The Doomsday Key (27 page)

The automated safety protocol had summoned security.

Monk froze. He couldn’t retreat back into the mushroom lab. That would surely be the first place they’d check. He had only one other option. Stepping into plain view, he hurried across the hall and placed his palm on the reader beside the other door. He held his breath as it scanned, watching the far door, praying that no one turned around.

Finally, the lock freed. With a silent sigh of thanks, he shoved the door open. He and Creed rushed inside.

Monk kept the door cracked open enough to watch the hallway.

A team of security guards, four in total, were led by a technician in a lab coat. The man looked like he had just woken up. Apparently access here required a certain level of clearance.

Monk allowed the door to slip closed, though he remained crouched where he could listen. The other lab door opened and closed. Men remained out in the hall. Monk heard them talking in low voices. He didn’t know how many. At least three, he guessed.

Now what?

“Make some room,” Creed said behind him.

Monk turned. His partner had shed his parka and donned his lab coat. He’d also dried his hair and finger-combed it roughly in place. Creed stepped into the anteroom. While Monk had been manning the door, his partner had gone into the larger room with the glass-walled apiaries.

“What are you doing?” Monk asked, eyeing him up and down.

Creed moved aside. Beyond the closed inner door, a stir of movement drew Monk’s eye. In the outer room, a thin cloud of bees swirled and gathered.

“What did you do?” Monk asked.

Creed lifted an arm. In his hand, he held a meshed drawer. “I stole the queen.” Creed pointed to the left. “And I broke the hive seal.”

Monk frowned. From one of the apiaries, a thick column of bees boiled out where the drawer used to be.

“But why?” Monk asked.

Beyond the door, the bees gathered into a growing swarm.

“They’re definitely Africanized,” Creed said as he eyeballed his captured queen. “Very aggressive.”

“That’s great, but again—
why
?”

“To get us out of here.” Creed pointed to the anteroom’s inner door. “Open it when I say
now.
But keep behind the door.”

Monk began to understand. He switched places with Creed and moved to the anteroom’s inner door. Creed took his post by the hallway door and watched the gathering swarm of bees.

The cloud now hugged against the anteroom’s glass door and walls, drawn by their queen’s trail. Buzzing grew so loud it made Monk’s skin crawl.

Creed continued to wait. He placed the drawer with the queen on the floor. In the other room the swarm grew so thick that it blocked the light.

“Be ready,” Creed said as he straightened back up.

Monk grabbed the handle of his door.

With a final swipe through his hair, Creed faced the door and pulled it open. Monk was blocked from view, but he heard the startled outbursts of the security guards out in the hallway.

Creed put on an air of irritation and snapped at them in Norwegian.

As the guards struggled to decide if the new technician was a threat or not, Creed kicked the drawer across the floor toward the guards.

“Now!” he yelled.

Monk yanked his door open and crowded behind it.

The swarm immediately swept into the anteroom like an angry fist.

Creed dropped back and dragged his door fully open. With the way clear to their queen, the hive shot into the hall in a thick cloud. Panicked, one of the guards fired a wild shot.

A mistake.

Monk knew enough about Africanized bees to know they were sensitive to loud noises.

Screams followed, which only made matters worse.

Creed lunged over and grabbed the sleeve of Monk’s jacket. Time to go. Monk followed Creed out the door. There was no need for stealth. Four guards writhed in the center of the swarm, covered thickly in a stinging mass. The bees filled mouths and crawled up noses.

Monk and Creed sprinted down the hall.

A few ambitious bees gave chase. Monk got stung several times, but the swarm remained close to their queen. With his long legs, Creed reached the
door to the elevator lobby first. He pounded through. Monk slammed the door closed behind him.

Creed called the elevator, and the doors glided apart immediately. The cage was still on this level. They hurried inside. With no time to reach the servers, Monk abandoned their primary mission and pressed the lobby button. It was time to get out of here. Creed didn’t argue.

Monk stared over at him as the elevator climbed.

“You did good, Doogie.”

“Really?” He scowled sourly. “I’m still Doogie?”

