Chimera

CHAPTER 23

In the break room of the Draganov Research Center

Sergei Draganov and Aleksei Tsarovich had returned to the sanctuary of the Center’s lockable break room, and were now back to drinking vodka and arguing passionately. Both men were physically and emotionally exhausted.

“They will be here in one week,” Draganov pointed out for the second time. “We must have everything arranged by then. We have no choice in the matter. None whatsoever.”

“But would you let them come here, on our clinic grounds?”

Draganov’s blurry eyes widened in shock. “No, certainly not! We can never let them see the early mistakes — the creatures at MAX. If word got out to the research community, we would be finished. At best, we would never receive financial support again from anyone… at worst, we would be arrested.”

“I tell you again, we should have destroyed them at birth, Sergei Arturovich. We never should have let them live.”

“But there is so much we can learn from their development, even if it is… abnormal development.”

“There’s a big difference between learning and keeping evidence that can be used against us.”

“Yes, I understand that now,” Draganov acknowledged. “After the hunt is over, and Marcus and his men are gone, we will deal with the animals in MAX.”

In the Phuket hotel suite

Gedimin Bulatt had just drifted into a blissful sleep when the phone on the lamp table near his head began to ring loudly.

He fumbled for the phone, listened intently for about twenty seconds, reached for his Blackberry, quickly checked his e-mail listing, and then said “okay, we’ve got it. Thanks!”

He was starting to type with his thumbs on the Blackberry’s small keyboard when Pete Younger stumbled into the doorway of his small suite room.

“What the hell’s all that bloody racket about… and what time is it?” Younger demanded, trying to blink himself awake.

“That was Achara, and it’s four-thirty in the morning.”

“Achara? What’s she doing up at this hour?”

“Apparently working harder than we are,” Bulatt replied as he continued to type. “Chief Narusan found a latent print on the battery of that remote transmitter when he took it apart. She sent a photo of it to me, and I’m forwarding it to you right now.”

Younger’s eyes snapped wide open. “Christ, one of those bastards may be on file somewhere. I’ll get our Interpol lads on it ASAP.” He whirled around and ran over to his desk, indifferent to the fact that he was still in his underwear, sat down, activated his satellite-linked laptop, and quickly began calling up screens.

Bulatt pulled himself into a pair of jeans and then followed Younger into the living room where he collapsed into one of the stuffed chairs.

“Hell of a bloke, that Narusan. Sounds to me like you created yourself a CSI monster to go along with your princess warrior,” Younger said, his eyes now completely focused on his computer screen, “who, by the way, is an absolute doll, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“I noticed,” Bulatt said with a discernable edge to his voice.

“And?” Younger said, looking up from his laptop quizzically.

“And nothing. She’s Kulawnit’s daughter, for Christ sake.”

Younger smiled. “Feeling a little predatory, are we?”

“She’s a family friend, and a kid who’s deeply upset about her brother and father. I’m not going to take advantage of her emotions.”

“Good on you, mate,” Younger nodded approvingly as he went back to his computer. “Try to keep those noble thoughts in mind when she gets tired of waiting for you to be properly consoling, knocks you silly, and drags you off to a nice cozy cave.”

Bulatt blinked, starts to say something, and then hesitated as Younger visibly recoiled from his laptop screen.

“Bloody hell!”

“What’s the matter?”

“My latent query. I got a negative hit — no match to any of our linked databases.”

“In thirty seconds? That was fast.”

“Not just fast. Absolutely bloody impossible. My input generated an automatic full database scan, but there’s no way in hell our computers could have searched — ”

The desk phone on the lamp table next to Bulatt’s chair suddenly rang loudly.

Bulatt glanced curiously at Younger, who shrugged, and then picked up the handset.

“Hello?”

“Agent Bulatt?”

“Who’s asking?”

“Agent Smith. We need to talk.”

“About what?”

“Your recent latent query.”

“You mean the recent query we made approximately one minute ago?” Bulatt asked, his voice turning cold and dangerous.

“That’s correct. The Phuket Mariott coffee shop in one hour. Be there.”