Hammer of Angels Read online

  Radio Guy slowly rotates his head as we come out of the stairway. Whatever he was expecting, it obviously wasn’t a pair of scuba divers. He blinks hard, confirms that yes, it is two face-painted scuba kids, and draws in breath to call a warning to Newspaper Guy. Before he can form any words I’m already right on top of him. He’s so shocked by how fast I move that he tips over backward in his chair to get away from me.

  Since Radio Guy is already on the floor, I shift my trajectory to lance myself feet-first into Newspaper Guy’s chest. He exhales a loud whoosh as a cubic meter of beer breath gusts out of his lungs. I spin to Radio Guy, who’s regained his feet and drawn his sidearm. I lunge forward and swipe his pistol right out of his hand. Then I punch him so hard that he flips over, lands on his head, and sploogles onto the floor.

  I lean over Radio Guy and stick my finger in his face. “Stay!”

  His flabby chin waggles. “Jah! Okay! Jah!”

  I yank a pair of handcuffs off his belt and slap them on his wrists.

  Meanwhile Newspaper Guy crawls around on all fours. There’s a puddle of puke under his wheezing clam catcher. Blood drips out of his nose into the vomit. That may have been my best flying kick ever! I’ll have to tell Raj about it. Of course, if Raj had done it, this goombah’s bones would have exploded out of his skin like calcium rats leaving a sinking meat ship.

  Our dramatic entrance has the prisoners on their feet. I load Grey’s image of Eisenberg onto my Eyes-Up display and jog along the rows of cages until I find a matching face.

  “Victor Eisenberg?” I say to the thin, fierce-eyed prisoner behind the bars. One gander at him and I can see why he’s called the Hammer. The man bears his lean, muscled body like a ramrod, his chin could chop down trees, and his burning stare threatens to cook the inside of my skull.

  Eisenberg’s file says he’s in his forties, but he looks early fifties. Not regular fifties, mind you. More like that super-rugged, frontiersman fifties where he still drinks the young cowpunks under the table and then chucks their boozed-up asses over a barn.

  “American,” he says. It’s not a question. He examines all sixty-four inches of my scuba-clad body, nods appreciatively, and states, “It’s about time.”

  I’m not sure if he means it’s about time Americans got involved in the abolitionist movement or if it’s about time an American chick in skintight clothes busted him out of jail. Brando grabs a ring of keys from Radio Guy and opens the door to Eisenberg’s cell. Victor walks out, stretches his arms over his head, then takes Brando’s keys and tosses them to the prisoner in the next cell. The other prisoner opens his own door, then dashes around unlocking all the other cells. My partner and I each drag one of the guards into separate cells and lock them in.

  The freed prisoners gather in front of Eisenberg.

  “Men,” he says, “introductions will have to wait, but I think you all know me. We arrived separately, yet we will escape together. To do so, we will harness our energy as a group and overwhelm our opponents. Are you ready?”

  The man next to Eisenberg responds, “Yes, sir!” This is followed by a ragged but lusty chorus of “Yes, sirs.”

  Eisenberg turns to us. “Okay, little Americans, what’s the plan? Victor Eisenberg and these men are at your service.”

  Brando comms his boss to report we’ve acquired a squad of pissed-off guerrillas, and can we grab him anything as we torch our way out of here?

  * * *

  CORE

  PER-BB-342

  6/21/1971

  To Captain Bourbon,

  Hey, Cyrus, I finished the upgrades on your LB-505 and put it in your locker. You’ll find a new fire mode called “Auto-Pilot.” This enables your pistol to shoot at a locked target with no trigger pull required. As long as your palm is in contact with your weapon’s grip pad, it can fire itself. I also rewired the gyroscopes for extra spin so the targeting system can maintain a target lock even if you fall down a flight of stairs (ha-ha).

  I tried to give your weapon a persistent personality like mine has, but I couldn’t get it to work. To be honest, I’m not sure how I did it to mine in the first place. You should let me try again sometime. The way Li’l Bertha anticipates what I need from her is amazing.

  Enjoy the upgrades and remember all us little people when you make Director. If I ever get pulled out of the field, maybe you can give your old buddy a job in the Tech Department.

