Gorgon

CHAPTER 5

Kemel Baykal’s frustration showed in the volcanic glare he turned on the team of local police who were tasked with monitoring the image feeds from the cisterns. He had requested a twenty-four-hour watch on the cameras placed in both the inner and outer chambers of the deep tunnels. But sometime during the night, one of the image feeds had gone dead, and no one had noticed for several hours. Whoever was supposed to have been watching, wasn’t.

Baykal noticed a young policeman’s eyes darting back and forth, refusing to meet his own. You, he thought. He leaned his large frame toward the young man, his moustache a black shelf of bristles and fury.

At last the young man’s eyes slid up to his, and he dry-swallowed. ‘I just stepped out for —’

‘Go.’

The policeman’s mouth snapped shut. He looked like he was about to plead his case, but then must have thought better of it. He got to his feet and left the room.

Baykal turned to a seated technician and spun his finger in the air, indicating he wanted the relay feeds backed up so he could look at the information prior to the image whiteout, for the tenth time. He folded his arms, but one hand crept up to pull at his moustache. There was always something, a tiny speck that might seem insignificant but gave a clue as to what had taken place, he thought.

Concentration drew his brow into deep clefts on his forehead as he viewed the footage. Like all the other times, the cameras showed nothing — all was quiet, dark, no motion. However, the mobile unit still stationed over the pit had picked up some sound: initially, a sighing, or low weeping. Then a soft padding, like slow heavy footsteps, followed by a noise like ragged breathing — as if someone or something large was moving around in that pitch-black of the pit.

Baykal waited while the technician tried once again to focus in on the pit’s depths, but just as a slow-moving lump began to take shape, the camera’s lens clouded, as though steam had risen in front of its electronic eye, and then the image changed to static. The breathing turned to a soft hiss, a sob, and then something indistinct. If a language, it was impenetrable.

‘Kahretsin!’ Baykal’s curse bounced around the small room. He stood straighter, feeling an angry tension from his feet to his furrowed brow. His fist came down on the benchtop. ‘Again.’

The technician rewound the recording. The answers were there — they had to be. Baykal had had the place locked down, no one had gone in or out, and his guards were stationed at all known entrances. But he knew that for every entrance that was on a map, there could be a secret passage into the enormous 1500-year-old tunnel system that hadn’t been used for centuries.

Again the recording played; again, nothing. Baykal dragged his fingers through his hair. He couldn’t afford to sit on his hands any longer. His request for orders from his superiors had placed him in an operational suspended animation, but enough was enough. He needed information; he needed to know what happened to his men, the tourists, and the first police teams. There was a knot in his stomach that tightened every minute he delayed. For all he knew, there was a terrorist cell down there, releasing some strange gas or plague into the cisterns, which would slowly seep out to infect the whole of Istanbul.

He couldn’t send in another team; not after seeing Zeren Yanar literally crumbling to pieces before his eyes. Kemel Baykal had risen through the ranks of the elite Special Forces to become an Atsubay, and though age had ground down his stamina, his spirit remained as strong as ever. He wouldn’t ask a man to do anything he wasn’t prepared to do himself.

He picked up a phone. ‘I’m going in.’

Nobody spoke as Baykal kneeled beside Yanar’s remains. He held a long heavy flashlight up at shoulder level, and with his other hand reached out to touch the man’s shoulder. He hesitated; even though he and his team wore fully sealed level-1 biohazard suits made of toughened PVC, he had no idea if what he was seeing was the result of biological, chemical or radiological assault on the young man’s system. He shrugged and placed his gloved fingers on the body anyway. His first impression was of coldness, and a density more like concrete than flesh. There was no blood, just a dry and powdery residue, and chalk-like debris close to where Yanar’s body and head had separated.

He rolled the detached head toward him. Yanar’s face was literally frozen in a mix of agony and surprise. Baykal remembered the statue with the gold ring on its finger in the lower chambers. He had a growing suspicion about what might have happened to the missing tourists.

He half-turned to one of the men standing close behind him. ‘Bag it … him; all of it.’

