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He nodded, reaching into his pocket and taking out his sound suppressor. “With these.”
Grimaldi tapped his ear protectors. “What for? We’ve got ears.”
Bolan lined up the fine threads of the suppressor with the end of the barrel on the Beretta. “The weight of the suppressor can throw off your aim. Plus it can affect your ability to get a good sight picture.”
Grimaldi shrugged. “Isn’t that why we have laser sights?”
“Laser sights can malfunction,” Bolan said. “Batteries can go dead. Right?”
Grimaldi nodded.
“Come on,” Bolan said, giving his friend’s shoulder a slap.
The pilot heaved a reluctant sigh and began screwing on his sound suppressor as he followed Bolan back toward the beginning of the Hogan’s Alley course.
Bolan’s cell phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and looked at the incoming text. It was from Brognola.
Come by the office ASAP.
“What’s up?” Grimaldi asked, leaning over to try to get a look at the LCD screen.
“Hal wants to see us right away.”
“What do you know?” the pilot said as he put the sound suppressor back into his pocket. “Saved by the bell.”
Pima County, Arizona
IN THE STERILE environment of the state-of-the-art laboratory in the GDF Laboratory, Dr. Ellen Campbell leaned intently over her microscope as she placed the second slide tray under the lens.
“You look tired, my dear,” Dr. Allan Lawrence said as he entered and stopped by her table. His long gray hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and his light blue eyes focused on her in their customary, probing fashion. “Haven’t you been sleeping well?”
She smiled as warmly as she could manage. “I’ve got a lot on my mind lately.”
Lawrence made a tsking sound and moved across the lab to the nude, muscular man on the steel table. Trang was the latest and most successful candidate in Dr. Lawrence’s GEM program. So many failures, so few successes...and yet John Lassiter had been one of those successes. If you could call him that. When she’d gone to Dr. Lawrence weeks ago with the somewhat puzzling results from her latest tests, he’d pooh-poohed her findings, patting her arm like a condescending favorite uncle. “Nothing out of the ordinary,” he’d said. “Typical fluctuations well within the parameters.”
Only now she knew they weren’t.
Campbell went back to studying the slide showing the breakdown of the cells she’d taken from Lassiter’s blood sample of the previous night, or more accurately, early that morning. The correction did little to alter what was grimly obvious: inflammatory myopathies leading to oncosis. She switched to another slide. Same effect, only in a more advanced stage of pyknosis. Something was causing them to break down at a progressive rate. The nuclei were dissolving into the cytoplasm. Karyorrhexis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karyorrhexis). She straightened and looked across the lab as Lawrence, her mentor and surrogate father figure, injected a syringeful of the AAV-IGF-X5 into Trang’s arm.
Lawrence had wooed her from her research studies at Johns Hopkins by promising her a chance to make a real difference. That had been seven years ago, and he’d fulfilled his promise in spades. Not only did he take her under his wing and give her total access to the fantastic, governmentally financed research projects that he’d already begun, but he welcomed her input as an equal partner.
Back then she was thrilled, but intimidated. Deep down she knew she could never be Lawrence’s equal. His peer, maybe, but she soon discovered his work, his outlook, was too cutting edge. He was unafraid to take risks, boldly cut swaths through regulations and restrictions, forging a new frontier in genetic enhancement, but ultimately, at the expense of the test subject’s safety.
“We’re this close to curing major diseases like M.S., Alzheimer’s, cancer,” Lawrence had said. “We’ll take the bold step—administration of dystrophin—to the next level.”
It had sounded wonderful, and his promise to give a new hope to so many made her look the other way as he explained the necessity of going from experimentation on mice and guinea pigs to human volunteers. She’d balked, until he’d reassured her once again.
“All the advancements, all the great leaders in medical science—Pasteur, Currie, Fleming—all saw the necessity of putting their theories to the ultimate test. The human test.”
