The Einstein Pursuit (37 page)

It wasn’t until after World War II and the end of the Cold War that many of the stories surrounding the facility began to surface. By then, the complex was an abandoned mess of crumbling brick and overgrown courtyards. To most, it was little more than a reminder of a bygone era. A period in history that was better left forgotten.

The locals saw it as an eyesore.

Zidane saw it as an opportunity.

He realized that the thick, sturdy walls could be resurrected to their former glory with only a fraction of the investment required to build them from scratch. He saw a self-sufficient compound with its own electrical and water treatment plants. Perhaps most importantly, he saw acres of undeveloped land on all sides of the grounds, a buffer zone that ensured privacy.

The former military settlement deep in the woods was far from prying eyes, yet it was close enough to Rakovnik – and the services enjoyed by its more than fifteen thousand residents – to entice those scientists who insisted they couldn’t leave the comforts of civilization.

It was the perfect place for a laboratory.

A lab to study whatever he wanted.

In the waning light, Jones stared at the facility through a pair of high-powered binoculars. He noted that only a single story was visible above the ground. The rest of the structure had been dug into the earth. Rumor had it there were tunnels that went for miles.

Although Payne had been the leader of the MANIACs, it was Jones who had a special gift for tactics. As such, the assault had been his to plan. He had chosen dusk not because of the fading light. That logic was sound if they were fighting out in the open, but today’s battle would take place inside. Instead, the decision to proceed at this hour was based upon Masseri’s note that most of the guards would be eating dinner. Jones wanted to take full advantage of any edge he could find, and having his opponents gathered in one place was a good start.

To aid their cause, Berglund had provided a description of the security measures used at the facility. There were no cameras or booby traps – nothing that would provide a record of the men and women who worked there or expose the true nature of the building. As such, the main deterrent the team had to overcome was a series of locks.

The front entrance and interior doorways were secured by magnetic locks that could be temporarily disabled with the swipe of a keycard. Fortunately, Berglund had stolen one of the cards from an unsuspecting guard and had smuggled it to Masseri, who in turn had made multiple copies and placed them in the folder he had given to Payne.

Of course, Payne had no way of knowing if they would actually work until his ass was on the line and he was standing outside the compound’s front door.

He took a deep breath and swiped the card.

The door opened with a soft click.

‘Main breach,’ Payne whispered as he entered the building. The mic in his ear relayed the news to all the members of his team.

‘Copy,’ came the reply, ‘on your go.’

As much as they hated the thought of involving Dial or the Czech police in the assault, Payne and Jones had no qualms about bringing in outside help. To strengthen their numbers, they had turned to the vast network of former commandos now living abroad.

Men they had met in battle.

Men they could trust.

Two phone calls later, they had successfully recruited three men to help. Each was ex-special forces, and each lived within an hour of Prague. In fact, two of them were roommates. Though none of them were ex-MANIACs, they had been stationed with Payne and Jones in the Middle East and had heard stories about their exploits. The chance to help them out and to shoot some bad guys was an opportunity they couldn’t pass up.

The soldier who lived alone – a demolition expert in the Navy SEALs – was known to his peers as Rapture. His call sign was given to him because of his ability to create end-of-days-type carnage. His main responsibility was to level the electrical substation on Payne’s order.

Rapture could do that in his sleep.

When the time was right, they hoped to use the loss of power to their advantage. The problem with the strategy was the possibility that the power outage would render the magnetic locks inoperable. If the interruption unlocked the doors, everything would be fine. But if the doors were stuck in the locked position, they would need another way to open them.

Enter Hulk and Rhino, two hard-partying ex-Marines who could bulldoze their way through anything in their path. Though they were known as human battering rams, they were also good with knives and guns. Their main job was to evacuate the innocent scientists. If they happened to kill some guards along the way, so be it.

That being said, if anyone was going to get hurt, Payne and Jones wanted to make sure they were first in line to take a bullet. That was why they planned to handle the riskiest part of the mission personally. Their job was to find and eliminate Hendrik Cole.

