King lifted the head. It was a lot heavier than it looked. King grunted from exertion.
Pierce slid the bag over the head, covering two thirds of the object. King placed it back on the floor of the cave, suddenly craving a drink from his few seconds of work. How anyone could have spent the time and energy to create the line drawing above was beyond him. Even here in the shade, the air was still plenty hot and dry enough to wither a man until he looked like a raisin.
Pierce took the satchel strap and dragged the object toward the tunnel. "Let's get out of this sweat lodge and catch up over a beer. I'll tell you all about our little friend here, too. I'll pull, you push."
George ducked into the tunnel, pulling the satchel behind him. King followed on his hands and knees, pushing the artifact with his hands, leaving the lantern behind. He would return for it after getting the heavy son-of-a-bitch artifact out of the hole. He squinted as Pierce climbed out, letting the sun blaze down. With a final heave he pushed the object out and followed close behind. But when he emerged from the hole and looked at Pierce, his face was twisted with an awkward discomfort King had seen on so many faces before — right before — he shot them.
King spun, following Pierce's gaze and came face-to-face with the muzzle of a t riple-barreled handgun he'd only seen in demonstrations, the Metal Storm O'Dwyer VLe. Its electronic firing system used no moving parts and didn't require a clip or magazine. Bullets were stacked inside the barrel, separated by propellant. Some Metal Storm weapons using more than three barrels launched projectiles at speeds of up to one million rounds per second. They were the future of battlefield weaponry, but King had never heard of them being utilized in actual combat. Last he heard the technology was still in the R&D phase in Australia, but that did little to comfort him. The handgun lined up with his skull could fire three rounds in under a second without recoil until after the third bullet left the muzzle. His head would be obliterated. Of course, the first round would do the job on its own. The second two just added insult to injury.
SEVEN
Seth Lloyd had never been fond of James Bond, Mission Impossible, or even Nancy Drew, but as he snuck through the dimly lit, electronic-smelling Manifold Gamma computer lab, he wished he'd paid attention and taken notes on how to be a super sleuth. In the confines of a computer system, he could enter and exit at will, hacking networks, opening backdoors, and dismantling firewalls with ease. But the real walls, doors, and security cameras, not to mention the guards watching them, twisted his stomach and had him running to the bathroom before attempting this final act as a Manifold employee.
Seth sat down at his assigned computer, a twenty-four-inch iMac with all the trimmings running Linux, trying to look as normal as possible. He carried a coffee, now cold after his trips to the bathroom, a clipboard full of notes, and wore his funniest T-shirt, that read: There are ten different kinds of people in the world: those who know binary and those who don't. He doubted any guard watching would be smart enough to figure out the joke, but he hoped they'd spend enough time on it so as not to notice his computer screen or see the thumb drive he'd inserted into the USB port behind his cup of coffee.
He set to work on the keyboard and found his fingers too shaky to type at the speed he required. Needing to calm down, he turned on his iPod, scrolled down through the list of downloaded tunes, selected "My Hero" by the Foo Fighters, and placed the small earphones in his ears. He returned to the keyboard bolstered by the song's lyrics and heavy beat.
After opening the diagnostic tools he typically used in the lab to make sure the network was up and functioning glitch free, he opened his own personal software from the thumb drive. The small program ran behind the diagnostic window, allowing him to work without worrying about his program being seen on-screen, but it also meant that he had to work blind. He'd memorized the keystrokes, commands, and timing over the past week, since he'd broke into Manifold's database for fun. He'd done it like this, working secretly behind his diagnostic program, which did most of the work for him.
His fun had been short-lived when he uncovered a list of Manifold clients behind an ultra-secure firewall. The list included numerous terror organizations and violent regimes. Several were on the waiting list for something called Project Lerna, so he dug deeper while his subconscious told him to run. As a computer tech and network wizard, he never knew what the geneticists he worked alongside were doing. He knew it was high tech, like everything Manifold did, but he would never have guessed it involved rapid human regeneration. He'd been fairly anarchist throughout most of his twenty-three years of life, even as a child, but this flew in the face of decency. The technology would clearly be used to suppress people worldwide, and that spoke to his inner rebellious core and started his act of corporate treachery in motion.
He first attempted to hack into the system from the outside, which would have negated the need for his own personal Mission Impossible, but the firewall held its ground against every trick in the book. The only way past it was to connect, physically, behind the firewall. And the only place to do that was here, in the computer lab, which had been created for the sole purpose of maintaining the internal network protected by the firewall.
Without seeing it, Seth set the first data transfer in motion, downloading nearly two gigabytes of information to his thumb drive. He began counting down the two minutes it would take for the data to transfer.
When a hand touched his shoulder, he jumped and nearly fell back in his chair. Standing above him was David Lawson, second in command of Gen-Y security and head of the Manifold Gamma security force when Reinhart wasn't present. He'd always been nice enough, but he had seen Lawson during training sessions and knew what the twenty-one-year-old was capable of. He pulled the iPod earphones out and put on his best smile.
"Damn, man, you scared the hell out of me."
"Sorry," Lawson said with a grin. "You're not scheduled to run a diagnostic until next week. Had to come see what was up. You know how it is."
"Yeah, right. I was downloading some files last night and noticed the transfer rate lagging a bit. Wanted to make sure we didn't have a problem."
"What'd you get?" Lawson asked, growing excited. Seth provided most of the young security guards with a supply of video games. They had training and high-tech gadgets, but had very little to actually do. Most were starved for action and the games he provided were as good as it got most of the time.
"Call of Duty Six Beta," he said, hoping Lawson wasn't up on his video games enough to see through the lie.
"Beta? Sweet. Can I get it from you when you're done in here?"
Seth's ass twitched as his nerves began to chew at his insides. "Never finished downloading," he said quickly. "Too slow. Once I find the problem I'll start it back up and should have it for you tomorrow."
"Awesome," Lawson said. "I'll let you get back to work then." He turned and headed for the door, then stopped and said, "Just sign the check-in sheet when you leave so there's a record of you being here. I don't want to get canned because you forgot to sign in."
Seth gave a thumbs-up and looked back at the screen. The two minutes were long since up, so he clicked the "Safely Remove Hardware" button and pulled out the thumb drive, quickly replacing it with a second. His father, a carpenter, had always said, "Measure twice, cut once." He'd seen the logic behind the saying and had incorporated it into most of his life. If something could be doubled quickly, he did it, just in case something happened to the first. He worked over the keys and set the transfer in motion.