STEPHANIE TOPPED THE STAIRS AND SAW THERE WAS A CHOICE OF routes. Left or right? She turned left. Ely headed right.
“Over here,” Ely called out.
They all rushed his way and saw an open doorway.
“Careful,” Thorvaldsen said. “Don’t let those things out there spray you. Avoid them.”
Ely nodded, then pointed at Lyndsey. “You and I are going after that flash drive.”
The scientist shook his head. “Not me.”
Stephanie agreed. “That’s not a good idea.”
“You’re not sick.”
“Those robots,” Thorvaldsen said, “are programmed to explode, and we don’t know when.”
“I don’t give a damn,” Ely said, his voice rising. “This man knows how to cure AIDS. His dead boss has known that for years, but let millions die. Zovastina has that cure now. I’m not going to let her manipulate it, too.” Ely grabbed Lyndsey by the shirt. “You and I are going to get that drive.”
“You’re nuts,” Lyndsey said. “Frickin’ nuts. Just go up to the green pool and drink the water. Vincenti said it worked that way. You don’t need me.”
Thorvaldsen watched the younger man closely. Stephanie realized that the Dane was perhaps seeing his own son standing before him, youth in all its glory, simultaneously defiant, brave, and foolish. Her own son, Mark, was the same way.
“Your butt,” Ely said, “is going with me into that lab.”
She realized something else. “Zovastina went after Cotton and Cassiopeia. She left us in this house for a reason. You heard her. She purposefully told us those machines would take a little time.”
“We’re insurance,” Thorvaldsen said.
“Bait. Probably for Cotton and Cassiopeia. But this guy,” she pointed at Lyndsey, “him, she wants. His babbling made sense. She doesn’t have time to be sure an antiagent works, or that he’s being truthful. Though she may not admit it, she needs him. She’ll be back for him before this place burns. You can count on it.”
ZOVASTINA LEAPED INTO THE POOL. MALONE HAD BESTED VIKTOR and Cassiopeia Vitt had managed to elude her.
If she swam fast she could catch Vitt in the tunnel.
MALONE PLANTED HIS PALMS AND PUSHED HIMSELF UP FROM THE pool. He felt a rush beneath him and saw Cassiopeia surface. She deftly sprang from the warm water and, dripping wet, grabbed one of the guns that lay a few feet away.
“Let’s go,” he said, retrieving his shoes and shirt.
Cassiopeia backed toward the exit, gun leveled at the pool.
A shadow clouded the water.
Zovastina’s head found air.
Cassiopeia fired.
THE FIRST EXPLOSION STARTLED ZOVASTINA MORE THAN FRIGHTENED her. Water cleared from her eyes and she saw Vitt aiming one of the guns straight at her.
Another bang. Unbearably loud.
She plunged beneath the surface.
CASSIOPEIA FIRED TWO TIMES AT THE ILLUMINATED POOL. THE gun seemed to jam so she worked the slide, ejecting a cartridge, loading a new round. Then she noticed something and faced Malone.
“Feel better?” he asked.
“Blanks?” she asked.
“Of course. Rounds stuffed with wadding, I imagine, so there’d be enough kick to at least partially work the slide. But not enough, obviously. You don’t think Viktor would have given us bullets?”
“I never thought about it.”
“That’s the problem. You’re not thinking. Can we go now?”
She tossed the gun away. “You’re such a joy to work with.”
And they both fled the chamber.
VIKTOR RUBBED THE BACK OF HIS HEAD AND WAITED. ANOTHER few seconds and he’d roll into the pool, but Zovastina returned, breathing hard as she emerged from the water, and rested her arms on the rocky edge.
“I forgot about the guns. They have us trapped. The only way out is guarded.”
Viktor’s head hurt from the pounding and he fought an irritating dizziness. “Minister, the guns are loaded with blanks. I changed all the magazines before we escaped from the palace. I didn’t think it wise to give them loaded guns.”
“Nobody noticed?”
“Who checks rounds? They simply assumed the guns aboard a military chopper were loaded.”
“Good thinking, but you could have mentioned that to me.”
“Everything happened so fast. There wasn’t time and, unfortunately, Malone gave my skull a good pop on these rocks.”
“What about Malone’s gun from the palace? That was loaded. Where is it?”
“In the chopper. He changed it out for one of ours.”
He watched as her mind rolled through the possibilities.
“We need Lyndsey from the house. He’s all that’s left here now.”
“What about Malone and Vitt?”
“I have men waiting. And their guns are loaded.”
EIGHTY-NINE
STEPHANIE STARED OUT THROUGH THE OPEN PANEL INTO ONE OF the mansion’s bedchambers. The room was elaborately furnished in an Italian style and quiet save for a mechanical whir from outside an open door, which led to the second-floor hall.
They stepped from the back passage.
One of the Greek fire machines whizzed passed in the hall, spewing mist. A pall hung heavy in the room, evidence that the robots had already visited.
“They’re quickly basting this house,” Thorvaldsen said as he moved to the hall door.
She was just about to caution him to stop when the Dane stepped out and a new voice-male, foreign-shouted.
Thorvaldsen froze, then slowly raised his arms.
Ely crept close to her ear. “One of the troops. He told Henrik to halt and raise his hands.”
Thorvaldsen kept his head toward the guard, who apparently was positioned to their right, without a way to see inside the room. She’d wondered about the troops, hoping that they’d been evacuated when the machines started their patrol.
More loud words.
“What now?” she whispered.
“He wants to know if he’s alone.”
MALONE AND CASSIOPEIA CLAMBERED DOWN THE INCLINE IN their wet clothes. Malone buttoned his shirt as they descended.
“You could have mentioned that the guns were duds,” Cassiopeia said to him.
“And when would I have done that?” He hopped over rocks and hastened down the steep slope.
Breaths came fast. He certainly wasn’t thirty years old anymore, but his forty-eight-year-old bones weren’t totally out of shape. “I didn’t want Viktor to even sense we knew anything.”
“We didn’t. Why’d you give up your gun?”
“Had to play his game.”
“You’re an odd bird,” she said to him, as they found level ground.
“I’ll take that as a compliment, coming from someone who traipsed around Venice with a bow and arrow.”
The house lay a football field away. He still saw no one roaming the exterior and no movement inside, past the windows.
“We need to check something.”
He raced toward the chopper and leaped into the rear compartment. He found the weapons locker. Four AK-74s stood upright, ammunition clips stacked beneath.
He examined them. “All blanks.” Barrel plugs had been carefully inserted to accommodate the phony rounds and allow the cartridges to be ejected. “Thorough little cuss. I’ll give him that.”
He found the gun he’d brought from Italy and checked the magazine. Five live rounds.
Cassiopeia grabbed an assault rifle and popped in a clip. “Nobody else knows these are useless. They’ll do for now.”