THE FIFTH HORSEMAN: A NOVEL OF BIOLOGICAL WARFARE [042-011-066-4.8]

By: Richard Sherbaniuk

Category: fiction military

Synopsis:

Big dams often bring big trouble.  For instance, the huge Ataturk Dam
in southeast Turkey, with its control of neighboring countries' water
and fast-growing green slime and poisons.  Add an apocalyptic "fifth
horseman"--genetically modified organisms (GMOs)--and a band of
terrorists, and you have the makings of world-shaking problems.

Jamal, a power-hungry genius who wants his own country, runs the
terrorists, including a drunken Russian general and a monk who is much
more effective than he seems, for the Russian agent who supervises
delivering and mixing the GMOs has been crucified and resurrected by
the monk and is understandably committed to the cause.  Dr. Zammit,
whose connections as a Knight of Malta save the situation and many lives
at a crucial point, and several accomplished and fascinating colleagues
chase through an intellectual labyrinth, an underground temple, and
secret cities and research labs to counter that cause.  Sherbaniuk has
the skill and the detailed scientific and psychological knowledge to
make this a gripping, fast-moving, realistic caper, and a frighteningly
provocative one, to boot.

THE FIFTH HORSEMAN

A NOVEL OF BIOLOGICAL WARFARE

Richard Sherbaniuk

A Tom Doherty Associates Book New York

This is a work of fiction.  All the characters and events portrayed in
this novel are either fictitious or are used fictitiously.

THE FIFTH HORSEMAN Copyright 2001 by Richard Sherbaniuk

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or
portions thereof, in any form.

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Book design by Jane Adele
Regina Map by Michael Fisher, cartographer

A Forge Book Published by Tom Doherty Associates, INC 175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010

www tor com

Forge is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, INC.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Sherbaniuk, Richard.

The fifth horseman / Richard Sherbaniuk.--1st ed.

p. em.

"A Tom Doherty Associates book."

ISBN 0-312-87435-9 (alk.  paper) 1.
Environmentalists--Fiction.  2. Weapons of mass destruction-Fiction.
3.

Biological warfare--Fiction.  4. Conspiracies--Fiction.  5. Middle
East--Fiction.

I. Title.

PS3569.H3987 F54 2001 813'.6--dc21 00-048448

First Edition: March 2001

Printed in the United States of America

To my wife, Bonnie Dorish, without whose endless love, help, and
encouragement neither this work, nor its author, would exist.

To my parents, who instilled in me a love of reading and learning.

I am grateful to the following people for sharing their time and
knowledge.  Any errors in this book are mine and mine alone.

Clive Cussler, whose immense success has not prevented him from being a
generous and considerate man, and for giving me the biggest break of my
literary life.

My wife, Bonnie Dorish, for her editorial and psychological advice.

Dr.  R. W. Sherbaniuk, my father.  Professor Emeritus of Medicine, for
providing me with wise advice.

Environmental scientists, detectives, and enforcers: Dr.  Bruce Taylor,
Wayne Inkpen, Jim McKinley, Ken Simpson, and others.

Dr.  Alan Bean, professor of theology, for his eagle-eye and vast
knowledge of religion.

Ruth Anderson, Mega Search for her diligent research into biological
warfare.

Ken Yackimec, editor, polymath, and forest ranger, for his keen wit and
inherent sense of drama and psychology.

Janet Bliss, Janice Laurie, Tim Perrin, and Christopher Taylor for
their editorial skills and suggestions.

Olga Dorish, for her meticulous reading of the story.

David Hunter, Joint Chairman/ Managing Director, HR Aviation Group
Limited, United Kingdom, for his patient and comprehensive help on
Soviet-era aircraft.

Jaron Summers and Robert McKee for their sage advice on how to tell a
story.

Dr.  Will Orram for his elegant and detailed explanations of mono
amine oxidase and medivac surgery, supplied during a busy time in his
life.

Wayne Logus, physicist, for his meticulous and enormously detailed
technical information on subjects ranging from nuclear warfare to
environmental detection to medicine.

Dr.  Jonathan Tyler, Tyler Research, for reading the manuscript and
offering insightful advice, and for his thermal reactors and Eppendorf
tubes.