He got slowly to his feet, wiping his hand on the biohazard suit’s trousers. He knew it was a futile gesture, but it was instinctive to want to shake off something so horrifying. He turned to his three soldiers waiting patiently and cradling skeletal M16s with illuminated flashlights on their barrels. He pulled his own pistol from the holster nestled in the middle of his back, nodded toward the pit, and walked to its edge. He stared down into the inky blackness for a few seconds, waving the flashlight’s beam back and forth.

Baykal was the first to descend. He eased down the slick steps, finding the thick PVC suit restrictive and counterproductive for any sort of stealthy approach. The faceplate was front-facing so he had no peripheral version; and the suit’s oxygen cells gave off a constant whine, like having a mosquito trapped inside with him, which meant any small external sounds were lost.

The deep chamber at the bottom of the steps was exactly as it had appeared on his original team’s monitors. Baykal waved his men toward the large archway, cautiously stepping over the tumbled stones and dislodged bricks scattering the floor. A few pieces of the statues were strewn about, and Baykal no longer thought their tortured expressions had been created by long-dead artisans with an eye for the macabre.

The SFC commander raised his hand and his small team halted mid-step. Something about the tunnel before him, the impenetrable darkness that refused to be illuminated by his pipe of yellow light, made his animal instincts scream. Fight or flight. His heart rate must have been close to a hundred beats per minute; he could feel the pulse from his stomach to his neck.

Baykal swallowed, and carefully placed one foot in front of the other until he passed under the arch of the doorway. His three men immediately followed, fanning out to either side of him. Baykal moved his flashlight around the room: it was no more than fifty square feet, and octagonal in shape.

‘Temple room.’ His voice sounded loud inside his suit.

The walls were decorated with mosaics of serpents and hideous faces either screwed in torment or with something like blue ropes writhing around their heads. Baykal stepped toward one of the faces and saw that its eyes were filled with a dulled orb of metal. Lifting his light he realized that it was solid silver. He rubbed his gloved thumb back and forth across one of the orbs, and revealed his own ghostly reflection. Pure, he thought, to remain intact and without corrosion.

He turned and moved his flashlight around the room; each set of eyes glowed momentarily as the beam passed over them. When his light came to the farthest wall, it fell into more depth — there was another small room. He motioned for two of his men to approach from one side, as he moved up from the other.

The vestibule was undecorated, suggesting it was a vault rather than the antechamber of a place of worship. In its center stood a vessel made of age-darkened bronze. It was huge, six feet across, and stood on three ornate clawed feet. On the side was a horrible face, crowned with what looked like writhing snakes.

There was a manhole-sized cover resting on the floor, and bronze chain-links strewn about nearby. Judging by the fresh scars on the side of the huge urn, Baykal assumed the cover had only recently been removed. Whatever had been inside had been sealed in tight and then the lid further locked.

The Special Forces commander walked forward and then stopped, frowning. He looked around the vestibule. It didn’t make sense. The urn was large, and certainly could have held several people, but it wasn’t big enough to conceal the thirty-plus that had gone missing.

Baykal stared at the urn, concentration making his eyes burn. All he heard was his own breathing and the whine of his suit’s air-conditioning unit. Though he was thankful for the insulation, he wished he could have turned it off momentarily, so he could listen, or smell the air, or use any of his other senses, rather than having to rely on the narrow focus of vision the faceplate afforded him.

His men held their positions, waiting for him to make a move or issue an order. Any of them would have been willing to peer inside the vessel first, but Baykal never asked his men to do anything he wouldn’t consider doing himself. He sucked in a deep breath and stepped forward, his flashlight in one hand, the other gripping a gun held defensively in front of his face, his finger already putting pressure on the trigger. If someone, or something, unfriendly leaped out, it would take a point-blank slug to the head.

He edged over the rim … and then exhaled, long and slow. He hadn’t even realized he’d been holding his breath. Relief flooded his muscles as the oxygen inflated his lungs. Whatever had been inside the huge vessel was gone, or had been dust for over a thousand years.

