Vulcan's Forge

Arlington, Virginia

The faint chime of the Tiffany alarm clock woke Mercer instantly. His hand snaked out from under the tangle of sheets and blankets and silenced the antique piece. He pushed aside the bed coverings and swung his legs to the floor. His deep gray eyes were already bright and clear. Mercer’s eyes reacted to light much quicker than the average person’s. He barely squinted at bright lights and adjusted to darkness with the speed of a cat. It was an ability he fully exploited in the subterranean world of hard-rock mining.

He shaved and took a quick shower before heading down the circular stairs to the rec room, passing through the library on the way. The built-in dark oak shelves were full of plain beige boxes containing his vast collection of reference books. For the thousandth time, Mercer promised himself he’d unpack the books and place them properly on the shelves. He also wanted to hang the dozens of pictures and paintings he had collected over the years, which currently lay crated in one of the brownstone’s two spare bedrooms.

Cup of coffee in hand, he went to the front door and grabbed the morning Washington Post. He was just turning to the stories beneath the fold as he made his way to the bar in the rec room.

A story on the left corner riveted him to the stool.

The article went on, but Mercer really didn’t see the rest of the words; he was stunned. The sense of loss that he felt the night before slipped away, replaced by joy and relief.

“Harry, wake up.” Mercer had to share the news.

Harry came awake slowly, groans and yawns followed by scratches and stretches. “What time is it?”

“Quarter of six,” Mercer replied, glancing at his Tag Heuer watch.

“Christ, my mouth feels as if I just French-kissed an Angora sweater.”

Mercer poured him a cup of coffee. Harry moved from the couch to the bar and slouched onto one of the stools, a cigarette already smoldering between his lips.

“Remember me telling you about Jack Talbot, the guy who saved my life in Alaska?” Mercer didn’t wait for Harry to answer. “Last night I found out that his daughter was on board that NOAA ship that sank in the Pacific.”

“Christ, Mercer, sorry to hear it,” Harry said seriously.

“I was meaning to ask you last night if you had heard about that.”

Mercer held up the front page of the paper and Harry read it through still-bleary eyes. “Well, I’ll be god-damned. How about that for luck.”

“No shit.”

“I wonder if your friend knows yet?”

“He probably didn’t even know about the accident — last I knew he was working aboard an oil rig off the coast of Indonesia.”

Harry looked at Mercer for a second, then stood up. “I better get home.” Harry was through the door before Mercer could say another word. Mercer puzzled about his friend’s abrupt exit for a moment, then went back to reading his paper.

At 8:30, Mercer strode into his office at the U.S. Geological Survey. His secretary, Jennifer Woodridge, tried to smile and say hi with a mouth full of cherry danish. Mercer marveled at her ability to eat. Her desk was nearly always covered with half-eaten junk food, mangled bags of chips, and at least three empty soft drink cans. Yet she weighed around one hundred pounds and had a figure that made him wish half the rumors in the office were true.

“Morning, Jen. I see nothing’s changed in my absence.”

She swallowed hard and took a sip of coffee. “Welcome back. I was so relieved that you were in South Africa and not aboard that NOAA ship, you have no idea.”

“Trust me, you’re not half as relieved as I am.”

Jen Woodridge had not always cared so much for her temporary boss. Two months earlier, when Mercer had started consulting at the USGS, Jen had prepared an extensive list of the things she would and wouldn’t do in the course of her job. She read through the list at a staccato pace about two seconds after their introduction.

Mercer had listened to her calmly, without comment. When she had finished all Mercer said was, “Okay.”

“What do you want me to do now?” she asked, thinking she had the upper hand with him.

“Go back and sit at your desk.”

“And?”

“And nothing. Just sit at your desk. Don’t answer the phone, don’t fill out any papers, don’t do anything.”

It took only forty fidgety minutes before Jen caved in and returned to Mercer’s office, her blue eyes glazed with boredom. “Point taken and I’m sorry. Usually the consultants around here treat the staff like slaves.”

“Since you are the first secretary, excuse me, assistant, I’ve ever had, I really don’t know how to treat you.” Mercer’s honesty had begun a great working relationship. Now he asked, “Did you read about that woman rescued last night?”

“Yes, isn’t that fantastic?”