Father Don Stine for his advice on religion.

Dr.  Sean Graham for his her barium and greenhouse and demonstration
of
PCR.

Mark Tilden, Dr.  Max Meng, and James Smith, robotics experts.

Susan Crawford, my agent, the best, most dedicated, most supportive,
and hardest working agent in the world.

Natalia Aponte, my editor, for her perceptive, unerringly accurate
suggestions about how to make a manuscript better.

Author's Note

It may seem incredible, but the history, politics, and science depicted
here are true, and the events in this story are either happening now or
could happen tomorrow.  I have taken some literary and technological
license to keep the narrative flowing.  A fuller explanation of how
much of this story is true can be found in the Afterword at the end of
the book.

Turkish is rendered in a variation of the Latin alphabet, and there is
a confusion of spelling and usage.  I have tried to choose the simplest
route, which is why, for example, I call the town of Sanii Urfa (or
Sanliurfa, or Sanlurfa) just Urfa, and Catal Huyuk is Catalhoyok.

In the last book of the Bible, Revelation, Chapter 6, verses 2-8, the
four major disasters that befall mankind are personified as the Four
Horsemen of the Apocalypse: death, war, famine, and pestilence.

Now, there is a Fifth Horseman.

Dzerzhinsk, Russian Federation, August 25, 2003

Mike Zammit stood at the lip of the pit, wreathed in poisonous yellow
fumes.

He tried to estimate the extent of the damage, aware that he could
easily slip to his death down the steep greasy slope.  The iridescent
green lake a hundred feet below at the bottom of the pit was almost
pure acid, and his protective suit would dissolve in seconds.  Flakes
of white ash from the toxic waste burning in the garbage dumps danced
in the air around him, their edges glowing red, like Satan's version of
a winter storm.

He had heard Dzerzhinsk called the City of Death because it was the
most polluted place on earth.  Now he knew it was true.

Gazing through the plastic visor of his helmet, with the hiss of oxygen
in his ears, feeling its sting in his nostrils, he was grateful his
suit was completely sealed.  If you smelled anything but oxygen, you
were in trouble--you'd sprung a leak.  Breathing the yellow fumes would
sear your lungs in seconds.  He stared at the cascade of rusted drums
that spread far below like an avalanche of corrosion.  Many had burst
and were leaking.  He knew some contained industrial acid, but the
others?  Cyanide, fluorine, PCBs, spent reactor rods--the worst stuff
on earth.

He looked at the slimy green river that trickled from the factory
complex, belching foul black smoke.  The few dying trees were the color
of charcoal from their coating of soot.  They seemed to be lifting
beseeching arms toward the diarrhea-brown sky.

The mosquito-like whine was unnerving.  Zammit turned to his two
partners, also encased in the orange bulk of protective suits.

"I haven't heard a Geiger counter scream since Chornobyl.  Frankie,
what's going on?"

Frances Fitzgerald Richards held up the black box in her hand as Zammit
leaned over to look.  The red needle quivered at the far end of the
dial.  The pit zone was as hot as the aftermath of a nuclear
explosion.

Constantine Palaeov's muscular body-builder frame tensed as he also
leaned to look.  At twenty-four, he was new to the emergency field team
and the most likely to panic.

"Boss, I think we should get out of here."

"Connie, we're still OK," replied Zammit.

"I've been through this a thousand times.  There's a reason we get
hired as environmental detectives.  We're thorough, and we take risks
no one else will take.  Frankie?"

Frankie Richards pointed to a pile of ruptured drums, then looked again
at the Geiger counter.

"Some of those could cause cancer in a block of concrete.  We have
time, but not much."

Zammit nodded and turned away from the pit.

"Over here."

Their boots squelched as they slogged to a crater filled with pink
liquid, like melted candy.  In this black contaminated landscape, the
bright pool was as incongruous as a party hat on a skeleton.  Glancing
back at the smoke from the factory, Zammit noted the direction of the
slight breeze.  Gesturing for the others to follow, he walked away from
the crater and around the rim, moving upwind and farther away.

