Day of Doom (26 page)

Fiske lay motionless for a long moment. The pain in his shoulder burned likesomeone had pierced him with a swordcovered with molten lava. That’s what itfelt like to be shot. He rolled over and

rose   to  his   knees,   feeling  slightly

nauseous.

He looked up to see everyone staringat him. Nellie gazed grimly at him andtouched her own gunshot wound. Reagan,

the effects of the Taser wearing off, stared at him with semi-paralyzed features. Ted could not see him, but apparently could sense what had happened.

“Fiske?” he said. “Are you okay?”

Jonah just grunted with the rag stuffed in his mouth.

Fiske managed to say, “I’m all right.” However, he felt far from all right.

“For now,” said Vesper One as hewalked into the circle formed by his men. “But not for long,” he added, the smokinggun still in his hand.

Fiske stared up at him.

“You know, for an evil genius typewith delusions of grandeur, I really wouldhave pegged you for being a bit longer inthe tooth. You look like you’re about to goto the prom for the first time, not that any

decent girl would condescend to go with a creepy punk like you.”

Vesper One’s expression remained unchanged. “Sarcasm flowing from a defeated foe. Interesting. I guess if it makes you feel better, go right ahead.”

“You don’t want me to really get started. I might never stop.”

Vesper One gazed at him with pity. “Oh, you’ll stop. Precisely when I want you to.” He pointed the muzzle of his pistol at the center of Fiske’s broad forehead.

“Shoot an unarmed man? Hardly sporting of you.”

“But I’m not sporting. I’m a Vesper. I win any way I can.”

“Actually, so do the Cahills.”

This comment had not come from

Fiske.

It had come from Amy Cahill.

The  next  instant  Vesper   One’sminions were being overwhelmed by thisinfusion of fresh troops.

Jake brought down two of them all byhimself,   pounding   them   until   theycollapsed into unconsciousness.

Hamilton moved through the Vesperslike a threshing machine, kicking andpunching any of them within reach. Whenone tried to Taser him, he grabbed thedevice and zapped the man instead.

Amy and Dan stood back-to-back andtook on all comers. Kicking and punchingand biting when necessary, they managedto subdue a half dozen Vespers in a matterof minutes.

Evan had one Vesper in a headlock

when the shot rang out. At first Evan didn’t seem to have noticed that he’d been

hit. Then he looked down at his chest and saw the blood flowing from the hole there. He fell to the floor. The others were so

busy fighting they didn’t notice.

Ian and Natalie were kicking and punching as they worked their way to the Doomsday device. Natalie finally broke through a column of Vespers and ran for it, after picking up a large metal bar one of the Vespers had dropped. She swung it back, ready to deliver a crushing blow to the huge machine.

Ian watched in admiration until he noticed the blue sparks spewing from the base of the device.

“Natalie, no!”

She didn’t hear him.

She swung the pole and hit her targetsquarely in the middle. It did no damage. To the device. Natalie stood there,momentarily frozen as the electricalcurrent built up in the device sweptthrough her.

Ian watched, paralyzed by panic ashis sister was hit by the current. He didn’tknow what to do. He couldn’t exactlyfathom what was happening.

Then the surge of power from the Doomsday device ceased, and the metalbar fell away. Natalie moaned once andfell to the floor.

“No!” screamed Ian as he fought his way to his sister.

He knelt next to her. Her eyes were open. He felt for a pulse. There was none.

He started performing CPR. He

pumped and pumped her chest, trying to restart her heart. He kept checking her pulse. Finally, he sat back, exhausted. He stared down at his sister. The truth was

something that Ian could not comprehend,

though it was crystal clear.

Natalie Kabra was dead.

As the fighting continued all aroundhim, Ian sat there on his haunchesovercome with anguish. He had just beenreunited with his sister and now he had

lost her. He couldn’t quite understand that she would not be coming back. How could she be dead? She was always so much alive. In everything she did. Ian had so looked forward to growing up with her. They were all each other had. All the family left of the Kabras.

He reached down and touched her

cheek. It was still warm. He touched her hand. It felt so limp, but instead of pulling away, Ian gripped it more tightly, as though his warmth could bring her back. But of course it couldn’t. The dead could

not come back.

The laughter reached Ian’s ears a moment later. He looked over and saw Vesper One in the far corner. He held up a device that looked like a remote.

“ A
 
shocking
 
experience for her, wouldn’t you say, Ian?” crowed Vesper One.

Enraged, Ian slowly rose, smashedhis way through two Vespers, and chargedstraight at Vesper One.

“You die, right now,” yelled Ian. Hehad never truly imagined killing anyoneuntil right this instant. Now he could not

exist another second while this man lived.

“So many have said, and yet here I am,” taunted Vesper One.

In another moment he was gone.

Ian couldn’t believe his eyes. He looked around everywhere.

How had he disappeared?

Amy came running over to him. “I’m so sorry, Ian.” The tears in her eyes matched the ones in his. She had obviously seen Natalie’s body.

Ian panted. “I will get him. If it’s the last thing I do. I will get him.”

“
 
We’ll
 
get him, Ian. All of us.”

