Rogue Command (The Kalahari Series) (40 page)

“I vont him to die! I do not care how!”

“Listen, Rhinefeld, you hired us for psychic work. I can take someone out just as well as the next man, but if you part these two in this state you risk losing the woman, too. I won’t be held responsible for that – and we still want paying – you get that?”

“Mr Rickenbach, you vill obey orders. You are in zis up to your neck, and Springer, too.” Rhinefeld took a thoughtful breath. “Tell me exactly vot is going on here. Quickly!”

“Charlie, take her open hand; I’ll take Reece’s. And then a hand on their foreheads – let’s see.”

For more than a minute the two men held their positions; they appeared to drift into a hypnotic state. Presently Rickenbach mumbled something and then he suddenly opened his eyes. He stared blankly for a moment and then put a hand on his friend’s shoulder – Springer also returned to reality.

Rickenbach stood. He looked directly at Rhinefeld, whose hardened expression and dark eyes seemed devoid of feelings. “She seems to be holding open a synaptic pathway. I’ve never experienced such mental control. You can’t teach that, she’s a natural. Now get this, if you can . . . Richard Reece is doing what you intended to do with the woman – only on a much deeper level. Not psychic hypnosis to reveal facts and information; this is different. He’s gone into her memory. I’ve never seen two people so close; there has to be a natural affiliation. Call it soul mates, if you like.”

“Ugh! Zat is ridiculous! Going into her dreams . . .”

“Not dreams, Rhinefeld. Dreams are shallow, just residual electrical impulses in the synapse. This is much deeper; he’s gone into the recesses of her mind, deep into her memory – even together we can’t sense him, not on a semiconscious level. I’d say he’s trying to learn something; a secret that this woman has long since forgotten.”

“Can you follow him? Vot vill happen if you kill him inside?”

“If we kill his mind on a subconscious level, he’ll become a cabbage. Like someone who is acutely mentally ill. He’ll be finished as Richard Reece.”

“Not enough!” Rhinefeld barked. “He did zis to me.” Rhinefeld held up a trouser leg to expose his prosthetic leg. He thought for a moment and nodded sadistically. “I vont him to die twice. First his mind, and zen his body. I vill take pleasure in doing zat part. Can you follow him?”

Rickenbach looked down at Springer; their eyes met. “I’ve never heard anything like it being attempted before, but if we combine, it might just be possible,” said Springer.

Rickenbach nodded his agreement. He looked again at Rhinefeld. “The woman waits for Reece to return, but she doesn’t know what state his subconscious will be in, and so she maintains an unusually wide neural pathway to her memory centre,” he continued. “We will need every ounce of our training and experience, but I think we can enter in a similar way – down the same path. But you must protect us here. We’ll be totally unconscious; helpless to all intent and purposes.”

“Ya! Ve vill. Do it! Kill his thoughts . . . kill his mind!”

Same location – simultaneous

Peter Rothschild sat thoughtfully in the back of a police vehicle. He checked his watch; it was thirty-nine minutes past midnight, Local Time. He expected Richard to be sleeping, but with the situation on the Moon escalating and the Lunar Senate demanding his immediate return or threatening repercussions, he had no other choice but to disturb him. The Swiftsure class ship was already waiting for him at the spaceport. His suspicions, however, were immediately aroused when his driver turned the corner. He knew that roadside parking was prohibited in the street for security reasons, because of the number of foreign parliamentary dignitaries living there. It was the perfect front for a safe house: protected by default; pretentious to the point of diversion; isolated.

Rothschild instructed his driver to continue past the house without stopping, and he scrutinised the parked car and its registration plate as they did. He pulled his telephone from his coat pocket, pressed a key and held the device to his ear.

“Abbey Hennessy here.”

“Abbey, it’s Peter. I’m at the safe house, but there is a car parked along the street close by. I don’t like it. Run a number plate for me, will you?”

“Go ahead.”

“334335 STF.”

“Hold on while I put it through the system. While I have you on the line, we have been copied in on another memo from the Senator General. Unusually, they are requesting help – military help! There’s something serious happening there, Peter, but information is still restricted. They say that they want their Squadron Commander back before it’s too late. The Federation have circulated a reply saying that their long-range sensors cannot see anything abnormal on the Moon’s surface. They can’t see the dark side of course, and so they are speculating that the problem is on that side. God only knows what’s really happening . . . Hold on, I’ve got an answer . . . Yes, here we are . . . The car is registered to Spheron, Peter, one of their fleet vehicles.”

“I see, that’s bad news; it seems Richard may already have visitors. How the hell did they get hold of . . . ?” Rothschild paused while he indicated to the driver to drive around the block again and stop where he could see the house. “Abbey, we have a serious breach of security,” he continued. “The Americans and their bloody SERON mole, I expect – the damned ‘special relationship’ gives them access to just about everything. Find out who, exactly, had knowledge of Richard’s movements, and who is party to the safe house details . . . address, entry code . . . everything. But first call for backup – I need a SWAT Team ASAP, and medical cover just in case. I’m going to wait here and keep an eye on things.”

“Yes, immediately, Peter.”

“Those two men, Richardius, over there, do you see. They are staring at you as if they know you. I thought you were a stranger here.”

“I don’t know them, Diomedes; never seen them before.”

“Interesting,” responded Diomedes. “If I did not know better . . .”

At that moment something caught Richard’s eye. It was an effect he could not explain, as if the end of an adjacent street was shrouded in fog. The street was on his left and Richard put a hand on Diomedes’ shoulder and then turned into it. “Do you see that?” he asked, pointing.

“I see nothing but a street with modest housing,” replied Diomedes, following Richard on his diversion.

