Shaban clutched the cylinder to his chest, kicking at Eddie. ‘You are
‘If you’re a god,’ Eddie snarled, seeing the other man gripping the door frame, knuckles white, ‘let’s see if you can fly!’
He punched Shaban’s hand with all his might.
Pain erupted in Eddie’s fingers, skin splitting and joints crunching - but it was nothing to what Shaban felt as his hand was crushed against the hard-edged metal. The longest bone of his middle finger snapped. With a scream, he let go - and Eddie drove his bloodied fist into the Egyptian’s scarred face.
The Eurocopter swayed back into the dazzling beam . . . and Shaban fell.
Still clutching the canister, he plunged almost seventy feet down the blinding shaft of light - and hit the pyramid’s peak with a spine-splintering crack.
Eddie stared down at the splayed figure now blocking the beam, the tip of the summit poking up through his stomach. ‘Get the point?’ he yelled.
But Shaban wasn’t quite dead.
Blood streaming from the massive wound where he was impaled, he still had just enough strength to raise one hand as he tried to open the container - and scatter its deadly contents into the wind.
Eddie was no longer watching - the increasingly noisy warnings from the console had captured his attention. The oil pressure gauge was in the red, dropping rapidly. The engine was about to fail.
Wincing at the pain in his hand, he slid back across the cabin. ‘Macy! You okay?’
‘He - pulled my damn shoulder out,’ she said through clenched teeth. ‘Can you land this thing?’
‘Nope.’
‘What? But - but I thought you were some kick-ass super soldier! You mean you can’t fly a helicopter?’
‘I keep meaning to learn,’ he replied, releasing her harness, then reaching over her to open the door.
She gaped at him. ‘What’re you doing?’
‘We’ll have to jump.’
‘But we’re miles up!’
‘Not for long.’ The klaxons were overpowered by a grinding from the engine compartment. ‘When I tell you to—’
The driveshaft sheared apart. Broken metal clanged against the bulkhead like hailstones.
The helicopter fell.
‘Jump! Jump!
They dropped, ten feet, twenty—
And hit the pyramid’s sloping side.
The toughened glass cracked - but didn’t break. Every nerve on fire from the hard landing, Eddie slithered down the structure, Macy tumbling alongside him.
Shaban turned the lid, needing only one more small movement to open the container . . .
And froze as his pain-dulled eyes saw the helicopter plunging at him.
He screamed—
The EC130 slammed down on top of the pyramid - and continued through it, falling into the laboratory amidst pulverised glass and shredded metal. It hit the floor and exploded, a searing shockwave pounding through the chamber.
Reaching the hidden C-4.
The explosive detonated, ripping apart the gas tank. The lab was consumed by a colossal wave of fire, the entire top third of the pyramid blowing apart like the eruption of a glass volcano.
Eddie and Macy were already over halfway down. Below, Eddie saw Nina running from the blast, the Mitsubishi half buried in the wall—
‘
Despite her pain, Macy managed to slam her heels against the glass as Eddie did the same. He went left, she went right, passing on each side of the Shogun—
They hit the ground.
More pain exploded in Eddie’s legs as he rolled and bounced across the courtyard. He heard Macy scream again and threw himself at her, shielding her against the rain of glass with his body. More windows shattered as flying debris arced down.
The noise faded.
Bruised and bleeding, Eddie raised his head, wincing at the pain throughout his body. The pyramid’s top had gone, swallowed by boiling flames. The deadly spores were destroyed.
‘Eddie!’ More pain as he looked round, but it was slightly soothed by the sight of Nina running towards him. ‘Jesus! Are you okay?’
‘I’ll tell you when I work out if my legs are still attached,’ he rasped. ‘Macy, you all right?’
‘No,’ she said, very quietly. Nina and Eddie shared a worried look. ‘But . . . I think I will be. Eventually.’
Eddie tried to laugh, but it turned into a cough. ‘Another fucking exploding helicopter. Feels like I’m in one of Grant’s movies. Is he okay?’
‘Looks like it,’ said Nina, seeing the actor rounding the pyramid with Assad and one of the ASPS. She waved, then looked up at the building’s burning summit. ‘That’s one way to take care of a yeast infection. Kind of overkill, but looks like it worked.’
‘Bloody well better have,’ Eddie grumbled, lifting himself off Macy. ‘A pack of C-4 and a chopper blowing up? Anything in there ought to be toast.’
Nina raised her eyebrows. ‘Oh . . .’
‘What?’
‘I just realised. You took out Shaban’s spores . . . but you also toasted the bread of Osiris. The source of eternal life.’ She pondered that for a moment. ‘Still, who wants to live for ever?’
Eddie staggered upright and put his arm round her. ‘Depends who you’re living with.’
Epilogue
New York City: Three Weeks Later
Nina gazed up at the dark glass slab of the UN’s Secretariat Building as she stepped from the limo. Unlike her last visit, she had no feelings of trepidation. Quite the opposite. This time, she and Eddie were there to be honoured.
The ceremony had come about thanks to the Egyptian government. The discovery of a pyramid in the Western Desert - and the revelation that it contained the tomb of Osiris himself, turning studies of the country’s ancient mythology on their head - meant that Egyptology would become the hottest field of archaeology for the next several years. At the very least, the tourist trade was about to see a huge boom.
So the Egyptians had petitioned the UN to recognise Nina and Eddie’s achievement in uncovering the Pyramid of Osiris . . . as well as their role in stopping Shaban.
There was a distinct irony, Nina thought, to the fact that her interactions with the IHA had come full circle. The agency had been established in large part to keep the truth about attempted murder on an unimaginable scale from the public; now, the same organisation that had summarily dismissed her eight months earlier was forced to grovel for her co-operation in the investigation of another genocidal scheme.
Despite this, she still hesitated at the entrance. ‘You okay?’ Eddie asked.
‘Yeah. It’s just . . . the last two times I came to the UN, I got torn a new one by Maureen Rothschild.’
‘The only thing she’ll be doing to your arse today is kissing it,’ he assured her.
‘Good point,’ said Nina, grinning. ‘Would it be bad manners if I really rubbed it in that I was right and she was wrong?’
‘Probably. But I say bollocks to manners!’
Nina kissed him, and then they went inside.
