State of Emergency (18 page)

Fire Chief Truman Maclenahan was alone in the rear of the
ops centre when his phone rang. It was Mark Harrison.

'Sir, I'm grateful for your cooperation,' Mark said. 'What's
the situation with the shooter? You'll understand I'm
concerned about my people going in there.'

The fire chief quelled his irritation. His people were in just
as much danger. But, he recalled, these guys
were
helping
him. 'Not a lot I'm afraid, Mark. The SWAT team-leader was
killed. Booby-trap.'

'I heard. No sign of the perp?'

'No.'

'We have people here running scans on the area using a
sat system, but we have no idea who we're looking for. Do
you have forensics on the gas station roof?'

'Mark, I think you're forgetting we have a major incident
here. Every resource I have is stretched –'

'I do understand.'

'If you did, you wouldn't be asking me.'

'Sir, with respect. My people – and yours – can't help
anyone if they're shot through the head.'

Maclenahan stared around the room and sighed.

'Okay, what do you want from me?'

'Someone from the FBI will be up there imminently,
yes?'

'I guess so.'

'This shooter's a pro. He and the bomber may well be the
same person. I imagine he was extremely careful with his
prints, his DNA.'

'Yes, I imagine he was.'

'The FBI, being the FBI, will commandeer the evidence,'
Harrison went on. 'But they could miss plenty that my
people could spot. You have to spare someone to get me
anything useful from that roof. I have a pilot still there after
dropping off one of my team. He can get that evidence to
me within half an hour. Can you help?'

There was only so much the Big Eye could detect. Tom did
everything he could to filter out noise and to scan through
the full electromagnetic spectrum in an effort to work out
the best way for the team to get down to B3 or B4, but there
was only so much he could do too.

Stephanie, Mai and Josh were kitted out. Their cybersuits
were skin-tight, each a matt copper-bronze colour. At their
waists hung utility belts containing a high powered halogen
torch, a small laser cutter and a 50-metre length of super
lightweight cord made from carbon threads. Alongside these
high-tech devices they each had a pouch containing some
old-fashioned back-ups – matches, a whistle and a Swiss
Army knife.

The cybersuits would protect them for short periods
from temperatures between –300 and +475 degrees Fahrenheit.
They wore skin-tight helmets, and each carried a
backpack only an inch thick made from almost weightless
carbon-iridium fibres. This could supply them with oxygen
for up to 24 hours. A chamber adjoined to the oxygen production
tank could provide water and essential nutrients
that could last a week. As well as these, the suit was fully
integrated with their implants and had super-fast digital
comms.

They were emerging from the Big Mac when Tom opened
a link. 'This is the situation,' he began. 'We've ruled out
the western emergency stairs. They're still too unstable. The
elevator must have been a desperate choice. BigEye reckons
your best option is the eastern rear emergency exit. I'm not
sure why the senator didn't try it, but I guess they felt getting
across the Main Concourse was too hazardous.'

'Okay, Tom. You got anything from BigEye about access?'
Stephanie asked, leading the other two towards the ravaged
front of the CCC. It looked like the stabilisers were holding
up well in Hall A. Emergency workers were everywhere.
Paramedics emerged bearing stretchers, and firemen were
heading back into the hall with heavy lifting equipment
and oxygen tanks on trolleys.

'Not much, to be honest. It's going to be a case of taste
it and see.'

'Alright. Keep in touch, Tom.'

The Main Concourse was still ablaze. Material had fallen
from the roof and this had fuelled the flames. The insulating
material – which, according to Californian law, was supposed
to be a fire-retardant – was not holding up too well. Lengths
of fibrous material, insulation and plastic piping had
tumbled through great gashes in the ceiling. They burned
all too easily, filling the air with noxious fumes.

The Main Concourse had taken the worst of the blast.
Very few people had been in the area but the explosions
had gutted the inside of the CCC. Huge expanses of marble
flooring had been ripped up in milliseconds and hurled
through the air. They had smashed into the ceiling, bringing
down concrete, steel, wood and plastic. With these had
come human beings, many ripped to shreds, and computers,
chairs, desks and filing cabinets. Papers were still fluttering
down from a storeroom on Level 1. The marble and concrete
and steel and wood had also blown outwards. The front of
the CCC was barely standing. The doors and windows had
gone, the lintels had collapsed. But the furthest point from
the two blasts, the eastern wing of the complex, had suffered
the lightest damage.

It took Stephanie, Josh and Mai several minutes to get
to the far side of the Main Concourse. Picking their way
through the devastation, they saw things that would remain
with them forever. Raw dereliction, a remorseless stripping
of humanity that would long haunt them at night.

Pete was waiting for them in the Cage at the emergency
exit. He was manoeuvring a steel girder that had been lying
across the door, picking it up as though it were a twig. He
swung the grappling arm round and slammed it against the
door. It disintegrated inwards and they could see a stairwell
beyond.