  Sincerely,

  Captain Vodka

  PS: Don’t forget, you’re coming over for dinner on Sunday. Cleo will make pork chops and her homemade applesauce. Alix has volunteered to help peel apples, and she asks about her Uncle Cy all the time.

  20

  SAME MORNING, 1:47 A.M. GMT

  TOWER OF LONDON, LONDON, PROVINCE OF GREAT BRITAIN, GG

  ExOps agents are trained to handle surprises, the expectation being that surprises are bad. But Victor’s instant company of fighters is a pleasant exception. Their current lack of weaponry limits our tactical options, but we’re about to rectify that shortcoming.

  I’ve snuck up to the outer wall’s parapet. In front of me, twelve regular German Army guards exchange small-arms fire with Grey and Raj. Behind me, half of Victor’s men slink through the darkness like a long, angry shadow.

  I set Li’l Bertha on “incapacitate” and direct her attention to the nearest guard’s backside. She sets the other eleven posteriors as Butts Two through Twelve and jiggles her gyroscopes to signal me she’s ready. I mash down on her trigger. She shoots Butt One, shoves my hand a little to the side, bangs a shot into Butt Two, and spins on to Butt Three. Moments later, she’s unloaded a dozen assfuls of liberty.

  Victor’s boys rush past me, swarm the wounded guards, and stomp their heads until the Fritzes lay silent. The ex-prisoners load up on German weapons, and we all scurry down to the main courtyard, where the rest of our group waits for us. Victor distributes the captured rifles to the guys with the most military experience.

  Brando comms, “Grey and Raj, hold your fire. The wall guards have been neutralized.”

  The racketing gunfire stops, only to be replaced by police sirens.

  Raj comms, “Darwin, we have competitors crossing the Tower Bridge. Grey and I can slow them down, but let’s move it along in there. We’re behind schedule.”

  “Roger that,” Brando comms. “We’re dealing with significant scope creep. Do you need help holding the bridge?”

  Raj answers, “Affirmative, if help is available.” He pauses, then shifts to a more conversational tone. “What’d you do, recruit Mary Poppins?”

  I comm, “More like Peter Pan.”

  Brando confers briefly with Victor, who dispatches ten of the gun-toting members of his company to fight their way outside and help Raj fend off die Kops. This leaves us with Victor and eight of his men to bust into Carbon.

  The outer Tower guards have been disabled with bullet wounds to their asses and blunt-force trauma to their heads, so they’re out of the game. It’s a quick run from the Waterloo Block to the White Tower’s base. Up close, the old keep is as imposing as it must have been the day they built it. I circle the building to find an entrance. The only doorway is twelve feet off the ground. My partner catches up to me, followed by Eisenberg and our new comrades.

  Brando says, “This can’t be how they enter and exit this building every day. There must be another way in.”

  “Well,” I say, “we don’t have time to search for it. Darwin, let’s use Jade and Pericles’s cheerleader routine. I’ll bounce you up to that doorway.”

  “The Krauts may have drained their garrison,” Brando says, “but this is still Carbon we’re breaking into. We’ll need more than two of us.”

  We turn to Victor. He’s not too heavy-looking. I can get him up there. Victor looks at me quizzically—he’s not sure what we’re talking about.

  I say to Brando, “Sure, but let’s boost you first so we don’t have to explain it.”

  I position myself beneath the high doorw
ay. My partner climbs onto my shoulders, and we crouch like springs.

  “Ready?” I ask.

  “Ready.”

  We flex our legs, and Brando flies up to the small landing in front of the high doorway. Muffled exclamations come from the men.

  I point at Eisenberg. He directs his men to form a perimeter around the building. Then he walks in front of me and says, “Okay, red hair.”

  Victor’s not as graceful as Brando, but he makes it to the landing on his elbows and stomach. His legs dangle over the edge until Brando grabs his arm and helps him up. I bend down, suck in a long, cold breath, and fire myself into the air. Brando and Eisenberg reach out to help, and I make a nice two-point landing. Presto!

  Now for the door. I activate my sidearm. The door is heavy oak, but we only care about the hinges. I set Li’l Bertha to .50-caliber Explosives and fire seven times. Stone shards and wooden splinters crease the air and ricochet into the courtyard. We shove the door open and squeeze inside.