Her reticence lingered, however, until he assured her that nothing could go wrong. “That’s why I need you in the program,” he said. “As a safeguard. You could be a distaff Daedalus to my impulsive Icarus.”
She was flattered by his allusion to Greek mythology, giving her, by implication, the more dominant role. He’d sounded so idealistic, so brilliant, how could anything possibly go wrong? And that was, she reflected, how she first got involved in the supersecret governmentally funded research called the Genetically Enhanced Male—GEM—project. What she’d originally thought would be a quest to eradicate disease soon was transformed into the quest for a super soldier. Human volunteers were no problem. Most experienced violent side effects and were quickly dropped from the program, faceless young men who came and went. Then she met John Lassiter, and everything changed.
Now, instead of the allusion to Daedalus, she likened her experience more to Pandora.
She watched as Trang grimaced slightly when Lawrence depressed the plunger, and wondered if the risks of what they were doing had been fully explained to him. She thought about the slides. She thought about John. All these ramifications, albeit unexpected and sudden, certainly hadn’t been explained to him.
“Doctor,” Campbell said, “I need to talk to you.”
Lawrence glanced at her briefly, then turned back to Trang. He was Asian, but the enhancements had begun to give his face a more brutish cast. The high cheekbones had begun to expand, as had his mandible.
John’s face hadn’t shown the same degree of distortion, she thought. That had to mean that Lawrence was using a higher dosage. She had to tell him about her new findings immediately.
“Doctor, I really do need to talk to you,” she repeated.
He looked toward her, his ponytail flipping over the collar of his lab coat. When she’d first seen him she’d thought he resembled a tall, handsome Einstein. Now, she wasn’t so sure.
Trang gritted his teeth. “Feels cold. Like you’re injecting ice into my veins.”
Lawrence patted his shoulder with a gentle assurance. “That will pass soon.”
The door opened and Mickey Potter entered. The man made her think of a human weasel, with his thick tufts of dark hair slicked back, and his small, feral-looking teeth that slanted back into his mouth. He smiled and Campbell wanted to gag.
“Phone call, Doctor,” Potter said.
“What? Can’t you see I’m busy?” Lawrence seemed genuinely irritated.
“Artie sent me.” Potter’s lips peeled back from the disgusting teeth. “It’s Washington. Greg Benedict.”
Lawrence shot him a sharp glance, then turned to Ellen. “Monitor Trang’s vitals until I get back,” he said, as he set the now empty syringe on the metal tray and followed Potter out of the lab.
Campbell approached Trang and looked over the telemetry. Heart rate 56, blood pressure 120/70, respiration 9...everything seemed normal. Trang’s dark eyes stared at her. His body exuded a sharp, almost pungent odor, like pure testosterone. She didn’t like being alone with him, although she knew he wouldn’t try anything. She had only to scream or hit the red safety button and the security forces would be in the lab in seconds.
His piercing stare continued, and the thought of the security guards gave her little reassurance. Trang was progressing at such an accelerated rate that he’d soon equal John’s abilities. Maybe even surpass them. Plus, with John’s current affliction, who knew how long it would be before he’d begin to feel the degenerative effects? She forced a lips-only smile to reassure Trang, and said, “I have to check something over there,” as she moved back to the microscope.
Looking down, she transferred another slide to the shelf and adjusted the focus. These cells showed something new: karyolysis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karyolysis). The nuclei were breaking into fragments. That could mean an acceleration was imminent. But what was causing it? And why was it showing up now?
“Doc, I don’t feel so good,” Trang said.
She went back to him. “What is it, exactly?”
He frowned and shrugged. “I just feel, like, all flushed or something.”
Campbell patted his shoulder. “That’s perfectly normal. Lie back and try to relax. It should pass soon.”
He reclined on the padded table, the huge muscles flexing under skin that looked as thin as paper.
“What’s causing it?” he asked. “Is it the strength serum?”
“It’s probably the vector spreading the serum to your cells throughout your body,” she said.
“Vector? What’s that?”
