Chimera Code (Jake Dillon Adventure Thriller Series) (17 page)

Night fell. With it came a bitterly cold wind and sleet.
Dillon slammed the Landrover’s door shut. The Assassin would
find the 4x4 soon enough, of that he was sure - but then, hopefully,
the couple would be far away from this place. Far away from the
violence and pain they had already suffered.
Dillon supported Tatiana as they moved carefully around the
edge of the wood. Before long they came to a pair of heavy-duty high
metal gates, a customary notice board nailed to one of the gate-posts,
clearly stating that ‘trespassers will be prosecuted’. Dillon produced
a small leather pouch from his jacket pocket. “This is where we start
breaking the law. But don’t worry - this is such a small airfield that noone will discover anything adrift until the weekend, when the gliders
start turning up.”
Tatiana stared at Dillon hard. “Can you please hurry up? I’m
freezing my tits off standing out here in this bloody awful weather.”
Dillon nodded. “Somebody is trying hard to bring down the UK
and global economy with the most powerful ever computer software
programme. And all you’re worried about is your tits falling off.”
Dillon continued to jiggle the lock picks around inside the
padlock. “And, we find ourselves embroiled in a cat and mouse game
to get to those bastards, before they’re able to push the green button.
Only one little problem. They’ve teamed up with these Assassin
weirdos, who have eliminated the Scorpion network, possibly the only
organisation that could have destroyed them, and are now trying to
kill both of us...”
He stood up and shrugged, moved forward, and pushed open
one of the gates. Then, when they were both on the other side, he
closed it again and replaced the padlock.
The airstrip squatted mostly against the darkness. A long hanger
with a rolling roof-line stood lonely at the side of the strip withanother
low timber building alongside, and a two storey building furthest from
them, the control tower, Dillon thought. And, beside the hanger was a
single damp and glistening aircraft.
“Is that the plane?” Tatiana asked quietly.
“Yes. And, I’m hoping that it’ll be fully fuelled and ready to go.
She’s got excellent range. Fast. Come on.”
They made their way slowly across the grass, and Dillon halted.
He checked the area ahead of them with a night vision monocular,
and once satisfied that there were no obvious security measures in
place they moved towards the twin engine Cessna. They circled the
hanger and finally scurried through the driving sleet to crouch under
the shelter of a tin-roofed lean-to. Slush and ice-cold water poured
around them from the non-existent guttering. Splattering incessantly
onto the hardstand beneath their feet. Dillon pointed through the
gloom. “You wait here. I’ll go and see if it’s unlocked.” Tatiana nodded
from under her faux-fur hood. He moved away from her, and was
soon a ghost in the sleet. His senses were alive, and he felt incredibly
awake: energy flowed through him and the pain from the beating he’d
taken back at the castle had all but disappeared. He moved forward.
He halted beside the Cessna, slowed his breathing, and focused,
the Glock in his left hand glistening in the gloom. Just behind the
wing he reached up, tried the cabin door handle, and immediately
discovered that it was locked. It was the fourth pick that gained him
entry, forty-five seconds later. The door opened easily outwards,
exposing the dark interior.
Dillon reached up and pulled down the steps, which thwacked
against the hard-stand. Then he went back for Tatiana and helped her
back to the aircraft, constantly aware that they were sitting targets out
in the open...
Tatiana crept forward through the sleet, her outer clothing
drenched through to the lining, and soon were both climbing the
steps and into the dry interior of the cramped twin engine plane.
“Where are we going, Dillon?”
“Santorini!. Oh and possibly a stop off in Dorset!”
“A Greek Island. A stop off in Dorset? You’re joking?” she said,
and then; “So I was right?”
Dillon looked her in the eye. “Right about what?”
“Charlie Hart?”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Gold Bullion, Dillon. Gold Bullion...”
“Oh that. Yeah, there was a rumour of gold bullion. I’ll admit, I
did look when the dust had died down. Didn’t find any though.”
“Yeah, pull the other one. Like you said, I know you better than
most, and I did think it ever so slightly odd, how you announced
your retirement shortly after that assignment. How else could you
have afforded to buy that bloody great big castle? It all clicks into
place, Dillon, and I’ve never forgotten what you said about having
transferable currency?”
“Can you just drop the bullshit about gold bullion, please?”
Dillon said, as he quickly went through a pre-flight checklist. Then
added, “It really was only a rumour, you know... Now let’s get the fuck
out of here, before that Assassin catches up with us.”
Tatiana nodded, and wiped water from her face with the sleeve
of her jacket. “You sure you know how to fly this thing, Dillon?”
“Yeah, just like riding a bike...” Dillon grinned, and engaged the
starter. “Now lean back and chillax.”