Payne led the men down the first corridor of the building, peeking into every room but finding nothing but empty offices. They had no way of knowing if these were an elaborate ruse to fool visitors, but it was clear that whoever worked there had gone home for the night.

After ensuring the area was clear, Payne and the others used the stairwell to descend to the next floor. They were halfway there when the smell told them what they were about to find. Their senses were confirmed when they saw the test subject storage level. Every wall was lined with built-in cages of all shapes and sizes. A third of the spaces were empty, but the cages that were full contained the same assortment of animals that had been found in Stockholm.

Only here, they were very much alive.

Pigs squealed and dogs barked at them as they made their way across the floor. Jones vowed right then and there to make sure these creatures were cared for. He knew they had a job to do before he could worry about saving them, but he also knew he would be haunted by their faces if he left them behind. Nothing deserved to suffer for being what it was born to be.

Nothing
.

At the end of the row, a trio of chimpanzees stared out at them from behind the bars of their cages. There were no cries, no howls; only the forlorn faces of three animals already resigned to death. Jones could see the intelligence in their eyes, and he felt his normally iron stomach begin to turn. So much so that he had to do something right then and there.

‘Hold up,’ he whispered to Payne.

Payne glanced back. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘
Them
. I have to free them.’

‘What? Why?’

‘
They’re
from Africa.
I’m
from Africa …’

‘No you’re not. You’re from Pittsburgh.’

‘Come on, man. Just these three.’

‘I swear to God, I don’t get you sometimes.’

‘That’s ’cause
you’re
not from Africa.’

Payne rolled his eyes. ‘Be quick.’

Jones smiled and opened the cages. Then he directed the chimps’ attention toward the main entrance. ‘Go that way, guys. Toward the trees. Run like the wind.’

Hulk and Rhino glanced at each other, confused.

Then they turned and pointed at the door as well.

The chimps squealed their thanks as they bolted for the exit.

‘Okay,’ Jones said, laughing. ‘
Now
we can go downstairs.’

In contrast to the other floors, the third floor down was bustling with activity. Through the small window in the stairwell door, Payne and Jones could see an assortment of laboratory and computer equipment, with each station attended by at least one scientist.

Along the far wall they could see a small area that was being used as a guard post. Its cinderblock walls were only three feet high, with wide panes of glass rising to the ceiling. The cordoned area extended awkwardly into the main room, a hastily constructed afterthought to be used as an observation point.

Inside the cement and glass box that jutted into the primary space was Hendrik Cole and seven of his men. They were laughing over plates of spaghetti and meatballs, blissfully unaware of the threat bearing down on them.

Payne glanced at Jones, who in turn nodded toward Hulk and Rhino. Payne swiped the keycard through its receiver, disengaging the door’s lock. Then he contacted the fifth member of the assault team, who was waiting outside. ‘Rapture. You there?’

‘Here, sir,’ he replied.

‘Game on.’

Rapture smiled when he received the order from Payne. Then he did what he did best: he unleashed a series of explosions that utterly decimated the power station. In a flash of fire and a shower of sparks, the entire facility went dark. Before anyone else could react, Payne and his assault team burst through the doorway of the laboratory’s main floor.

‘Fire!’ they screamed as loud as they could.

They had learned from experience that this distress call transcended language barriers. It was one of those words that elicited an immediate response, regardless of the situation or the location. Within seconds, the warning was being translated and relayed throughout the room. Startled scientists pushed toward the exits in a calm and orderly fashion. Even in near darkness, the evacuation of the building had started better than Payne and Jones could have hoped. It wasn’t until the battery-powered backup lights switched on that all hell broke loose.

That was when the real panic started.

As the flickering lights began to illuminate the room, the invading men could no longer remain hidden. Payne and Jones had broken for the guard station the instant the room had gone dark, but they had only made it halfway to the door when the glow of the backup lights gave away their advance. One of the scientists screamed at the sight of two armed soldiers streaking across the room. Then another. And another.