“Think of it as a sort of dye,” she said, not wanting to use the term virus, even though the AAV—adeno-associated virus—had been tested as non-pathogenic. “It’s a special medication that spreads to each cell.”
“Man, it sure feels weird. Like I’m one of the X-Men or something.” Trang’s face showed a forced smile. “This ain’t gonna turn me into a mutant or anything, is it?”
Campbell patted his arm again and said something reassuring to calm him, but her own mind was racing. A mutant.
Something clicked in her brain and she rechecked all three slides. It was as if the cells were being affected by a new, lethal virus. The AAV had been thought to be safe, in its original form, but that was seven years ago. What if the virus, through the repeated injections John received, virtually one after each mission, had caused his immune system to attack the carrier? What if the AAV had mutated in some way, and was now causing the necrosis?
It’s got to be the vector, she thought. That has to be the answer. It’s killing him.
Stony Man Farm, Virginia
BROGNOLA’S FACE LOOKED even more haggard and drawn than it had twelve hours earlier when Bolan had last talked to him. It was obvious he hadn’t slept or rested in quite a while. He motioned Bolan and Grimaldi to two chairs in front of his desk. They sat and waited while the big Fed refilled his coffee cup.
“You look like you’re running on caffeine and adrenaline,” Grimaldi said. “You had any sleep in the last day and a half?”
“Sleep?” Brognola asked. “What’s that?” He made an attempt at a smile, but it failed to reach his eyes. After taking a sip of coffee he took his seat, then blew out a long breath. “You want the bad news first?”
“That’s usually the best way,” Bolan said. “We didn’t think you called us here to talk about the weather.”
Brognola set the cup on his desk and closed his eyes, squeezing the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. “They found Chris Avelia. He’s dead.”
Bolan had been expecting that news. He gave Brognola a few seconds, then asked, “Where and how?”
“Arizona, just outside South Tucson, near the Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation. He was dumped alongside the highway with a bullet through his head.” The big Fed compressed his lips, then added, “It looks like he was tortured, too.”
“Who caught the investigation?” Bolan asked.
“You name it,” Brognola said. “It was first reported to the Pima County Sheriff’s Department. As soon as they found out who the victim was, the FBI got involved, not to mention the DEA sending somebody, as well as the ATF. Avelia was supposedly investigating a pending arms deal. There’re rumblings that even the Agency was involved.”
Bolan nodded. Dealing with so many organizations would make it both trickier and easier. He’d have to have a rock-solid cover story to get through the door by using Justice Department credentials. Once he was in, the Feds could eliminate a lot of the legwork for him, if they shared information. That was always a problem, and not playing catch-up on this one was imperative. Still, with so many agencies involved, his Justice Department cover story would make it look as if there was one more federal agency wanting a piece of the pie. It was something all bureaucrats could relate to in spades and would probably attract little attention. “Any good news come with this?” Grimaldi asked.
“Yeah,” Brognola said. “Aaron was able to trace home base for those helicopters you guys saw.” “Where?” Bolan asked.
“South Tucson area, outside city limits. The helicopters are registered to Rigello Transport and Tours, an outfit that does helicopter tours of the Grand Canyon and other choice places. It also buys up a lot of old military hardware that it tunes up and rebuilds for Hollywood productions.”
“And they rented the copters out on the same night as the raid?”
Brognola nodded. “As far as we could tell, they’re the only game in that region that could have. Aaron hacked into their accounting system, but all we could come up with was some company named Bannerside Productions periodically renting two old Black Hawks and a Hind. They did so on the same day as the raid and returned them the following day.”
“Did Aaron find anything on Bannerside Productions?” Bolan asked.
Brognola shook his head. “Nothing yet. It seems to be a front. He’s working on it.”
“What’s the background of this Rigello Transport?”
“Now this is where things get a little bit more interesting.” Brognola picked up his coffee cup and took another sip. “Aaron checked their financials. The business was started about four years ago by Joe Rigello and his brother, Dean. Where they got the capital for such a big investment is a mystery. Before that, they owned a small motorcycle repair shop in South Tucson.”