  The moment I’m in, Li’l Bertha frantically spins her gyros. I switch to night vision and spot a charging figure with something metal in his hand. Boom! Pow! My assailant absorbs two .50-caliber Explosive bullets and flies away in a shower of liquefied idiot that schpritzes all over the ancient entryway. The man’s weapon—a semiautomatic pistol—smashes into the wall and clatters to the floor.

  I switch Li’l Bertha to less dramatic ammunition as Brando and Eisenberg follow me inside. The gore-streaked walls loom sixteen feet to a heavy wooden ceiling. We take in what happened to Herr Splat while Eisenberg retrieves the dead man’s sidearm. He tries the weapon’s slide. It doesn’t move. A closer inspection reveals that the ejection port has been crushed by a direct hit. Eisenberg throws the ruined pistol away and passes his eyes across one of those old crossed-sword and shield combos hung on the wall. He pulls a sword from the display and takes it with him as we move into a large central room.

  The Germans are using this area as an office, with rows of desks, filing cabinets, and computer servers. Thick electrical cables spill from the servers, snake up the walls, and vanish into the ceiling. In the back is a kitchen and meeting area. A large conference table in the far corner has sprouted three quivering pairs of hands.

  We ease into the room’s center. There’s a lot of furniture and gear in here, plenty of places for troublemakers to pounce from. “Darwin,” I comm, “go corral those three people and find out if we’re in the right place.”

  My partner calls out, in German, “Stand up!” When the three pairs of hands don’t move, he blares, “Schnell!” Six hands rise to reveal six arms, three frightened mugs, and three bodies wearing white dress shirts and neckties.

  Eisenberg doesn’t look at the men. He studies the rest of the room, in particular a large flight of stone stairs that leads to the next floor.

  Brando corrals the three necktie schnooks and fires questions at them in rapid German. They answer in even faster German.

  My partner comms, “They say there’s a lab on the top floors for cloning humans.” He pauses while the neckties tell him something else. “The guards are one floor up.” Another pause. “It seems like these three are computer programmers. They write the software for Carbon.”

  “Ask them who attacked us when we came through the front door.”

  My partner barks his question at the programmers, listens to their answer, and comms to me, “That was an SZ sergeant assigned to watch them.”

  The Staatszeiger. “All right, then,” I comm. “Let’s crack some skulls.”

  Eisenberg asks, “What about these three?”

  Brando says, “I’ve told them to hide down here. They’ll be perfectly happy to see us eliminate the guards.”

  Eisenberg glowers at the neckties and brandishes his sword. The programmers blanch and retreat behind the conference table. Brando, Victor, and I gather at the bottom of the stone staircase. An autocratic, commanding voice rings from above, then: “Jah, Hauptmann.” Yes, Captain.

  A pair of SZ troopers clomp down the stairs and almost run into us. I hook the first soldier’s arm into my elbow, jam my hip into his, and flip him over me, slamming his body to the floor. I whip out my knife and bury it in my opponent’s chest as the sword-wielding Eisenberg runs the second man through. Victor neatly pivots on his heel so his victim can fall past him.

  Eisenberg and I yank our blades out of the dead troopers, then exchange short, appreciative nods.

  I say to him, “You’re pretty good with that pig poker, bud.”

  “Danke,” he says.

  I reholster my knife and ask Brando, “What floor is Carbon on?”

  “The third and fourth.”

  I fix my partner with a steady look and raise one eyebrow. “So the second floor is fair game?”

  He grins, gently rolls his eyes, and recites, “She will lay great vengeance upon them, and they will know her name is Scarletzerker.”

  I bang a bunch of Madrenaline and charge up the stairs. My body wings past the top step—and a half dozen black-shirted SZ men—then sails halfway down a door-lined hallway.

  One of the soldiers I blew by fires his MP-50 submachine gun at me. I drill a few slugs into him and twirl through a doorway to dodge his 9-mm salvo. A brutish SZ trooper chases me into the room and reaches out to grab me. I slap his meaty paws out of the way, leap in the air, and ram my foot into his face.

