through probabilities and options, considering and discarding dozens of strategies. His mind seized on one he thought had a good chance of succeeding. But he would need to interact with the species Homo sapiens dullard, which meant he had to create an avatar personality of the old Desh so he could operate on their delayed level and not arouse suspicion.
Sam’s watch began emitting a series of high-pitched beeps, and he smiled in satisfaction. He pushed a button on his watch and the beeping stopped. “I’m afraid I have to go now, my dear,” he said to Kira. “I have a helicopter waiting for me. And it’s already 9:40. You were unconscious for quite some time. So before I leave, I need to reset the device in your skull. If I don’t—” He spread his hands helplessly. “Well, let’s just say that neither of us wants that.”
He barked an order and seconds later three plain-clothed men had joined him in the basement, each holding a tranquilizer gun. Under any other circumstances they would have been armed with automatic rifles, but Sam was taking no chances that something would go awry and result in Kira’s death.
Sam gestured at Smith’s corpse lying in a pool of blood ten feet away. “I’ll call in a clean-up crew when I’m in the air,” he informed the newcomers. He didn’t offer any other explanation for the body and the men didn’t ask for one.
Sam pointed to the tallest of the three men. “Jim here will be in charge when I’m gone,” he announced to his prisoners. “He’ll take good care of you.” He paused. “Mr. Desh, I’ll be back to interrogate you tomorrow morning. As much as I would enjoy slicing off digits and beating you to within an inch of your life, I’m afraid that truth drugs have become just too damn good to justify this sort of thing. Oh well,” he said in disappointment. “I’m sure the session will prove interesting, nonetheless.”
Sam turned to Kira. “As for you, my dear, you’ll have all the information you’ll need to confirm the activity of our sterility virus very soon.”
Sam paused in thought, and a look of mild amusement came over his face. “Jim, if the girl needs to relieve herself,” he continued, “I want one of you in the bathroom with her and one of you outside the door. And don’t turn away while she’s going either. As for Desh here, if he needs to go—” He shrugged. “Let him pee in his pants.”
With that Sam turned and walked to the wood staircase. When he reached it, he turned and faced Kira. “One last thing. Listen for three high-pitched beeps in a few minutes. This will tell you that your twelve-hour clock has been reset.” He smiled. “I thought it was considerate of me to provide an audible confirmation for you. I’m trying to minimize your stress until you’ve come to your senses.”
“Yeah, you’re a real prince,” said Kira bitterly. She paused. “Look, we’re handcuffed to a concrete wall. Do you really think you need three guards?”
Sam looked amused. “Just the fact that you asked the question tells me that I do.” With that he took a careful look at his watch and rushed up the stairs.
The three guards fanned out in the basement at equal distance from the prisoners.
Kira turned toward Desh with an alarmed look in her eye. There was no getting out of this situation. Moriarty, or Sam, or whoever he was, had won. He had an explosive charge planted in her head and a knife at the throat of the entire species. The situation was hopeless.
Desh winked. The gesture had been completed so quickly she had almost missed it, but it was unmistakable. She wrinkled her forehead in confusion. What did he know that she didn’t?
It was time. Desh instructed sweat to exit the pores in his face, and in less than a minute moisture started to bead on his forehead and cheeks. At the same time, at his command, the color drained from his face and lips. He moaned softly.
Hearing the prisoner moan, the guard nearest Desh studied him more closely. “Jesus,” he said to his companions. “This guy is sweating like a pig. He looks like death.”
“I need a doctor,” gasped Desh, the avatar personality he had set up ensuring he said the words in character and with mind-numbing slowness.
Kira struggled to make sense of what was happening. She would have been sure he had come down with the mother of all fevers if it had not been for its sudden onset and the wink he had given her. So this must have been planned. But the sweat sliding down his face was real. They were in a basement and the air was currently cool and dry. No one could cause themselves to sweat. This couldn’t be faked. Unless …
She glanced down at her chest and stifled a gasp. The locket was gone!
Her eyes widened.
The guard named Jim, stationed between his two colleagues, peered at Desh uncomfortably. “What’s wrong with you?” he demanded.
“Don’t know,” uttered Desh feebly. “Gonna vomit,” he whispered. “Bathroom. Please.”
“It’s a trick,” said the guard closest to Desh. “It has to be.”
“Brilliant conclusion,” said Kira mockingly, rolling her eyes. “Can’t you tell when someone’s feverish? How the hell could it be a trick?” She shook her head in disgust. “Look at him! You can’t fake that.”
Desh moved his head forward and swallowed hard several times, as if fighting a gag reflex.
“In another few minutes he’ll be covered in vomit!” pressed Kira. “Are you prepared to live with that smell all night? You think your psychotic boss will be happy about this when he returns?”
Jim frowned miserably. “Ken,” he said, nodding at the guard closest to Desh, “cut him loose. And get him to a toilet.”
Ken hesitated.
“Hurry!” barked Jim.
Desh moaned as Ken approached, pulling a combat knife from his belt. The other two guards raised their guns and trained them steadily on Desh, as Ken reached behind him and cut through the tough plastic of his restraint, which fell to the ground, and returned the knife to his belt.
Desh grunted in pain as he rose unsteadily to his feet, hunched over and clutching at his stomach. He glanced at the other two guards. Ken began escorting him to the stairs. When Desh was halfway there, he bent over and made a loud, throaty, heaving sound, as though a week’s worth of stomach contents were erupting from his throat.
The guards all glanced away, just for a moment, in disgust.
Desh moved! He snatched Ken’s knife with a speed and precision that could never be equaled by a normal man and flicked it toward the guard farthest from him with a smooth, practiced motion. The knife buried itself deep in the guard’s chest. The instant Desh released the knife he spun Ken to his right and into the path of the tranquilizer dart that Jim had sent racing toward him. Desh threw his human shield forward and into Jim in front of him, who shoved the dead weight of his tranquilized colleague violently to the concrete floor. As he did so, Desh was on him immediately, landing a vicious kick to his arm and sending his gun flying. The guard attempted a knifehand strike to Desh’s throat in combination with a palmhand blow to his nose, but Desh blocked both attempts easily. He had read the guard’s body language so precisely he knew the man’s intentions before he had begun to move.
Desh now read Jim’s defensive posture, and spotting an opening, wheeled around and landed a roundhouse kick on the guard’s chest, exploding him back against the staircase. Even as the kick was landing Desh calculated the exact distance to the staircase and the exact speed and force he would need to exert to achieve his goal. As the man’s head cracked against the staircase, he crumpled to the ground, unconscious, and Desh knew his calculations had been perfect.
Desh snatched Jim’s tranquilizer gun from the floor, stepped over Ken’s body, and crouched low under the open staircase. As he had expected, the guard who had remained upstairs bolted through the door to the basement and down several stairs holding an automatic rifle out in front of him. So much for non-lethal force, thought Desh.
The man expertly covered the staircase and entire basement with his gun. He took in the sight of Kira, still bound, and four bodies sprawled on the floor, but could detect no other movement, which he immediately realized suggested his adversary was hidden under the staircase.
His realization came far too late.
Desh casually sent a dart at point blank range through the opening between two stairs and into the guard’s leg. He collapsed and slid down four stairs before finally coming to a stop.
Desh was expert in several forms of hand-to-hand combat, and long practice had made his movements precise and cobra-strike quick. And this was