'You're on your own now, guys,' Pete said. 'Good luck.'
And he turned to the main doors.

They dove into the narrow passageway beyond the
smashed door. It was pitch black. Powerful lights built into
their helmets instantly flicked on. A stairway fell away to the
right and twisted upward to the left. The air stank, a blend
of fumes, incinerated plastic and the acrid smell of spilled
chemicals. A pink-tinged smoke hung in the air.

Stephanie tapped at the keypad woven into the wrist
of her suit. A small screen lit up and a few seconds later
an image appeared – coloured bars and chemical symbols.
'Nasty,' she said. 'Sulfuric acid, hydrogen halides. Probably
from foam insulation and glue. Come on.'

She led the way down the stairs then stopped so suddenly
that Josh and Mai almost fell over her. At Stephanie's feet
lay a body, face-down. Josh helped her gently turn it over
and they crouched opposite one another over the prone
form. The young man had asphyxiated, his face blue and
contorted in a horrible grimace. He had one hand at his
throat. His fingers were covered with dried blood, and some
of them looked broken.

'I think he must have tried to get out through the
emergency exit,' Mai said, 'but the girder Pete moved was
too heavy. Must have been overcome by fumes, poor man.'

Stephanie straightened, exhaled heavily into her helmet
and turned away.

Another turn of the stairs and they reached a door marked
B1. Stephanie was about to try it when they all heard Mark
Harrison's voice in their comms. 'Guys? We have an update
on the senator and his companions.'

'Go ahead,' Josh replied.

'Looks like they're on their way out of the elevator onto
B3.'

'That's good news.'

'Suggest you go straight down the stairwell and see if it's
possible to get in through the emergency door. If not, we'll
have to figure out something else.'

'Wilco.'

Mai was nearest to the stairway and she led the way. The
fumes were growing worse. It looked as though a fire on a
lower level was the source of the trouble. They ignored the
exit into B2 and continued down. It was growing warmer as
they approached the fire. Halfway down the stairs between
B2 and B3, they could see orange fingers of fire slithering
under the door into B3. Mai checked her wrist computer.
The air temperature in the stairwell was nudging 180 degrees
Fahrenheit.

They reached the door. The frame and the rim of the
door itself was beginning to warp. 'There must be quite a
fire the other side,' Josh commented. 'These are fire doors,
designed to withstand temperatures up to about 250 degrees
Fahrenheit. They're not going to last much longer.'

Stephanie was tapping at her computer and adjusted
a micro-filter on her visor. Thanks to the nano-implants
behind her eyes, she could view the door with her vision
enhanced at either end of the visual spectrum. 'The stress
lines look very bad,' she said. 'There's no way we can get
through there.'

Josh peered down the stairwell. It was completely blocked
with rubble. 'The only way is up,' he said.

'Agreed. Let's go,' Stephanie replied, and led the way back
up the stairs. She was talking into her comms as she ran.
'Mark – B3 is hopeless and the stairwell down from there is
impassable. We're going to see if we can get into B2.'

A moment later they were back at the B2 emergency door.
Josh took the handle, turned it and pulled. It was stuck fast.

Crouching down, he surveyed the area around the lock. 'I'll
try blowing it,' he said. 'Step back.'

He tapped at the keypad on his wrist. A fine tube slid from
the cybersuit just above Josh's wrist. It was about two inches
long and made from a carbon-nanotube composite, super-strong
and super-light. He stepped close to the door, leaned
back and pointed his hand a few inches above the lock.
An intense blue light shot from the end of the tube. Josh
slowly moved his wrist down, and there was a loud crack
from the lock. The blue light snapped off and he grabbed
the handle.

The door flew into the stairwell, sending Josh with it. He
landed heavily at the edge of the stairwell and scrambled away
as rubble cascaded through the opening. He leapt onto the
handrail just ahead of the avalanche. Something caught his
arm as he jumped and he felt a sharp stab of pain in his side.

Stephanie and Mai were standing a few steps up the
stairs leading to the floor above. Stephanie reacted quickly,
grabbing Josh's arm as he flung himself onto the rail. Josh
hardly dared move as they watched the slurry tumble down
the stairs.

Scrambling up the handrail, Josh kept a few feet away
from the detritus flowing through the doorway, and landed
with little grace a step below Mai and Stephanie. The pain in
his side shot through him but he forced himself to ignore it.
Between them, the two women managed to haul him up the
stairs. Reaching the next turn, they could see down through
the doorway. The cascade had almost stopped now, but the
door was sealed. B2 was beyond reach.

'I need to stop a second,' Josh said, his voice pained.

'You're hurt,' Stephanie said and crouched beside him.

He was clutching his side. She felt the area gently and
Josh almost jumped out of his suit when her fingers found
a certain spot.