  The brute staggers backward as blood spurts from his nose. I shove him out of the room. Private Brute pitches into the hallway, where a panicked burst of gunfire rips him apart. His death shriek is followed by shouts and barked orders.

  A quick look-around shows me a simply equipped kitchen: white tiled floor, basic white appliances, and several open doorways into other rooms sparsely furnished with metal-framed beds, small desks, and weapon lockers.

  I switch on my infrared and track the other SZ slimeballs as they fan out to attack me from multiple angles. One glowing figure remains at the top of the stairs, pointing and bellowing directions to the other men. He must be Yes Captain.

  I swing out of the kitchen, tear-ass up the hall, and tackle the officer to the ground. I crack my right fist into his temple, and he instantly stops moving.

  I haven’t been resupplied since we came to England, and Li’l Bertha is running out of her special ammo, so I grab Yes Captain’s MP-50. The big automatic weapon blankets my small frame as I sling his belt and ammo pouch over my shoulder.

  I cut to my left and mow down two troopers as they return to find out what happened to their boss. My feet vault over their bodies and hustle toward the second floor’s back rooms. I find a large area with a few sets of tables and chairs. Someone’s unfinished snack rests on one of the tables. This must be the mess hall.

  A hot-orange person is sneaking through the kitchen where I met Private Brute. Herr Sneaky moves into a small office on the other side of the mess hall. I hoist a chair and sling it through the wall near my stealthy competitor. When I fly through my jiffy door, the startled Staatszeiger man opens up on me.

  I evade Sneaky’s full-auto hailstorm by bouncing across the room like a red-haired jumping bean. Brando calls this move the Scarlet Two-Step. I somersault behind a desk, spin, and fire. My gun’s last few bullets rip through Sneaky’s guts, and he collapses in a slithering heap.

  Marauding soldiers rush at me from the room next door. I retreat to the mess hall and slap in a fresh clip. I kneel down, aim at the doorway, and get ready to fill these dunderschmucks full of lead. They don’t come in, though. A hand waves past the doorway, and something lands with a thunk.

  Grenade!

  My feet press into the floor to launch me into the main hallway. As I lift off, the grenade explodes and something whacks into my lower right leg. I spin into the wall and roll like a tumbleweed. My captured MP-50 skitters toward the stairs where Brando and Eisenberg lie in wait.

  Three SZ soldiers run from the mess hall, raise their weapons, and suddenly collapse in a rattling storm of gunfire. Abo
ve me, Victor’s angular features flicker demonically in my submachine gun’s sharp claps of light. This baleful display is abruptly blocked by Brando’s worried face.

  “Scarlet, you’re hit!”

  “I’m fine,” I croak. My throat feels like it’s coated in sawdust. “This is from the bad guys.”

  “No, it isn’t. Your leg’s cut.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” I hold my hand out to him, but when he hauls me up, a searing bolt scorches across my calf. “OW, fuck!” I hop on one foot until Brando makes me sit down.

  My neuroinjector pumps Overkaine into me, and the throbbing subsides to a buzzing tingle. I catch my breath while Eisenberg collects another MP-50 and more ammo from the dead SZ men. He hands me one of the submachine guns and cradles the other in his arms.

  “Ahh,” he beams. “That felt good.”

  I smile at him. This guy is my kinda people.

  Meanwhile, Brando dives into his X-bag for his first-aid kit and quickly wraps my wound.

  I peek at my dad’s watch. Only four minutes have passed since we first entered the White Tower. Nothing like a crazed firefight to make you lose your sense of time.

  “That’ll do for now,” Brando says. He packs away his first-aid kit and helps me up again.

  “All right, gents.” I nod toward the stairway. “Let’s go.”

  A low thrumming sound, like a vast beehive, echoes from the floor above. As we climb, the stone walls begin to reflect an unnatural blue light. The thrumming sound is deeper now, a long, low wOWww…wOWww…

  “Darwin, do you hear that?”

  “Yeah. Sounds like a generator.”

  We enter another large chamber. The White Tower is simply a stack of these voluminous rooms with connecting stairs. Here the walls are lined with about thirty metal boxes, each seven feet tall and three feet square. They resemble coffins except they have thick bundles of cables and tubes blooming from their tops. The cables and tubes stripe the walls and penetrate the ceiling.