Project Cyclops Part 57

"Live a little, baby." Peretz beamed back. "Lie back and enjoy it."

"Let me break some news to you, chum. This organization isn't going to just roll over and give you the store. Now I want to talk to that greaseball who calls himself Number One. It's time we got some consideration for my people here. They need food and they need to be rotated so they can get some rest. There's going to be h.e.l.l to pay, and in short order. I can guarantee it."

"Hey, man, ease up." Peretz leaned back, then rotated away from the console. "Everybody's okay. Don't start getting heavy. We're just about ready to party."

"Right." Bates walked past, headed for the door. "I want to see what you f.u.c.kers have done to my people down at Launch. I'm going over there."

"You're not going anywhere, a.s.shole," Peretz declared, "so just sit down and make yourself comfortable." He turned and signaled the Iranian lounging at the door, barking something to him in Farsi.

The man was carrying his Uzi by the strap, almost as though it were a toy, but in a second he clicked to attention, brought it up, and chambered a round. Bates glared at him, then turned away, knowing when he was licked. He might try and take the b.a.s.t.a.r.d, but it probably wasn't worth the risk. Not yet. The time would come.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

1:45 A.M.

"Isaac, wake up." She shook him, trying to be as quiet as possible.

Outside a new storm was building, but the large barracks room in Level Three of the Bates Motel was dark and deserted, with the staff all now mobilized for the upcoming launch. 'Thank G.o.d I found you."

His eyelids fluttered, and then he slowly raised up and gazed at her, his look still somewhere between sleep and waking. He seemed to be in a drug-induced, or shock-induced, torpor. "What? . . . Cally, is that you?"

"Isaac, there's been a disaster. I don't know where Bill is, but the gantry's been destroyed. He blew it up. Jesus, when I told him to be careful and--"

"Cally." He finally managed to focus on her presence. Then he looked around. "What's going on? Where--?"

"Everybody's down at Launch," she interjected impatiently. 'These hoods have taken over the Cyclops and they've started a countdown. I want to get you out of here, and then try to radio someone. Now."

"What . . . what are you talking about?" He was still staring at her groggily. "Radio who?"

"The people who set up the original security system. They--

"ARM?"

"They're coming in. To get rid of these hoodlums."

"Well, good luck. But the man who saved me, what was his name? He mentioned something about it. Then he disappeared. I don't--"

"That's who blew up the gantry. His name is Vance." She quickly recounted the story. "I told him not to blow it up, but he didn't listen. All he accomplished was to make things worse." She was so outraged she could barely speak. The idiot! The f.u.c.k-up!

Mannheim's mind seemed to be clearing. "A countdown. But why would Georges--?"

"He isn't involved, at least I don't think so. He's been replaced by one of their people. They've taken over Big Benny, somebody who knows how to run SORT."

Mannheim exhaled. "Then, what are we supposed to do?"

"It gets worse. Not only is the gantry gone, but I'm afraid they've taken Mike prisoner."

"Mike?" He was still trying to get his bearings.

"Vance." She was suddenly embarra.s.sed by the implied familiarity.

Isaac, she noted, hadn't missed it, and he raised an eyebrow. "Look,"

she continued, "he may be dead by now, who knows. But I want to get you out of here, and then try to raise ARM on the radio. They were going to delay everything for a day, but now they've got to get in here and stop the launch." She paused, shaking from the strain. "Isaac, I'm not as strong as I thought I was." Her voice quavered. "I'm scared to death.

For you, for Bill, for Georges, for Mike. For all of us. Even worse, I'm scared for the world."

"What do you mean?" He was finally coming alive. With a faint groan he rubbed his gla.s.sy eyes and brushed back his mane of white hair.

"I've got a sneaking suspicion that those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds have put a nuclear weapon in the payload bay of VX-1."

"Good G.o.d. And now you say the gantry is gone? How will we get it down?"

"Look, let's not worry about that part just yet. We just have to stop them from going through with the countdown. We can disarm the bomb later."

"All right, then." He was on the side of his bed, searching for his shoes. "Get me out of here."

She led him out into the darkened hallway. The separate rooms were all locked, giving no clue who was still around. Where was the SatCom security staff? she suddenly wondered. Were they locked up in their own safe little enclave somewhere? Wherever they were, they wouldn't be any help now. They undoubtedly were unarmed and demoralized.

With a sigh she pushed open the door and they stepped out into the storm. Wind was tearing across the island, bringing with it the taste of the Aegean, pungent and raw. It felt cool, a refreshing purge after the stuffiness of the Bates Motel. The rain lashed their faces, cleansing away some of the feeling of the nightmare, and she knew that the few wild goats that had not been captured and removed would now be huddled in the lee behind a granite ledge they liked, bleating plaintively. There was a wildness, a freeness about Andikythera, as the winds tore across and through the granite outcroppings--and the sea churned against the timeless rocks of the sh.o.r.e--that made it feel like nowhere else on earth.

Get practical, she ordered herself, forget the romance. The storm would probably be over well before morning, but in the meantime it would just make things that much harder for ARM to reach the island. If they made it at all, it would be around dawn, just in time to watch the launch.

d.a.m.n Vance.

2:05 A.M.

"Somebody's on the frequency," Hans declared abruptly. The ARM team had been settled in for just slightly over an hour, trying to keep plastic sheets over them to ward off the rain as they attempted to alternate taking naps. However, in spite of the weather he had kept open the single-sideband frequency Vance had been using, just in case. Up until now, it had been a continuous hiss of empty static.

"What the h.e.l.l . . . ?" Armont pulled back the plastic, wiped the rain from his eyes, and lifted a questioning eyebrow. Around them the dark Aegean churned against their granite islet. "Vance's crazy to be on the radio now. He'd better have a blasted good reason."

"It's not him. It sounds like a woman." Hans had a puzzled look on his face as he handed Pierre the headset, shielding it haphazardly from the rain.

"He mentioned something about a woman when we talked yesterday," Spiros said, snapping out of his morose reverie. "Maybe it's the same one. She was with him then."

"Well, whatever's going on, I think we all should hear this." Armont unplugged the headphones from the radio, then turned up the volume, the better to overcome the rain and roar of surf.

"Sirene, do you read me?" the voice was saying. "Oh, G.o.d, please answer."

"I copy," Spiros said into the microphone. He was as puzzled, and troubled, by this development as by all the rest. "Who the h.e.l.l is this?"

"Thank G.o.d," came back the voice. "You can't wait. You've got to come in now."