Stackpole, Michael A - Dark Conspiracy 03 (41 page)
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Authors: Evil Triumphant
used in Plutonia. "Is that what 1 think it is?"
Crowley frowned, "ft's meant to look like it, but it doesn't really work." Each of the buttons on the 10-by-10 grid glowed with one of the colors that corresponded to the mnemonic Roy G. Biv: red, orange,
yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. I knew that after violet came ultra-violet, which I couldn't see, and then the "off1 position. Selecting the correct pattern of lights would program the dimensional gate to link to another gate. If that remote gate was receptive, stepping through the gate would instantly transport a person to that other point.
The occultist punched the buttons through a new color pattern. 1 glanced at the gate and saw nothing
happen. Crowley waited for a moment, then reset the original pattern and shrugged. "This thing has
power running through it, but it cannot interrogate a remote gate. I punched up the code for the gate at
Pygmalion's place. I should have gotten a new pattern on the board that I would have had to complete so I could travel there, but nothing."
I pointed at the crystal rectangle. "So is that a dimensional gate or not?"
He shrugged. "I think so, and 1 think it's operational, but I don't knowwhy it would be. In any event, if it is, the coding is in that crystal and it only goes one place." He reached beneath the right side of the
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cons
ole, then nodded. "Power switch is in the "on" position."
Mickey scowled. "Does it go to the bad place?"
I nodded. "I think we'd best find out."
I loosened the Colt Krait in its holster and saw Crowley do the same with the Beretta M9 he had chosen
to bring on the expedition. From the start, we had known we would have to try to go through any
dimensional gate we could find, and would have preferred to be loaded with heavy weapons and
explosives. Unfortunately, the way we had to get into the base precluded that, so the two of us settled for using pistols that carried Teflon-coated, armor-piercing bullets. Hardly subtle, but if things got nasty, subtle was not much of a concern.
I led the way up the ramp and moved toward one edge. Crowley moved to the other, leaving Mickey
between us. "On three, gentlemen," I instructed them. "One... two...three."
Stepping through a dimensional gateway is normally a disorienting experience. Colors flashed before my
eyes, but that came from the transition from a dark cylinder to the bright sunlight that greeted us on the other side. The external heat also spiked and could have led me to believe we had just exchanged night
for day in the Arizona desert, but the air smelled different and felt even less humid. While experiencing none of the discomfort dimensional gating usually causes, I knew we were far away from Earth.
It took my eyes a couple of seconds to compensate for the shift from dark to light. When vision returned, I found myself standing on one platform of a whole tower created from the blue gemstone that made up
the gates in the Nevada base. I looked down at my feet and saw the disk on which I stood had been coated
with the black, no-skid covering as back on the other side, and 1 could not be 100% certain the same disk with the same rectangle was not existing in both places at the same time.
Out beyond the tower, as far as 1 could see to the
horizon, a city built of black-purple obsidian rose up out of a black sand desert. While some of the outlying buildings seemed little more than shelters constructed like houses of cards from stone slabs, the hub of the city was very much a work of art. Each building appeared not so much built as
sculpted,
and 1 had no doubt that from the air the effect would be as stunning as an Aztec calendar stone or a primitive sand painting.
Vast though the city was, and as captivating a vision as it constructed, it did not hold my attention for long. To my right, Mickey nodded his head emphatically, telling me wordlessly that we had arrived in the bad place.
Beyond him, I saw Crowley's shadowform and he clearly understood what Mickey meant to communicate.
We had arrived at our destination and now we needed to return, if that were possible.
Unfortunately, standing directly to the north of us, three men were enjoying the view of the city. Two were dressed in suitcoats and white shirts, with the conservative sort of haircut 1 had grown to expect on young executives. The third man stood tall and gangling. The Build-more security uniform he wore in no way
disguised his lack of shoulder breadth and the stiff collar called attention to his scrawny neck.
".. .Now this is just a Saudi Arabian test site of course, since it's petrodollars building the place in Nevada, but wait until we hook up with Hawaii..." the security man droned. His companions took notice of us first, and he turned to follow their lines of sight. "Oh, hello," he began, then his voice sank and his hand started to go for
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the pistol
on his right him. "I know you. You're Tycho Caine."