Monk shrugged as they exited the elevator and hurried across the front foyer. He didn’t want the kid’s success to go to his head. As they headed back out into the night, a voice suddenly whispered in his ear, angry and urgent.

“Monk, report in.” It was Painter.

Monk thumbed his throat mike. “Sir, we’re heading out now.”

A heavy sigh of relief followed. “And the mission?”

“We ran into a little trouble with bees.”

“Bees?”

“I’ll explain later. Should we rendezvous back at the hotel?”

“No. I’m headed your way now. I’ve got company with me.”

Company?

“There’s been a change in plans,” Painter said. “Things have gotten a little too hot here in Oslo. So we’re pulling up stakes and moving somewhere a little colder.”

Still soaking wet from the foamy shower, Monk felt the ice-cold night cut down to his bones.
Colder than this?

As Monk headed across the corporate campus, he pictured Gray nestled in a warm cabin, a fire blazing in a camp stove.

Lucky bastard.

16
October 13, 12:22 A.M.
Lake District, England

As the forest burned, Gray clutched the lead rope of his stallion. He and the others had quickly saddled the ponies. They didn’t have a moment to spare.

After the initial firestorm, the flames had died down to hellish glows all around them. A pall of thick smoke covered the valley, dimming the stars. A single blaze marked a section of the woods that had caught fire. Likely an old deadfall, dry and ready to burn. The rest of the snowy forest had resisted the flames so far.

But they were far from safe.

“Mount up!” he called to the others.

They had to move now. Every second counted as a more insidious danger closed around them. Peat fires traveled underground, spreading outward in smoldering channels and deeper fiery pits. Though the woods were dark, they hid a raging conflagration below.

Wallace had estimated that the entire valley would be consumed in less than an hour. No rescue could reach them in time. Gray had used his satellite phone to contact Painter, to briefly explain their situation and pass on their GPS coordinates, but even the director had agreed that air support could not be mobilized in time to reach them.

They were on their own.

As Gray climbed into the saddle, one of the massive stones in the ring toppled over as the peat beneath it burned and gave way. As it struck, a
spate of flames erupted from the dark soil. Other stones had already fallen, some vanished completely into fiery pits.

This was no natural peat fire.

Someone had torched the place, plainly meaning to destroy the excavation site—and anyone here.

Rachel walked her pony next to Gray, keeping a firm grip on her reins. Her mount’s eyes rolled white, on the edge of panic. Rachel looked no less scared.

They all knew the danger.

As the fires had erupted, one of the ponies had broken out of the paddock. Wild and tossing its head, it had fled into the forest. Moments later, they heard a crash, a fresh blaze of flames erupted, and a horrible screaming followed.

Gray glanced over at the toppled stone as it slowly sank into the fiery mire, reminding him of the danger beneath their feet. Any misstep and they’d end up like the panicked pony.

Seichan hurried over to Gray’s stallion’s side. It was her mount that had fled and died. Gray leaned down, grabbed her forearm, and hauled her up into the saddle behind him.

“Let’s go!” He pointed toward the darkest section of the forest, where there were no glows at the moment. They had to break through the ring of fire and get up into the hills.

Gray led the way with Wallace at his side.

Ahead of them trotted the terrier, Rufus.

“He’ll find us a safe route,” the professor said, his face ashen. “Peat burns most ripe. His nose may pick up what we can’t see.”

Gray hoped he was right, but the entire valley reeked of burning peat. It was a slim chance the dog could nose out the subtle seep of smoke from the subterranean fires. But what other course did they have?

And maybe the dog did sense something. As they headed out, the terrier’s path switchbacked through the woods, with sudden stops and turns.

Gray kept their pace to a slow trot, balancing speed and caution. The dog bounded through the snow and across an icy stream. It seemed impossible
that on a night so cold, with the ground mantled in snow and ice, there could be a hellish inferno below.

But they were reminded of just that danger as a red deer leaped past their trail, frightened by the fires. It flew sure-footedly through the trees, then bounded into a snow-filled gully. The ground gave way beneath it. Its hindquarters dropped into a fiery pit, casting up a swirl of flames and burning ash. Its neck stretched in a silent posture of agony, then its body went limp and fell the rest of the way out of sight. Smoke roiled upward. A wash of heat chased back the chill of the night.