‘Empty,’ he said.

One of Baykal’s men lifted his M16 to shine the barrel-mounted flashlight into the urn. He craned his neck forward. ‘Almost … I think there’s something down at the bottom.’

The soldier motioned to one of his colleagues, who pushed his own gun up over his shoulder and made a cradle with his hands. Putting his foot into the interlocked fingers, the first man stepped up over the side of the bronze urn and dropped down inside. His boots clanged against the heavy base as he landed.

The two remaining soldiers crowded forward, but Baykal held up his hand. ‘Taluz, keep watch.’

The man nodded, and went to stand at the entrance to the vestibule.

‘What have you got?’ Baykal kept his voice hushed.

The man inside the pot straightened; he was holding something in his hand. He shrugged. ‘Flakes … like scales or fingernails, I think.’

‘Scales? Of what?’ Baykal asked, his voice rising slightly.

The soldier shrugged again, and Baykal motioned with his thumb for him to climb out. ‘Whatever was here has long gone. Let’s get back topside.’

The soldier went to drop the material to the floor, but Baykal stopped him. ‘Bring it with us. I want to take Yanar’s remains too. We still need to find out what the hell killed him.’ He looked around. ‘And everyone else that came down here.’

‘Sir.’ It was Taluz, still in the doorway. He waved Baykal over. ‘You’ve got to see this.’

Baykal followed him out of the chamber and around the corner. Behind a mound of debris and shattered wall tiles, there was another exit — or at least a huge hole smashed through the wall.

Taluz crouched beside it. ‘Looks like someone found another way out.’

Baykal got down beside him and ran his hand around the edge of the hole — new stone. He shook his head. ‘No, not another exit. It looks like someone made their own exit.’

By the look of the gouges and smashed and pulverized debris, something had literally torn a hole through the wall, at great speed.

Baykal cursed. ‘Whatever was trapped in here has got out. And it’s now somewhere in our city.’

CHAPTER 6

Jack ‘The Hammer’ Hammerson sat in his darkened office watching the feed from the VELA satellite. His face was an emotionless mask as his fingers pressed several buttons on a keypad recessed into his desk, causing the image to dive down and enlarge and then clarify the moving figure. The man was tall and bearded with long hair — a typical drifter, like thousands right across the States. Anonymous, invisible — but not to all. Not to Jack Hammerson. He’d been tracking his former Special Ops soldier ever since he’d given the impression of stepping off the side of a mountain in the southern Appalachians a year back.

Alex Hunter, the Arcadian — Hammerson would know him anywhere. He’d been tracking him for months. Many times he’d sent clean-up crews to deal with the damage Alex had inflicted on some person or group determined to interfere with him. Just recently, Hammerson had watched Alex pursued by three men just outside of Omaha. He’d entered an alley, and men had followed. Hammerson had known what the outcome would be even before he’d hijacked an adjacent CCTV feed to watch Arcadian dismantle the men in under seventeen seconds. Community service, Hammerson had thought at the time.

Alex was nearing a phone booth. Hammerson paused for a second, but his hand moved without him even thinking about it. He slid an onscreen bombsite over the phone box and pressed another key — the phone’s number appeared over the box, with two highlighted options: Call or Cancel. He pressed down, and the number flashed green as the call was initiated.

The tall bearded man slowed as the phone rang, and stared at it. Hammerson could have sworn the face behind the beard twisted into a smile.

‘Pick it up,’ Hammerson said.

Alex started walking again, past the phone, then stopped and looked up … almost directly into the lens of a satellite hovering more than 20,000 miles overhead.

Hammerson waited, looking back into the young man’s face. Time seemed to stretch as he remembered the remarkable warrior Captain Alex Hunter had become. Severely wounded in a black ops mission in Chechnya, Alex was expected to live out his existence in some sterile hospital wing, with just the beep and hiss of artificial respirators for company. Hammerson had intervened and personally authorized administration of the experimental Arcadian treatment — and it had worked, sort of. How, was a mystery — a fluke of circumstances; a thousand variables colliding at just the right time to see the man revived. But the Alex Hunter that woke was different — vastly superior in strength and stamina, with senses more acute than any other human being. As unique an individual as he was an enigma to both the US military and the USSTRATCOM Science Division’s Alpha Soldier Research Unit.

