Protocol 7

OXFORD, ENGLAND

Samantha's Flat

A distant ringing faded and Samantha’s eyes snapped open. She lurched into a sitting position, gasping as if she had been touched by a live wire. Her head was pounding; her bedroom spun around her. She clutched at the bedclothes as a powerful wave of nausea surged through her. The safe phone faced away from her on the side table; Simon’s missed call disappeared from the screen.

The last thing she remembered was a shadowy man standing over her. Then a stinking cloth slammed over her mouth, so tightly she couldn’t breathe. There was a struggle, and then…

Nothing. Nothing until this moment, still in her clothes from last night, in agony as the room wheeled around her.

She couldn’t remember what had happened or who that may have been. She had a strong sense that she had spoken to him, or vice versa. She half-remembered a voice, but she had no real recollection, no idea what she might have said or what she might have been told. And when she tried to think of it, when she concentrated on the moments after that ghostly stranger stood over her, she could see only one thing—the man’s lithe frame.

She pushed away the half-memory and the nausea, fighting to think clearly.

She had to tell Simon. He would know what to do, how to help.

She took a breath and called to her AI. “Hollis? Call—”

—and she stopped herself. Why didn’t my security systems work last night? she suddenly asked herself. Where was Hollis? Was the system compromised? And what about the phone lines now?

Simon had given them all those silly, old-fashioned phones at Ryan’s house last night. Maybe she should—

“Call whom, Doctor?”

“No one,” she said, thinking it through. “Never mind.”

She reached to the side table, picking up the cell phone Simon had given her. She knew she could use it safely. She had to tell him what had happened. Ask for help. But she stopped, her hand an inch away from the phone.

She felt confused and began to reconsider. If she did indeed tell him what had happened, she knew what would happen next: she would be cut out of his plan to find Oliver. She’d be left isolated and alone. Too big a security risk, they would say. Compromised. And the others would go off without her. She wouldn’t be there to help them, wouldn’t be able to protect Simon. And she knew, she was positive, he was going to need her more than once—more than ever—in the difficult days to come.

What else could she do? She thought looking around her immediate surroundings, then decided Simon needed to know. Otherwise, he may be in more danger if she didn’t tell him.

She decided she was sure and grabbed the phone, just as there was pounding on her front door. She froze, clutching the phone in hand.





OXFORD, ENGLAND

Samantha's Flat

Simon didn’t realize how fast he had gotten to Samantha’s apartment.

He pounded on the door as hard as he could. “Sam!” he called out, desperate for an answer. “Samantha!”

Five seconds, he told himself. Then I kick the door in. Five…four…thr—

“Simon?” Sam’s weak voice came through the door.

Simon blew out a sigh of relief. At least she’s okay, he told himself. “Sammy, it’s me,” he said. “Open up.”

He heard her unlocking the door and impatiently helped to push it open, eager to see her.

Sam’s eyes were still half-shut; she looked disheveled and surprised. She was dressed in the same clothes from the night before. She must have fallen asleep as soon as she got home, he reasoned. And then…

Simon moved closer to her and held her shoulders, looking straight at her face as he asked, “Sammy, tell me everything that happened.”

There were tears in her eyes. “That’s just it, Simon, I don’t remember.”

He dropped his hands, still looking into her eyes. “Then tell me the last thing you do remember. Andrew dropped you off…you came inside…you…”

“…brushed my teeth,” she said, almost dreamily, “…sat down on the bed, still dressed and so tired…and…”

Her eyes were wide and empty when she looked at him. “And that’s all. Nothing else until I woke on the bed an hour ago, still dressed.”

She sat on the edge of the bed and put her head in her hands. She was doing her best not to cry. “Oh, Simon. God, what…?”

He saw it then—a tiny, circular rash about the size of a large coin on the side of her neck. He wouldn’t have noticed it at all except for the angle of the light; it was just a slight roughness to her skin and not much more.

“Wait a second,” he said, leaning forward, sniffing at her neck.

“Simon, what the devil…”

“Sorry,” he said again. But he had caught a whiff of what he had expected to: the astringent, garlic-like odor of the DMSO derivative used in most medi-patches. “You were drugged, Sam.”

She put her hand to her neck protectively, as if she half-expected a knife to be put there. “A patch?” she repeated. “But who…and why would they…?”

Simon was already on his feet again, pacing nervously. “I want you to gather some clothes and come with me. Now.”

She looked at him, confused. “What are you talking about? Have you gone mad?” He was already moving toward her closet, looking for a suitcase or a bag. “Where the hell do you want me to go?”