The silver Ducati motorcycle flashed through the night, tyres
gripping the wet tarmac, groaning under pressure as the powerful bike
hit speeds of over a hundred and seventy m.p.h. The sleet and rain
smashed down from the blue-black clouds overhead, and the Ducati
finally pulled to a halt behind the Landrover.

Light-weight boots splashed down in a large muddy puddle.
The black clad figure stood beside the bike, staring towards
the heavy metal gates and across the apparently deserted airfield. A
twin-engine Cessna taxied along the grass strip with engines roaring,
climbing steeply up into the night sky and disappeared, navigation
lights blinking through the gloom.
The Assassin stared into the darkness, her eyes alert, unblinking,
unmoving. Then as dogs barked and their leads slipped free, the figure
moved fluidly, swiftly, climbed back onto the Ducati. Within seconds
the full face helmet was on and, the Bluetooth comm.-link was reactivated.
“He’s escaped,” came the soft feminine voice.
“How has this happened?”
“He was ready. He had sophisticated warning systems in place
that...”
“Stop. These are merely excuses. Do you know where Dillon is
now?”
“He escaped - he stole an aircraft. Heading due south and flying
low.”
“He will keep below radar, making it almost impossible to track
him conventionally. But not so difficult for a satellite. Keep your
comm. open and head towards London.”
“Understood. Out.”
The Ducati was fired up, tyres hissed, the silver motorcycle
disappeared into the darkness with only the barking of dogs following
the roar of sound emanating from the tailpipe - and nothing remained
to provide evidence of the Assassin’s recent passing.

Alix stood on the roof of the tall modern building, a look of
frustration and anger on his face. Behind stood Lola, both shocked
into silence. Below them the landscape of London that had been
changed forever by the small but deadly nuclear device that had been
detonated inside Scorpion HQ.

“I can’t believe what happened here,” said Alix softly. He reached
into his jacket pocket, pulled free a cigar and lit up. Smoke plumed
around his face, swirling in the cold air. He took a deep and heavy
draw.

“Those bastards,” said Lola, her expression malevolent.
“Yeah,” drawled Alix. “But which bastards, exactly?”
They moved off the roof-top and used the service stairs all

the way down to ground level. The bustle of activity following the
immediate blast had subsided; no longer did emergency service
vehicles line the area where Scorpion HQ used to occupy. At least
seventy people wearing hard-hats and hi-visibility jackets picking
slowly through the rubble and debris, machines lifting blasted concrete
slabs and massive H sections of steel reinforcement had already been
cleared from around the cavernous hole; all of the bodies had been
recovered and taken to mortuaries all over the city. They walked across
the park, away from the blast zone, away from the devastation and
total destruction, away from the lost lives and smashed worlds. They
got into the Mercedes van; driving away in silence.

The cliff top road was deserted; rain beat against the Mercedes
windscreen, the black of night turning grey as dawn started to break
over a tumultuous ocean. The battered van hissed its way through the
deluge, headlights carving slices of yellow from the murky gloom.
Lola leaned back in the passenger seat, looking out from somewhere
inside of the fur-lined hood of her parka coat, at the coastal landscape
unfolding before them.

