Apocalyptic Visions Super Boxset (85 page)

Kasaika capitalized on the hit and tackled Dylan onto the hard concrete, where Dylan’s head snapped back into the floor with a loud crack. The blow caused a flash of white light that blinded Dylan’s vision and triggered a deafening, high-pitched whine in both his ears. He grappled with Kasaika, who struck repeated blows to Dylan’s body.

Each blow from Kasaika chipped away at what was left of Dylan’s strength, the strikes coming at him faster and faster until Kasaika’s fist was nothing more than a blur. One of Dylan’s ribs finally snapped in half, triggering a primal scream from Dylan and a powerful reactionary shove with his legs that catapulted Kasaika off him and across the floor.

Dylan wallowed on the ground, each breath shredding his lungs with a thousand tiny knives. The room spun, and when he looked over to Kasaika, who was already on his feet, he scrambled to get his legs under him. Once he was able to stand, he tried straightening his back but was hindered by the pain in his ribs. His body trembled, the blinding pain overriding the pride that spurred him to keep going.

Kasaika pawed at his stomach, which was bleeding. The violent movement had caused his stitches to tear, and blood soaked the fabric of his shirt, but he gave no tell of pain except the light twitch in his left eye. The shouts from the surrounding crowd began to turn in Kasaika’s favor, and in the moment of cheers, his ego swelled large enough to push through the pain, and he stood erect. “I hope you’ve prayed to your false god, Captain. Because after I kill you and you come face to face with Allah, you will burn in the seven hells for all your sins.”

The shouts and jeers from the increasing hysteria of the surrounding men reached a crescendo as Dylan tried to gather what spit was left in his dry mouth to force a swallow. “That’s not gonna happen.” Dylan took a sidestep as Kasaika circled him, going around and around, waiting for his chance to pounce.

“If you’re worried about being there alone, you shouldn’t be.” Kasaika flashed a wicked smile across his face. “That slut you were married to will be there waiting, her screams just as loud as the rest of the whores. And then we’ll send your son and daughter to meet you, where they’ll be cut into a thousand pieces, and the devil will finish what Perry started!”

The surrounding chants and cheers slowly faded from Dylan’s ears. While he could still see their mouths moving, their fists shaking, he could no longer hear them. A white-hot flash of rage consumed him, cauterizing the pain in his ribs, his face, and the rest of his body. He suddenly became aware that his feet were moving, quickly steamrolling toward Kasaika, who started his own charge.

At the moment of collision, Dylan used his weight to knock Kasaika to the floor. Kasaika tried protecting the bleeding gash on his stomach, but Dylan punched the wound repeatedly until he felt the stitches break, and his fist entered Kasaika’s stomach to wails and screams of agony.

Dylan brought his bloody fist across Kasaika’s chin and slammed it down like a hammer on a nail until the screaming stopped then continued even after Kasaika’s body went limp. Dylan was blind to the pain in his hand, blind to the fact that Kasaika was motionless, blind to everything but the bloody stump of bone and flesh that Kasaika’s head turned into. Each punch, splat of blood, crunch of bone only fueled his rage, and it wasn’t until an army of hands and arms pulled him off Kasaika that he stopped.

Once the terrorists had moved Dylan away, they dropped him in a corner of the room, where the surge of energy left him, and he collapsed like a wet noodle. The sharp stab in his side returned, along with the shallow breathing. He looked down at his hands, bloodied and trembling from the adrenaline and pain. He lay on his right side, curling up into a ball, making himself as small as he could, melting into the floor. All the pain, all the loss sank him deeper into the earth until another pair of hands lifted him up and dragged him past Kasaika’s lifeless, bloodied body and through the narrow halls of the bunker until they flung him inside a room.

When Dylan looked up, Perry was standing in the doorway, shaking his head, a sad smile plastered across his face. “Oh, Captain.” He squatted to the floor, balancing on his toes while still gripping the doorframe. “You’ve come so far, given so much. I know how tired you are.”

Dylan wanted to spit in Perry’s face but couldn’t muster the strength to do it. His only response was another tremor as he lay on the floor and a wheeze from his lungs as he drew breath. Perry reached out a hand and placed it gently on Dylan’s leg, which Dylan pulled away.

“It’ll be over soon. That much I can promise you.” Perry pushed himself off the ground, but before he turned away, Dylan found a whisper of his voice.

“Why?” Dylan had won the fight, and with the totality of the pain of everything that had occurred, he desperately wanted to know why this was happening to him. He wanted to know why his ex-wife had died, why his son had been tortured, and why he held the weight of millions of dead lives over his head. “Why me?”

But Perry only offered a smile. “Soon.” And with that the door was slammed shut and Dylan was left alone in the cell with only the tortured pain of his body and mind. The tsunami of pain that followed cast his consciousness into shadows, and he drifted off into a realm of nightmares of fire and death—nightmares he hoped would stay in the realm of his mind.

The maritime records building in Boston was in worse shape than the rest of the city, and Cooper didn’t think it was because of the attacks. The dilapidated structure had long since been abandoned, and whatever files were still inside were sealed and locked up.

Cooper parked the car in the abandoned lot and made her way up the steps to the boarded-up doors, blocked off with crisscrossed two-by-fours. The crowbar hung loosely in her hand as she stood there. If the records to Dylan’s father’s ship weren’t inside here, then they were lost. This was the end of the road, the last piece of the puzzle she needed to put together.

Cooper wedged the flat end of the crowbar behind a slat and levered down. The nails slowly pulled out from the clutches of the building’s side, and with one last push, the board cracked in half then tumbled to the floor. She followed the same motions for the second board, which came out more easily than the first. She used the keys for the lock that she’d obtained from the offices downtown, and the door creaked open as she stepped inside.

The building smelled of musty walls and decaying paper, and trash littered the floor, along with the distinct stench of rat droppings that stung her nostrils. Cooper lifted the collar of her shirt to cover her nose and flicked on her flashlight, which only illuminated more decrepit features.

Cooper made her way to the back of the building, where the records keeper had told her to look for the ship logs. She found the room and, inside it, hundreds of boxes, stacked and sagging on top of each other, covered in thick layers of dust. Her light shone into a corner, and a rat scurried back behind the boxes, its small feet scratching against the floor, retreating until she couldn’t hear it anymore.

The boxes were alphabetized, and she searched for the Ts, finding them in a cluster at the back end of the room. She ripped off the lids and started combing through the old ledgers, scanning page after page of the yellowed strips of paper.

Faded names, cargo lists, dates, all recorded with pen and paper long before the invention of anything digital. Some of the handwriting was hard to see, and after an hour, her eyes began to strain from the dim lighting.

The stacks of books piled up as she searched for the name of Dylan’s father’s ship. She had an idea of the range of dates of the trip but started from the beginning of the year when Perry had been burned. She slowly and methodically went down line by line, searching for her needle in the haystack.

With the piles of books reaching a tipping point next to her, she closed another journal then started a new pile. Cooper leaned back in her chair, which squeaked, and cast her back into the shadows, away from the lantern on the desk. It has to be here somewhere.

Cooper reached for the next book and opened it, a slide of dust falling down the slanted sheets as she did. Her fingers had dirtied from looking through all the papers. And then, with her finger pushing through the thick layer of dust on the old page, she stopped. At first she thought it was just her eyes playing tricks on her, but after rereading the name, she knew it was real.

The Fish Bowl had an entry for departure with a crew of five, and the date of the trip was a week before Perry’s father had burned him alive. Cooper shifted her finger and the light over to the list of manifested names in the details, and there, in faded black cursive, scribbled nearly to the edge of the paper, were Richard and Melvin Perry.

Christ. Dylan’s father had taken Perry and his own dad on a fishing trip nearly thirty years ago. This was the connection, the possible link as to why Perry had chosen Dylan. But what happened on the ship? Did Dylan’s father strike Perry? Was he hurt on the ship? Was something said? She’d only know if she could speak with the crew that had been on board, and right now the only living survivor of that trip was sealed in a bunker a thousand feet underground.

The phone in Cooper’s pocket buzzed, and in the quiet of the hot warehouse, lost in thought, she jumped. It was Moringer’s assistant, Jimmy. “Hey, is Moringer with you?”

“No, he’s in the situation room with the other directors. They’re waiting on any word from Dylan about the mission. So far it’s been radio silence. I did get that report back on Perry’s step-brother though.”

“Let’s have it.” Cooper double-checked the names on the manifest one last time, just to make sure she wasn’t imagining it.

“Alex Shearer was born August 12th, 1952, enlisted in the Army in 1970 after his eighteenth birthday, and then was killed in action in 1978.”

Cooper perked up in her seat. “The brother was military? Where was he KIA?”

“Well, that was what was taking so long. Alex’s file was listed as classified, and the only public information that I could find was what I just told you. So, I had to use the director’s clearance level to access the file, and found out that Alex was killed in a top secret assassination mission of Anwar Sadat.”

“The Egyptian president?” The connected dot triggered another surge of adrenaline. “Perry would have had access to that file with his clearance level at Homeland.” Cooper jumped from her chair and ripped the manifest page out of the book, leaving the lantern where it stood in her rush. “I need you to get me Moringer, now.” Cooper tripped over boxes and pinballed her way to the front of the building, knocking into walls and doors until she was out in the parking lot fumbling with her car keys.

“I can’t. The room is locked, and they’re not to be disturbed unless it’s an emergency. The Secret Service is here.”

Cooper cranked the car’s engine to life and tossed the manifest page into the passenger seat. “I don’t care what you have to do! I need to speak with him.” The tires spun out as she slammed the engine into reverse, and she peeled out of the parking lot. “Tell him it’s about the missiles, tell him it’s about Perry, tell him whatever you need to, but get him on the phone!”

***

Moringer had undone his tie and the collar of his shirt, rolled up his sleeves, untucked his shirt, and tousled his hair to the point of chaos. His eyes kept flitting back to the clock on the wall, as did everyone else’s. There was nothing more frustrating for an intelligence operation than having a lack of information. They wouldn’t know if Dylan had succeeded or failed for another thirty minutes. That was when the next two-hour mark would pass.

Every government official in the room had calculated the odds, and the chances of Dylan being able to accomplish what they asked of him were slim to none. But what was more troubling than waiting was the knowledge of what would happen if Dylan failed.

While they had never told Dylan about the alternative, they’d had it planned as a last resort since the beginning. Right now, off the Atlantic Coast, one of their nuclear submarines was poised to launch a nuclear strike, one that would decimate all three military bases now under Perry’s control via the Taipan.

The calculated blasts would destroy what was left of the nuclear arsenal at Perry’s disposal. However, it would come at the cost of more American lives. The fallout in the areas around the bases would kill hundreds of thousands. And if the winds decided to act accordingly, they could carry fallout to millions of other Americans that could affect their health for years to come.

Not to mention the riots in the streets from protestors once it was brought to light what had happened. There would be coup against the government, looting, plunging the country into further chaos than it already was. The thin thread of civilization and humanity that was still holding everything together would be cut, and the country would descend into insanity.

The thought made Moringer sick to his stomach, and he fought once again to keep down the diet of coffee he’d been living on for the past forty-eight hours. He folded his forearms on the desk then rested his forehead on top of them, closing his eyes and trying to calm the flurry of fear and stress that plagued his mind.

“We’ve just received word that the rest of our personnel on the ground around the bases have been evacuated,” the CIA director said. “And half of D.C. is on the move. All we have to worry about now is the fallout. Where are we at with a statement to the press?”

Moringer tilted his head up at the news, and the FBI director chimed in. “The president will be addressing the nation as soon as it’s over. We’ve coordinated with local law enforcement in the major cities. We haven’t given them all the details, just that they should be on alert for another attack and that looters and riots should be dispersed at all costs.”

Moringer let out a sigh, shaking his head and doing his best to try and rub the weariness out of his eyes. “Perry’s getting what he wanted after all.”

“We’re not going to let that bastard have the last word.” The CIA director’s voice had an edge to it, and he smacked the table defiantly, like a child who had no other course of action but to lash out.

“Perry put us between a rock and a hard place,” Moringer said. “He wins even if he loses. All he wanted was for us to cause more havoc, wreak more destruction, and look at what we’re doing.”

“We’re saving lives.”

“We’re launching a nuclear strike on our own country!” Moringer shot up from his chair. “We’ve descended to the level Perry wanted us to sink to. You’re just too stubborn and idiotic to see it for yourself!”

The tempers in the room flailed, and before any of the other men could interject, the CIA director lunged across the table and tackled Moringer to the floor. Both men rolled over one another until Moringer finally had the upper hand and sent a hard right cross against the CIA director’s cheek. But before he could give him another welt, a rush of hands peeled him off the floor and separated the two of them.

“You’re out of line!” The CIA director’s face turned red from both the hit and the anger rising up within him. “We are not like Perry! We will never be like him!”

The brief burst of adrenaline was quickly fading from Moringer. His breathing was heavy, and his voice cracked when he spoke. “Yeah, you just keep telling yourself that.” Moringer shrugged the hands off him and walked over to the door, letting himself out.

The Secret Service men posted outside were holding back someone who was waving his arms, trying to get inside. “You don’t understand! I need to see Director Moringer now! It has to do with the missile crisis!”

“Jimmy?” Moringer pushed past the guards and made his way over to his secretary, his eyes distraught in hysteria. “What are you doing here?”

The Secret Service agent finally let him past, and Jimmy gripped Moringer’s shoulders, digging his fingers hard into his flesh and trying to control his labored, excited breathing. “Cooper called me. She needs to speak with you. I have her on the line now.”

Moringer snatched the phone out of Jimmy’s hand. “Cooper, what do you have?”

“Perry’s half-brother was an Army Ranger and was killed in action during the late seventies.”

Moringer wrinkled his face in frustration. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“The mission was a classified assassination attempt on former Egyptian president Anwar Sadat.”

Moringer circled the facts in his mind, trying to put it all together. “Then why recruit them? Why try and help the same people that killed his brother?”

“It’s a smokescreen. Think about it. Everything Perry has done has been for misdirection. From day one he’s been pulling the strings. The kill list for those former DCF workers, his father who was mysteriously murdered in prison. He brings his enemies close to keep an eye on them then kills them when he’s done. And if the only other people he needs to get rid of live in D.C., then the only other explanation for the other nukes would be—”

“The Middle East.” Moringer almost dropped the phone from his ear right then and there. With all the attention focused on a domestic attack, none of the directors, intelligence officers, or advisors had even considered the possibility of Perry using the missiles on anyone else. If Perry launched any nuclear strike in the region, it would trigger an international conflict that could unravel the rest of the world. “Cooper, I need you to get your ass here, now! I don’t care how you do it, just make it fast.”

Before Cooper could answer, Moringer hung up the phone and rushed back into the room, where the CIA director was nursing his chin. “We need to get on the phone with the UN.” Everyone in the room looked to each other, their faces squinting in confusion. “Perry’s going to start World War III.”