The Darwin Elevator

Chapter Twenty-four

Darwin, Australia

5.FEB.2283

Well after midnight in the Gardens, a poorly named slum in southern Darwin, a caravan of armored trucks surrounded a crumbling old parking garage.

Half the vehicles skidded to a stop in the street outside. Black-clad police leapt out and moved into defensive positions. To anyone watching from the shadows their maroon helmets announced them as Nightcliff security, not that any doubt existed.

The other half of the caravan did not slow down. They followed one especially large truck adorned with a thick corrugated steal wedge bolted to the front grill. The truck’s electric motors surged as it smashed into the metal gate at the garage’s entrance. The old bars broke away from their brittle joints, clattering away into the darkness.

The vehicles flowed into the open hole like roaches. They barreled down the concrete spiral, spewing sparks whenever their rough-plated edges scraped the cracked sidewall.

Hardly dented from the first impact, the lead truck accelerated through the final corner and made short work of the feeble chain-link fence at the end. The barricade collapsed and parted easily, leaving nothing but a large door between the intruders and the interior of the building.

This door didn’t hold, either. When the ram hit it, the old wood splintered, sending a shower of debris into the warehouse and headquarters of Mr. Prumble, noted smuggler and a chief supplier of Darwin’s black markets.

As the mighty vehicle backed out of the way, police flowed into the hole.

Russell Blackfield enjoyed watching his elite do their work.

He entered behind them, carrying only a pistol. From inside he heard shouts of “clear” as his men fanned out through the building. Above, he knew they would be working through the upper floors, though reconnaissance said those were long abandoned. Worth a look anyway, he had decided during the planning session.

According to the intelligence Russell had paid for, Prumble kept a payroll of forty toughs, protecting the goods stored in this rank tomb of a hideout.

“So much for resistance.”

The massive room held no one at all, save for Nightcliff men. Someone tipped him off, Russell thought. He should have arrested the informants who sold Prumble out. Recoup the bribes, exact some revenge if it didn’t pan out.

His soldiers maintained a professional aggressiveness despite the lack of an enemy. Russell strode past aisle after aisle of organized merchandize, meticulously stacked. The urge to scatter it all required more self-control than he usually exercised.

At the very end of the last aisle in the room, he came across the only obvious hiding place—another room, retrofitted into the far corner of the underground space.

Five of his guards waited there, guns trained onto the solid metal door. It looked just like the giant refrigerator entrance in Nightcliff’s cafeteria.

“Open it,” he said to one of his men. The others fanned out on either side.

The officer grabbed the handle and his entire body jerked. Every limb shot straight out, except the arm connected to the door. He let out a sickening, guttural sound, and his hair began to smolder. Another officer had the presence of mind to hit his electrocuted companion in the chest with his rifle, knocking him away from the door.

The room plunged into darkness. Somewhere below, the hum of a generator faded.

Some of the soldiers had lamps on their helmets or attached to the underside of their guns. Within seconds they all came on. Russell removed a small, handheld flashlight and trained it on the victim.

Dead, or near enough. The scent of burning hair and skin filled the stagnant air. “For f*ck’s sake, someone get him out of here,” Russell said, holding his nose.

Someone grabbed the cooked man by his collar and dragged him away.

“The power is out. Try it again,” Russell said. One of the men approached the door and tapped the handle with one finger. Nothing happened, so he gave the handle a full tug. It didn’t budge. He tried again, this time straining with effort. No movement.

“Enough,” Russell said. “Use the onc-rope.”

Another officer came forward with a coiled yellow cord. He unwound a length of it and stuck it to the door in an oval pattern.

Russell cupped his hands around his mouth to amplify his voice. “If you’re in there, Prumble, better hide under the desk. Assuming you can fit.”

A few of the men chuckled. Russell turned and led everyone back to the main entrance. The explosives expert arrived last, unspooling a thin blue wire as he moved. He crouched down next to Russell.

“Fire in the hole!” he shouted. After a pause, again, “Fire in the hole!”

Russell covered his ears.

The guard pushed the wires into a small object in his hand and pressed a button on the side of it.

The building shook. Brown dust shook loose from everywhere and filled the stale air.

Russell felt the explosion in his bones. His own clothing buffeted in the rapid shift of air pressure. Hell of a thing, that rope. He’d appropriated it from that immune scavenger’s ship. The bloke had said he fenced through Prumble, a delicious irony.

It took a good minute for the smoke and dust to clear, at least enough to see a few meters. Russell wanted no more time wasted and used a hand signal to indicate his men should proceed inside.

Two by two they entered, their lights making the thick smoke somehow worse.

“Clear!” Russell heard from the far end of the room.

Goddamn it! Not what he wanted to hear. Two well-paid informants, plucked off the street outside yesterday, had sworn Prumble was inside. Russell’s own watchers said no one had left.

Now Russell looked every bit the idiot. He made a mental note to find those two-faced tossers and dump them outside Aura’s Edge.

He walked into the small office. The portion of the door removed by the onc-rope had torn through the room, shearing off part of a large oak desk and badly denting an old file cabinet. Debris and papers littered the floor.

“Check that desk,” Russell said, “and be careful. I’ve smelled enough barbie for one day.”

He loved giving orders to no specific person and noting who took initiative. It served as a key method for choosing whom to promote.

“Those of you not in here,” Russell said loudly, “pack everything into the trucks. Nothing gets left behind.”

A chorus of unenthusiastic “Yes, sirs” resulted. They’d come for some action and were disappointed to find an empty building instead. “Whatever you can fit in your pockets, you can keep,” Russell added. The grumbling abated a bit after that.

“Some kind of ledger here, sir,” said one trooper, looking into the file cabinet. He handed Russell a spiral-bound notebook, filled with page after page of handwritten information.

“Paperwork, exactly what I dreamt of finding.” He flipped through the pages anyway. The scrawled notes were cryptic at best. Initials, abbreviations, numbers. The type of thing only the author could understand, and Russell guessed that was the point. He flipped to the end and found something peculiar.

The last entries all began with the same initials: “N. P.”

“Sat telem,” Russell read, sitting down in the worn leather chair. The cushion was rock hard—compressed by Prumble’s gigantic ass, no doubt. “What are you looking for, Platz, you old goat?”

The soldiers ignored him, stuffing their pockets with anything that fit.

Two of the Platz entries were marked as “Sat telem.” Satellite telemetry, Russell realized.

Why? What would I do with that?

Satellites. Military satellites. Orbiting weapons from an era long gone. Something Platz could use against the ground, against Nightcliff. Something that would give him the upper hand again. Russell felt a chill run through his entire body. Had he underestimated the goat? Could Neil really be that clever?

Even if wrong, this provided ample pretense to crack some skulls.

He closed the book, then smiled. It was time to call Alex Warthen.