Before long, everyone was screaming.

Cole charged out of the guard station with his weapon raised. He spotted Payne in the midst of the chaos and opened fire. He didn’t care about collateral damage. All he cared about was killing the intruders. Payne launched himself sideways into a pack of scientists. They crashed to the floor like bowling pins as broken glass rained down on top of them.

Other guards joined in, and before long, automatic weapons were shredding the laboratory. Jones and his squad returned fire while shrieking scientists crawled their way toward the safety of the stairwell. Payne twisted around and yanked one of the women he had saved behind the solid base of a specimen table.

‘See him,’ he said as he pointed to Hulk, ‘he’s here to get you out.’

Now sobbing, the young woman summoned the courage to rise to her knees and scurry toward the door.

From his position on the floor, Payne could see other scientists cowering behind anything and everything to protect themselves from the chaos around them. ‘Go now!’ he yelled. To reinforce his demand, he rose to his feet and returned fire.

His first volley caught one of Cole’s men in the stomach, and he crumpled to his knees. A second later, a headshot from Rhino splattered the wall with grey matter. When Jones silenced another guard with a shot to the neck, the rest of the men cowered inside the guard station, ducking for cover behind the concrete walls and an overturned steel table.

Spaghetti and meatballs covered the floor.

Together Payne, Jones, Hulk and Rhino were able to lay down a suppressive wave of gunfire, allowing the remaining scientists to crawl their way to the exit.

Hulk stepped farther into the room, determined to help Payne and Jones, but the duo cut him off before he could make good on his intentions.

‘We’ll handle this,’ Payne insisted between bursts of gunfire.

‘Get the scientists out of the building and to the rally point,’ Jones directed.

‘But sir—’

‘Now! That’s an order,’ Payne barked.

‘Yes, sir,’ Hulk replied as he backpedaled toward the exit.

Payne watched as Hulk and Rhino disappeared into the stairwell. From here on out, it was just him and Jones against whoever was left cowering behind the conference table.

They ducked low to reload.

‘What are you thinking?’ Payne asked.

Jones raised his assault rifle. ‘I’m thinking maybe we should have brought a little more firepower. Is it too late to call Kaiser?’

Payne smiled. The M4 in his hands was compact and efficient. It could easily shoot through the steel table, but it didn’t have the punch to drive a bullet through a concrete block. If they wanted Cole and his men, they would have to flush them out.

As he considered their options, two of Cole’s men rose from their positions and began firing wildly in Payne and Jones’s general direction. In the spaces between shooting, Payne could hear the squeak of rubber soles against linoleum tile. He knew that Cole was trying to escape. The men weren’t really trying to hit Payne and Jones; that would merely be an added benefit. Their actual intent was to cover Cole’s retreat.

‘Jon!’ Jones yelled above the din.

Payne turned to see his friend pointing toward the second stairwell at the far end of the floor. He watched as Cole and two of his henchmen disappeared through the exit.

‘Rabbit?’ Jones asked.

Payne flexed his trigger finger. ‘Rabbit.’

Jones slung his M4 over his shoulder. He crouched like a sprinter in the starting blocks and took a deep breath before bursting from his stance. His head held low, he darted between tables and equipment stands, ducking and weaving his way across the room.

Like greyhounds chasing the racetrack hare, the gunmen’s aim followed Jones as he ran. As they turned away from him, Payne sprang from his crouch and unloaded a full magazine into the unsuspecting pair. They fell, unable to catch their breath as the air escaped their bullet-ridden lungs. Confident that his friend was no longer in danger, Payne stepped over each man and ended his life with a single round.

‘Clear?’ Jones asked.

‘Clear,’ Payne replied.

Jones rose to his full height as Payne raced by him in pursuit of Cole. Jones followed him into the second stairwell, where they had a decision to make. The exit was above them, but bloody palm smears on the wall indicated that someone had made their way down.