“All of us who are
 
left
,” he amended

bitterly, staring over at his dead sister.

They turned back to the fight.

That’s when Amy saw him.

Evan, on the floor, blood flowing out

of his chest.

“NO!” screamed Amy. She ran toward Evan, flooring a Vesper with a kick to the head as she zipped past.

She reached Evan and knelt down

next to him. His eyes were closed. She felt for a pulse. It was there, but just a trickle.

“Evan, can you hear me?”

He opened his eyes, managed a smile. “Boy, this sucks, right?”

He laughed feebly.

All Amy could do was let the tears slide down her face. She took off her sweater, balled it up, and placed it over his wound.

“You’re going to be fine, Evan. I swear.”

“Amy, look out!” screamed Dan.

Amy ducked and the sword missed

her by an inch. The Vesper holding it reared back to try again. But he had picked the wrong time to try to kill her.

Amy lashed out with a tremendous kick and the man toppled to the floor.

As she turned back to Evan, she heard a little gasp.

She looked down at him. His eyes were open. But they were no longer seeing. His arms slid off his chest and lay limp next to him.

Amy took one long, shuddering breath, and then closed Evan’s eyes.

Then she rose, turned, and plunged back into the fight. But there was only one person she wanted to destroy.

Vesper One.

And she would. Or die trying.

Whatever happened, one of them

would not see the sun rise ever again.

They beat back the Vespers, forcing themfrom the room where the Doomsdaydevice was located. Hamilton and Jake

had managed to wrench several guns from the Vespers. They each had one and had given one to Amy and the last weapon to Reagan.

They had carried the bodies of Natalie and Evan to a far corner and found

blankets to cover them. Amy and Sinead

were  cleaning  and  bandaging  Fiske Cahill’s injured shoulder. Fortunately, the bullet had gone clean through. But he was in a lot of pain, though he tried not to show it. As they were working on him he kept staring over at the two bodies under the blankets.

“That should be me under there,” he told Amy and Sinead. “Not Evan and Natalie. I’m old. They had their whole lives ahead of them.”

Amy said nothing. She just keptwinding gauze around Fiske’s shoulderand arm.

Sinead said, “Before this is over, wemight all be dead.”

“Cheery thought,” said Dan as hejoined them.

They had posted sentries at all entry

points to the room. Hamilton, Reagan, and Jake, being the most athletic and having guns, had taken the first watch and intently gazed at all possible attack points.

There were thirteen of them left now, thought Amy.

Maybe an unlucky thirteen.

“You’re good to go,” said Amy as she applied the last bit of adhesive to Fiske’s dressings.

“Thank you, Amy.” He looked over at the bodies. “Alistair, now Natalie and Evan.”

“It would have been ridiculous to

think that everyone could survive this,” said Sinead logically, if dispassionately.

Amy wasn’t listening to her. She stared up at the Doomsday device. Ian had already told them about the electrical

charge, so they knew not to touch it. She wondered what was going on outside this mountain. Had catastrophe already struck? What would happen if it were fully initiated?

She turned to Sinead, Dan, and Atticus, who had come to sit next to them. “Talk to me about subduction zones. I’veread about them, but I need to knowmore.”

“What do you want to know?” asked Atticus.

“If I have it right, we’re sitting on abig one.”

Sinead said, “Yes, as I explained onthe train before. It stretches a long wayboth east and west.”

“So if the device taps into it, thedestruction would follow that exact route,

both
 
ways?” asked Amy.

Atticus   looked  unsure.   So   did

Sinead.

Dan said, “I guess I see what you’regetting at. Vesper One brought thehostages here. He’s here. If he starts thissucker up, then both the hostages and hewould be the first to die.”

“That’s what had Isabel confused,too,” added Atticus. “I guess she thought Vesper One was far too vain to take hisown life.”

“Reversing  the   polarity  of  themagnetic poles,” said Amy. “Results?”

Fiske rubbed his injured shoulderand sat back against the rock wall. “So,that’s what we’re talking about here? Reversing magnetic polarity?”

“Well, it’s about subduction zones,

too,” amended Amy.

“All right. I can give you a little insight into both, actually.”

“You can?” said Amy.

“I’ve traveled all over the world, particularly in my youth. Spent some time at a research facility in Amsterdam that specialized in collecting data on the Earth’s magnetic poles. When I was in Japan I learned about subduction zones from a scientist there studying tsunamis.”

“Cool,” said Dan. “We know if you reverse the poles it’s catastrophic.”

Fiske  looked  at  him  curiously. “Actually, the magnetic poles of the Earth have reversed many times over the eons.”

“What?” exclaimed Dan and Atticus together.

“Oh, yes. The last time was nearly

eight hundred thousand years ago, so I don’t exactly recall the details. Even I’m not
 
that
 
old. And on a daily basis, the magnetic poles can wander up to fifty miles.”

Amy looked confused. “But how isthat possible? Our research showed itcould be catastrophic, cause all sorts ofnatural disasters.”

Fiske   explained,   “The   Earth’smagnetic field protects us from cosmicradiation. The field itself is produced byinteraction of the Earth’s solid inner iron