Facing the pool again from a distance of twenty feet, he ripped open
the Velcro flap on one of the pockets of his protective suit and
removed what looked like a black golf ball.  He pressed a sequence of
buttons on the bomblet and a red light glowed.  Silently Zammit counted
to five, then stepped forward and tossed it underhand into the pool.
The instant the tiny incendiary device disappeared into the pink liquid
there was an explosive who mp  Electric blue and acid green flames
licked toward the sky and black smoke roiled.

Zammit glanced at his chronometer and waited.  Twenty seconds.  Thirty
seconds.

Sixty seconds.  The pool was still burning.

"You want me to collect some samples of whatever that crap is, when it
finally burns out?"  asked Connie Palaeov unhappily.

"There's no point," replied Zammit.

"I'm not a miracle worker, and that's what it would take to clean up
this mess."

"Besides, with all this radiation we better get out of here," added
Richards.

Zammit took a final look at the crackling flames and tried to lessen
his sense of defeat with some black humor.

"Hey, Connie.  Got any more of those sausages we had for breakfast?
It's not often you can have a weenie roast in hell."

Palaeov suddenly pointed.  Zammit turned.  Yury Bogov, their official
translator and fixer, ran toward them, stumbling in his bulky
protective gear as he gestured back the way they'd come.  A former
member of the disbanded KGB, Bogov was now a freelance spy, a definite
asset in a country as corrupt as Russia.  Zammit wiped greasy brown
film off his visor so he could see better.

A couple of hundred yards away, by his mobile lab, two Mercedes
limousines disgorged half a dozen large men.  The athleticism suggested
by their brightly colored track suits was belied by heavy,
slope-shouldered gaits as they shambled toward the troops guarding the
lab.  They all walked from the shoulders, like bears.  Big Russian
bears.  Zammit's escort of young soldiers was backing away.

Mafia thugs.  Bad news.

Bogov reached them, panting.

"I told you there would be trouble.  We shouldn't have argued, we
should have just paid what they asked."

"Maybe," said Zammit.  It wouldn't be the first time he'd been
threatened by people who didn't want an environmental detective
investigating their affairs.

They trudged through the barren, devastated landscape toward the mobile
lab, black muck sucking at their boots.

It was now another fifty yards to the vehicle.  Flakes of ash still
swirled through the air, but the Geiger counter finally fell silent.
Zammit stripped off the helmet and gloves of his protective suit.  He
wiped his streaming brow and coughed as the air bit his lungs with the
acrid smell of sulfur and smoke.  How to deal with the six men?

"Frankie, what do you think?"

Frances Richards pulled off her helmet and gloves, as did the others.
She plucked a piece of grit from her long blond hair.

"The mafia chief didn't seem unhappy with the deal we made.  Maybe his
boys are bored, out for a Sunday drive."

As Zammit assessed the situation, the natural warmth in his sea blue
eyes vanished and hard lines appeared around his eyes and mouth.  Three
of the track suits stared down the troops, arms folded on top of their
huge bellies.  The five pale young soldiers supplied by Moscow to
protect Zammit's team were slouched in a tense but hangdog posture of
submission that said they were already beaten but still feared attack.
Two other track suits poked their heads into the open doorway of the
mobile lab.  One watched them approach.  As they drew near he used his
fingers to clear first one nostril, then the other, spraying wads of
snot onto the ground.

"I thought Neanderthal man was extinct, and here he is having a
convention," said Zammit.

"Chechnya war vets," said Bogov.

"We might as well be protected by Boy Scouts."

One of the track suits was urinating against the side of the mobile
van.

"There can't be many forms of life lower than these guys," remarked
Zammit.

Bogov shrugged.

"They exist to eat, drink, fuck, and kill.  Mainly drink and kill."

"Any suggestions on how we deal with them?"  asked Richards.

"More bribes are good.  Unless they have orders to murder us.  More
money would've"

"Yury, for the last time," said Zammit, "our agency isn't a bank with
limitless funds, and we can't spend that kind of money just to pay off
a gangster.  We negotiated a fair price."

"Besides," added Richards, "we're here on behalf of the government in
Moscow."

Bogov coughed.

"Here they wipe their asses with the government in Moscow.  And our
troop bodyguards are conscripts who only shave once a week and never
get paid."