“Positive. I’ve only been here once before, but I remember
where it is, and what a fucking desolate and lonely place it is.”
Alix guided the van with care; along a narrow unmade lane as
they drew nearer to their destination, through a tall gated entrance,
and still the rain pounded down and Lola began to wonder if agreeing
to this meeting had been the best decision she had ever made.
The Mercedes van slid to a muddy halt on the grass verge.
Rain and sleet danced in the beams of the headlights.
Alix stared at the Sat-Nav screen. “Well according to this, it
should be just on the other side of that wood. On the right.” He
selected first gear, and they moved forward with a jerk and the backend of the vehicle swung to the left and then the right as they picked
up speed; Alix was right, they found the small granite stone chapel. He
parked discreetly away from the chapel entrance. Steam hissed from
the cracked radiator as Alix killed the engine.
“Do you think he’s in there?” Asked Lola casually.
“I doubt it, but you never know with the Priest.”
The rain had eased off and Alix stepped out of the van, an
automatic pistol in his gloved hand. He stared around; scanning the
countryside in all directions, then saw headlights and a car creeping up
the lane towards him. Inside the van, Lola had slotted a fresh magazine
into a Heckler & Koch MP5 carbine and she held the muzzle low,
unseen; a precaution.
The car halted, steam immediately rising off of its muddy tyres.
It was a silver Aston Martin DB5, identical to the one that a wellknown big-screen secret agent of the 1960’s used to drive.
“Everything okay?” Shouted Alix.
The Priest climbed out of the vintage sports car.
“Oh yes, my son,” he said. He looked around, and, with his Bible
clasped in his right hand, walked slowly towards Alix.
“I hate this place,” said Alix miserably. The rain was falling again
and soaking through his protective clothing to the skin; his face a
sheen of water.
“God sends the rain to nourish the land, my son. So that seeds
may be sown and life can flourish.” The Priest beamed, moss green
eyes shining.
Alix frowned.
“That might, or might not, be true Priest. I assume you got the
secure email I sent to you?”
“I did. The infidels have been busy. They seek to destroy
everything in their path.”
“I thought -
think
- that I can trust you, because I know you are
one of the main Tactical Planning Officers at Ferran & Cardini - one
of the main men, the partners’ ears and eyes, yeah?”
“By your trust, I assume you mean the MP5 rained on me from
your van, by your very pretty friend Lola?”
Alix shrugged, grinning. “You can’t blame us for taking
precautions - you know how it is.”
“Indeed I do,” said the Priest calmly. “What is it you seek, my
son?”
“As you know, things have gone from bad to worse; we’ve just
driven up from London.”
“Scorpion HQ?”
“Yes,” said Alix sombrely.
“We must pray for their souls,” said the Priest, great sadness
in his voice. “And yet, before prayer, I cannot help but feel that this
crime must not go unpunished.”
“We need your help,” said Alix softly. “You have the highest
clearance level at Ferran & Cardini, and to be honest, you probably
know more about what’s going on at Scorpion than we do...”
The Priest’s eyes glittered. “There is no Scorpion, well not in an
operational sense, anyway. There have, shall we say, been...
complications
.
What is it you have in mind?”
“Find out who is responsible - gather together all remaining
Scorpion units and go after them. Terminate every single one of
them.”
“First you will need to find the source; then you will need to find
the target.”
“That’s why we’re here,” said Alix. “There’s nobody else we can
trust - and believe me, it was hard deciding even to contact
you
.”
The Priest stood, both his hands deep in the pockets of the
black overcoat he was wearing, rain dripping from the brim of the
black fedora hat. He thought, long and hard, brow furrowed; finally,
looking skywards, he smiled at Alix, then reached out and patted him
gently on the shoulder. “I have been given guidance, my son.”
“Really, so quickly?” Alix looked up, nervously, at the heavens.
The Priest nodded. He placed his hands together, as if he
were going to prey. A frown appearing across his forehead as he
concentrated. “The Lord works in mysterious ways, Alix. But he will
lead us and protect us, and the Lord will guide us.”
“You sure about that, Priest?”
“My faith in my Lord is unwavering, Alix. I am merely his
physical medium on earth, and the one chosen to carry out his will.
Yes I am sure. But I am going to need help on this journey. Under
normal circumstances I would call my old friend, Jake Dillon. But, he
had a visit from a unit of these Assassins, got them all except one. He
