Shaking the icy water from her body, Judith Foy defi-antly met the gang leader’s gaze. Only half conscious after her violent capture, Judith Foy had been dragged through a stinking sewer, tossed into a hole blasted in the wall, and dumped on a cold concrete floor. She lay there for an inde-terminate amount of time, until someone poured a bucket of ice water over her.
Gasping against the freezing torrent, she found herself in a circle of street thugs, some white, most black or Hispanic. Harsh fluorescent lights buzzed over her head. Soon she realized she wasn’t in the garage anymore. There was no lab here, and the room stank of sweat and spilled blood.
Judith saw two headless corpses piled in the corner.
“I ordered your death many hours ago, but my command was not obeyed,” Noor continued.
Head throbbing, she studied the speaker. Noor had a body like a black bear, tattoo-etched arms thicker than her waist. His voice was deep, like Darth Vader’s without the asthma. Everything she knew about this man suggested he suffered from a delusional messiah complex. But when Agent Foy locked eyes with Noor, she saw no madness there — only a fierce and terrible cunning.
“And you’re Ibrahim Noor, alias Travis Bell,” she replied evenly. “Counterfeit holy man, full-time felon, and total wack job.”
A youth lashed out, plunged the toe of his boot into her abdomen. Judith grunted, felt the world recede again. She fought to stay conscious, and by some miracle prevailed.
“Don’t be so tough on Rachel Delgado,” Judith gasped, tasting bile. “Someone killed her first.”
The punk moved to kick her again. Noor stopped him with a gesture. Foy spit on the kicker’s leg.
Judith should have been afraid, but she wasn’t. Instead, she was filled with an all-consuming fury, a savage hatred.
She would have given her soul to kill Noor right now, tear out his throat with her teeth.
“We all thought you were a religious fanatic, but you’re not, are you, Travis?” Foy challenged. “You’re just a street punk with delusions of grandeur, using people like pawns because they’re too stupid to know better.”
Noor didn’t prevent the youth from kicking her this time. Judith howled in agony when she felt a bruised rib snap. “Tough… tough guys,” she gasped. “Beat up on a… helpless woman.”
“Did CTU send you?” Noor demanded.
“Actually… It was the neighborhood cleanup committee,” Foy replied, fighting the urge to throw up. “This place… is such a pigsty… You really should clean it up.”
The youth kicked out again. This time she managed to protect her vitals with her elbows. Her left arm felt para-lyzed now, but at least her bruised ribs were still intact.
“If CTU sent you, they made a tragic blunder,” Noor continued. “You have delivered the one tool I need to bring America to its knees.”
“A boombox blasting hip-hop?”
She waited for a fourth kick, but it never came. Instead a newcomer approached Noor. “Kabbibi is finished,” he whispered.
A smile tugged at Noor’s lips, then he faced the others.
“It is time for me to go, my friends. When next we meet, it will be in Paradise.”
The men lined up to receive Noor’s final blessings, completely ignoring the woman on the ground. Foy used the time to gather her strength, examine her environment.
She saw a red steel door at one end of the windowless room and realized she was inside 1313 Crampton Street, Noor’s gang headquarters.
The sewer must connect this place with the old Peralta Storage facility at the end of the block.
Meanwhile Noor waved his men back. “Give me thirty minutes to get clear of this place. After that, you may release yourselves from this world of corruption.”
“Allahu akbar! Allahu akbar! ” the men chanted.
Flanked by two bodyguards, Noor walked to the hole in the concrete wall and climbed through it.
As soon as their leader was gone, the room exploded with activity. Someone produced jerricans filled with gasoline. Muttering prayers — and still ignoring Judith Foy—
the men began dousing the walls, the floor, the dead men in the corner, with the flammable liquid.
“This is Raptor One. ETA, two minutes,” Captain Fogarty said into Jack Bauer’s headset.
Jack, now clad in a black CTU battle suit with Kevlar chest, shoulder, and spine plates, faced the five assault troopers inside the helicopter’s bay. He spoke into the headset in his helmet.
“As soon as we fast-rope down to the street, I want you to hit the warehouse. Blow the garage door and we’ll move in,” he said.
“The team in Raptor Two will hit 1313 Crampton on the opposite end of the block,” Jack continued. “Agent Abernathy’s team in Raptor Three will remain airborne, ready to provide backup if needed. Any questions?”
Grim-faced, the men shook their heads.
“Move fast and hit hard,” Jack advised. “We may be dealing with a biological or chemical weapon, so capture and containment is key.”
“One minute,” Fogarty warned.
Jack lowered his visor and shouldered a UMP
45-caliber submachine gun. “Hit the ropes!” he shouted.
The men rose and moved to the chopper’s open doors.
The stench of gasoline was suffocating. Judith Foy battled the urge to empty her stomach. Though her head was spinning, she kept her focus on a stocky Hispanic teenager with shoulder-length black hair and a Browning Hi-Power handgun tucked casually in his belt.
The youth had come down from an upper floor, empty jerrican in hand. He tossed the container into the pile of empties and crossed the room to the stack of full cans.
He was four feet from Judith when she stumbled to her feet and lurched into his path.
“I need a bathroom,” she rasped. “I’m going to be sick.”
The punk snarled something in Spanish and thrust her aside, eyes on the gas. Foy pretended to waver, but as he stepped around her, she yanked the gun out of his belt, threw the safety, and shot him in the base of the spine.
The youth howled and hit the floor. Five heads turned, mouths gaping in shock. Judith was a marksman and she hit her marks — first one man, then another.
Before she dropped the third man, he drew his own weapon and squeezed off a shot. The bullet struck sparks off the steel door. Judith lurched sideways and fired again, hitting the shooter in the forehead.
Two men remained standing. One clutched a can of gasoline like a shield; the other was reaching for his weapon.
Firing too quickly for accuracy, even at point-blank range, Judith hit the wrong man. The bullet penetrated the jerrican, and it exploded in an orange ball of fire.
Immediately, the pair was engulfed in flames that quickly spread. Fire scorched Judith, too, setting her hair and jumpsuit ablaze. Bolting across the basement, she dived through the hole and into the tunnel.
Judith landed in a shallow pool of fetid sewer water, dousing her burning clothes and singed hair. Choking, eyes burning, Judith crawled to her feet and raced through the dripping tunnel in a desperate bid to outpace the roaring conflagration at her back.
As soon as Jack’s combat boots struck pavement, he moved away from the fast-rope so the man behind him had a clear space to land.
Jack felt a hand grip his armored shoulder, turned, weapon ready. Tony Almeida was there, blinking against the prop wash.
“We’ve got to get inside,” Tony shouted over the hovering chopper’s engine. “Agent Foy’s in the sh—”