As they got closer to the lab, one of the track suits pulled the dead
two-headed calf from the interior of the vehicle.  Zammit had collected
the badly deformed animal from a nearby farm.  Holding it by the legs,
the gangster spun around as if throwing the hammer, finally sending the
carcass soaring through the air toward them as his friends roared with
hoarse laughter.

"Good distance," said Richards.

"This guy's a definite for the mutation Olympics."

They passed the dead calf, its two tongues lolling from its two slack
mouths.

Zammit made a decision.

"Frankie, where did you plant the gun?"

"It's clipped behind the third structural rib on your left as you reach
through the door."

They walked through the group of six track suits to the lab, ignoring
them.  The men had the bloated, overfed look of people who ate nothing
but fatty, salty food, and too much of it.  There was a strong smell of
alcohol.  Zammit caught the eye of one man and held it briefly.  He saw
dull curiosity, nothing more.  One of the track suits removed his
sunglasses to fix Frankie Richards with a predatory stare.  As he
nudged the man next to him and whispered something, she coolly returned
his gaze.

Zammit leaned into the vehicle, tossed his gloves and helmet on the
seat, and picked up the satellite phone that would connect him with
headquarters in Seattle.  Pressing the speed-dial with his left thumb,
he braced against the door frame, ready for trouble.  He faced a
hulking crew-cut blond in a magenta-striped navy track suit.  The slit
Mongol eyes betrayed the genetic legacy of a 13th century rape that had
mingled the genes of Genghis Khan with those of some flaxen-haired
Slavic peasant.  The thug stared with flat hostility.

With his right hand Zammit reached inside the door for the Heckler and
Koch .33 caliber automatic.  Had they found it?  A surge of relief as
he grasped the butt.

"Me good guy," he said to the blond.

"You bad guy."

Suddenly the connection came through.

"Get me Cairo Jackson."  Without taking his eyes from the thug, he
delivered a terse report.

"Cairo, this is the most poisoned environment I've ever seen.
Dzerzhinsk's been a chemical production center for fifty years--mustard
gas, DDT, Agent Orange, you name it.  They weren't too careful about
how they disposed of their waste.  Also, lots of illegal incineration
and dumping of radioactives.  You can cut the air with a machete and
the soil is soaked with dioxin.  Flammable pools of chemical cocktail
on the surface, drinking water's cloudy and stinks of kerosene,
everybody's gray-faced and coughing.  The only thing higher than the
mutation rate is the incidence of alcoholism.  There's nothing we can
do.  Only Mother Nature can clean this place, and it's going to take
her a long, long time.  Anything at your end?"

He frowned as his eyes met Frankie's.

"Thousands of people dying in a remote region of Turkey after drinking
water from the Euphrates River.  That's all you've got?"  He listened
intently.

"The source appears to be the reservoir of the Ataturk Dam."  He raised
an inquiring eyebrow at Frankie.  She shrugged and shook her head.

"If the White House is supervising data gathering, it must be
important.  You'll have to brief me later."

Zammit glanced at the track suits surrounding him.  Two of them took
experimental steps forward as the soldiers shuffled and averted their
gaze.  It was the thugs' job to be intimidating, and they must be
armed, but there were no weapons in sight.  Maybe they just needed a
deterrent.

"The local primate population is hostile.  Hang on."  He pressed the
hold button as he swung the gun around the door frame and pointed it at
the torso of the blond in the navy track suit, moving the barrel in a
slight circle to keep his aim limber.  Without taking his eyes from
the man, he tilted his head toward Connie and said, "Beads."

The muscular young Russian disappeared into the van and returned
immediately with four bottles, two of Marten cognac, two of Johnny
Walker whiskey.  Smiles split the faces of the track suits, gold
bridgework gleaming among teeth the color of tree stumps.  Tension
disappeared as the bottles were opened and upended.  The blond backed
away and grinned.  He hawked and spat before drinking, then handed the
bottle to one of his friends.  Frankie was right--the lads were just
out for a drive, looking for some fun.

"Yury.  Remember we got drunk one night and you taught me some Russian
insults?  I forget how you call someone a walrus's penis."

"Please, Dr.  Zammit, that's not funny.  You don't have a wife and
kids.  I do."