Hammerson had told his young soldier that the startling and unnatural changes he was experiencing were ‘gifts’ — but some gifts came with a price. For all the advantageous changes to his physicality, Alex had also been afflicted by psychological tempests — a beast within him. Conditioning had taught him to manage his furies, and sometimes control them, but they were never fully suppressed. Instead, they waited inside him, growing stronger each time, until they burst forth in a rampage of obliteration. Alex Hunter was like a high-powered weapon: a military game-changer, but one that if not handled correctly could destroy those trying to wield it.

Alex strode into the phone booth and lifted the handset. ‘Jack.’

The single word made Colonel Jack Hammerson sit forward in his chair, his mouth momentarily dry. ‘Hello, son,’ he managed, then waited for Alex to speak again.

‘I know you’ve been following me.’ Alex’s voice had an edge to it.

Hammerson shook his head even though he knew Alex couldn’t see it. ‘Not out of malice or intent, just… looking out for you.’

‘I don’t need a minder; I don’t need anyone. I’m not safe to be around, remember?’

Hammerson smiled. ‘We’re HAWCs, we’re not supposed to be safe to be around.’ He paused, steeling himself. ‘We want you to come back in.’

The silence that followed felt like it had physical weight. Hammerson knew what he was saying wasn’t wholly true — he needed his soldier to come in from the cold, but he wasn’t ready to bring him back onto the base. Quite simply, Alex Hunter, the Arcadian, was supposed to be dead. Incinerated in a chemical furnace in the bowels of the military’s disposal centers; turned to ash to destroy the lethal bacteria that was overrunning his system. And also to throw off some pretty pissed doctors in the medical division who wanted him back to work out why he’d survived the Arcadian treatment when all other subjects had turned into self-destructive psychopaths. Captain Robert Graham had found out about Alex’s survival, which was another reason to leave him out in the wilderness; but the game had changed. Graham had gone missing, which gave Hammerson an opportunity.

‘I’m tired,’ Alex said, his tone flat and emotionless.

‘You? Hard to believe.’ Hammerson concentrated on the young man’s movements, his body language and facial expressions, his voice, assessing his operational status.

Alex looked over his shoulder, as if concerned about being overheard. ‘Not physically. I get bad dreams still.’

‘We all have them,’ Hammerson said calmly. ‘Can’t outrun them, so best to embrace them, try and understand them, determine which are real and which aren’t. We can help you. We’re ready now.’

‘What about Graham?’

‘Not an issue any more, but there are others still looking for you. You need to keep eyes in the back of your head. Look, Alex, there’s too much to bring you up to speed on now. Let’s discuss it over a coffee. Where can I find you?’

Hammerson knew exactly where Alex was, but wanted to check whether the man was aware of his own location. Or was he wandering aimlessly along endless highways?

There was more silence, then. ‘Lincoln. But you know that.’

Hammerson smiled. Only about fifty miles or so south-west. He split his screen and called up a street map.

Alex spoke again. ‘I’m close to the Capitol Building — I can wait.’

Hammerson traced some gridlines on the streetscape. ‘No, there’s too much surveillance there. Stay indoors or out of sight — we’ll find you. I can be there in a few hours. Do you need anything?’

‘No, just to talk is fine. I’ll grab something to eat.’ There was a pause. ‘Come alone, Jack,’ Alex said.

‘I only ever bring what I need,’ Hammerson said, and disconnected. He kept the phone in his hand, then dialed again. ‘Reid, suit up. You’re taking a trip with me to Lincoln … to meet an old friend.’

