Control - Cordelia Kingsbridge.pdf

(1376 KB) Pobierz
Control
by
Cordelia Kingsbridge
Chapter One
Joaquin ducked around the corner, crouching low, and swept the light mounted on his rifle
across the hallway. “Clear.”
“All right,” Danica said over his earpiece. “Proceed thirty meters west.”
“Are you sure?” Joaquin asked, though he didn’t hesitate to follow her directions. He
imagined Danica sitting back at Control in her cubicle, watching everything he saw
through her link to his visor. “This section looks deserted.”
“I’m positive. Rowland made a beeline for this floor the second the raid started.”
“You don’t want me to wait for backup?”
There was a slight hesitation on her end. “I’d prefer it, but there’s no chance. All the other
teams are caught up downstairs. There are more guards than we expected.”
No kidding. Joaquin could hear muffled shouts and the rat-tat-tat of automatic gunfire
echoing throughout the slavers’ compound. “Anything I should worry about?”
“Negative. Our orders are to terminate Rowland. Proceed.”
Joaquin kept shuffling down the hallway until his visor alerted him that he’d traversed
thirty meters. This hallway didn’t look like anything special to him – fancier than the rest
of the compound, maybe, but there was nobody up here.
“Turn your head to the left,” said Danica. “Yes, there. See that door across the hall? That
leads to Rowland’s private chambers.”
“There is no way you could know that.”
“This is why I’m the Brain and you’re the Body,” she said, an old joke between them.
“Switching to infrared.”
A second later, the view through Joaquin’s visor changed from the dark greens of
nightvision to the odd purple of infrared. He could see two human-shaped splashes of
yellow and orange behind the wall in front of him. One was huddled in a far corner,
probably sitting on the floor; the other raced around the room in obvious panic.
“Two Tangos,” Joaquin said. “I’m going to take a wild guess and say Rowland is the one
running around like his ass is on fire.”
Danica snorted. “That’s a safe bet. Don’t terminate the second Tango until you’ve
identified him.”
“Understood.”
“Can you get me a better look at that door?”
Joaquin crept across the hallway on silent feet until he was right up next to the door. Fuck,
infrared vision gave him a headache.
“Switching to ECL,” said Danica.
The electric current locator wasn’t much better. Joaquin’s vision went mostly black, save
for the ghostly blue light emitted by every source of electricity in his vicinity. The door
was locked and alarmed to the teeth.
“Hmm. Okay, hook me up to the keypad. Carefully.” Danica switched the visor back to
nightvision.
Rolling his eyes at her unnecessary warning, Joaquin withdrew his all-in-one from his belt
and flicked out the tiny screwdriver. He eased it into the bolt on the keypad’s bottom panel
and turned it as quietly as he could. There was a lot of noise coming from the other side –
banging and thumping and rustling – but no conversation. Apparently Rowland had
nothing to say to the person who was in the room with him.
When the panel popped free, Joaquin set it on the floor, returned his all-in-one to his belt,
and selected a slim length of fiberoptic cable. He hooked one end into his wristwatch and
fed the other end into a port inside the keypad.
“Jacked in,” he whispered.
“Roger that. Back to ECL. Hold still.”
Joaquin remained motionless, listening to the mind-bendingly rapid tapping of keys
coming through his earpiece. As Danica worked her magic, the blue lights suffusing the
door began to go out one by one, until the entire thing was dark. Joaquin heard a soft click
that was the electronic lock releasing.
“You’re clear to proceed.” Danica put the nightvision back on long enough for Joaquin to
retrieve the cable, then said, “You want infrared for this?”
“Affirmative.”
The world was once again washed in purple and orange. Joaquin pulled himself half-
upright, pressed against the wall beside the door, and readied his rifle.
“Good luck,” said Danica.
Rowland was moving around the room so much that it was difficult to get a bead on him.
The other person still hadn’t changed position, not even by an inch.
Joaquin took a deep, steadying breath and opened the door, nice and slow. Rowland’s back
was to him, busy with something against the far wall. The second Joaquin entered the
room, Rowland stiffened and whirled around, firing blindly with the pistol clutched in his
right hand –
It was too late. Rowland’s panicked shot went wide, and Joaquin caught him in the face
and chest with a spray of bullets. There was a terrified scream to Joaquin’s left, but it cut
off in the middle as if the screamer had been killed himself. Joaquin swung his rifle in that
direction. The small yellow-and-orange shape still sat in the corner, unmoving.
Certain that the unidentified person didn’t represent a threat, Joaquin crouched by
Rowland’s body. He felt for a pulse, then tugged one of his gloves off and held his fingers
beneath Rowland’s nose. Nothing.
“Can you confirm the kill?” Danica asked.
“Confirmed. Tango down.”
Danica breathed out a sigh of relief. Joaquin could empathize. Six fucking months they’d
spent planning this mission, aiming to take down Rowland in the hopes that his syndicate
would crumble without his leadership.
The nightvision switched back on, but the light was so blinding that Joaquin yelped and
shut his eyes. “Fuck, Dani! There’s lights on in here. I need regular vision.”
“Sorry.”
A second later, Joaquin dared to open his eyes. White spots danced in his vision, and he
blinked to clear them.
He was standing in an ornate, lavishly decorated bedroom, full of heavy dark wood
furniture and velvet upholstery. Rowland had been packing, Joaquin could see now – there
were half-full suitcases strewn across the bed, and every drawer and cabinet in the room
was open.
Remembering the second person, Joaquin stepped around to the far side of the bed. Then
he came to a sudden, dismayed halt.
It was a young man, kneeling on the floor and sitting back on his heels. He was
completely naked, hands cuffed together in his lap, collar chained to a tall steel pole
behind him.

Plik z chomika:

Inne pliki z tego folderu:

Inne foldery tego chomika:

Zgłoś jeśli naruszono regulamin