“Something tells me we shouldn’t be here,” he said. He shook his head tightly, quickly. “We should get the hell out of here. Sam, my place was broken into last night. Get your stuff—we’re leaving.”

More in response to the urgent tone in his voice than any real understanding, she jumped up and started toward her room to gather her things. “None of this makes any sense,” she muttered. She sounded muzzy and confused; clearly, the drugs were still in her system.

Simon moved back into the living room, thinking furiously. Maybe I should go back to my flat, he thought. But…but they could be waiting. He wasn’t quite sure what to do; he had never been on the run before, especially from something as bizarre as this. Max would know what to do, he told himself. This is his element. But he had no choice. He couldn’t go to the authorities; for all he knew UNED and Jonathan’s CIA bosses were part of the group that was after him and his friends. And now he was conspiring to steal a multi-billion-dollar piece of government technology. They couldn’t possibly know about that…

…could they?

Simon came to a decision at that very moment: their only alternative was to accelerate the plan that he had discussed just a few hours earlier. Get to the Spector safe house undetected—all of them. Highjack the fully assembled submersible, and get the hell out of Oxford, out of England, and as soon as possible out of the Northern Hemisphere entirely.

Simon looked at his watch, then called out to Samantha. “We’ve got to go.”

“I’m almost there,” she replied.

While she packed, Samantha suddenly asked him, “Do you remember Corsica?”

Simon was surprised. “You actually remember that?”

“How could I forget?” she replied, but made sure to add with a sarcastic tone. “The question is, how could you forget?”

Simon hadn’t forgotten a thing. He vividly remembered the weekend they had spent at his father’s hideaway, a beautiful cottage nestled in the hills in Corsica, when they were both in college. That was the first time Samantha had told him how much she cared for him…and the first time he had disappointed her.

“Never mind,” he said.

That weekend on Corsica had been a major event in Simon’s life as well—just not the one that Samantha imagined. It was the last time he had been at the cottage with Oliver—the last time in his adult life that he had a chance to share a few days with his father.

The secure phone made its familiar and annoying buzz. He put it to his ear and keyed the communication. It was Jonathan.

“Almost there,” he said. “I called Andrew. He’s meeting us in front of Sam’s place. I’ll leave my rental there, and we’ll go together with the Rover.”

“Sounds good. What about Ryan?” Simon asked.

“Not responding to calls on the secure phone, and I don’t want to use an open line—especially now. We’ll talk about it when I get there.”

“All Right. We’ll be walking north on Holden—find us.” He didn’t fancy waiting around on the sidewalk with luggage.

“Will do.” The old-fashioned phone went beep, and the conversation disconnected.

Simon called to Sam as he dialed a different number. “About ready?” he said.

“Almost!” she called back.

Hayden’s voice came out of the secure phone’s tiny speaker. “What?”

“Hayden, it’s Simon,” he told him. “Where are you?”

“Already at the safe house, seeing to some last details. Really couldn’t sleep after that meeting of ours, so I came straight back here. Been working with Teah and the other AIs to get the Spector operational.”

“We’re on our way.”

“Ah…not quite ready, Simon. No need to rush.”

“Not rushing, Hayden. I think we’ve been discovered.”

“So soon? Oh, god…” Simon could almost hear Hayden’s wheels turning, trying to figure all the angles.

“Wonderful,” he said finally. “All right then, just get here—you, Samantha, Jonathan, everybody. Get here as soon as you can.”

“Done,” Simon said.

He heard a sound behind him as he ended the call. He turned to find Samantha standing in the bedroom doorway with two small bags in her hands and a suitcase, staring at him.

“Come on,” he said. “Let’s get out of here.” Without another word, he took the larger suitcase by the handle, lifted it, and pushed out the door.

Samantha was close behind.

Moments later they emerged from the building. Simon led the way, moving briskly up Holden Road, trying to look in every direction without seeming suspicious.

A dark blue car, half a block up the street, pulled up to the wrong side of the curb and stopped, its engine running, its headlights on. Without a pause, Simon turned to the left and entered a narrow side street.

“Simon?” Samantha said from behind him. “Where are we going?”

He pulled the secure phone out of his pocket and said, “Jonathan?” The sound of his voice was rough in his ear; he could hear the rush of wind distorting it.

“Two minutes away,” Jonathan said.

“Change of plans. We may have company. We’re heading east on Overton,” he said. “Meet us going south on Lyme.” He started walking even more quickly.

“Coming,” Jonathan said and hung up.

“Simon,” she said. “Please, I can’t keep up.” He risked a glance over his shoulder and saw her almost running to catch up to him. Half a block behind her, the blue car turned, filling the narrow street side to side. The roar of its engine was louder as it moved closer.

