Callsign: King

28.

His liquid body armor stopped Fulbright’s bullet from piercing his heart, but the impact was like getting hit in the chest with a baseball bat. King staggered back, rebounding off the wall of the elevator car as Fulbright fired again and again.

The rogue CIA agent was trying for a headshot.

King twisted to the side, and blindly squeezed off a volley from the P220. Fulbright was already gone. Struggling to breathe past the pain in his chest, King pushed off the elevator wall and stormed out, hoping to catch his foe off guard.

Instead, he found Fulbright standing behind Sara, his smoking pistol held against her cheek. “You know how this works, Sigler. I don’t give a shit whether you live or die, so you can trust me when I say that the only way you and your girlfriend are going to get out this alive, is if you put down your weapons. But if they don’t hit the floor in about five seconds, I promise I will pull this trigger.”

King’s eyes narrowed as he studied Fulbright across the distance. “Five seconds? One Mississippi…”

“What the hell are you doing?”

King fired the P220.

The. 45 caliber ACP round whispered past the suppressor and plowed into the barely exposed side of Fulbright’s head. The CIA man spun away, the pistol falling unused from his nerveless grip.

Sara gaped at King in disbelief. “Nice shooting.”

“Thanks. Where’s Graham?”

Sara glanced around, but the silver-haired man was gone. Then she was in his arms, unable to hold back the tears. “He said you were dead, but I never believed it. I knew you’d come for me.”

He hugged her tight. “Not even God could stop me. Okay, well maybe God, but-”

“It is you!” This incredulous exclamation was from another female voice, and King glanced up to find Felice standing a few steps behind them. “You sure know how to make an entrance.”

King gave her a tight smile. “I know how to make a pretty good exit, too. Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

Felice nodded eagerly and strode toward the elevator doors. Sara seemed unwilling to let go of him, but he gently loosened her grip while still holding her hand in his. “Let’s get you home, Dr. Fogg.”

But suddenly his legs were swept from beneath him and fell backward, crashing heavily onto the floor. The impact sent a wave of pain through his body, aggravating a host of scrapes and bruises that had not yet begun to heal, and for a moment, he could only lay motionless, struggling to breathe. That moment was long enough for his attacker to gain the upper hand.

A hideous specter materialized above him; a familiar face-Fulbright’s face-on one side, and on the other, a swollen mass of destroyed flesh, weeping blood and serous fluid. His hands sought out King’s throat and closed, shutting off the flow of blood to King’s brain and the exchange of air to his lungs.

King clawed at Fulbright’s choke hold, but could not gain an iota of relief. Dark spots started to swim across his vision, but through the descending night, he saw Sara hammering at the rogue agent’s face with her fists in a desperate effort to free King. Nothing worked. Fulbright was almost certainly mortally wounded, certainly suffering incomprehensible pain, but none of that mattered. There was no trace of sanity to be found in his remaining eye, but the force empowering his grip was singular in nature. He wanted King dead, and nothing would prevent that.

He let go of Fulbright’s stranglehold and with fumbling fingers, found the hilt of his KA-BAR. Desperately, he slid the blade from its sheath and stabbed out blindly. The knife struck something hard and then twisted out his grip, as King felt his consciousness start to go.

“Stop!”

The commanding voice was barely audible through the roaring in King’s ears, but miraculously the darkness began to lift. He drew in a painful breath, welcoming the restored flow of blood to his brain, and struggled to sit up.

Fulbright squatted nearby, his one good eye gazing blankly into space. His injuries continued to bleed, including a new one just below his collarbone, where the hilt of King’s KA-BAR protruded, but he seemed unaware of any of it. Covered in blood, he looked almost exactly like…

King turned to meet Felice’s gaze and understood in an instant what had happened, what she had done. He searched her eyes, but saw no trace of the guilt or despair that had marked her earlier. She had found some untapped reservoir of strength; the strength to do what needed to be done, and to make an ability out of her liability.

She was probably more dangerous than ever before.

“Thank you,” he croaked.

Felice just nodded.

Sara helped him up and held onto him as they moved to the elevator doors. Sara pushed the button calling the car, but nothing happened. The button didn’t light up and there was no sound of machinery in the emptiness beyond.

“Graham,” King said. “He must have shut them off to strand us down here.”

“Or it’s Brainstorm,” Sara replied.

King cast an inquisitive glance her way and listened intently as she quickly recounted what Fulbright had told her about Brainstorm and her own experiences with the disembodied electronic voice. As she related her suspicions about Brainstorm being a sentient computer, King recalled Deep Blue’s metacorporation conspiracy theory, and then he remembered something Graham had told him: subbasement level two was the computer room.

Surely it can’t be that easy, King thought.

He was right.

“King, do you read?” Deep Blue’s voice scratched in his ears. He sounded a little more frantic than usual.

He keyed his mic. “This is King. Send it.”

“I’ve just detected a massive cruise missile launch, targeted at your coordinates.”

“Missiles? Whose?”

“Ours. They were launched from a naval missile frigate. I’m still trying to identify the boat and figure out who ordered the strike, but there are Tomahawks inbound. You’ve got about ten minutes to get out of there.”

“Easier said than done.” He released the mic key and quickly relayed the bad news to the others.

Sara’s eyes widened, and then she abruptly crossed the room and took a seat in front of a computer desk. “Brainstorm, are you there?” When no answer came, she leaned over the keyboard and tapped out a message.

A moment later, an electronic voice filled the room. “What is your request, Dr. Fogg?”

“Are you responsible for the missiles that are heading here?”

“I am.”

“How did you manage that?” King asked, not knowing whether Brainstorm would respond to him. “Did you hack into the Defense Department?”

“It was not necessary to infiltrate that computer network. I merely sent a priority message to the United States military Central Command, authenticated with Fulbright’s credentials, stating that this location is a secret terrorist training camp.”

“Why did you do that?” Sara asked, a hint of desperation in her voice.

“He’s just covering his tracks,” King supplied.

“You are only partially correct, Mr. Sigler. I am also ensuring that you do not survive to further compromise my activities. There is a 72.5% probability that you will make destroying the Brainstorm network a priority, if you are permitted to live.”

“There’s no ‘probable’ about it.” King said. “I am going to take you apart.”

“That is unlikely. The probability that you will survive the missile strike is only 23.2%.”

“Brainstorm, you can’t do this,” Sara pleaded. “You can’t…you must not allow Felice to be killed.”

“Please explain.”

“You already know that Felice was affected by something in that cave, and you know what she can do now, right?”

“Anecdotal reports have been received and evaluated. There is evidence to suggest that Miss Carter is linked to incidences of evolutionary regression. The destruction of the facility will eliminate that threat.”

“No it won’t. Felice isn’t just a carrier of some virus. Her consciousness is quantum entangled with that of the entire human race. If you kill her, it will cause evolutionary regression on a global scale. You’ll be responsible for the downfall of humanity.”

King searched Sara’s eyes and saw that she was deadly serious.

“You are mistaken,” Brainstorm replied.

King thought it odd that there was no calculation of probabilities; Brainstorm was exhibiting the very human tendency of denial. “She’s not,” he declared. “And you know it. You have to stop this. If Felice dies, humanity dies, and who will you rule over then?”

“That is a chance I will have to take. Good-bye.”