Alex reached up to feel his face — he was clean-shaven after carrying a full beard for months. It felt good. He’d rented a room for the shower, then cut away his beard and long hair, and discarded most of his old clothes. He was wearing the last clean shirt he owned; he’d get some new ones later. First he had more pressing needs — his body craved food, again; a side effect of a blistering metabolism. It was eleven ten in the morning — late for breakfast, and early for lunch. He crossed the road to a small red-brick restaurant and sat down in one of the outside tables, close to the wall, sheltered by some potted palms but facing the street.

A tall thin waiter pushed out through the door and stared at Alex with a mix of disdain and concern. ‘I’m sorry, sir, we’re not open yet.’

Alex pointed with his thumb over his shoulder. ‘That’s okay, I can wait. It says on the wall that you open in twenty minutes.’

The waiter pursed his lips, obviously contemplating whether he was going to allow Alex to sit there, in or out of business hours. Alex smiled again, trying to appear as harmless as was possible for a large stranger with intense eyes.

The waiter rearranged his features to feign sympathy. ‘There’s a nice little café down the road that’s open right now. Why don’t you try there? ’

He went to pull the menu from Alex’s hands, and suddenly Alex was gripping the man’s wrist a little too tightly. He wasn’t even aware he’d moved; the response was automatic, like someone else was controlling him for that split second.

‘Let go … please.’ The waiter’s voice rose in pitch.

Alex fought an overwhelming urge to bring his fingers together and crush down on flesh and bones.

‘Please.’ The man used his other hand to pry at Alex’s fingers. ‘Please!’

Alex blinked, finally hearing him, and let go. ‘Sorry … just tired. I only want something to eat, coffee to start, and then I’m gone.’

The waiter held his hand up in front of his face, recoiling from Alex’s gaze. Alex smiled again, sat back and tried to look relaxed. He knew he could be frighteningly intimidating; hell, his glare made other soldiers take pause. He breathed in and out slowly, easing the anger back into its cage. He didn’t want to become some kind of bogyman that dogs barked at and people crossed the road to avoid.

The waiter looked up and down the street. Alex could tell he was wondering whether he was going to need assistance from the local police — exactly the sort of attention that Alex wanted to avoid. He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a roll of notes, peeled off two hundred-dollar bills and laid them on the table.

‘Just a steak, rare, and keep the change.’

The waiter’s eyes darted from the money to Alex, then back to the money.

‘Just a rare one, then I’m gone,’ Alex said again, and slid the notes across the table.

The waiter’s lips pursed for a second before pulling up into a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. ‘One rare steak, very good, sir. Would you like fries and salad?’

Alex shook his head. ‘Just the steak, and make it a big one — half a cow.’

The waiter laughed obsequiously, and backed away into the dark interior of the restaurant.

Alex exhaled, sat back and rubbed a hand through his hair. He kept the hand up, examining it as he curled it into a fist. The knuckles popped and stood out, raised and callused. They looked hard enough to break rock — which they could. He dropped his hand, slid down a few inches in his chair and reflected on his coming meeting. He wanted to trust Colonel Jack Hammerson, and for the most part he felt he could. He had saved Hammerson’s life in the Appalachians, and in turn the tough old soldier had had his back more times than Alex could remember. But there was a seed of doubt that urged caution.

Before he’d seen Aimee and the kid, Alex had wanted to disappear; he’d even wished for death. But seeing them had changed everything. They made him want to live again. But as long as he suffered these uncontrollable rages, he was a danger to them. He couldn’t protect them if he was far away, but he couldn’t guarantee he wouldn’t hurt them if he was close. There had to be an answer. If Hammerson wanted something from him, then he would need to trade for it.

The waiter put a coffee down, and Alex drained it in one. Next came the steak. He looked at it and nodded. ‘Nice.’ The thick and bloody slab of meat hung over the sides of the plate. Alex ate slowly, savoring every bite.

As he chewed, he watched the surrounding area. Half a mile down the road, Antelope Park’s manicured lawns and memorial displays were just visible. The nearest monument was two huge slabs of black polished marble, each seven feet tall, containing hundreds of names of local soldiers lost in Vietnam. Further in, a ghostly platoon of statues, nearly twenty of them, in rain ponchos and helmets, marched eternally as a tribute to those who’d died in the Korean War. Alex stared at the frozen marchers. He too had served, and fallen, but he’d woken and come back, whether he liked it or not. The day would come when he stayed down, but unlike these men, he would be remembered by few.