A grinning turquoise-blue track suit with lank black hair wiped lips
wet with liquor and said something to the translator.  Bogov listened,
eyes flicking back and forth.

"Do you want a missile, very cheap?  An SS-25.  Forty grand.  There's
no launcher, and the guidance system doesn't work anymore.  But the
warhead is still live, and it checked out OK a month ago.  If you pay
cash in American dollars he'll throw in an armored car and a couple of
girls."

Zammit spoke into the phone.

"I thought it was impossible, but this place has suddenly gotten
filthier.  Cairo, I'm coming home."

ATaTurK Dam, TurKEY, August 26

In the gathering dusk, the huge maintenance vehicle reversed and ground
to a halt.

Ruslan Glinka looked up into the evening sky twinkling with faint stars
and filled with the heavy whump-whump of ceaselessly circling
helicopters.  He nervously adjusted his mask, making sure his oxygen
supply was secure.  He hated this task almost more than he hated the
Turks, but it had to be done.  He tried not to think about his fate if
they caught him.

He jumped from the cab and walked to the rear of the vehicle, which now
faced the reservoir.  After checking the huge tanks in the back one
last time, he walked to the edge of the concrete and surveyed the area.
Half a mile away, 600 feet high, loomed the dam's gigantic concrete
wall, its mile-long crest curving into the descending darkness.  No one
was close enough to see that he was doing anything more than his job.
To be sure of concealment, he always did it at twilight.  Back at the
truck, he pushed a button to activate the winch that would un spool the
heavy giant hoses, then walked again to the water's edge.

Or what should have been the water's edge.  Instead of water, and
extending as far as he could see, there was a thick, gelatinous mat
gleaming iridescently in the setting sun.  He knew it stank like
millions of tons of putrid flesh, and men vomited, fainted, and
sometimes died when they smelted it.  Heart pounding, he again checked
his oxygen unit.

Most of the mat was bright green, but in places there were fleshy,
greenish-black lumps growing like slowly inflating basketballs.  He
knew from previous tests that the gluey mat was far deeper than it
looked.  It now extended almost fifteen feet deep, and it was getting
deeper and denser all the time.

Returning to the truck, he adjusted the nozzle on one hose, clipped a
shell-shaped weight to the end, fitted the weight into the gas cannon
mounted next to the tank, aimed, and fired.  A heavy thud, and the
truck bucked with the recoil.  Carried by the weight, the hose made a
lazy parabola far out into the reservoir, then sank without a sound
into the viscous muck.  He punched a bright blue button on the tank's
console as the motor whirred into action, heard the sloshing sound
coming through the hose and into the tank.  He waited until he heard
the beep that said the tank was full and punched the button again.

So far so good.  He looked around once more.  Seeing no one, he quickly
adjusted the feed hose on the second tank so that it connected to the
base of the first hose, its head still sunk beneath the surface of the
reservoir.  When it was secure, he took a deep breath, hearing the rasp
and hiss of his oxygen unit in his ears.  While making a show of
adjusting his tool belt, he touched the yellow button of the small
remote control nestled in one pouch.  He didn't want to take his eyes
from the glowing red dial of the device, but he had his instructions.

In an elaborate pantomime he folded his arms and waited as the second
tank, instead of sucking up samples, started spewing its contents into
the reservoir.

It was feeding time.

Republic of Tuvamistan, August 27

Elated, Abdul Jamal waved the remote control at the big-screen TV like
a conductor orchestrating a symphony of disaster.

The TV set was incongruous in this fake 18th-century suite.  He gazed
around the cavernous room.  One of hundreds in the palace--the personal
residence of the brutal dictator of Tuvanistan and his vicious wife--it
was the size of a ballroom.  It reeked of bad taste, with its gilt
French antiques, pink velvet upholstery, and purple watered-silk
wallpaper.

His eyes returned to the screen, again absorbed in the tape of the CNN
newscast.

I could watch this forever, he thought.  A perfect plot, unfolding
perfectly.

