The Nemesis Origin

XXXIX

Aaron Devlin strode through the corridors of the Defense Intelligence Analysis Centre and boarded the elevator that would take him up to the fifth floor. He passed through the security protocol stations and made his way to the anechoic chamber, stepping inside and sealing the doors behind him before he moved to the centre of the room.

There, alongside the remains of the being found in Israel, the mummy of the Inca girl sat in a temperature controlled Perspex case, her features as serene as ever.

‘Report, please.’

The voices remained as anonymous as ever. Aaron spoke in a clear voice and used as few words as possible.

‘Lucy Morgan failed in her attempts to recover the remains that she sought,’ he said. ‘No materials recovered from the expedition have made it back to the United States except in my custody, and thus no security protocols have been breached.’

There was a long silence as Aaron stood in the darkness and awaited a response.

‘You’re absolutely sure this time,’ the voice of Number Four asked. ‘The governments of well over one hundred nations have their eyes on us and are expecting absolute security surrounding this issue. They can be in no doubt that there will be no information leak, no compromise.’

‘I am absolutely sure,’ Aaron replied. ‘We recovered all of the remains. In addition, all evidence of human presence on the mountain peaks at the site in question have been destroyed either in the attempt to recover them or afterwards by my own men. I oversaw this process personally.’

‘And what of Ethan Warner, Nicola Lopez and Lucy Morgan?’ asked Number Seven.

Aaron maintained a steady voice as he replied.

‘We lost track of Ethan Warner in Peru. Nicola Lopez and Lucy Morgan have both returned to Illinois, Lopez to her work and Morgan to her studies. We are maintaining a track on both of them.’

‘You lost Ethan Warner?’ Number Nine demanded.

Aaron grinned tightly to maintain his patience with a question that sounded like an accusation of incompetence. ‘Ethan Warner broke from the main group somewhere between Peru and Argentina and disappeared. Due to the limited nature of support offered me on this mission, my men were not equipped to pursue him. We will maintain a watch on his family and home in expectation of his return, but given his recent life off the grid, he may not be easy to find.’

A long silence followed Aaron’s reply before Number Six spoke.

‘What are the chances of Yuri Polkov having survived the incident?’

Aaron shrugged, although he knew that none of the men could see him. ‘Yuri Polkov’s body was located during our search of the mountain. He was interred in an unmarked grave in the Atacama Desert. It’ll take any of his associates ten thousand years to locate his remains. In the meantime, we have taken control of his assets to further fund our own investigations.’

Another long silence, and this time Number One spoke.

‘The director of intelligence has been attempting to gain access to operations, and is believed to have dispatched a former DIA analyst in order to expose us. Do you have any knowledge of this individual or what stage their work has reached?’

‘Ethan Warner was in the company of Lucy Morgan, Nicola Lopez and an unknown individual who could possibly have been working for another government agency. However, I was not able to identify them. Due to the illegality of our presence in both Peru and Argentina and the need to remain covert, all individuals had to be allowed to leave to avoid an international incident. Had we continued operations or indeed attempted to arrest anybody in plain sight of local guides and terrorists, it is certain that the governments in question would have made moves to prevent us from leaving the country at all. A large number of Russian mercenaries were intercepted by my team and were killed when they attempted to resist arrest. The Argentinian government recognises that they were part of an international crime syndicate, and have repatriated their remains to Russia. Vladimir Polkov was found dead several days before in Peru. The official story is that both were killed during high-risk and illegal tomb-robbing exercises in the respective countries. Given that they were Russians and not Americans, we have nothing to fear from any further investigations into the deaths.’

Another long silence, before a final reply.

‘Congress must remain unaware of our activities,’ Number One said. ‘Make no mistake, we cannot allow the American people to become aware that their government, their Congress, is merely a cipher for our operations. Continue your work, Agent Devlin, and ensure the security of our futures. All of our futures.’

Aaron turned, and without another word he left the chamber.

‘I don’t know where to begin.’

The Intelligence Director closed the file before him, which contained Doug Jarvis’s report on the entirety of events since he had begun his pursuit of Lucy Morgan.

‘This is something that we have been wrestling with for decades,’ Jarvis replied, the director’s office windows fogged for privacy. ‘Majestic Twelve is in effect a shadow government, capable of pulling strings globally to advance its agenda. Ever since President Eisenhower warned of the growing power of the military-industrial corporations’ influence over politics, units of the intelligence community have been trying to pin down exactly who is really running our country. Suffice to say, sir, that right now it’s neither Congress nor the White House. They’re just the public face of something far more sinister.’

The director nodded, one hand resting on the file for a moment.

‘What of the operatives you employed during this operation?’

‘Nicola Lopez and Ethan Warner were not employed by me,’ Jarvis admitted. ‘They were called in by Lucy Morgan. Neither of them has any real love for the intelligence community any longer after their previous investigations — too many close calls fighting against our own damned people.’