Alex sensed the approach of the van before it glided into the end of the street. He watched as it pulled in a few blocks down from the cafe. Even though its windows were darkened, he knew the HAWC commander was inside. He also knew he hadn’t come alone.

Alex eased back behind the plants. The van’s front door opened and a solidly built older man stepped out onto the sidewalk. He rolled his sleeves down, placed his hands on his hips and turned slowly to scan the street from all angles. Colonel Jack ‘Hammer’ Hammerson. He put a hand over his eyes as though to shield them from the sun; his thumb was curled and Alex knew he held a scope. He turned slowly, stopping at the cafe building. Even though he doubted Hammerson would spot him, Alex backed further in behind a thick palm.

The van’s side door slid back and the vehicle tilted sideways and down as one of the largest men Alex had ever seen — all shoulders and arms, and slightly older than himself — stepped down. Something about the way the man moved was odd, but Alex immediately knew him: First Lieutenant Sam Reid — Uncle Sam. The name came back to him easily.

He couldn’t make out any unusual bulges or indentations on either man that might have indicated weaponry, but given what he knew of the HAWCs that didn’t mean they weren’t armed with something that could deliver unconsciousness or death instantaneously. Alex shook his head. Now I’m being paranoid, he thought. If Hammerson wanted me dead, I wouldn’t be breathing. He sucked in a deep breath and stood. Time to join the party.

Hammerson stood at ease, his hands behind his back, as Alex approached, but Alex heard his soft aside to his companion: ‘Heads-up.’ Sam Reid moved to stand at Hammerson’s shoulder. Alex could feel their apprehension, but no fear.

He stopped about six feet from them and looked from Jack Hammerson to the large HAWC behind him. ‘Sam Reid.’

Immediately the large man’s face broke into a grin, and he seemed about to step forward and shake Alex’s hand.

‘Stand fast, Reid.’ Hammerson’s eyes were like lasers.

Alex returned the unwavering gaze. ‘You said you’d come alone.’

‘I said I’d bring what I need. Sam’s my left arm now … and besides, I couldn’t have kept him away if I tried. You still have friends you know, Alex; people who want to see you, who believe in you … and want you to return to us.’

Hammerson kept his eyes on Alex’s face as he spoke, no doubt searching for anything that might indicate instability. Alex conducted his own examination, reading the older warrior for signs of nerves, discomfort, a drip of perspiration on the forehead, a slight elevation in breathing, heart rate or body temperature — anything that might indicate deception.

‘Not sure what you want or expect, Jack. You handed me over to the Israelis, remember. They tried to kill me.’

Hammerson’s eyes were unwavering. ‘I did, and they took a huge risk taking you in. But they panicked when you ran. Bottom line: they saved you when we couldn’t. You were infected with a lethal necrotizing bacteria — I couldn’t do anything for you here, so gave you into their care. You survived, intact. Everyone else that got infected wasn’t so lucky.’

‘Intact?’ Alex shook his head.

‘That’s right.’ Hammerson took a step forward. ‘I know you lost a lot, and your memory’s been fragmented. But I’m here to tell you that we’re your friends. We can help you rebuild.’

‘Adira said the US medical division wanted to cut me up —’

‘Adira Senesh is gone,’ Hammerson cut in. ‘She caused some pain — to all of us. But she’s home now, safe and sound. Forget her.’

‘My own people wanted to pull me to pieces to see what makes me tick,’ Alex finished. He still had nightmares about being tied down in a sterile white lab on cold stainless steel.

‘I’ll never let that happen, son. Circumstances have changed — one reason we’re here today. I swear, you can trust us.’

‘Alex looked up. ‘And can you trust me?’

‘I think so,’ Hammerson said.

‘That’s why you wore body armor.’

