Killer of Killers (37 page)

After dropping from the vent with reduced
grace, Trent spied a blurry movement from the corner of his eye.
The Chinese security guard was charging with his arms swinging in
the style of a Kung Fu offensive.

Trent parried the strikes, surprised the
Chinaman’s speed rivaled his own, but his lacerated skin gave him
reason enough to consider a different strategy. He’d try talking to
the man. “Stop fighting me. Do you even know what you’re guarding
in there?”

The guard didn’t stop. Instead, he delivered
a combination of punches and roundhouse kicks. The attack was heavy
on the flanks, and it triggered déjà vu.
Who else fought like
that?

Trent continued to parry the blows, and then
landed a side-kick to the guard’s chest. The blow knocked the guard
off his feet, but an acrobatic back-roll sprang him instantly up.
He returned using the same strategy, forcing Trent to shield his
flanks, and then delivered his own side-kick, knocking Trent onto
his shredded and blood-soaked backside.

Massive agony swarmed Trent’s senses, as the
crystal razors further embedded his skin. The multiple fragments
made a back-roll impossible. Trent could only shift to his side and
bear yet another blue-clad obstacle. He shouted, “Stop fighting me,
you idiot! What’s the matter with you? I’m not the bad guy. Can’t
you see that?”

It became clear to Trent that what the guard
saw was a grisly intruder, frazzled and splattered in gore. He was
nothing more than a mangled and messy portrait of misery. He wanted
to explain, but fatigue overwhelmed him. He couldn’t believe his
string of victories over so many colossal killers would end in
defeat to a pint-sized security guard.

Apparently, the guard was waiting for Trent
to right himself, but Trent couldn’t move anymore. He lay in an
expanding pool of red, exhausted and immobile. He hoped the
security guard would believe the duel was finished, and it seemed
that he did, because he started to approach in an unsuspecting
manner. The moment he stepped within reach, Trent shot his legs out
and took him down with a scissors throw. And before he could react,
Trent applied a chokehold—the
Tatsumaki-Shime
.

Trent was prepared to maintain the hold until
the guard passed out, but he felt the guard tapping his forearm.
Trent knew the signal. It meant his opponent would no longer fight.
Trent didn’t let go, but he eased up and snarled, “Do I have to
kill you
to get you to listen?”

“No,” the guard answered. “That would be
permanent.”

“You’re damn right it would be
permanent.”

“But this assignment is only temporary.”

Trent couldn’t believe the man’s levity at
this critical juncture. It called to mind a fighter in his past.
Trent released the hold.

The guard stood up, and when Trent dragged
himself to his own unsteady feet, the guard bowed and declared,
“Midori no Me no Tora.”

Trent mentally separated the blue uniform
from the guard’s Asian face. “I know you,” he said. “You’re Zao
Lin. I fought you in the Japanese circuit.”

“Yes,” Zao replied. “You are the only person
to floor me with a scissors throw and follow with a dragon choke.
That day you did it to me twice. And today, a third time. I knew
then it was you.”

“I didn’t recognize you in that uniform,”
Trent confessed.

“And I didn’t recognize you with all that
blood everywhere,” Zao countered with a good-natured smile.

Trent had no time to get reacquainted.
“Listen, I just found out how they’re making their medicine. You’ve
got to help me.”

Zao remained silent.

Trent spoke again. “Do you even know what
they’re doing to your people in there? What I just witnessed goes
beyond human degradation.”

Zao’s face darkened, but still he didn’t
answer.

Trent threw his arms up. “Are you listening
to me?” Flustered, he grumbled, “If only Samantha was here. You’d
listen to
her
, I’d bet.”

Zao raised his eyebrows. “Samantha
Jones?”

“Yes, Samantha Jones.” Trent studied Zao’s
face. “She was working with someone in the FBI to uncover the
horrors of this place. And believe me, I just uncovered some
horrors that would blow your Chinese socks off.”

“It’s me,” Zao said. “I am her contact. The
FBI recruited me for this assignment. My orders are to await
Detective Jones’ arrival and find a way to admit her into the wing.
She was to report anything suspicious and call in a task force if
needed.”

“Why haven’t
you
gone in there?”

