a roll as he hit the deck and came up in a crouch, his Glock in both hands. He quickly tracked the barrel left and right—but no one was there. The deck was empty.
Up in the wheelhouse Reid could discern the shape of a man at the helm, his back turned. One man? Did he not hear us approach?
Maria pulled herself up over the side, her gun in hand and an equally confused expression in her eyes.
Clear the hold, he quickly signed to her. I’ll go up to the wheel. She nodded and stepped quickly and quietly towards the hatch beneath the wheelhouse’s stairs that led down into the darkness of the freighter’s hold.
Reid took the five stairs up and peered through the glass into the wheelhouse. The pilot’s back was still to him. Maybe he couldn’t hear over his own engines. He reached for the door and pulled it open silently.
“Turn around,” he ordered sternly. “Hands in the air.”
The surprised man spun at the sound of the voice—and the size of his eyes doubled at the sight of the gun trained on him. Both of his hands immediately went up as he quickly rattled off a slew of foreign language that Reid didn’t comprehend in the slightest.
Not Arabic. The driver was older, early fifties, with deep creases around his eyes and the shadow of a beard on his face, but he was definitively not Iraqi. He wasn’t the Brotherhood. We have the wrong boat.
“Stop,” Reid ordered, and the man fell silent. “Take this boat in.”
The man furrowed his brow and shook his head; he didn’t understand the words.
Reid pointed towards shore. “That way. Understand? That…”
He saw movement in the reflection of the wheelhouse glass behind the boat’s pilot and ducked as a wooden oar sailed an inch over his head, the breeze of it ruffling his hair. Reid spun, or tried to, but his assailant swung the oar downward.
Reid barely got his arms up in time to block the blow from crushing his skull. The wood smacked dully into his forearms and a bolt of electric pain shot up both limbs. The powerful blow knocked him backwards, nearly colliding with the terrified and confused captain.
The assailant fled back down the stairs of the wheelhouse as Reid clambered to his feet again. He quickly squeezed each forearm; neither seemed to be broken, but the bone would certainly be bruised. He gave chase out of the wheelhouse and leapt down over the stairs and onto the deck.
His knee gave out as he landed in a stagger, lurching forward and grabbing onto the gunwale for support. His assailant swung the oar again before he could recover, in a downward chopping motion meant to split Reid’s head open. He shifted his weight and bladed his body and the oar missed its target—though the wide end smacked painfully into his hand and the Glock 17 went skittering across the planks of the deck.
Reid leapt for it before his assailant could. He snatched up the gun and turned again, ready to fire. But his assailant wasn’t interested in the gun. He caught a flash of brown skin, of black hair as the terrorist leapt over the side of the freighter.
The speedboat. He’s stealing the speedboat.
“Maria!” Reid shouted. If the insurgent got away with their boat, they would never catch him before he reached Upper Bay—and the Coast Guard might not either. He sprinted across the short span of deck in time to see the man tugging loose the line that tethered the two boats. The assailant scrambled behind the wheel and started the motor, one hand around the throttle lever, ready to open it fully.
There was no time to wait for backup from Maria or from the Coast Guard. Reid shoved the Glock into its holster and hopped up onto the gunwale with both feet. As the Brotherhood member pushed the lever forward, Reid jumped, aiming just slightly ahead of the speedboat’s position, knowing it would lurch forward in an instant.
As he fell, the boat did leap forward—but the insurgent spun the wheel at the same time, pointing the boat away from the freighter. Reid soared through the air off the side of the cargo ship with nothing but water beneath him.
CHAPTER FORTY FIVE
Reid reached out with both hands, his arms outstretched as far as they could go, but he knew before he hit the river’s surface that he would miss.
He smacked into the water in a nasty belly flop, the shock of the cold water as tortuous as the painful landing. It was the least he deserved for letting the man get away, he thought as he was enveloped in darkness and water.
Something rough brushed against his face.
His hands instinctively reached for it before his brain realized what it was, but as soon as his fists closed around it he knew: it was the rope, the one he had used to lash the speedboat to the freighter. And the other end of it was tied to the speedboat’s bow.
The rope went
taut and Reid was yanked forward. He tried to yelp as his shoulders threatened to dislocate with the sudden lurch, but instead swallowed a mouthful of the East River. His upper half broke the surface of the water and he coughed violently as cascades of water sprayed into his face, his eyes, his nose, but still he held on.
Slowly he reached forward and pulled himself along the rope. He couldn’t see a thing, his body skittering across the river behind the speedboat, but he knew the rope couldn’t have been more than thirty feet long. He reached again, pulled, reached again, and pulled, all the while hoping the insurgent hadn’t looked back, hadn’t seen him trailing along.
At long last his hand reached forward and, instead of rope, found the slick white side of the speedboat. Reid looped the rope several times around his left wrist to keep his aching, sore hand from releasing it, and then he tried to reach up to the silver railing with his right—but it was too high up, and he lacked the strength to overcome the drag of his body in the water.
I have to stop this boat. He flipped himself over onto his back, the rope still looped tightly around his wrist, and glided alongside the speedboat like a water skier as he reached into his jacket. Above him, he could see the shoulders and head of the insurgent behind the wheel. The man looked young, surprisingly so, his eyes hard and angry—especially when they glanced over the side and saw Reid clinging there. The terrorist mouthed a handful of angry curses that were lost under the roar of the motor, and then he ducked away, likely to find something as a weapon to dispel his unwanted stowaway.
Reid had his hand on the grip of his Glock, ready to pull it free, before he realized he couldn’t just shoot the man. If the boat continued on at this speed, he’d never be able to pull himself up; he would have to let go, and the boat would eventually crash into something. It could hurt someone.