used one of his pay-as-you-go mobile phones to contact me. Told me
that he was shipping out with Tatiana.”
“Bloody hell.” said Alix, and immediately added. “Sorry, didn’t
mean to say that.”
“No need to apologise, Alix. But... as you are now here, my
friend. Sent, I think, by the Almighty. You can be of assistance to me.”
“What kind of journey?” Alix’s voice was suspicious.
“As TPO’s at Ferran & Cardini, we have always worked closely
with our equivalent rank at Scorpion. Between us we keep tabs on a
variety of people and locations around the world; keep an eye on them,
shall we say. There has been an increase in hostile activity at various
locations and we sent Scorpion units to investigate and in some cases,
baby-sit some of Scorpions key personnel - just before Scorpion HQ
was destroyed in London. The partners had instructed me to look into
a matter of grave importance concerning a Scorpion unit. I was on my
way to the assignment when I received your transmission.”
“So now we can all go together?”
“Your assistance would be greatly appreciated, my son. This
increased activity would appear to be linked with various hot spots
of trouble around the globe and at Scorpion HQ in London. The
partners of Ferran & Cardini have a strong hunch of there being a
connection.”
Alix nodded.
The Priest smiled. “We will have to meet at the old Sarum private
airfield in Wiltshire - I have a few jobs to take care of first along the
way.”
“No problem. Just name the time.”
The Priest glanced at his wristwatch. “Twelve hours from now.”
We’ll be there,” said Alix softly.
The twin engines droned like bees gathering honey. Tatiana
woke up, rubbed her eyes, and watched the sun dancing across the
tops of cotton-wool clouds. She yawned, enjoying the view for a few
moments; far below, the brilliant blue landscape of the Mediterranean,
marked with the Islands of the Balearics, reminded her of long past
holidays, and much better days - happier days before the imminent
crisis that now loomed and would grip the world’s economies and
governments and cripple them beyond recognition...
She shifted on the uncomfortable seat. Winced as the stitches
that Dillon had so expertly sown her together with, pulled tight.
She glanced across at Dillon. “You okay?”
“Never felt better.” Although, Dillon’s wane smile, told a
different story.
“Where are we?”
“We’ve just flown over Mallorca.”
“Mallorca. I had a few good holidays there in the past. My father
owned a villa in Puerto Pollensa, up in the north of the island.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Honestly? Battered, bruised, and sore, but I’ll live. You hungry?”
“Starving.”
“Which bag is the food in?”
The blue one has food and drink in, and I apologise in advance
for the amount of junk food content. I swear, somebody should sue
the manufacturers of that shit.”
Tatiana rummaged. Found food - or a close approximation
thereof. She ate, and so did Dillon, even though his hands were firmly
gripping the Cessna’s control column.
“You look tired, where are you refuelling?”
“We’re heading for Sicily to refuel.”
“I thought you were never going back to Sicily? Something to
do with the Mafia wanting you real bad after you destroyed their very
large shipment of cocaine. Wanted by men with machine pistols who
want you very, very dead?”
“Well, yes. But when I say Sicily, it’s a biggish island and what
I mean is that I’ve arranged to rendezvous with an old friend, just
outside of Ragusa. That’s on the other side of the island and a long
way from Palermo.”
“So there’ll be no time for sunbathing or sampling the exquisite
local food?”
“Not this time, luv. I’m sorry. Anyway, the less time I spend on
that island, the better.”
They were still over the sea, and the sun glittered across waves
and tiny crests of foam. Tatiana watched Dillon carefully; she could
see his concern about landing on Sicily but he hid it well. The Mafia
chased him all over Europe; he had killed every one of his pursuers one
by one before returning to the UK. The Mafia have long memories...
She had read it in his personnel file, and as he always said, it wasn’t
the Mafia that bothered him; it was the one million Euro contract that
they had put out on him...
Hours had passed.
The ‘rendezvous’, much to Tatiana’s horror, was a narrow dirt
strip cut between lines of olive groves. Dillon brought the twin engine
Cessna down in a swirl of dust, taxied to the far end, turned, and came
to a halt, much to the bewilderment of a small group of olive pickers
who were sitting in the shade eating their lunch. Tatiana watched
Dillon go across to them from the Cessna’s cockpit, decidedly on edge
and alert for any signs of trouble.
She needn’t have worried. Dillon, all smiles, nodded in her
direction and she watched as one of the older women, dressed
traditionally in black garb, lead him away to throw back tarpaulins
concealing drums of what Tatiana assumed was aviation fuel. She did
not understand how Dillon made contacts, nor how he had arranged
this little meeting; so she decided that it was probably best not to ask.
An hour later, when Dillon climbed sweating and covered in
dust into the cockpit, Tatiana had been sleeping again. She smiled
wearily at him. “We fuelled up and ready to go?”
“We should have just about enough to get us to Santorini. That’s
assuming we don’t meet with any problems along the way, we’re going
to be flying low altitude and under radar...”
They flew low with the sun high in a sky of brilliant blue...
Tatiana decided it was quite romantic or it would have been if
she hadn’t taken a bullet in the shoulder and they hadn’t been running
for their lives. What happened? She thought, what had happened to
her near perfect world? It had been going so well, so smoothly.
Ezra walked slowly through the spectacular landscaped gardens
of his hillside home, gazing around in appreciation of the vividly
colourful scene; looking down he observed honey bees hovering and
settling on the abundance of large blooms throughout the garden.
He lifted his head slowly, hair whipping gently in the light breeze,
and gazed out across the breathtaking view before him - a medley
of browns and burnt orange merging into the dazzling blue of the
ocean. The amber light of early evening flowed effortlessly across
the island landscape like molten honey, breaking across white painted
villas, moulding itself around the trees. Although, Ezra could not see
them from where he was sitting, sheer cliffs rose up hundreds of
feet from the ocean floor and he could feel the past violence of this
ancient land within his soul.
The high voltage electric security fence, made the large man
feel comforted, solid and real without any fear. Ezra sat in his private
grounds knowing that he owned outright everything, and everyone
around him was a part of him, belonged to him - and he belonged
to them; a symbiotic relationship that made Ezra smile. His hand
reached out and, lightly touched the shocking purple petals of the
flower. He sighed.
The sun was sinking, glinting a deep burned red in his dark eyes.
He rose slowly to his feet, pulling himself to his full height
and massaging the constant ache in his right hip and lower back.
Moving away from his view-point, he was soon walking back through
landscaped gardens, along wide sandy paths, winding back and
forth, and leading uphill towards his luxury villa complex and the
last glimpses of the sparkling dance of the sun’s sinking rays. Ezra
walked on, the limp in his left leg becoming more pronounced with
each step he took, sweat rolling down over his temples, his long grey
hair flowing behind him in the light breeze, his automatic Browning
cumbersome, yet comforting, in its leather shoulder holster concealed
under his robes.
As he walked, the Scorpion G8 link comm. pressed against his
right thigh through the pocket sewn into the Bedouin style robes he
was wearing. He hated the heavy device. It had been hacked of course,
by his own programmers - just because they
could
. The small device
had been dismantled and reassembled minus certain circuitry and
software. Ezra kept the G8 close to him at all times; it was a constant
reminder of distant, better days.
Ezra halted for a moment, turning, hands on hips, regaining his
breath.
The landscape of Santorini spread out before him, the most
awesome of panoramic views he had witnessed in his many years of
travelling the miserable ball of rock called Earth.
Ezra loved the Greek Islands and in particular, Santorini; that
is why he had chosen this place in which to set up and run a stateof-the-art listening and monitoring station for the Israeli Intelligence
Agency - Mossad.
He pushed on up the last steps leading to one of the villa’s many
verandas overlooking the orange tree orchards filling the slopes all the
way to the edge of the cliff tops. This vision of contrasting colour
splashes against the brilliant blue of the ocean beyond, filled his
complex mind with calm, soothed the raging bull that burned within
his soul, found the soft spot in his heart and allowed him to coast
through each day with ease.
The interior of the villa felt luxuriously cool after heat outside.
Ezra touched the age-worn spine of the hard-back edition of the Bible,
tilted it backwards and; immediately, a secret panel in his purpose built
library opened to reveal a stairway leading down to the bunker and his
centre of operations.