“Strange thing is, I know her, or rather, I know her father,” Mercer said, heading for his office. “Come on and fill me in on what’s been happening while I’ve been gone.”

Mercer struggled out of his jacket and threw it carelessly over the leather sofa. He laid his briefcase on the desk and settled into his chair. Jen hung up his jacket with a maternal scowl and sat in the chair in front of the desk to help him pore through the mountain of papers.

Around noon, Jennifer went to lunch; Mercer stayed in his office, catching up on the paperwork treadmill. A security guard knocked quietly at his office door a few minutes after Jen left. “Are you Dr. Philip Mercer?” the guard asked, confirming the name from the slip of paper in his hand.

Mercer winced inwardly — he hated to be called doctor. He grinned at the security officer. “So you boys finally caught me stealing toilet paper from the men’s room.”

The guard looked at him, puzzled, then realized that Mercer wasn’t serious.

So much for a sense of humor, thought Mercer.

“Sir, Western Union delivered this telegram to the front office; it’s addressed to you.” The guard handed Mercer the envelope and left without another word.

The telegram had been sent from Jakarta. Mercer knew instinctively that it was from Jack Talbot. For some reason he felt a sense of foreboding as he unfolded the paper.

“Tish is in mortal danger. Help her. Ocean Seeker intentionally destroyed. Will try to get to D.C. soonest.”

It was signed Jack.

Mercer spent no more than ten seconds making up his mind. The Jack Talbot he knew was not prone to fantasy or hysteria. If Jack said that his daughter was in danger and that the NOAA ship had been purposely destroyed, Mercer believed him unequivocally.

Mercer stood quickly, his gray eyes hard and set, his lean body already slightly tensed for the unknown. He grabbed his jacket and strode to the elevators. Within six minutes of reading the telegram his black Jaguar XJS convertible was bulling its way through downtown traffic toward the GWU hospital.

The nurse at the hospital’s front desk informed him that Tish was in room 404, but that no visitors were allowed. The nurse also told Mercer that the room was being guarded by the FBI.

The fact that the sole survivor of a shipwreck was under guard gave some credence to Jack’s warning that his daughter was in danger and that the sinking of the Ocean Seeker had ominous overtones.

“Well, that takes care of that,” Mercer said, and gave the nurse a smile that made her blush. “Where can I find a cup of coffee?”

“To the right and up the stairs, sir,” she responded, patting her mousy hair. “The cafeteria is on the second floor.”

Mercer thanked her, but once in the stairwell he climbed quickly to the fourth floor. The fluorescent lights, yellow-painted walls, and hospital smell were enough to cause nausea in the most healthy person. After a few minutes he found the wing which contained room 404. The two beefy no-necked men sitting at an impromptu security desk eyed him like sharks looking at a wounded mullet.

“Dr. Mercer to see Tish Talbot,” Mercer said casually, flashing an ID card.

One guard looked him up and down, noting the stethoscope protruding from his coat pocket. Mercer had picked it up at an empty nurse’s station. The other guard saw the GWU logo on the card and noted that the photo of Dr. Mercer matched the man in front of him.

“What’s your business, Dr. Mercer?” The man’s voice was flat and lifeless.

“I’m a urologist,” Mercer replied, and stifled a small yawn. “I need to check for renal damage due to extended dehydration.”

The guard waved him through without a second thought. The ID that Mercer flashed had in fact been issued by GWU hospital, but it merely signified that he was a recipient of the hospital’s health coverage. Anything more than a cursory examination would have gotten him a quick trip to the J. Edgar Hoover Building.

So much for the vigilance of the FBI.

Mercer looked over his shoulder and saw one of the guards bury his face in a near-empty bag of corn chips and pour the remainder in his mouth. Since Tish was in possible trouble, there was no way that he would let these two idiots look out for her.

Tish was sitting up in bed, a magazine resting on her bent knees. Though she looked fatigued from her ordeal she was a beautiful woman on the easy side of thirty with short-cropped dark hair, arresting red lips, and high cheekbones. Her skin was burned dark by the sun but did not appear permanently damaged. She looked up at him with her father’s eyes, impossibly clear blue and impish.

“Miss Talbot, I’m Philip Mercer. I’m a friend of your father’s. In fact I owe him my life — maybe he told you the story?”

