The Curse of Medusa

CHAPTER NINE

Lea Donovan leaned forward in the plush leather couch and stared hard at the giant 3D Plasma TV. She was sitting in the tropical headquarters of ECHO on Elysium, an island nestling in the warm, turquoise waters of the Caribbean. It was most people’s idea of paradise, but what she was seeing unfold on the TV looked more like some kind of hell on earth.

Right now, she was watching coverage of Washington DC as filmed by a news chopper hovering on the outskirts of the city. The news reader was explaining that a serious terrorist attack was underway in the United States. The President had been kidnapped, the Vice President and Speaker had both been assassinated and a no-fly zone was in force across the city. It was, announced the newsreader with grim anguish, a day of terrible national tragedy.

“That explains why the news chopper’s flying so far out,” Ryan said. He collapsed in the chair beside her and pulled open a bag of popcorn.

Lea glared at him. “Haven’t you got any respect at all?”

“What?” As he spoke, some popcorn tumbled out of his mouth and landed in his lap.

“It’s not a bloody Hollywood movie, Ry. This is real people we’re talking about.”

His face grew serious. “Yeah thanks, I got that. I’m just hungry, that’s all. Want some?” He held out the bag to her and she waved it away with a scowl on her face.

“You can be so childish and insensitive sometimes.”

“I’d do anything to stop the scumbags behind this,” he protested. “I’m just hungry, so leave me alone.”

She made no reply, but turned away to see Scarlet out on the ocean, ripping past the window-wall on a red-sailed windsurfer. Protected in the lee side of the kite, she performed a flawless back loop before blasting further out to sea. She never seemed to be still for more than a few seconds, Lea thought. Even now, as the tropical sun was pitching down at its strongest, Scarlet Sloane was still searching for adventure.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of Ryan belching loudly. “Gross,” he said weakly. “I think a little bit of sick just came up.”

“For fuck’s sake, Ryan, get a grip.”

She heard a noise behind her and turned. Behind the couches in the center of the room was an impressive circular staircase of tempered glass and Brazilian cherry which lead to the mezzanine and offices on the upper level. Sir Richard Eden came bounding down it, three steps at a time, holding a slip of note paper.

Lea looked at his face. “So I guess you’ve heard about Washington?”

Eden shook his head. “No, what?” As he spoke he looked up at the TV set with horror.

“Terror attacks,” Lea said. “Massive, apparently.”

Eden’s face dropped. “My God, that’s terrible. “ He shook his head slowly and clenched his jaw. “We need to keep an eye on developments there.”

Ryan twisted in his seat. “So, we’re not packing for America then, boss?”

Eden looked at him, confused. “No. Why would be going to America?”

“Um — that,” Ryan said flatly, pointing at the TV set again.

“Of course not. We respond to matters concerning covert history and related anomalies.”

“So Poseidon, Thunder Gods and Osiris yes, but massive terror attacks no?”

Eden nodded. “Yes, and you have popcorn grease all around your mouth.”

As Ryan wiped the grease with his sleeve, Lea looked up at Eden.

“So if you’re not talking about the attacks in Washington, why did you come racing down here looking like you’ve seen a ghost?”

Eden looked at her, to Ryan, and then back to Lea. “You’d better come with me — alone.”

She followed him back to his private office. They took a seat and Eden started to speak.

When he had finished, Lea stared at her boss for a full minute in shocked silence. Then she wiped her eyes and sat up straight in her chair.

“My dad, you say?”

Eden nodded. “I know how hard this is for you, Lea. I knew Harry before you were born, and I was devastated when he died.”

Lea heard the words, but none of them seemed to make any sense. Her head was spinning so much from the revelation Eden had just delivered to her — but this time not in his usual calm and measured style. This time, he had sounded slightly ruffled and uncertain of things.

“Can we trust the source?” she asked quietly.

“Without a doubt. Sean McNamara was an old mutual friend of mine and your father’s, and this information comes from his sister.”

Her mind wandered. It felt like everything was falling apart. They had worked so hard to locate the elixir of eternal life, only for it to be snatched away when the Tomb of Eternity mysteriously crumbled away right under their feet. Then, to make matters worse, Joe Bloody Hawke had stormed off in a sulk because she had kept ECHO and Elysium a secret from him. She wanted to tell Hawke that he was being stupid, that she had to keep it from him — that was the way it worked. She wanted to kiss him… she wanted to throttle him. She didn’t even know where in the world he was, and now this.

She turned to face Eden. He was watching her, a look of understanding on his kind face.

“How many jets are available?” she asked.

“I thought you might ask that. The answer is two of the three. Sasha, Alfie and Ben are in Acapulco looking into the Wade affair.”

“Oh sure, I forgot about that… so I could use one then?”

He nodded. “For Harry Donovan’s girl, anything.”

Thanks to the tufts of wheat sticking out of the Jeep’s radiator grille, Hawke, Alex and Jack Brooke drew a certain amount of unwanted attention as they sped along Main Street and pulled into Friedman Memorial Airport.

Thanks to the Secretary’s phone call back on the highway, his jet was fuelled and ready to go, and a small contingent of men in the Bureau of Diplomatic Security who had stayed with the aircraft met them at the gate and ushered them outside to the apron.

“We have to get back to DC in a hurry,” Brooke said to Lopez, the lead BDS man. “Those sons-of-bitches killed three of my men back at the cabin and they almost killed me, my daughter and Joe Hawke here. Whoever the hell they are we need the President to respond and…”

Lopez and the other men shared a glance. He turned to the Pentagon chief. “You mean you haven’t heard, sir?”