He sipped from his snifter of cognac, savoring the amber liquid as it
burned like liquid smoke.  On the screen, a huge crowd of people. About
a hundred thousand.  A podium, a woman making a speech.  The camera
veered wildly as mobs of angry men rushed the stage.  They were beaten
off by club-wielding police in visored black helmets.  He listened
carefully, relishing every word.

"..  . as the riots continue in Istanbul.  In the midst of the most
important election campaign in this republic's history, the prime
minister of Turkey, Thamar Amurkhan, seems powerless to deal with a
situation that is deteriorating by the moment.  With no end in sight to
the worst drought in history, and facing the Kurdish insurrection, it
may take a miracle to save the world's only successful Muslim
democracy.  The winner is expected to be the fundamentalist party known
as Strength ..."

Jamal heard a heavy tread behind him, the footsteps deadened by the
expanse of silk Bokhara carpet.  A toneless voice said, "Sir, a call
from your Black Sea friend."

His assistant and bodyguard Wurban Ice, the only other person with a
key to the suite.

"Have him hold for a few moments.  You've scanned the room for
listening devices?"

"Yes, sir.  Nothing.  Also, President Popov and his wife inquire
whether you wish to join them again for dinner?"

Jamal sighed and paused the videotape.  He turned to Ice, thinking
again how appropriate the man's name was to his personality.  Built
like a 300-pound fireplug, the Hungarian had white-blond hair, a flat
face, and cold blue eyes.

"I suppose it's necessary, although their taste in food is as bad as
their taste in interior design."  He took a sip of cognac.

"Tell them yes, and make it sound both graceful and grateful.  We can't
afford to antagonize them at this stage."

Ice nodded and left the room.  Jamal pressed the remote control and
continued watching the tape.

"As Syria and Iraa demand that the Turks supply them with more water,
it seems--incredibly--that the opposite is happening.  The president is
said to be seeking assurances that the Turkish government will honor
its commitment to maintain the flow to the parched lands of what was
once the Fertile Crescent.

Meanwhile, the threat of war looms larger every day in one of the
world's most volatile regions.  And no one knows why the Turks refuse
to release more water.

According to the State Department ..."

Jamal smiled as he turned off the TV.  I know why.  He walked to the
window and twitched the heavy purple curtain aside.  The setting sun
filled the flaming orange horizon, studded with the spires and domes of
minarets and mosques.

He remembered the waiting phone call and reflected on the inconvenience
of partners.  So much explaining and persuading, invariably to people
of inferior intelligence.  Then, if they proved incompetent or became a
liability, you had to get rid of them.  And blood was a big expense.

He set down his drink and lifted the receiver.

"Da?"  Eyes closed, he listened for several moments before
interrupting, again in Russian.  He tried to keep the irritation out of
his voice.

"Everything is on schedule.  No one is going to be able to stop us."

He listened again.

"Don't worry about Zammit.  I know every move he makes."

His jaw muscles clenched.  For a man supposed to be so tough, the
Russian worried about the stupidest things.  It was insulting.  Perhaps
he'd been drinking again, out of control.  A feral snarl appeared on
Jamal's lips, transforming his handsome face into something
frightening, as if a mask had been ripped off.  But he kept his voice
steady--at least he could control that.

"Of course they'll talk.  I expect Turkish Intelligence to conduct the
interrogation with their boots, if not worse.  They'll babble about the
Koran.  If you're going to worry about anything, worry about your
task."

Jamal hung up, then stretched, bones cracking.  He thought about his
partners, especially the Russian he had just spoken with and his
drinking.  But he didn't want to think about that right now, so he
didn't.  Instead he gazed at his image reflected in the mirror on the
opposite wall.  He liked what he saw.  He ran his hand over his ebony
hair, silvering at the temples, and considered what a handsome devil he
was.

Forty-five years old, six foot three, and built like a Greco-Roman
wrestler, there was not a line on his coffee-and-cream complexion.  His
eyes were always watchful beneath the inch-long eyelashes that melted
female hearts, until more intimate knowledge froze them with fear.  A
cleft chin was accompanied by dimples when he smiled.  Jamal smiled now
at his favorite sight, himself.  He turned and walked to the window,
humming his favorite operatic melody, "Au fond du temple saint," from
Bizet's The Pearl Fishers.  His family had for centuries been pearl
fishers and merchants in Oman.  Now, just as Saint Peter had been a
fisher of men, so was he.