Dark Conspiracy 3-31.jpg
"And you're Watson Dodd." I knotted my face in a snarl and pointed to a spot beyond him. "Over there,
nowr
I ignored his half-drawn gun and passed between him and the other two men with long
purposeful strides. "I said
nowr
ft seemed like a lifetime ago, but I had met Watson Dodd and his wife through Marit Fisk, a woman
who had been one of Coyote's trusted aides. Marit and I had become an item, and our break-up was
anything but pretty. Watson had, at that time, been in Build-more's Operations division and what
little of his talk I had caught here showed he should have been back there pursuing marketing goals.
When Sinclair MacNeal had left Build-more, Dodd had been elevated to replace him in the security
hierarchy because Darius had wanted a puppet he could dominate in that position.
Dodd's presence explained the uneasiness among the guards on the site. I knew the bluff I was going
to try to run might not work, leaving me with the alternative of killing Dodd and the two men with
him. I was reluctant to do that—more because of Mickey's presence than because I knew Dodd's wife
had been very pregnant a couple of months back. Killing all of them might have been more
efficient, but in resisting that course of action I guess I found the down side of compassion.
I would have smiled at that thought, but saving Dodd required an angry snarl on my face. 1 kept my voice a strained whisper. "Dodd, what the hell are you doing here?"
Watson blinked his eyes and pushed his glasses back into their place on the bridge of his hawk-beak. "I..
.wait, I'm security here, I should ask the questions."
1 stared at him hard enough to bore holes clean through his skull. "Security? Security? If you'd been doing your freaking job, Dodd, how the hell would I be here? When I heard you were in charge of things, I figured my security checkwould be tough, notapiece of cake likethis. You've disappointed me, and you'll have made the sultan very, very angry."
"What? What sultan?"
I shook my head. "Okay, you get this once and you forget it immediately. You didn't hear it from me, and the only reason I'm telling you is because you knew Marit, got it?"
He nodded, eager to be let in on
a
secret.
"I heard you telling those two this was in Saudi. Anyone who isn't a neuron shy of a synapse knows it can't be Saudi, ft's Brunei. The sultan hired me to find out how secure this whole operation was. Even Darius does not know I'm doing this, nor should he. If he finds out, you get burned, and I won't do that to a friend of Marit's."
"What happened to her?"
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For a hal
f-second I contemplated telling him the truth. Part of me wanted to see how he would take learni
ng
that she h
ad been turned into an agent by one of Fiddleback's minions and that, because of her, the Dar
k Lord
himself almost took over Phoenix and the world. "She and I were working for the sultan gathering information on invest-ments. A rival terminated her."
I looked beyond his right shoulder at the other two men. "Who are they? Should we kill them?"
Dodd's eyes nearly bugged out of his head. "Kill them? No! They're just two guys I knew in Ops. They're okay."
"If you vouch for them, that's fine with me. They'll have to develop amnesia."
"What?"
"They never saw this place, never saw us, right?"
"Right."
"Good." I frowned for a moment. "Look, I'm not going to report this breach, got it? In fact, I'm going to fax you a password- and-challenge system that I want you to have in place by next Thursday. Some time after
that, I will try another penetration, a small party, just like this time. 1 want your people sharp so we can impress the sultan."
Dodd nodded solemnly. "1 appreciate this. Security stuff is still new to me."
1 smiled. "Dottie deliver yet?"
Dodd grinned ear to ear. "A boy, Chipper."
/
hope he takes after your wife's side of the family.
"That's great. After the next attempt, I'd like to visit with your family, if that's okay?"
The security man nodded emphatically. "We'd love it."
"Good, we'll set it up then." I shook his hand. "You'll get my fax by tomorrow or the next day."
"I look forward to it."
"And you' 11 take care of those two, right?" As I asked the question I let my jacket gap open and he saw my pistol.
"Yes."
"Great, then. I'll be seeing you."
I slapped him on the shoulder, then headed back up the ramp and walked through the gateway. On the dark
side, I paused for a moment to let my eyes adjust again to the night, then I laughed in relief at having bluffed
looked at my watch and saw that little journey there had pushed the analog portion of it well into the