Hammerson half-smiled as he tapped the plating under his shirt. ‘Hope for the best, plan for the worst.’

The three men stood in silence, the seconds stretching.

Sam broke the quiet. ‘It’s good to see you again, boss.’

The big HAWC took a few steps forward and Alex looked down at his legs, his eyes narrowing slightly. The sound was almost imperceptible to normal hearing, but Alex had picked up the slight whine that accompanied the movement of turbo hydraulics.

‘Did I do that?’ he asked.

Sam shook his head. ‘No. You saved my life. You sent what did this to me straight back to hell. But the mission went to shit, for both of us. I lost my legs, and you … you lost a lot of your life.’

Alex nodded. ‘I remember you … in the jungle.’

‘You’re back,’ Sam said. ‘That’s all that matters.’

‘Not yet.’ Alex slowly turned his head to scan the street, the buildings and other potential areas of concealment. Satisfied, he turned back to Hammerson. ‘Well, you called me.’

‘That I did,’ Hammerson responded. ‘Wanted to see how you were — in person. See if you’ve found what you were looking for.’

‘You know the answer to that,’ Alex said, and snorted softly. ‘I’ve felt you on my shoulder the past few months now.’

Hammerson smiled back. ‘Son, we were never off your shoulder. As I said, we were watching over you.’ He took a step forward. ‘Fact is, there’s a lot of people out there who want to do you harm.’

‘I can take care of myself. And no, I didn’t find what I was looking for. When I got there, it had all changed. You know that.’

Hammerson took another step toward his protégé. ‘Everything changes; it’s what makes life interesting. We want you to come back to us. We think —’

‘Makes life interesting?’ Alex shook his head. ‘I don’t want interesting. I want normal. I want my life back the way it was. I want to have a wife, a family. I want to go home after a day’s work, have a few beers with friends. I want normal.’

Hammerson shook his head slowly. ‘We don’t do normal. I know you know that, Alex.’

‘Jack, I don’t want this life anymore. I want to go home. I was nearly there.’ Alex remembered Joshua waving goodbye to him. ‘I was so close.’ His eyes bored into Hammerson’s. ‘Do you know about Joshua?’

The older man seemed to relax. But Alex knew he was doing the complete opposite — he was making his body loose, ready.

‘Yes,’ Hammerson said.

Alex’s jaw clenched. ‘You knew. And you knew he was mine.’

‘We suspected it. We assessed it was better to monitor the mother and child, stay away from them. Let them —’

‘Let them what? Continue thinking I’m dead? Live a normal life without me? I should be there with them.’

Hammerson shook his head. ‘You’re not ready.’

He turned slightly side-on. Alex recognized the defense position. So much for trust. He rubbed his temple, feeling the ache again, deep inside.

‘That’s just it. I’ll never be ready. You should have let me die after Chechnya.’

‘I chose to stay away and make them safe,’ Hammerson said. ‘And I think you did too. I take risks — we both do, every single day of our lives — and sometimes it’s my goddamn shitty job to decide what’s an acceptable risk for someone else. When I authorized the Arcadian treatment for you, it was a risk. But the alternative was leaving you as a brain-dead bag of meat on a hospital bed. Is that what you would have preferred? You’re alive and walking around — you got a good deal.’

‘I’m a ghost — I don’t exist! Alex Hunter, the real Alex Hunter, died on that damned operating table, and what’s left is some sort of military killing machine. I can’t even speak to my son. I’ve got nothing!’

Alex’s head throbbed, and a small voice began to whisper its hate to him.

‘Bullshit! Time to stop feeling sorry for yourself, soldier.’ Hammerson yelled the words, chin jutting, jabbing his finger into Alex’s face.

We’ll all be better off if you’re dead.

Alex ground his teeth. Did Hammerson just say that?

The experiment was a failure. Time to clean the books — wipe out you and your abomination offspring.

Alex shook his head. ‘What did you say?’

Hammerson spoke again, but Alex couldn’t hear his words. There was another voice, even louder in his head.

We don’t need you any more … we’ve got the kid. We can cut him up — see what makes him tick.