Finally he would achieve everything he ever wanted in life, and reel in
Dr. Michael Zammit as well.

Seattle, August 28

Mike Zammit contemplated the woman asking about the slaughter of baby
seals.

He still felt the sting of Dzerzhinsk air in his eyes as he squinted
into the hot TV lights.  It felt as if his TV makeup was melting.  He
had returned from Russia longing for sleep and a decent meal, only to
find that his communications and public relations director.  Earl
Stone, had booked him onto a national talk show hosted by bottle-blond
celebrity Molly Katz.  Jet-lagged and irritable, he soon discovered
that the Chats with Katz audience was crammed with environmental
activists and New Agers.  Something was being shown on the monitor to
his left.

From the sound track and the audience's horrified gasps, he figured it
was an old video of seal pups being clubbed to death.

I've been set up, Zammit thought.  He'd have a few words with Earl.

"You do great work as an environmental investigator.  People should
know about it," Stone had said.

"Communications, Mike, that's what it's all about in the Information
Age."

But for now, in front of a hostile audience, he had to tough it out.

"Yes, seals have historically been a source of fur," he continued.

"But hunting has been banned for years.  And now they're breeding by
the millions, destroying the fishery--" Molly Katz interrupted, "But
isn't there a moral issue here?"  Zammit fought a sudden surge of
irritation and lost.  He wished he weren't so tired.

"Yes, there is.  Whether people who have lived on fish and seals for
centuries are being driven to welfare and despair by people like you,
who've never even seen one of the damn things."

There was a roar of outrage from the audience.

"But don't all creatures have a right to life?"  insisted Katz.

"You're talking about the Disneyfication of the animal kingdom, where
every creature that looks cute like Bambi should be saved."  He knew he
was making a mistake but couldn't stop himself.  A rising murmur from
the audience threatened to drown him out.

"If baby seals looked like cockroaches, nobody'd give a damn how they
die."

As boos erupted, Molly Katz shouted, "We have to go to commercial
break!  We have with us environmental detective Dr.  Michael Zammit,
Director of the International Environmental Response Team, based right
here in Seattle.  Now we will be joined by the Reverend Edward Pompo,
head of the Spiritual Brotherhood of the She-Manitou.  You've read his
books by the millions.

Don't go away!"

Zammit leaned back and tried to ignore the catcalls from the audience.
He watched Edward G. Pompo wave to the audience as he walked onto the
stage to loud applause.  The gray hairpiece had been carefully chosen
to match the color of his Old Testament prophet's beard, and his mock
Native American outfit looked expensive enough to have been designed in
Italy.  As he sat in the chair next to Zammit, beads glinting, fringes
swaying, Pompo offered a politician's hearty handshake and looked the
scientist straight in the eye with a faint smirk Zammit couldn't read
but didn't like.  Probably thinks it's hilarious that I've been set up
in front of a hostile crowd, Zammit thought.  He noticed that as soon
as Pompo sat down, the hot lights made the false hair at the back of
his head start to curl upward.

Molly Katz moved to the stage and took Pompo's hand.  She smelled as if
she'd recently dived into a vat of cheap perfume.

"I love your books."  She flashed a smile at Zammit.

"Tough audience for you, huh?"

As if you didn't know, he thought sourly.  Before he could say
something rude--"I hope your ratings tank"--she turned away.

Zammit glanced into the wings and saw Cairo Jackson waving a cell
phone.  He rose and walked over.

"What?"  He'd known Jackson since shortly after his parents had died in
a boating accident, when the tough black kid had befriended him.

"An update on the situation in Turkey.  The death toll is spiking
incredibly fast.  The Turks have now completely cut off the water
supply for both Iraq and Syria.  That could mean war.  The White House
can't get coherent answers about what's going on in the Ataturk
reservoir."

"Sounds bizarre.  It's in the middle of nowhere, miles from any
pollution source."

A sound technician was beckoning urgently.

"I'll get off this show as fast as I can."  Jackson nodded.  Zammit
headed back to his chair and sat down.

Thunderous applause.

"We're back!" shouted Molly.