'I think you've broken a rib,' she said. Then, into her
comms, 'Base One – Josh is injured. Please activate Conus,
five mils. Nanobots need to be directed to left vertebro-sternal
rib five.'

'Sybil's onto it, Steph. What's your status?'

'Door to Level B2 is impassable. Apart from Josh's injury,
we're okay.'

'What's the plan?'

'We'll proceed to B1. See if we can get in that way and try
to get down to B3 via an alternative route.'

'Roger.'

As they spoke, Sybil activated the nano-implant in Josh's
brain stem, secreting the correct dose of painkiller into
his bloodstream. At the same time, the computer ordered
35 million nanobots to make their way to Josh's damaged
rib. It would take an hour for them to mend the break, but
the painkillers would keep him mobile and able to cope.

The painkiller kicked in almost instantly. Made from
a toxin found in the sting of the deadly cone snail
Conus
victoriae
, it used a protein called ACV1, which quickly binds
to pain receptors in the brain and shuts them down.

As soon as the toxin started performing its magic, Josh
got to his feet. 'I love this stuff,' he said with a grin. 'So, what
are we waiting for?'

Mai led the way up the stairs back to the emergency door
on B1. 'What do you reckon?' she asked the other two as
they met her in front of the door.

'I reckon it's our last chance,' Stephanie said grimly.

War was seated on the deck of his $50-million yacht
Rosebud
when he made the call to the other three Horsemen.
Rosebud
,
which he had christened in honour of his favourite movie,
Citizen Kane
, was moored off Naladhu, in the Maldives.
Powered by twin Bentley Marine gas turbines, the yacht
boasted six luxury suites, each overlooking the ocean, an
open-floor main deck 120 feet long, and a top-deck lounge
with an electro-hydraulic retractable roof served by elevator.
It could cruise comfortably at 40 knots.

The twenty crew members were all female and were
forbidden to wear tops while on duty. Two of them
were massaging War's massive neck as he lay on a lounger
in the bright afternoon sun. His huge gut was glistening
with suntan lotion. A trolley with a flat-screen computer
had been wheeled beside him. Each of the other Horsemen
was in a separate panel on the screen.

'Gentlemen,' War said, his eyes half-closed. He took
a sip of his mint julep made from 60-year-old Kentucky
bourbon. 'I hope I haven't called you away from anything
important.' He chuckled and his chins wobbled. 'Only we
have a problem.'

'What sort of problem?' Death asked. The wood
panelling of his Washington DC office could be seen in the
background.

'It appears our friend is still alive.'

The men on the screen stared at War impassively. They
were not easily rattled.

'How can you possibly know that?' Pestilence asked. He
was high above the Atlantic Ocean aboard a Hawker 400XP
private jet.

'Communications are my business, remember? My people
have picked up two separate cell phone calls from his private
number.'

'Anyone could be using his phone.'

'Possible, but unlikely. Especially as the second call was
to his wife.'

'So, the Dragon's work is
not
complete,' Conquest said,
his black eyes surveying the others. He was in the back of
a limousine being driven along Birdcage Walk in central
London. It was four am, the streets wet with rain.

'I have instructed him to hold his position. Naturally, he
is itching to complete his task.' War giggled like a child. The
girls rubbing his neck smiled inanely. He bent forward on
the lounger. 'A little lower,' he snapped at one of them. The
other three Horsemen caught a glimpse of tanned breasts
and, in the foreground, War's rolls of fat spilling over his
skimpy trunks. 'I assume you agree he should move in,' War
continued, raising his eyes to the screen.

'Of course,' Death said matter-of-factly. The other two
were nodding.

'There is one other thing,' War added after a pause. He
was relishing knowing things the others were unaware of,
and he wanted to string it out as much as possible.

'Stop being so damn melodramatic,' Pestilence snapped.

War giggled, but hatred lay behind his wrinkled cheeks.
He would love to have Pestilence's head in a vice, and to
slowly tighten it until it split open like a watermelon. 'There
is some strange group of rescuers at the site.'

'Rescuers?' It was Conquest, his face expressionless.

'My people report the presence of odd-looking aircraft at
the CCC appearing out of nowhere. They're a small group,
but they have technology no one's ever seen before.'

'What sort of technology?'

War gave a little shrug. 'I have no specifics.'

'Can you get images, video footage?'

'I'll try.'

'Where are these people from?' Pestilence asked.

'No idea.'

'What are they there for?'

War shrugged again. 'I just received the news myself.'

'This smells bad,' Conquest said grimly.

'Yes, I agree, it does,' Death responded. 'But we are in far
too deep to back out now. The Dragon must proceed. And,'
he added, glaring out of the flat-screen monitor, 'we must
get everything we can on these "rescuers". You never know,
gentlemen. We may acquire more from this operation than
the removal of a nuisance like Senator Kyle Foreman.'