Zao pointed to a camera bolted high on the
wall. “All of the rooms are monitored. The security tower is
watching me every minute.”

Trent looked at the camera. “Are they
watching you right now?”

“No. The surveillance and facility intercom
systems were disabled just before the intruder alert.”

Trent remembered the microchip Manoukian
handed to the swarthy guard at the gate, and he remembered when
Manoukian accessed the computer inside his office. Trent also
recalled Manoukian planned to kill Soriah long before he met
Samantha or Susie, or anyone else involved with Eternity Labs. The
conniving businessman must have arranged for the security
malfunction well in advance. Being a tool in Manoukian’s design
didn’t sit well with Trent, but his resolve to avenge Susie and
Samantha needed no inquest.

“Samantha’s been killed.” Trent closed his
eyes when he said it. “She won’t be able to help you anymore.”

“Then what should I do?”

Trent gestured to E Wing’s entrance. “Get in
there and see for yourself. And get that task force over here right
away.” Trent was finished talking. He turned about and resumed his
hike to the Hub.

“What about Chief Tacau?” Zao asked. “He’s in
there.”

Without breaking stride, Trent answered,
“You’re
The Chinese Dragon Who Fears No Man
, remember?”

* * * *

When Trent barged into the Main Lab, two
guards stationed there whirled around to face him. One of them
asked, “Are you surrendering?”

Trent ignored them. After his experience in E
Wing, he had no inclination to waste time. He stayed on course to
the B Wing lobby, but the two guards rushed to cut him off. Just as
the first one tried to apprehend him, Trent threw a powerful chop
to the base of his neck, which sent him unconscious to the floor.
The next one took his turn to approach Trent, but Trent delivered a
flurry of crossing blows, which slammed him senseless against the
wall.

Noticing the two Chinese scientists watching
in astonishment,Trent glared at them and shouted, “You two, come
here!”

The startled scientists seemed unable to
speak. Finally, they exchanged glances, and one of them asked, “You
mean us?”

“Yes,” Trent said. “Right now.”

Both of them slinked forward.

Trent pointed at the E Wing doors. “You’ve
got three dead
patients
down there,
maybe more
, and
several others who are in need of your immediate attention. You can
start by disconnecting the CSF lines and bringing them out of those
comas.”

The scientists again exchanged glances. “We
can’t do that,” the same one advised. “Not without orders from Mr.
Soriah.”

“Then I’m giving those orders right now,” the
voice of Abraham Soriah proclaimed from afar.

Trent spun around. Abraham Soriah was
standing near the opened entrance to B Wing, and his facial
expression was eerily familiar. It was like that of a
Kendo
master ready to inflict his
coup de grace
.

“Get down there right away and take care of
them,” Soriah insisted.

The scientists bowed in compliance and
scurried away.

“As for you,” Soriah said to Trent. “If you
still want to kill me, here I am. No bodyguards, no security
force... Just an eighty-eight year-old man standing helpless before
you.”

Trent slowly walked toward Soriah. With each
step, he considered the punch to Soriah’s pulmonary artery. When he
reached striking distance, he looked up into Soriah’s cold gray
eyes for many seconds. But Trent realized Soriah was observing him
as well, and actually seemed more interested in his gore-splattered
clothes than anything else.

“You’re a walking work of art,” Soriah
remarked. “I’d even venture to say Jackson Pollock would be
proud.”

“I don’t give a shit about Jackson
Pollock.”

Soriah scrunched his eyes and nodded. “Of
course. You’re the man who’s all about justice. Well then. Do you
want to kill me or not? It’s your move.”

Trent examined the lines on the old man’s
face. He envisioned them lines of wisdom, as were those on the face
of his elderly Japanese mentor, whose words he recalled those many
years ago: ‘
Respect your elders, for they have earned your
respect, even before you breathed your first air. Never disregard
what they have achieved and what they have sacrificed.
’

Trent said, “Furuki o tazune atarshiki o
shiru.”

The wrinkles on Soriah’s face increased.
“What’s that you say?”

“It wasn’t you. It was Manoukian.”

Soriah’s expression didn’t change. He folded
his arms and asked, “How did you figure that out?”