Richard was engrossed and walked with purpose for another sixty metres or so until he approached a wall of semi-transparent mist beyond which the streetscape at first became blurred, and then faded completely, as if the mist’s density gradually increased, eventually turning to thick impenetrable fog. Like an unfinished landscape painting, for Richard the scene ended where he stood.

“At what do you gaze so intently, Richardius? What occupies your thoughts?” asked Diomedes, puzzled by Richard’s manner, but growing a little impatient.

“Don’t you see it?” Richard responded, turning to look Diomedes in the eye and raising his hand as if to present the amazing sight that appeared before them.

Diomedes shrugged and raised his brow at the total lack of revelation. “I see only a common street,” he said, stepping forward into the mist but making it clear to Richard that for him the street continued as expected, with unpretentious, uninteresting architecture.

Richard stood mesmerised for a moment and then he nodded knowingly. “It is the extent of Naomi’s remembering,” he uttered under his breath. “It’s the edge of her memory.” He paused again thoughtfully. “For whoever preceded Naomi, this street warranted just brief glance. Nothing lies beyond this point because nothing was remem . . .” Richard suddenly came to his senses. “Sorry, I’m not making any . . . we had better get on.” He gestured with his head.

With that Richard turned to retrace their path and on the corner with the main thoroughfare, he saw those same two men loitering. Diomedes saw them too and his eyes narrowed with suspicion.

“How much further?” Richard asked as they walked back. The two men he dismissed as simpletons because they had disappeared.

“We approach,” replied Diomedes, as he and Richard turned the corner. They continued walking and a few minutes later Richard saw the square opening before him.

Richard entered the wide expanse with admiration, as from that direction the true extent of his surroundings became apparent – classical architecture on an unprecedented scale. It was a wondrous place that reminded him of history book scenes and paintings of the great thinkers and philosophers of Ancient Greece: symmetrical rows of columns; great porticos in white marble; wide steps; and precisely proportioned statues of people and animals on tall rectangular plinths. It was like stepping into a great museum. Richard was overwhelmed by the culture, the people, the freshness and, above all, the blue sky.

“I will leave you now. May your journey home be uneventful,” Diomedes said, wresting Richard from his astonishment. The old man raised his fist to his heart in the customary way.

Richard was about to reply when he felt a low level vibration beneath his feet. The vibration quickly grew to a shuddering and then, for a moment, the ground heaved. He looked up; some of the tallest buildings were teetering in a precarious way and a nearby statue of a rearing horse came crashing down, narrowly missing some passers-by. And then the disturbance completely subsided.

Richard looked at Diomedes, whose face had paled. “Do you get earthquakes here?” he asked.

“The land complains from time to time, but mostly it sleeps – never have I felt such a thing.”

Around them the crowd seemed frozen, their expressions bemused.

“Well something is waking,” replied Richard, and with that the uncanny silence was broken by a much deeper and more disturbing rumble. This time there was a noticeable ripple across the ground and the flagstones on which they stood shifted. “I’ve felt something like this before, in the Middle Ea— . . . It doesn’t matter where. This is going to break, Diomedes; take my advice and make for open ground.” Richard looked at the people around him; there was a look of panic on some faces and indifference on others. “Make for open ground!” he shouted. “
Quickly! Make for open ground
!” But there was apathy around him.

At that moment Richard felt something pointed pressing into his lower back. He half-turned to see one of the onlookers from earlier on. It was an elderly man, lean and angry looking, and he pushed the point harder into Richard’s side. “Move!” ordered the man. And then Richard’s arm was gripped and someone jostled him – it was the other onlooker. “I said,
move
!”

Suddenly, there was a massive explosion. It was loud and intense, a combination of unearthly rumbling and ear-piercing crackling. The crowd gasped in unison. Richard looked over his shoulder. High above the rooftops to the east and in the near distance he saw an enormous column of flames and black soot thrusting upwards into the sky. And then the ground began to move. At first it was an underlying shaking and then intermittent, erratic juddering, but soon the movement grew to be violent, continuous shudders. A wide crack opened in the plaza not metres from where Richard stood – a man lost his balance and fell, disappearing in an instant. Panic ensued. People ran for cover. It was bedlam. Screams and shouts and calls of names filled the air and the rumbling intensified. A more distant chain of explosions merged to one continuous catastrophe and the sky darkened.

Richard shook his arm free and turned on the man with the knife. Momentarily startled, the two assailants were caught unawares. A scuffle broke out. Richard grappled for the weapon.

Around the plaza, buildings became unseated as their foundations shook. Great stone columns teetered and fractured and then crashed to the ground. Fleeing people were crushed by falling masonry and porticos broke and tumbled down.

Richard had a hand on the knife and tried to turn it inwards, but the second assailant was upon him. Realising what was happening, Diomedes joined the fray. The knife caught Richard’s arm and cut it. Diomedes was thrown aside. The two men had skills at close quarters but Richard fought back.

Wide rifts opened in the ground. Pieces of fiery debris fell from the sky and caused small, splintering explosions as they impacted the ground. People were burning; it was carnage. Hot acidic soot began to fall like black snow and there was a pungent smell of sulphur in the air and all the while massive explosions continued to the east. The earth trembled.

Diomedes, who was on the ground, called out for help. Having hit his head this expression went blank momentarily and his eyes rolled upwards. Suddenly he came to and hesitantly at first climbed to his feet. Then, without a thought for his own safety, was into the fight and hard at the two men. Richard got a leg behind the man with the knife and tripped him over backwards; Diomedes, throwing his full weight, came crashing down on the man. Richard, thereafter, had the upper hand and turned the knife to threaten the man. Suddenly Diomedes screamed out in pain – a deathly scream. Richard turned to see that the second man had drawn his own knife and was stabbing Diomedes repeatedly in the back.