"With us today we have Dr.
Michael Zammit and Dr. Edward Pompo. We've been talking about planet
Earth and how to protect it."

Zammit tried to recall what Pompo had done for a living before figuring
out he could make millions peddling pseudo-religion. Used cars?

"Today Dr. Zammit has been telling us that the human race, as a
superior species, can exploit animals at will," explained Katz.

That's not what I was saying, thought Zammit wearily, but hey, it's TV.

Molly Katz looked down at some notes in her hand and read, haltingly:
"But in his best-selling books. Dr. Pompo has taken a different
approach to the reality of our world, an approach based on love and
caring for the soul of Earth, the mother of us all." A beaming smile
at Pompo, his cue.

Pompo's brow crinkled earnestly.

"To survive, the human race must re-ensoul itself. Move back to the
land, live in cooperation, not exploitation, with the animals. This
will be possible in the coming global post industrial society."

"Wait a minute," interrupted Zammit.

"In a few years there will be nine or ten billion people on this
planet. They'll all want cars, refrigerators, computers, and
everything else that must be manufactured or processed industrially.

There will never be a post industrial society unless there's a global
disaster. What are you babbling about?"

Pompo's eyes darted.

"We were talking about an animal's right to life." He turned to the
audience, searching for a laugh.

"I must say you're not demonstrating much political correctness."

"I don't care about being politically correct," said Zammit.

"I'm content merely to be correct."

The guru suddenly stood and faced the audience.

"Let's save the life of an animal right now. Think as hard as you can
of a beautiful little panda or a baby seal. Let us meditate together."

He began to chant, and to Zammit's surprise, a lot of the audience
seemed to know the monotonous dirge and joined in immediately.

He hated this smarmy exploitation of people's search for meaning. The
religion business was booming. It was the same pattern over and over.

Take a group of intellectually or emotionally needy people, and mix
with an American culture whose primary religion was that peculiarly
unsatisfying cult called Consumerism.

Stir in a manipulative leader who cobbled together a new cult made out
of bits of Buddhism, Native American beliefs, and popular delusions
about UFOs and angels. Although Zammit considered most such cults
harmless, he knew that others were not. With the wrong cult, the wrong
type of leader, you ended up with brainwashed zombies. And if you
washed your brain too often, it fell apart like an old rag.

Zammit realized the chant had stopped and Pompo was again seated and
speaking.

He picked up his coffee cup and sipped. Cold.

"Everything in the universe is connected at the subatomic level. Just
looking at a single atom can influence the spin of another atom
hundreds or thousands of miles away. This has been proved by science,
as I am sure Dr. Zammit can attest." Zammit said nothing--he had
heard of this phenomenon, but he wasn't a quantum physicist.

"From this it stands to reason that your being, your soul, even an
individual thought, can affect events here in the real world. If you
allow yourself to have negative thoughts, it affects events in the real
world."

Molly Katz frowned.

"You mean not just, like, with atoms?"

"From the micro world of the atom to the macro world of forests and
cities, all is connected," said Pompo.

"I teach people how not to have bad thoughts so as not to provoke
retaliation by the universe. For less than a thousand dollars, one of
my seminars can teach you--" Pompo's sales pitch for his cult was too
much. A surge of anger snapped Zammit's patience.

"You charlatan."

The audience was shocked silent. Pompo gazed at Zammit, his mouth an
0. "Most people think science is a can filled with facts, and every
once in a while a scientist finds a new fact and tosses it into the
can. But science isn't a can full of facts, it's a way of thinking."

Katz was fidgeting already.

"That's what we're talking about, right, Molly? The influence of
thought. And science enables you to spot sloppy thinking."

He turned to Pompo.

"You're a sloppy thinker whose only interest is peddling spiritual
trash."

A rustling in the audience, the sound of leaves before a great storm.

Pompo swelled with outraged dignity.

"My research has proved it to be a fact. Nothing bad can happen to you
unless you want it to happen. You may disagree as a point of
philosophy, but you cannot disprove it."

Mike Zammit glanced at the coffee cup he held in his lap, then threw
its contents directly in Pompo's face. He leaned forward into the
great silence that followed.

"Hey, swami. Something bad just happened to you. