The Phoenix Variant: The Fifth Column 3 Read online

  With both hands, she smashed the back of the iPad on Denton’s head. He reeled backward. He managed to stay on both feet, faltered, shook his head.

  ‘How—?’

  Sophia smiled. ‘Electromagnetic disturbance,’ she said. ‘Disrupts the signals in your brain, for a change.’

  She could feel blood run warmly down her lips, down her chin. It was her blood.

  ‘I didn’t see those blows,’ he said.

  ‘Because you were choking me,’ she said. ‘And I couldn’t …’

  Think.

  It was how she’d been trained to fight in Belize. It was fast because there was no conscious thought to slow it down. And it worked because Denton didn’t have a sneak preview.

  She started to think of something else. Something outside her and Denton.

  Denton closed on her.

  Cupcakes. Red velvet. Dark chocolate with peanut butter frosting.

  He punched. Her hand ran along his arm, forced the joint across her hip. Broke his arm. He screamed. Forced his elbow back into place.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he roared.

  Sophia blinked. ‘I’m thinking about cupcakes.’

  He struck again. She waved the blow over her shoulder, her arm going in low. She snapped her fist inward, driving her knuckles into his abdomen. The punch was unexpected for both her and Denton. The movement was relaxed, but her fist heavy as lead. The energy corkscrewed into his midsection.

  Denton retreated a step, lips taut. She could see him try to bear the pain she’d sent rippling through his body. But she could feel it. He was enraged.

  ‘It won’t work,’ he said between sharp breaths. ‘It’s over.’

  Chapter 58

  Damien picked himself up off the ground. He was covered in books. He couldn’t see in front of the debris cloud. Half of it seemed to be in his lungs because he coughed violently. He searched around him. The operative was nowhere to be found. He got to his feet, aware of a laceration across his back that had started to sting.

  The nearby explosion had washed the dining concourse with debris, sending Damien crashing into a bookstore. He checked his body and tested his limbs. Nothing life-threatening and he wasn’t losing blood. That would have to do for now. He moved from the bookstore into the dining concourse. He’d lost all sense of direction and, with the concourse littered in bricks, tiles and plaster, nothing looked familiar.

  Then he heard movement from his right, farther down the concourse. He peered through the thick cloud but saw nothing. He could hear footsteps. A single figure moved away from him. Running. He wasn’t sure who it was but he knew he needed to find Aviary and Jay, and Nasira too. He moved through the cloud toward Jay’s platform.

  *

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Aviary said.

  She’d screwed up again. Almost gotten herself killed and everyone else around her. Now she knew why Nasira had told her to stay away. She just wasn’t trained for this.

  ‘I was going to disable the sensors,’ Aviary said. ‘I wanted to—’

  Nasira lowered Aviary’s knife, took it from her. She grabbed Aviary by the collar of her jacket and held tightly. Aviary thought Nasira was about to hit her.

  ‘Did I kill Damien?’ Nasira said.

  Aviary felt Nasira’s saliva hot on her face. ‘What? No,’ Aviary said. ‘I got him out.’

  ‘Thank fuck,’ Nasira said.

  Aviary found herself in probably the most unlikely scenario possible—being hugged by Nasira. Aviary’s face pressed in Nasira’s shoulder. She stopped freaking out and shut her eyes, dizzy from the near-death experience. She didn’t know if she could move at all, let alone survive the rest of this. She let Nasira hold her.

  ‘Thank you,’ Nasira said.

  Chapter 59

  ‘Last chance, Gypsy,’ Denton said. He grasped a chunk of marble. ‘If I don’t kill you, the reinforcements certainly will.’

  Sophia didn’t think of getting back onto her feet. That would happen naturally, when the time was right. Instead, she lay there and thought of cupcakes.

  ‘That’s stupid! You don’t use espresso frosting on pumpkin cupcakes!’ Denton yelled.

  He brought the chunk of marble down on Sophia’s skull. She slid fractionally to one side and fractionally inward. Her arm brushed his, knocked the chunk off trajectory. It missed her. She brought her hand down, palm striking his kneecap. His leg straightened out and he hyperextended.

  Dry cupcakes. Burnt cupcakes. The icing was too watery on that one.

  Denton shook his head, dizzied by her thoughts.

  She brought her hand back up, driving another corkscrew punch into his stomach for good measure. The air burst from his lungs.

  Gluten free cupcakes. Vegan mocha cupcakes with garlic frosting.

  ‘I hate garlic!’

  She watched him lash out with another fist, but it was more of a wild shot than a precision strike. She moved around it, brushing it off with her shoulder. Circling him, she wrapped her other hand over his face and pulled him back. Then she bent her leg so his spine dropped onto her knee. He bounced off and landed on rubble.

  His stomach rose and fell with ragged gasps. He held his thumb in one hand, then released it.

  ‘Last … chance,’ he said.

  She picked up the chunk of marble.

  Denton cupcake. With marble frosting.

  ‘Stop!’ the Commander yelled through the haze.

  Sophia turned slightly, saw the Commander standing ten feet behind her. His Colt .45 aimed with both hands. She noticed his arms were steady but he was having trouble standing. His strength was being drawn from him.

  Sophia moved to one side, keeping both Denton and the Commander on the edges of her vision.

  ‘Why?’ she said.

  ‘Where’s the meteorite?’ the Commander said.

  ‘Destroyed,’ Sophia said. ‘With the explosives.’

  She didn’t know on which platform DC had cached the meteorite, she’d left that to him, but she hoped it was the one that had been destroyed.

  ‘So be it. We need him alive,’ the Commander said.

  ‘No, that’s not it,’ she said. ‘You actually think he’s worth saving.’

  His voice was a rough whisper. ‘I do.’

  ‘You think he’s human?’ Sophia said.

  ‘He’s my son.’

  ‘He’s not human.’

  ‘I’m not a fool, Sophia. I know he’s not like most people,’ the Commander said. ‘But I can’t give up. I hope you understand.’

  ‘I don’t need to,’ she said. ‘I’m close enough to disarm you before you get a shot off. Let alone a shot that could stop me.’

  She saw his fingers tighten around the pistol. His primary hand held the pistol firmly. Too firmly. She knew his shot would go a little left and high, but at ten feet it would still hit her face. She didn’t tell him that though.

  ‘Let me take him in,’ the Commander said.

  ‘He’s already injected two Phoenix viruses,’ Sophia said. ‘Even without the third he’s more dangerous now.’

  ‘He will be punished, I promise that. Walk away and I call off the search in this building. Pick any tunnel and you’ll have safe passage out.’

  ‘And if I don’t?’ Sophia said.

  ‘Then there’s a cell next to Denton’s,’ the Commander said. ‘I’m sure he’d enjoy the company.’

  ‘There is no cell,’ Sophia said, gripping the marble chunk tighter. ‘You’d have me on an operating table. For as long as it takes to get the Phoenix from me.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ he said. ‘If you don’t accept my deal.’

  ‘You could have us both,’ she said. ‘Why should I trust you?’

  ‘Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,’ he said.

  Even if he was lying, she thought, at least her team would have a chance to escape.

  ‘Can you contain him?’ she asked.

  ‘I can’t kill my son,’ he said. ‘But I promise you he will never be in a positi
on to harm anyone again.’

  Sophia tried to laugh but it emerged as a cough. ‘You should just kill him. I can do it for you.’

  He shook his head. ‘As tempting as it might be to bring an end to all this, he possesses valuable information.’

  ‘The Phoenix,’ Sophia said.

  ‘The Phoenix. The plague. The future. The fate of the human race. Hell, even the origins of the human race,’ he said. ‘One man can know too much.’

  Now she knew why the Commander had been sent in to collect Denton. It wasn’t just to stop him, he was a high value intellignece asset now. The Commander was here to cash in on both the Phoenix virus and Denton, or at least one of them anyway.

  ‘And how do you plan to extract this information?’ Sophia said.

  ‘We have various means, one will work,’ the Commander said. ‘I know you want to kill him. I know you want to kill me. All of us. But the fact of the matter is, he’s more valuable alive than dead. You’re a woman with a sense of justice, Sophia. You know the only chance you have of making all these wrongs right is to let us take him.’

  ‘You don’t exactly fill me with confidence,’ she said.

  ‘The other option is you kill him now. With that piece of marble. And me in the process. And then you and your friends die here in this place. After all you’ve done,’ he said. ‘But what of the Fifth Column, and the future of the human race? What of the people who will never know what Denton knows? Who will never know what’s coming.’

  ‘No one ever knows,’ she said.

  ‘You will,’ he said. ‘All I ask is you walk away. Pick a tunnel. I’ll hold off the search as part of my agreement.’

  Desperation and sadness came off him in slow waves.

  ‘You mean that.’ She let the chunk of marble fall from her hand.

  ‘Your friend in the red jacket is still alive. She’s in the passage behind the ticketing train boards.’ He lowered his pistol. ‘We’re not all monsters.’

  Sophia found the transmitter lying nearby. She picked it up.

  ‘Not all of you,’ she said. ‘But enough.’

  *

  Sophia found Czarina propped against a wall behind the main concourse. She’d moved around the ticketing train boards and down into a lowered passage. It dipped under a walkway. The operative was under the walkway.

  Sophia followed a smear of blood along the wall, calling Czarina’s name as she ran, but she showed no response. Sophia yelled her name louder and louder. The Commander had shot Czarina. For that alone, she regretted her decision in leaving him with Denton.

  Anger coiled inside her and she wanted to double back and kill them both. She would use as many chunks of marble as it would take to shatter their skulls. But the thought of doing that made her sick. And the sight of her new charge sitting against the wall, motionless, made her sicker.

  By the time she reached Czarina she felt tears pouring down her cheeks, clouding her vision to the point she could barely make out Czarina’s face. She checked the carotid pulse.

  It was there, but not strong.

  She tried to keep her mind together. OK, what next? Check the wounds. She opened Czarina’s jacket wider to inspect her T-shirt and ran her fingers across it. She felt the hardness of a ballistic vest underneath and realized the round hadn’t even penetrated her skin. Relief washed over her.

  Czarina opened her eyes and focused on Sophia.

  ‘You’re OK,’ Sophia whispered.

  ‘Request command,’ Czarina said.

  More tears poured down her face. She smiled. It was probably a stupid smile. ‘You’re OK.’

  ‘No critical injuries,’ Czarina said.

  Sophia swallowed hard. ‘Unload parapsyche Lycaon.’

  Czarina stared straight through Sophia, then blinked twice.

  ‘Hi,’ Czarina said.

  Sophia almost laughed. She rested her forehead against Czarina’s and closed her eyes for a moment.

  ‘Wasn’t letting you go that easy,’ Sophia said.

  She heard footsteps above. She soon recognized them as their pheromones reached her. The Commander was difficult to identify but Denton was unmistakable.

  ‘This man needs medical attention,’ the Commander said. His voice echoed through the main concourse. ‘Banged up pretty bad, has a concussion.’

  Sophia heard them draw to a halt on the walkway, directly above her. She locked gazes with Czarina and listened. She could hear a shuffle as the Commander took something from his pocket.

  ‘NCS,’ the Commander said.

  He was referring to the National Clandestine Service, a CIA division. On the rare occasions Sophia had worked in an official capacity, she too had been issued a mask identity matching the host country.

  More footsteps on the other end of the main concourse. Local reinforcements. Sophia heard them guide the Commander and Denton around the concourse, avoiding the collapsed center and west mezzanine. Once they were around the other side, she heard the Commander again.

  ‘No one is to enter this terminal until I say so; get everyone out now,’ the Commander said. ‘I need to speak with your commander.’

  Sophia waited for them to leave the main concourse before getting to one knee. ‘We don’t have much time,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t feel right,’ Czarina said.

  She leaned past Czarina to rest her head on the wall. She closed her eyes and focused on breathing. If the Commander kept his word, he would hold off a sweep of the terminal. At least for a short time. Either way she needed to get out now.

  Sophia focused on the smear of blood across the wall. Slowly, she leaned Czarina forward to check across her back. She noticed a tear in the jacket and remembered the glass shard that had struck her while running through the MetLife lobby.

  She saw movement at one end of the passage. Nasira and DC.

  Without a word, they moved quickly down the walkway. DC still had his sword, sheathed. Sophia helped Czarina to her feet. She was weak but she could move.

  DC and Nasira came to a stop before them.

  ‘Is Damien alive?’ Sophia said.

  Nasira nodded. ‘Lucky son of a bitch. Everyone’s in one piece.’

  ‘Even the meteorite,’ DC said.

  ‘Where is it?’ Sophia said.

  ‘Still in a carriage,’ DC said. ‘Intact.’

  She handed Nasira the transmitter. ‘Once everyone’s clear, blow it.’

  ‘You got it,’ Nasira said.

  ‘Where’s Denton?’ DC said.

  ‘His father helped him out. Agreed to give us time to escape,’ Sophia said.

  ‘Why?’ Nasira asked.

  ‘He … I don’t know,’ she said. ‘But I could feel it. He’ll let us go. I’m not questioning it, I’m just taking it.’

  ‘You fucking let him go? Are you crazy?’ Nasira said. ‘You had the motherfucker in your sights and your finger off?’

  ‘Look, there are compelling reasons,’ Sophia said. ‘I’ll explain later.’

  ‘Fine,’ Nasira said. She slung Czarina’s arm over her shoulder and started to help her up the passage. ‘Let’s move.’

  Sophia started after them. ‘Come on,’ she said to DC. ‘About time we get off the island.’

  He wasn’t moving.

  She stopped. ‘You’re not coming with us, are you?’

  ‘I can’t,’ he said.

  Nasira and Czarina had already reached the end of the passage. Nasira waited for a moment before losing her patience and moving onward.

  ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘You should go. He won’t stop you.’

  She shook her head and couldn’t help but smile. ‘You’ll take on highly trained operatives with just a sword but you’re too scared to kiss a girl.’

  DC swallowed. ‘I am … not.’

  He took a step forward but she grew impatient and closed the gap herself, her hand around his neck, drawing him in. His lips were softer than she expected. She felt the tension slip from his body. She could smell more than the
blood and sweat between them. It was an intoxicating spice that dizzied her. Or that might’ve been her post-adrenal dump, she couldn’t be sure.

  DC broke away, hesitated a moment, then withdrew. She noticed a slight smile across his face, but he quickly concealed it.

  ‘Why won’t he stop me?’ Sophia asked. ‘You seem so sure.’

  ‘I never said I was sure,’ DC said.

  ‘You know your bodyguarding gig is up, right?’ she said. ‘You don’t have to watch me anymore.’

  He shrugged. ‘He’s just honoring his agreement.’

  ‘With you,’ she said.

  ‘I never said that,’ he said.

  ‘You didn’t have to. But thanks,’ she said. ‘I’ll see you on the other side.’

  Chapter 60

  Sophia stepped out of the excavated tunnel. Her friends were waiting in the chamber. The ground was mostly mud, rock and water. Pipes hooked to the ceiling and snaked around her. The tracks hadn’t been laid in these tunnels yet, but the bare bones of the curved surface had been assembled. It felt like it was an animal carcass and she was walking through the ribcage.

  Fluorescent lighting spaced at intervals gave the chamber enough light, along with a single red bulb that burned above Nasira.

  Czarina stepped out from behind Sophia to help create an informal circle. She was patched up, her arm immobilized in a sling. She would need a more thorough deprogramming, but for now she held.

  Nasira and Jay leaned along the chamber’s rocky wall. Aviary stood between Nasira and Damien. Damien had both hands in his pockets as he kicked rocks.

  ‘I couldn’t have done this without you,’ Sophia said, her gaze falling across all of them and resting finally on Aviary.

  ‘No shit,’ Jay said.

  Nasira elbowed him in the ribs.

  ‘I mean it,’ Sophia said.

  Jay cleared his throat. ‘It’s not your burden,’ he said. ‘Hey, I don’t like nearly being killed on a daily basis but when we help you it’s dangerous—you know, all bets are off.’