Her smile was warm and open. “I’ve heard that story about a million times, Dr. Mercer, and I must say it’s good to have a friend here.”

“Better than you know,” Mercer said under his breath. “How do you feel?”

“Tired and sore but okay. I really don’t know why I’m being kept here.” There was annoyance in her voice.

“Believe it or not, you’re a pretty hot item right now. Do you know that you’re under guard?”

“I wasn’t aware of that. What the hell for?” She was plain speaking, just like her father.

“I was hoping you could tell me. I received a telegram about an hour ago from your father in Jakarta. He asked me to look after you.”

Tish stared at him.

“He felt that the Ocean Seeker was intentionally destroyed, and if that’s true, I don’t think that you’re safe here. I was in South Africa when all of this happened, so I don’t know any details, but for now I’ll trust your father and assume that your life may be in danger.”

Tish continued to regard him blankly.

“Does any of this make sense to you? Do you remember something or did you see something that could cause this stir?”

“In the first place, Dr. Mercer. .” Before she could continue a man opened the door. A lab coat covered his suit.

“Good afternoon, I’m Dr. Alfred Rosenburg, your urologist.” His smile was crooked and his teeth stained tobacco yellow.

Mercer took one look at the man’s shoes and reacted instantly. The punch was powered with a full twist of his body. The instant before his fist smashed into the man’s face, Mercer bent his arm, and his elbow connected solidly with Rosenburg’s cheek. Tish muffled a scream in her hands as the doctor’s head whipped around and he slammed into the wall.

Mercer turned to her. “Get dressed now, I’m getting you out of here.”

Rosenburg was already regaining his feet, a six-inch stiletto in his hand. Mercer bent at the knees and torqued his body around, extending one leg in a sweep. The man fell back, his body shaking the wall when he hit. Mercer planted a foot squarely in his stomach, then kicked up into his face as he doubled over. Rosenburg’s head snapped back and crashed into the wall. He slumped over, unconscious.

Mercer looked at Tish, who was still in bed. “He won’t be alone. Now get dressed.”

She flew from the bed and was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt within moments, though not before Mercer stole a glimpse of exquisitely long legs and a white silkpantied backside.

Mercer opened the door slowly and looked toward the guard station. The pool of blood under the desk told him that both FBI agents were dead.

“Oh, Jesus,” Tish moaned as Mercer led her past the desk. Pausing for an instant, he found an automatic pistol and a spare clip inside one of the dead men’s jackets. He held the weapon discreetly under his own coat and slipped the clip into a pocket.

Mercer took Tish’s hand as they went down the stairs to the lobby. A quick scan of the faces there confirmed that the killer upstairs was indeed not alone. Three men stood just outside the automatic door while another trio peered at a glass-covered bulletin board, their eyes watching the room in its reflection.

The fugitives turned away from the lobby. Mercer led Tish through a set of doors marked NO ADMITTANCE and out onto a loading dock. The man standing on the dock looked at Tish just a bit too critically, so Mercer smashed his knee into the man’s groin. If he was an innocent by-stander, where better to get treated for his injuries, and if he was an assistant to the assassin upstairs, screw him. Mercer and Tish ran to his car.

The Jaguar V12 burst into life instantly. Mercer had hoped to get away without being seen, but two men were already running toward them from the loading dock. Mercer jammed the gearbox into drive and smoked the Pirelli tires pulling out onto the street. A few cars pounded their horns in anger and a pair of nurses jumped back to the sidewalk for safety. Three identical BMWs were already in pursuit as Mercer turned onto 23rd Street heading toward Washington Circle.

Mercer took the car around the circle twice, trying to snarl his pursuers in traffic before tearing off down K Street. The maneuver gained him only a second or two.

Mercer put the borrowed pistol, a Heckler and Koch VP-70, on his lap as he jinked around a Metrobus. The deadly 9mm German-made gun had eighteen rounds inside its wide grip.

He clicked off the safety, then pressed the button that lowered his window. The sounds of the city whipped into the car. Mercer wished that he had taken the top down to give him better visibility, but there was nothing that he could do about that now.