Brooke stopped dead on the asphalt and the entire entourage screeched to a halt around him. He stared at Lopez. “Heard what?”

“The President’s been kidnapped, sir.”

Brooke looked incredulous. “Kidnapped? That can’t be possible!”

“Sorry, sir, but it’s more than possible — it just happened.”

Anger flashed across Brooke’s face. “Well, how the hell did it happen?”

Lopez shrugged his shoulders. “We don’t have the details, sir. It’s total chaos everywhere right now. From what we can gather he was snatched when he was down in Louisiana.”

“This is unbelievable.”

“I know, sir.”

They started walking again, faster now, and reached the plane where they stood at the bottom of the airstair. A few hundred yards to their right a group of men were refuelling an Embraer jet and readying it for takeoff.

“We gotta get back to DC right now. I’m going to need to talk to Mike Thorn. Has he been sworn in yet?”

Another glance. “Sir, the Vice President was killed this morning.”

Brooke’s face changed from anger to an incipient fear. “Killed?”

Lopez nodded. “He was shot by a sniper when he was leaving his house.”

Brooke looked at his daughter and ran a trembling hand over his stubble.

“And they also got Speaker Tobin — when he was at a football game with his wife. I would have told you earlier but I presumed you knew.”

“We were under attack, Lopez! We had no time to read the news.” Brooke’s eyes widened like saucers as he shook his head in disbelief and horror. “We’re talking about the total decapitation of the US Government!”

The normally hardened BDS men began to look nervous.

“Doesn’t that mean you’re the President or something?” Hawke asked.

Brooke shook his head. “No, I’m fifth in the presidential line of succession.”

“So who’s number four?”

Brooke put his hands on his hips and stared up at the sky for a few seconds. “After the Speaker, the presidential line of succession goes to the President pro tempore of the Senate.”

“And who’s that?” Hawke asked.

Brooke sighed and returned his gaze from the heavens. “Teddy Kimble.”

Hawke looked from Brooke to Alex and then back to Brooke. “You sound unhappy about something.”

“It’s nothing, it’s just that…”

With his words still hanging in the air, Brooke stopped talking and looked over Hawke’s shoulder, his jaw dropping in horror.

Hawke spun around to see a rocket-propelled grenade racing toward them.

“Run!” the Englishman shouted.

The group scattered in all directions as the grenade struck the port engine of the C-32 and ignited the kerosene contained in the wing. A series of enormous explosions tore through the aircraft and sent a white-hot fireball into the air over the airport.

The shockwave lifted Hawke and the others from their feet and blasted them away from the plane like rag dolls. Hawke smashed into the side of a small utility shed and fell to the asphalt with a smack. He shook his head, blinked and looked up to see the Secretary’s official aircraft had turned into nothing more than a blown-out airframe of twisted blackened metal. Flames poured from every part of it. It looked like the burned carcass of some hideous, dead monster.

Hawke now watched in horror as the pilots tried to escape on rope ladders hanging out of their windows, only to be mown down by the submachine gun fire of the men who had fired the grenade.

By now, the BDS men were on their feet and helping Brooke back onto his.

Hawke ran a few yards to Alex and helped her up.

“What the hell was that?” she asked.

“Up there,” Hawke said, pointing to the roof line of an industrial unit a few hundred yards beyond the airport’s western perimeter fence. “I saw a puff of smoke rising into the air when we turned and saw the grenade. I’m guessing it’s our friends who borrowed your Dad’s Corvette, plus a few of their friends.”

“Well whoever the hell they are,” Brooke said, joining them, “they’re not going to give up after one shot so get after them, Lopez!”

Lopez and the others fanned out and returned fire, temporarily pinning the enemy gunmen down. As the fighting continued, passengers, pilots and cabin crews streamed from their planes and ran for the cover of one of the hangars.

The familiar wail of sirens rose up in the hot Idaho air from behind the departure building. “Fire trucks and police…” Brooke said. He looked at the burning jet and shook his head in anger.

Lopez ran back over. “We took a couple of them out, but there has to be more. We need to get you out of here, Mr Secretary.”

“Concurred,” Hawke said. “And that’s how we’re going to do it.”

He pointed to the United Express Embraer jet a few hundred yards behind them that he had seen the men refuelling.

“Our pilots are dead, Joe!” Brooke shouted.

“I can fly that thing no problem,” he said. “It’s the only plane here with the range and we know it’s fuelled.”

Brooke gave Hawke a double-take. “You can fly it?”

“Almost one hundred percent certain.”

“Are you kidding me?” Alex said. “Almost one hundred percent?”

“It’s me or them!” Hawke said. He pointed as another one of Lopez’s men was shot through the chest and collapsed on the hot asphalt.

“Let’s get out of here!” Brooke said, and the four of them ran up the airstair and into the Embraer. From the top of the airstair, Brooke called out for Lopez to get on board, but he stayed behind to pin some approaching gunmen down behind a maintenance shed.

“Get in here, Lopez!” Brooke screamed.

“Yes, sir!”

He sprinted up the airstair, but as Special Agent Lopez began to close the heavy door behind him, one of the shooters fired a bullet through his neck. The round ricocheted off the far cabin wall, causing no damage, but Lopez was gone. He clutched at his neck in horror as he fell from the Embraer and landed with a sickening wet smack on the asphalt below.

Horror flooded through Jack Brooke, but he wasted no time in securing the door and joining Hawke and his daughter in the cockpit. It was time to take the fight to the enemy.