The Curse of Medusa

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Kiefel watched Alan Pauling as he counted him down to the next live broadcast and gave him the silent signal to speak to the world once again. For Kiefel, holding the American population in thrall like this brought him joy beyond measure.

“People of America! The time has come for me to deliver on the promise I made to you in my previous statement. You will now behold the greatest weapon on earth, a power so mighty it will reduce a living man to solid stone right before your eyes. Never forget that it is I, Klaus Kiefel who controls this weapon.”

On cue, Pauling increased the sound of the background music until Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries filled the room. Kiefel closed his eyes and smiled smugly for a moment before moving his hand in time with the string section as the French horns blared and boomed. “Ah, das ist viel besser, nicht wahr?”

Kiefel clicked his fingers and Jakob dragged Agent Dirk Partridge across the room. On his way to the hideous floor show, he knocked the camera and made the picture wobble for a few seconds. Out of frame, bound and gagged, Charles Grant was helpless and could only watch the insanity.

“Don’t kick and squeal like…” he paused searching for the word before looking at Angelika and snapping his fingers. “Ein Ferkel?”

“Piglet,” she said flatly

“Ah! Do not squeal like a piglet, Agent Partridge!” Kiefel said. “The whole world is watching… have some dignity, at least.”

The senior Secret Service agent, only four years from his retirement, began to run out of energy as the German gymnast held him fast against a support post at the side of the distillation unit. Angelika tied him to the post with the same rope that had secured the security guard. She paused to kiss him on the cheek and mock him with a sadistic wink before gently tracing her finger down his sweating face.

As she tightened the final knot, Kiefel gave an order in German and everyone in the room put on their gas masks and gloves.

As Jakob fitted a mask to Grant, the President’s heart sank as he realized he had no way of helping his loyal old friend.

Kiefel moved purposefully to the box and extracted the head for the second time, holding it aloft to the camera for the world to see.

“Behold, the Mighty Medusa!”

He carried the mummified skull over to Agent Partridge, who was now sweating profusely and unable to move his terrified eyes away from his fate.

“People of America!” Kiefel continued. “What you witness now is not merely a demonstration of my power, but the evidence about your world which you have long sought. This is the final proof that the history you learned in your schools was all lies! This is the final proof that the world is not what you think it is.”

Kiefel raised the skull and held it in front of Partridge’s face. Almost tenderly, Kiefel removed Partridge’s glasses and handed them to Angelika. He lowered his voice. “This is your end time, Special Agent Partridge… auf wiedersehen.”

Partridge tried to speak but the terror coursing through his veins froze his words before they reached his lips. He stared at the hideous, twisted face of Medusa — its blue-black skin and pits for eyes — and began to hyperventilate.

Grant tried to scream through his mask but the gag muffled his desperate pleas.

“Silence!” Kiefel screamed.

Jakob padded over to Grant and powered a heavy fist into his stomach causing him to double over in agony. Winded and desperately trying to heave breath into his lungs, Grant knew there was nothing he could now do to save Partridge.

Concentrating once again on Partridge, Kiefel pushed the skull closer to the Secret Service agent, and he began to react the same way as the female security guard — juddering and more hyperventilation. Seconds later, the looked of crazed fear on the Secret Service agent’s face was preserved in stone for eternity.

Grant looked away, horrified.

Angelika applauded and giggled insanely.

Kiefel beamed with pleasure and turned to the camera.

“People of America! If you enjoyed this performance, please tune in for the main show when I will turn your President to stone right before your eyes!”

He motioned at Pauling who cut the signal, and then he turned to Grant.

“I wonder what the viewing figures will be for our grand finale, Mr Grant, hmm?”

Hawke sat up front with Kim Taylor in the first of two Secret Service Cadillac Escalades as they made their way north-east along New York Avenue. Doyle and Vincent followed behind with three SWAT men in the back.

They drove in silence. They had watched the terrible last few moments of Dirk Partridge’s life on an iPad en route and no one had spoken since the signal was cut.

“We’re there,” Kim said at last. She braked and signalled to leave the highway.

They reached the Amtrak yard and pulled right to enter Ivy City, parking up a hundred yards down the road from the warehouse and surveying the industrial park for any signs of trouble. Hawke wondered how people like Kiefel always seemed to find places like this.

This was the industrial zone of the city, the part the rest of the world never saw.

The warehouse itself was a red-brick building that ran the full length of the block and was punctuated by three double roller-doors where trucks could make and take deliveries. A few yards behind a chain-link fence topped with razor-wire was a Ford F-150, jacked up on bricks in the parking area. The place didn’t exactly look like it was overwhelmed with trade.