The first chase car was pulling up on Mercer’s left. The driver was intent on the road ahead, but the passenger had his eyes glued on Mercer. He threw a sardonic wave and pulled a Beretta model 12 into view. The little Italian submachine gun could fire a blanket of 9mm bullets at a rate of 550 a minute. Just as the man brought his weapon to bear, Mercer lifted his pistol over the windowsill and let loose.

He fired as fast as he could. The first five rounds tore up the body of the gunman; his torso and head jumped at every impact. As he slumped over, the next five rounds pulverized the head of the driver. The BMW slowed and began to veer off the road. It careened off one of the huge trees that lined K Street and shot back into traffic. In the rearview mirror, Mercer saw the BMW fly into the other lane and slam into the front of a parked garbage truck. The windshield exploded outward as the two bodies smashed through it.

Tish had turned almost white and kept biting her lower lip. Mercer took one hand off the wheel to grasp her reassuringly on the shoulder. He wished he could do more, but there were still two cars chasing them.

Mercer ignored a red light as K Street turned onto Pennsylvania Avenue and so did the pursuers. They had just passed the World Bank Building when the first bullets smashed into the Jaguar. Tish slid to the floor and Mercer began weaving the car, but the bullets continued to find their mark.

Traffic was getting thicker. Once Mercer was forced to stop completely but luckily the two BMWs were stuck several cars back. As they approached the busy intersection at 17th Street, with the Jag doing about forty mph, the light turned yellow. Mercer jammed the transmission into second ignoring the tachometer needle as it arced across the gauge, and mashed the gas pedal to the black-carpeted floorboards. The engine revs peaked with an earsplitting whine before Mercer eased the car back into drive. They passed the point of no return as the light changed to red and the mass of cars started down 17th Street like a steel avalanche.

Mercer cut the car wide to the right, the tires squealing on the asphalt. Pedestrians dove out of the way as he took the car up onto the sidewalk for a few yards before veering back onto the road nearly in front of the White House. One BMW had tried to follow him, but had smashed into the thick concrete antitank barricades that protected the presidential residence. The other was stuck in traffic.

Mercer stopped the Jag at the corner of Penn and 16th. “Take my wallet,” he said, handing it to Tish. “My address is on the license and there’s enough money for a cab.” He yanked the house key from the ring dangling in the ignition and handed it to her. “There’s a security panel to the right of the door. 36-22-34 will deactivate it. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Will you be okay?” Tish’s eyes were huge with fear.

“Don’t worry, just go.” She nodded, then leapt out of the car and immediately blended with the flow of people on their lunch breaks.

The moment the door slammed shut, Mercer took off down 16th Street, past the Hotel Washington. He cut back onto Pennsylvania in front of the Department of Commerce Building. He glimpsed the BMW in the rearview mirror. They were still following him, so he figured Tish was safe for now.

The Willard Hotel and the Post Office Pavilion blurred past as Mercer used the power and control of the Jaguar to snake through the thick traffic. Suddenly he heard the unmistakable sound of automatic fire again. The first fusillade mangled the coachwork of the Jag and punctured the rear windscreen about a dozen times. The next burst blew out the left rear tire.

The car flew out of control, the steering wheel like a slippery, living creature in Mercer’s hands. He knew the Jaguar was doomed. The car’s mad lurching had cleared the road quickly, and Mercer exploited this by driving into the oncoming lane, bouncing off stationary cars like a billiard ball. He finally came to a stop at the entrance of the Archive Metro station. In the relative silence following the crash, he could hear the fast approach of police sirens racing from all across downtown.

Mercer jammed a fresh clip into the pistol and leapt from the car. He flew down the escalator, shouldering people aside as he raced toward the city’s modern subway system. Commuters gasped or complained as he pushed through the crowd and jumped the turnstile. The Metro guard in the glass booth was the last of his worries. As he reached the platform, Mercer was dismayed to see that the two sets of parallel tracks were empty and that there was not enough of a crowd to conceal him. He whirled around to see three men running toward him, weapons barely concealed under their jackets.

The floor lights lining the near track began to flash, indicating that a train was about to arrive. The station began to rumble as the train approached, pushing a wall of air ahead of it. The far track was still clear. Mercer knew that if he boarded the train he would be cut down instantly — these men obviously had no compunctions about a public murder.