“Motorcycles,” Bolan said. “Any gang affiliations?”
Brognola smiled. “It seems that one of them, Dean, was particularly close to a less-than-reputable motorcycle gang called the Aryan Wolves. The club supposedly is nothing more than a social-athletic organization, but it’s listed by the G was a one-percenter club. In other words, they’re into all the standard hard-core gangster activities like drugs, guns and, this close to Mexico, human trafficking.”
“Having a fleet of copters would make smuggling a bunch of drugs and illegals across the border pretty damn easy,” Grimaldi stated.
“Too easy. I found out the Wolves were rumored to be connected to De la Noval’s group. He supplied them with brown heroin, and they would get him whatever firepower his little heart desired. That’s what Avelia was purportedly working on. He was trying to find out who was supplying the Wolves with guns to sell. And there’s a new wrinkle.”
Bolan and Grimaldi both looked at Brognola.
“Our old buddy Dimitri Chakhkiev is supposedly coming to the U.S.”
“Chakhkiev?” Grimaldi said. “Where have I heard that name before?”
“Russian arms dealer,” Bolan said. “He used to be KBG before the Soviet Union broke up. Now he’s dipping his fingers into every little conflict he can, from Africa to Chechnya to the Middle East.”
“Maybe he’s planning on doing a little sightseeing,” Grimaldi said with a grin. “The Statue of Liberty, the Grand Canyon, Vegas...”
“Any idea what Chakhkiev is up to?” Bolan asked.
Brognola shrugged. “We have no idea yet, but it’s got to be something to do with an arms deal.”
Bolan stood. “I’ve heard enough. Jack, how soon can you get the Learjet at Andrews ready for a trip to Arizona?”
Grimaldi shrugged. “How long does it take to put in some gas and file a flight plan?”
“Call and put things in motion then,” Bolan said. “Hal, you’d better square things with the Air Force base.”
“Arrangements have already been made. And it’s already been fueled, Jack,” he added drily.
“Did I mention that I have to unpack from our last trip first?” Grimaldi said, shooting Bolan a smile, which he transformed into a fake yawn. “Not to mention repacking for this one. And according to FAA rules, I can’t fly until I’ve had at least eight hours sleep. How about we shoot for first thing in the morning? After all, we’ll gain three hours flying out West anyway.”
“Fine,” Bolan said. “Make it 5:00 a.m. I’m going to the gym.”
“Want some company?” Grimaldi asked. “I’d be glad to hold the heavy bag for you.”
Bolan shook his head. “Thanks, but I need some time alone.”
Pima County, Arizona
A couple things bothered John Lassiter as he rode shotgun in the blue van while Morris drove south under the dark canopy of twinkling stars set against the velvet of the moonlit sky. One was the informant they’d turned over earlier. The other was what Ellen had said. He tried to put all that out of his mind and concentrate on the mission. They were in the middle of nowhere on a lonely stretch of Arizona highway. The semi, laden with the cache of weapons, was three car lengths behind them. Lassiter had the suitcases with the money and the Mexican brown in the van with him. GOD had texted telling them to meet the Wolves to get their payoff money for the heroin, make that exchange, and then drive the weapons and the cash to the warehouse at GDF Industries. Then they’d collect their money and proceed to some much needed R and R.
The stuff about the tests that Ellen had mentioned still lingered in his mind, still bothered him. Was she right? Was he really sick?
But hell, he felt fine. During their liaison last night, which had lasted longer than he’d anticipated, Lassiter had dropped and done twenty-five one-arm push-ups with each arm as if it was nothing. She’d watched him with marveling approval and said she had to run more tests, and not to worry until she’d confirmed a few things. From his experience, doctors, especially women doctors, always made things out to be worse than they really were.
“I don’t think we’re too far from Wally’s Waterworld,” Morris said. “I grew up around here. The park closed about twelve years ago.”