Doyle, Vincent and the SWAT guys joined them as they strapped on bullet-proof vests and loaded their guns.

“Nice place they have here,” Vincent said.

Hawke smirked. “Just what I was thinking.”

“All right everyone,” Kim said. “We stick to the plan — and no heroics. This isn’t just about rescuing President Grant. This is about the vital national security of the United States. We just don’t know what these crackerjacks have got planned, but if it’s got anything to do with what we all just saw on YouTube it’s not going to be pretty so we can’t risk any screw-ups, got it?”

They all nodded. No one would ever forget the look on Agent Partridge’s face when Kiefel turned him to stone. The idea of that happening to millions of people across the country was unthinkable. As for his threat to do it to the President — they all understood the gravity of the situation and how that could never be allowed to happen, but time was running out.

“We got it,” Doyle said. He cocked his SIG and scowled as he looked at the warehouse. “This is for Partridge. He taught me everything I know, and now that son of a bitch Kiefel is a dead man walking.”

They jogged to a metal door a yard to the right of one of the roller-doors and Doyle kicked it in, almost tearing it from its hinges. After moving inside and seeing the office was clear, he flashed the others a pre-arranged hand signal and they fanned out into the warehouse space.

“Clear!” Kim shouted.

“Clear!” said Doyle. “Move on to the next warehouse.”

They continued through the empty warehouse. Hawke rounded a corner, SIG raised in front of him, ready to fire, but found nothing except yet another expanse of concrete and bare metal shelving units. He moved forward with caution, his footfall quietly tapping on the polished concrete floor.

He rounded a second corner which revealed a short corridor lined with office doors, one of which was throwing a faint blue glow from its window onto the corridor carpet below.

He gave a signal and a moment later Kim Taylor was at his side.

They counted to three and then kicked the door in, immediately covering the entire room with their guns, ready to fire — but it was empty.

“Looks like they moved out in a hurry,” Hawke said. He walked over to the desk and went through the drawers. In the third drawer down he found something.

“At last!”

Kim was covering the door as the Englishman made his search of the office, but when he spoke she glanced over and saw him pulling an Apple Mac laptop from the drawer.

Hawke smiled. “Bingo…”

“You think?” the American woman said.

“I bloody hope so, because whoever was here has moved everything else out!”

“Let me look at that,” Kim said, and holstered her weapon. She walked to the desk and fired up the laptop.

“We need to get this back to Alex at the Pentagon,” Hawke said. “It’ll have a password on it.”

“Never mind about that,” she said dismissively, and pushed a flash-drive into one of the USB ports.

Hawke watched in amazement as the password screen faded to reveal the desktop. “How did you do that then?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

Kim smiled and sat down. “CIA classified.”

Hawke smiled too. He knew he wasn’t going to get any more than that out of Agent Taylor so he changed subject. “So what have we got on here?”

Kim was busy opening and checking files. “Not sure yet, but I’m copying everything to the flash-drive for analysis later anyway… ah — what’s this?”

Hawke leaned in. “What have you found?”

“It’s definitely the laptop of this Nick Collins guy, and I’m just going through the email history… looks like he’s been spending a lot of time in the Bayou State.”

Hawke looked at her, confused. “Eh?”

“Louisiana — there’s talk here of a flight to New Orleans, and another email here booking a hotel in the French Quarter.”

Hawke sighed. “That narrows it down, but not much…”

“I know, but… wait — did you hear that?”

“What?” Hawke looked up at the door and focussed on the silence of the warehouse. “Maybe it’s the SWAT guys, or Doyle and Vincent?”

“No — I thought I heard a car outside the office.”

Hawke moved to the window and squinted at the darkness of the car park. “You’re right — someone’s just pulled up in a Dodge Viper.”

“And who would be driving to an empty warehouse at this time of night?”

They looked at each and spoke at the same time.

“Nick Collins!”

Hawke scowled. “Bastard must have come back for his computer before making like a swift and heading south for the winter no doubt.”

Kim pulled her gun out again. “Not on my watch, he doesn’t!”

They opened the outer office door quietly and went outside.

With his gun raised, Hawke ran forward through the car park in the shadows. Kim followed him until they were almost at the Viper.

They reached the car with their guns raised. “Freeze, Secret Service!”

Collins looked up, terrified, and re-started the engine.

Kim raised her weapon and fired at the Dodge Viper, but Collins reversed the powerful sports car at speed, its red striped roof flashing briefly in the pale glow of a streetlight on the perimeter of the car park. The bullet missed and struck a recycling unit, ricocheting off into the night.

“Damn it!” she screamed. “We need a car, Hawke!”

“On it!” Hawke called back, and sprinted to the front of the warehouse with the Suburban’s keys in his hand.