‘Like hell you will!’ Alex’s hand shot out to grab Hammerson around the neck.

Sam moved at a fantastic speed for someone his size, took hold of Alex’s forearm and yanked. Without releasing his hold on Hammerson, Alex grabbed Sam’s shirtfront with the other hand. Sam was a big man, weighing in at around 250 pounds, with the MECH suit adding another eighty to that, but Alex slowly lifted him till his huge boots were clear of the ground.

‘Put him down, Alex,’ Hammerson wheezed through a constricted windpipe. ‘You’re fighting the wrong guys.’

Alex lifted Sam higher. His arm was beginning to vibrate, not so much from the strain but from the conflict going on in his head.

Remind them who you are. They’ll only leave you and the boy alone if you teach them a lesson.

Alex’s teeth were compressed, and his eyes blazed, as he fought against himself.

Sam remained calm, unresisting. He let go of Alex’s forearm. ‘We came here for you, Alex — as friends. Listen to me, Alex, hear my voice. You’re safer with us. You want your life back … then you come back to us.’

‘I don’t need anyone any more,’ Alex said, but he released both HAWCs and turned away. The voice in his head still raged, but he shut it out.

Hammerson coughed and rubbed his neck. ‘So what now? You’re just going to carry on drifting around and messing up muggers? There’s more to life for you than that.’

Alex started to walk away and Hammerson raised his voice. ‘You never spoke to Aimee, did you?’

Alex stopped but kept his back turned.

‘Why not?’ Hammerson asked. ‘You tracked her down.’

‘She doesn’t need me,’ Alex said. He heard Hammerson step toward him.

‘You don’t know that, son. She still calls me. One guess what we talk about.’

Alex turned, frowning. ‘She thinks I’m dead, and she’s better off that way.’

‘Yeah? Maybe her head thinks so, but her heart tells her something different. Intuition, I guess. She always was pretty insightful. I’m betting she looks at that kid and sees you, every day.’

Alex shook his head. ‘You were right; I’m not ready. Everything’s messed up. Inside me is a tornado of chaos and violence. Not good for Aimee or the boy.’

‘I can’t make promises,’ Hammerson said, ‘but I know that you’re out of options by yourself. With us, you still have some.’ He put his hand on Alex’s shoulder. ‘What if I said we could give you back the stability you need? We can bring you back in undercover, and the medical division will work with you on your terms. Marshal’s in charge there now.’

Alex felt like a door opened a crack and light shone through. ‘Graham’s gone?’

Hammerson nodded, but didn’t expand on the subject. ‘You have my word that we’re here to help — fill in some of those blanks.’

Alex raised his head and gazed at the trees in Antelope Park. Anything’s better than the half-life I’m leading now, he thought.

‘There’s something else,’ Hammerson said. ‘Uli Borshov’s on our turf — could be fixing to pay you a visit.’

‘Borshov.’ The name conjured up an image of a giant of a man, freezing caves, and monstrous brutality. Alex remembered a gun barrel pointed at his face — the blast and then blackness. ‘You want me to kill him?’

‘No. If we can find him, we’ll do that ourselves. He’s snatched Captain Graham, which can’t be a coincidence. If he’s after you too, there’s no telling who he’ll try and get to. With Borshov, no one is safe … no one.’

Alex’s shoulders slumped. ‘Aimee. Joshua.’

Hammerson nodded. ‘We’re watching them, but …’

Alex stared into the distance, thinking. He knew he was being manipulated, but if there was a chance of curing the rages he suffered from, the price was negligible. He might even get to live a more normal life, and make it safer for those around him he cared about. He looked at Hammerson, and the older soldier’s craggy face curved into a grin.

‘Aimee and Joshua are safe. Don’t worry about them. But we’ve all got some scores to settle with that big bastard, and we’ve got some leads. Let’s grab a coffee and we can catch you up on a few things.’

‘Borshov the beast.’ After another few seconds, Alex returned the smile. ‘Coffee sounds good. I know a place — I’m a regular.’