He had a sinking feeling in his stomach. He picked up the pace even more.

“Simon,” she shouted, completely unaware of the car behind them. “Slow down! I can’t keep up.” He fell back just long enough to take the other suitcase from her. “Just keep moving,” he told her.

His shoulders were burning from the weight of the bag as they emerged onto Lyme Street. He glanced to the right and saw a black Range Rover approaching from a distance. Its headlights were on, but its tinted windows were rolled up tight on all sides as it approached, moving slightly faster than they were but going in the same direction—toward a busy intersection. I hope that’s Andrew, Simon told himself. He knew damn well there were literally thousands of Rovers just like that in England, and he couldn’t see a thing through the darkened windshield, but it had to be. It had to be.

The blue car nosed out of the alley and turned south on Lyme, barely two car-lengths behind the Rover. Simon sped up even more, adrenaline rushing through his body.

Samantha was close behind him, two paces back and panting heavily. “Please,” she said. “Tell me what’s going on.”

The Rover paced them. The front window rolled down a crack—not enough to see a face as a voice called out of the car.

“Get in.”

The Rover started to slow…but Simon kept walking. They didn’t dare slow—not with that damned blue car so close.

After a moment’s hitch, the Rover jerked and caught up again.

“Simon!” Sammy called, sounding annoyed. “It’s Andrew! Can’t you—”

He ignored her and kept walking. The voice from the car got louder, “Get in!” The window rolled down the rest of the way.

It was Andrew, all right, looking mad as hell.

“What the devil is wrong—”

“Open the back window!” Simon hissed. “Now!”

Andrew gaped at him for one beat…then glanced back inside. The window behind him rolled down silently and without a moment’s hesitation he threw the bag he had been hauling right into the opening. It flew through dead center, with barely an inch to spare. A moment later he stepped back, seized Sam’s larger bag and did the same, right through the window. Then he reached back, grabbed Sam by the elbow and dragged her into a full run—straight toward the busy intersection fifty yards in front of them.

“Go!” he said to her. “RUN!”

The Rover kept pace. The blue car sped up, trying to catch them.

“Simon! Why—why—”

The streetlight at the crossroad was red as they approached; cross-traffic waited impatiently as they ran for the corner. Ten yards…five…

The light turned yellow. “KEEP GOING!” Simon shouted and pulled at Sam even harder. “RUN!”

They stepped into the street as the light turned yellow, running full out. Andrew gunned the Rover’s engine and flew through the crossroads as horns blared all around.

Close at their heels, the blue car moved too, trying to beat the light—

—when Jonathan’s rental car roared into the intersection from the far lane and flew directly in front of the blue car. The hood of the blue car whammed into the side of the rental with an explosion of wrenching metal and shattering glass.

Andrew’s Rover screeched to a halt on the far side of the intersection. The door flew open, and he jumped out as the rear hatch popped up, apparently on its own. “Get in!” he shouted, and together he and Simon almost tossed Samantha into the Rover. As Simon climbed in after her, Jonathan staggered up to them, wiping a line of blood away from one eye. The steaming wreck of his rental car, welded to the twisted mass of the blue vehicle, completely blocked the intersection behind him. There was no movement from the blue car at all.

“Mind if I tag along?” he said breathlessly.

He rolled into the back as Andrew jumped into the driver’s seat and floored it. They were half a block farther down Lyme and out of Oxford before the door was closed, and another two blocks farther away when the first sirens sounded.

* * *

They hadn’t gotten more than a mile from the accident scene when Samantha said, “Guys, what the hell is going on?”

They looked briefly at each other, and Simon realized for the first time that the rest of them had already had the chance to talk this through, at least a little. Samantha had simply awakened from a troubled sleep and been swept away.

“Is someone finally going to explain everything to me?” she said. “Please?”

“Well, Sam, things are moving a bit faster than we had expected,” Jonathan said.

“Oh, really? Too much information, Jonathan,” replied Samantha sarcastically. “Please slow down.”

“Ah,” Andrew interrupted from behind the wheel. “Exactly where are we going, then? That is, I know its North Oxford, but I don’t think you mentioned the exact address of the secret entrance to the safe house…” He was keeping one eye on the rear-view mirror, waiting to see another blue car—or any vehicle at all—appear at any moment.

“Simon!” Samantha said, angrier than ever. “Please!”

Simon looked over to her, frustrated himself. He said in a calm voice, “Sammy, I’ll explain later. Please just give it a rest.”

She gaped at him, amazed at his response.