The noise in the station reached a tactile level as the train burst from the tunnel in a whoosh of air and a squeal of brakes. Mercer’s pursuers were only twenty yards away and already one was reaching into his jacket for his weapon. Mercer had only one chance for escape and he took it without thought. He ran for the edge of the track and leapt, barely two yards in front of the oncoming train.

The engineer blasted his horn and jammed on the brakes, but Mercer didn’t even notice. He was too intent on the ten-foot jump. If he overshot, he could fly into the next track, land on the current rail, electrocute himself and save his attackers the trouble.

He landed safely on the low platform between the two tracks. As his body rocked forward from the momentum, he was stunned to see another train rushing toward him from the opposite direction. He windmilled his arms, trying to regain his balance, and almost succeeded.

The oncoming train glanced into his shoulder, sending him flying back so that he bounced off the first train, which had ground to a halt. Mercer lay between the now-stationary trains for a moment or two, recovering his senses. Finally he stood and, ignoring the shocked faces of passengers on both trains, levered his back against one of the trains and his legs against the other to shinny up to the roof of the far carriage. Over the shouts and police whistles that echoed through the station, he heard the quiet double ping that indicated the train doors were closing.

A shot rang out and the roof next to Mercer’s head exploded. He flipped onto his back, extending the H&K toward the assassin who stood on the pedestrian bridge which spanned the tracks. Mercer fired just as the train lurched forward; his shot shattered concrete far to the left of his target. The assassin lined up another careful shot. Mercer rolled across the roof until he nearly slipped off, dodging the bullet.

An instant later, the Metro car slid under the bridge and Mercer rolled back across the roof, holding the pistol by his head, arms tucked close to his body. There was a four-foot gap between the bridge and the entrance to the subway tunnel. As Mercer passed through the gap, he spotted the assassin. Mercer pulled the trigger and saw the gunman fall back just before the Metro plunged into the darkened tunnel.

The ride through the tunnel was a nightmare. Though the train’s speed was nearly forty miles per hour, in the dark it felt like four hundred. The rattling car threatened to shake Mercer off the roof and he had the constant fear of being smeared against the low ceiling. The noise and vibration were maddening, but he grimly held on, jaw clenched tightly to keep his teeth from jarring loose.

After a couple of minutes that seemed like an eternity, the train thundered into L’Enfant Plaza, the next station on the yellow line. Mercer moved forward until he was under the pedestrian bridge. No doubt that there would be a backup team in this station by now and probably in all the stations on the line. They had him boxed in. Whoever “they” were.

The wait in the station dragged on as passengers left and entered the train in the confused ballet called commuting. Mercer feared that the train would be held because of the body he had left in the Archive station. But a moment later the bell chimed and the pneumatic doors hissed closed. The train began to inch along and in a second, Mercer was exposed to another gunman standing on the bridge.

Mercer raised the VP-70 to take aim just as the other man swung the barrel of a Beretta toward him. Neither man had time to fire before Mercer disappeared into the blackness of the tunnel. Mercer’s raised hand, the one grasping the pistol, smashed into the concrete wall. Instantly numbed fingers sprang open and the weapon slid from his grasp. It bounced against the roof, once, twice, then slipped over the edge, lost forever.

Mercer flipped back onto his stomach, cursing the pain and his own stupidity. He was now unarmed and facing an unimaginable number of enemies.

As the Metro climbed above ground just south of the Jefferson Memorial, Mercer realized that he had a chance to escape while the train was crossing the Potomac River. He swore at himself for even thinking it, but knew he had no other option. As soon as the train reached daylight, he sat up and kicked off his shoes. The train sped onto the truss bridge that spanned the sluggish river, rattling and clanging like an old steam locomotive. Mercer stood, the wind whipping his jacket around his body. He shed it quickly and peered at the river below. It was a sapphire blue.

Mercer jumped.

The jarring vibration of the Metro vanished as he arrowed toward the water, and for a moment all was quiet except for the wind in his ears. The impact as he hit the choppy water nearly knocked him unconscious, but the cold brought him back quickly. He was deep under the river’s surface. With lungs emptied by the blow, the swim upward was agonizing.

He finally broke the surface and coughed the water from his lungs. He looked up at the bridge, but the train had already vanished from sight.

Twenty excruciating minutes later, he dragged himself onto the shore.

“Welcome to Virginia,” he gasped.