The director looked at the file beneath his hand for a moment longer.

‘Call them in, Doug. I want to make them an offer.’

‘Of what?’

‘Something that they cannot refuse. Where are they, right now I mean?’

Jarvis managed to slap an awkward smile on his face. ‘I’m not entirely sure, sir.’

The director raised an eyebrow. ‘You’re not sure?’

‘It’s complicated.’

The community hospital was a small building in the town of Pitlochrie, nestled deep beneath the soaring peaks of the Cairngorns. Ethan at it as he climbed out of the car he had hired, feeling odd having to drive in the right hand seat once again.

‘This place is freezing.’

Lopez got out of the passenger side and slammed the door shut, then pulled her collar up about her neck. Her deeply tanned skin was at odds with the grey skies and cold wind.

‘This is pretty mild for the time of year,’ Ethan pointed out as he led the way inside the hospital.

‘Good to hear,’ Lopez replied. ‘Remind me what the hell we’re doing here?’

Ethan didn’t reply as he stepped inside the hospital. The interior was hushed, the building home to only a small number of wards and rooms for elderly patients and a general practice. Ethan asked at the reception desk and was directed to one of the private rooms down the hall.

Ethan had decided not to take Jarvis’s offer of a ride back to Chicago when they had finally landed in Argentina aboard Arnie’s Catalina, an aircraft which had flown a considerable number of miles since they had first encountered its grumpy captain in the Phillipines. Instead, wary of any repercussions from the intelligence community, he had bought various tickets to different destinations before heading for the United Kingdom.

Lucy Morgan had met him three weeks later in London and they had then travelled quietly up to Scotland, with Lopez in tow.

The private hospital room was small, a tinted observation window affording a glimpse inside. There was a single bed within the room and sitting on it was Bethany O’Learey, who was smiling and talking to a man and a woman whom Ethan assumed were her parents. Beside them sat Lucy Morgan. Bethany’s head was no longer encased in its scaffolding, and her features were already looking more even than they had, her skull cap having receded in size.

Lopez stared at Bethany for a long moment. ‘I don’t get it.’

‘It worked,’ Ethan replied simply.

‘I can see that!’ Lopez uttered in amazement. ‘What I can’t see is how it can have worked? They took the mummy away from us!’

Inside the room, Lucy Morgan spotted them and smiled. She got up from her seat beside Bethany’s bed and joined them in the corridor outside, closing the door behind her.

‘You should come in,’ she urged Ethan and Lopez after hugging them both. ‘Bethany’s doing great.’

‘The less she knows about us the better,’ Ethan replied. ‘You know how trouble follows us around.’

‘Don’t I just?’

‘Where are the remains?’ Ethan asked.

‘In my jacket,’ Lucy replied. ‘It’s so much easier to just carry them around with me now that we’re in the clear.’

‘What remains?’ Lopez asked in exasperation.

Ethan watched as Lucy reached beneath her jacket and revealed a clear cylinder some nine inches long, concealed in a custom-made pocket in the lining of her jacket. Vacuum-sealed and filled with a faint grey mist from the chill generated by the ice packed around the contents.

‘Oh my God,’ Lopez gasped as a hand flew to her lips and she stared at the cylinder’s contents.

Ethan could see within the shocking form of a foetal creature, humanoid but with a tall, conical skull and elongated black eyes like giant tear-drops. In the last moments before Lopez had returned to the truck in Argentina to retrieve the mummy and hand it over to Majestic Twelve’s soldiers and their mysterious leader, Lucy had performed an impromptu caesarean section on the mummy and extracted the unborn foetus she had believed resided within.

‘I was telling the truth to Yuri Polkov when I said that the mummy was worthless,’ Lucy explained to Lopez. ‘It was the foetus that held the true value. It was why a young girl with ritualistic skull deformation was treated with such respect — she carried in her womb a true hybrid child.’

Working alone, Lucy had sequenced the DNA from the remains and then extracted stem-cells. That she had deceived an entire department of the United States Government, covert or not, amazed and impressed Ethan, but the work she had done since completely bowled him over.

‘It’s not the first time something like this has happened,’ Lucy explained. ‘In 1930 the skeletal remains of a foetus were found in a mine tunnel a hundred miles southwest of Chihuahua in Mexico. Dubbed the Star Child because of its alien appearance, modern scientists believe it to have been suffering from congenital Hydrocephalus, a condition in which excess fluid in the brain causes the skull to enlarge. It’s not dissimilar to Bethany’s illness in many ways. The big deal was that the skull’s volume was larger than the average adult human brain, the orbits were shallow, there were no frontal sinuses and the optic nerve canal was situated much closer to the bottom of the orbit than the back, a highly unusual series of adaptions not common to human beings.’

‘Why did they kill her if she was pregnant?’ Ethan asked. ‘Surely they would have wanted to keep her alive until the baby was delivered?’