Simon turned to Andrew and said, “I don’t know the address, but I can lead you there.”

The Rover roared through another intersection, moving north as quickly as they dared.





OXFORD, ENGLAND

Abandoned Underground Station

Simon remembered his ride with Hayden in vivid detail, so it wasn’t difficult to guide Andrew directly to the abandoned entrance without a single wrong turn.

He explained the next steps he’d worked out for Andrew in a low, calm voice that only Andrew could hear. And when they were finished, as they moved slowly, almost carefully, onto the last block before the underground entrance, Simon pulled the secure phone from his pocket and dialed Hayden. The phone buzzed, and Hayden’s gruff, accented voice came on almost immediately.

“What?” he said, sounding completely uninterested in the answer.

“We’re here,” he said. “Most of us, anyway.”

“Can’t you people tell time?” he said. “I’m not bloody ready yet!”

“Change of plans, Hayden. I’ll explain when I get there.”

“Just stay out! I’ll call when—”

“Hayden, no. We need to talk now, and I need to see how far along we really are.”

“Look, Simon, I don’t have time for this—”

“We’re coming in. Not all of us, not for long, but we’re coming.”

“Jesus Christ, you high-handed, egotistical son of a—”

Simon hung up on him.

They had arrived at the hidden entrance. There was the gate that led to the downward staircase, the car park next to the gate, the chemist and the family-owned tea shop on the corner, just as he remembered.

When the Rover stopped abruptly at the curb, Simon was already frowning at what he could see—and what he couldn’t see. He checked again as the team climbed out of the Rover and moved away from each other, if only to stretch their legs and get a breath. It was the middle of the morning, but he had been up for hours already; he felt as if the day was already half over.

Hayden’s strange car was already parked crookedly halfway down the block, but Ryan’s vehicle was nowhere to be seen. One more time, Simon pulled out his hated secure phone and dialed Ryan.

It took a long moment for the call to go through—too long, as far as Simon was concerned. Finally Ryan’s voice was in his ear, sounding more than a little sheepish. “Sorry, Simon. Really, I’m trying to get out of here, but there are so many issues I’m dealing with—”

“Ryan, the others told you what happened, didn’t they?”

Another pause. “Yes. About your flat, you mean? And your dog? Bloody awful, I’d say.”

“And that incision mark on Samantha’s neck. She was probably drugged.”

“Well, yes, but—”

“And we were just chased halfway cross Oxford just trying to get out of Sammy’s place. You understand this isn’t some sort of joke?”

“I understand completely. I’m on my way in two minutes. Five minutes, tops.”

“And if you aren’t, you understand they may come for you next?”

There was another pause. When he spoke again, Ryan sounded more than a little shocked. “Me?”

“You and Sabrina.”

“My god.”

“Just get here, Ryan. Get on the road, then use the secure phone and call Jonathan for directions.”

He cut off the connection without another word.

“Why are you having him call me?” Jonathan asked, scanning the street for any unfamiliar cars or suspicious pedestrians. Everything looked calm and perfectly normal … for the moment.

“Because you and Sam are staying topside while we go talk with Hayden.”

Jonathan started shaking his head halfway through the sentence. “Not a chance, buddy.”

Simon took a step closer to his old friend and pitched his voice low so no one else would hear. “I can’t take Sammy down there right now. Look at her, Jon. She’s still freaked out from the attack, and that run through her neighborhood didn’t help.” Jonathan’s expression told Simon he didn’t have to look; he had already gauged Samantha’s state of mind, and he wasn’t happy about it. “Besides, Ryan’s…having some kind of issue. I’m betting it’s his fiancée, but I just don’t know. Someone has to be ready to pull him in.”

Jonathan looked away, clearly frustrated by the undeniable logic of it. Finally he nodded tightly. “Okay. I’ll stay. And you’re just going down to bring him out, right?”

“We need to have a talk—all of us, in one place—while the Spector is being finished. I don’t care, as long as it’s somewhere low-key. Somewhere safe. But we have got to get this under control before it’s too late.”

“Agreed.”

“I’ll take Andrew down with me, and we’ll bring Hayden back out with us.”

“Okay.”

He moved quickly to Samantha and explained what was happening. A moment later he called to Andrew, who was already up to speed; he’d talked to him in the Rover while they had been making their way out of town. “Andrew?” he said. “Ready to do this?”

“Yes, I am,” Andrew said, almost looking eager. For a moment Simon was reminded of his dog, and he felt an unexpected pang of regret. He missed his companion.

“All right, then,” he said and looked back at Jonathan and Sam one last time. “We’ll be right back.”