It was a sobering lesson.

“Christ on a spit,” Kowalski mumbled atop his pony.

Seichan’s arms tightened around Gray’s waist.

As they continued through the smoky woods, new blazes grew throughout the forest as the spreading inferno lit dead trees into torches. They gave one such tree a wide berth. It was an old oak, brittle and lightning-struck. The flames danced through its white branches, a warning of the danger flowing under its roots.

Even Rufus began to slow. He would stop often, his head swiveling, nose in the air, whining, plainly less sure. But he kept them moving, sometimes having to backtrack, dancing straight through the legs of their skittish mounts.

Finally, though, he came to a complete standstill. It was at an old dry riverbed, a shallow declivity that wound across the way ahead. There didn’t appear to be any threat, but the dog sidled back and forth across the nearest bank. He made one tentative move down into the channel, then thought better of it and retreated. Something was spooking him. He returned to the head of their stalled line of ponies. His low whine turned into a fearful whimper.

Shifting in his saddle, Gray stared into the woods. All around them the wildfire below had begun to crest to the surface, showing its true fiery face. Not far off, a large pine toppled into the forest, taking smaller trees with it. It crashed with a spiraling wash of flames. More and more of the woods was suffering the same fate. Whole sections were now collapsing
into the burning bog, either knocked to the ground as their roots were burned away or felled by their sheer weight as the ground itself turned to fiery ash.

They had to keep moving. The longer they waited, the worse their circumstances. They needed to reach the hills.

“C’mon, you old cur,” Wallace urged his dog in a gentle admonishment. “You can do it, Rufus. C’mon, boy. Find us a way home.”

The dog stared up at his master, then down at the gully. With a tremble, he sat down. He continued to shake, but his judgment was firm. There was no safe way forward.

Gray slid out of his saddle and passed his reins to Seichan. “Stay here.”

“What are you doing?” Rachel asked.

Gray crossed to a mossy stone beside their trail. He had to know for sure. Bending at the knees, he hauled the rock free and lumbered to the edge of the snowy riverbed. With a swing of his arms, he heaved the stone in a low arc over the bank. It landed in the middle of the gully—and crashed through to the fiery bog below. Flames spat up. Snow melted around the edges and boiled back up with a hiss of steam.

The hole immediately grew larger, sending out blazing tendrils. Other spots erupted along the channel. Tossing the boulder had been like throwing a stone in a pond. Fiery ripples spread outward in a cascading effect as fresh oxygen reached the buried inferno. Flames spat, and more steam rose. It spread outward, following the course of the old riverbed.

“You had to do that,” Kowalski said. “Couldn’t leave well enough alone.”

Gray ignored him and stepped to another stone. He dragged it up, and using his entire body, he swung and tossed the rock to the other bank. It was less than eight yards across. The stone struck the far bank and landed with a dull thud. It sat imbedded in turf and snow.

“It’s still solid over there. If we can reach the other side …” Gray turned to Wallace. “How good are these Fell Ponies at jumping?”

The professor eyed the fiery course. “They’re good,” he said hesitantly. “But that’s still a bloody long leap.”

Kowalski added his assessment. “Not like we have much choice.”

Another tree crashed deeper in the woods behind them. “Aye, that’s true,” Wallace said.

“I’ll go first.” Gray hurried back to his mount. He raised an arm toward Seichan to help her down.

“I’m going with you,” she said.

“No. Our weight will only make it harder to—”

“Do you see any free horses running around here?” Seichan snapped back, cutting him off. “I have to ride double with someone. And your stallion’s the biggest.”

Gray realized she was right.

He pulled up into the saddle. The others cleared to the side as he backed the horse a good distance away from the bank. “Hold tight,” Gray said.

She obeyed, hugging her arms and pressing her cheek against his back. “Go,” she whispered.

Tilting forward in the saddle, he kicked back and gave the reins a crack. The stallion, already bunched, as if knowing what its rider wanted, shot forward with a thunder of hooves. It accelerated into a full gallop within only a few strides.