Lucy closed her jacket around the cylinder. ‘I carbon-dated the remains and they were almost exactly five hundred years old, give or take a decade. The Incan Empire had been overrun by the Spanish conquistadores and their people slaughtered wholesale in conflict or by diseases for which they had no natural defense. Their civilization was doomed, and they likely had no option but to flee and to sacrifice their most revered people in the hope that their gods would intervene. They didn’t, of course. I suppose in that respect Yuri Polkov was right — great sacrifice in the name of nothing but faith is a fool’s errand.’

‘What are you going to do with it?’ Lopez asked. ‘Blow the whole thing wide open?’

Lucy sighed and shook her head. ‘I don’t know, but what I do know is that this thing is staying under lock and key. I’m not letting the government of any of our countries take this away from me until it’s been properly studied.’

Lucy took one last look at Bethany on her bed.

‘It was worth it,’ she said finally, ‘even if it meant getting shot at by lunatics and travelling half way around the world. You two should get back together. You’re better that way.’

Lucy walked back into Bethany’s room and closed the door behind her as Ethan turned and looked at Lopez.

‘Don’t even think about it,’ Lopez warned him as she started walking.

‘Think about what?’ Ethan pleaded ignorance as he followed her.

‘I’m doing fine on my own. I don’t want you coming in and blowing everything up again.’

They walked outside toward the car. ‘Is that why you followed us to Cambodia and sold out to the government, helped them to track us down?’

Lopez stared straight ahead as they walked. ‘How do you figure that?’

Ethan stopped at their car. ‘When we faced off against the STS team on the mountain, you said you’d want to take at least one of them with you, preferably Devlin. How would you have known his name if you weren’t in contact with them?’

Lopez sighed and glanced at the distant, rugged landscape around them. ‘They picked me up in Chicago, did me a solid when I got overrun by vagrants out on Englewood. I turned them down, but then Lucy visited my house and Devlin must have been watching still. He kind of had me over a barrel.’

Ethan frowned. ‘And Cambodia? They were shooting at you too.’

‘It was supposed to be a set-up,’ Lopez replied. ‘I’d figure out what Lucy was up to, then report back in from time to time. Then Devlin’s STS team showed up and I realized they had no intention of honouring any agreement with me, that his men would likely shoot us dead there and then. I figured that meant all bets were off the table.’

‘That’s not the first time you’ve sold out on me,’ Ethan said.

Lopez turned and jabbed a finger into his chest. ‘I needed the money because you walked away from the business, asshole!’

‘I needed a break!’

‘So did I, and you know what? It’s worked out just fine! Why don’t you head back to your cave in the highlands so I can get back to a real life?’

‘Fine!’ Ethan snapped. ‘I take it you won’t show up again next time things get a little bit too difficult for you to handle all on your own?’

‘Rest assured,’ Lopez shot back.

‘And you won’t want any part of the deal that Jarvis is offering us?’

Lopez stared at him for a long moment, her dark eyes flashing with distaste at the mention of Jarvis, but Ethan could see the tiny glimmer of intrigue flickering behind them. ‘Why the hell would I want to work for him again?’

‘You wouldn’t be,’ Ethad replied. ‘Look, he called me last night, said he had work for us on behalf of the Intelligence Director himself: legal work, up-front investigations, maybe even on behalf of Congress. I turned him down flat, said neither of us was interested. But now, seeing Bethany in that bed, healing…’

Ethan shrugged and looked at Lopez, who shot him a glance of absolute contempt.

‘I would rather shoot myself in the head than follow you about on more wild-goose chases for Jarvis and his goddamn cronies.’

Ethan sighed and opened the car door. ‘Fine, have it your way and…’

‘It’ll be Lopez and Warner Inc,’ she cut across him.

Ethan froze, and Lopez examined the tips of her fingers.

‘And you’ll be taking orders from me, got it?’

He turned back to face her. ‘You want me to take orders from you?’

‘Every goddamned day,’ Lopez snapped. ‘You walked away once, I’m not letting you waltz back in and start running the show. I’ll decide what we investigate, how we investigate it and who makes the coffee runs.’

‘You just sold me out and now you want me to do thy bidding?’ Ethan asked.

‘As soon as I learned about Bethany I stayed the damned course,’ Lopez replied. ‘You work for me. No more show-boating for the DIA, got it?’

Ethan’s jaw cracked as he smiled. ‘Got it.’

‘And no more smug grins.’

Ethan suppressed the smile. ‘Righto.’

Lopez hesitated for a moment. ‘You’re driving.’

Ethan headed for the driver’s seat without even a questioning glance as Lopez climbed into the car and shut her door. He started the engine and put the car into gear, and then looked at her.

‘I kind of like taking orders from a woman.’

‘Get used to it,’ Lopez shot back.

Ethan drove out of the hospital and onto the main road heading north, and pretended not to notice the faint smile touching Lopez’s sculptured lips.