“He’s in with those guys, like the one at the
front gate. They all resemble each other, and I don’t take it as
coincidence.”

“You’re right. They resemble each other
because they’re related. Cousins, I’m told, from Turkey. They owe
their allegiance to Mr. Manoukian, not to me. I suppose I’ll have
to let them go.” Soriah smiled at Trent and then added, “The ones
who are still alive, that is.”

Trent nodded. “Yeah.”

“It was Charles who discovered their
connection.”

“Where is he?”

“Charles or Manoukian?”

“Both of ’em.”

“Mr. Manoukian has departed in my limousine.
I would think he is on his way back to San Francisco to consult
with his lawyers about our agreement.”

“What agreement?”

“That he is no longer a part of Eternity Labs
or Soriah Enterprises. If he considers his options, I’m sure he
will sign by tonight.”

“And Charles?”

“He’s assisting my Specials. The ones still
on their feet, I mean. We have to get our workers back inside. We
need E Wing under control.”

“Under control? Your E Wing resembles a Nazi
death camp.”

“And I’m another Hitler, is that it? Isn’t
that what Mr. Manoukian would have you believe? After all, I do
want to hoard Eternity and create a separate race of immortal
supermen.”

“After today your drug is out of production,
and you know it,” Trent said. “You won’t be able to recreate the
formula. Not if it takes the cerebrospinal fluid of people forced
into comas.”

“Forced? Who said these people are forced to
do anything?”

Trent thought about it. No one said they were
forced to do anything. “Are you telling me they volunteered?”

“That would be closer to the truth. They
agreed to donate their bodies to science for a limited time to
escape the drudgery in their homelands.”

“You expect me to believe they just lie down
in those capsules and let you put them to sleep?”

“Well, we don’t explain every detail. We do
promise they won’t lose any body parts in the process, and we keep
that promise as you managed to see. When they arrive, we prep them
in our stasis tubes and that’s where they stay for a few months.
Then, they are resuscitated, and after a short rehabilitation,
they’re free to begin a new life in a new country. So you see,
we’re not the evil miscreants you were led to believe.”

“Thirty million innocent Chinese civilians
were butchered by men who made the same claim!” It was the angry
voice of Zao Lin. He stood at the entrance to E Wing’s lobby.

“Mr. Lin,” Soriah called out. “Do join us,
won’t you? You may remember our guest. He is, after all, the reason
you are here.”

Trent crumpled his brow. “You hired him
because of me?”

“After our meeting, I couldn’t take the
chance that you would become a thorn in my side. I was told Zao is
the only fighter you have never defeated.”

It wasn’t how Trent remembered the match, but
that wasn’t important. “So you figured I’d come back and be a pain
in your ass, and you found a Chinese enema to flush me out, is that
it?”

“Mr. Smith, I didn’t get to where I am today
without accounting for and preparing for every possible mishap. You
said you worked for no one, but the future is uncertain.” Soriah
looked at Zao and then at Trent. “When you refused to cooperate
with us, Charles and I were forced to find someone who could match
you, just in case. I had to be certain my plan would proceed.”

“No, Mr. Soriah,” Zao Lin said. “An FBI task
force will be here soon, and your plan will
not
proceed. My
grandparents died at Nanking, and I will not allow a horror like
that to happen again. Not even under controlled conditions such as
this.”

“Well, if you say so, young man.”

Soriah’s grin revealed he still believed his
bases were covered. Trent was aware that Soriah’s now deceased
state senator passed special laws to solve this problem if it ever
came up, and that Soriah owned most, if not all, of the courts in
Minnesota. He asked, “You don’t believe any of this will be a
problem?”

“My only problem,” Soriah brazenly confided,
“is if the missing flash drive containing Eternity’s database is
never recovered, it will take another five years to reinvent it.”
He focused on Trent. “Would you happen to know where Dr. Benson put
it? You were there when he died. Did he give it to you?”

Trent remained silent, mostly because he was
unsure of what to say. The Fountain of Youth was in his pocket, but
he couldn’t bring himself to simply take it out and hand it
over.

Appearing frustrated, Soriah continued. “It’s
no good to you. I must have it. Just think, Mr. Smith, you can live
forever.”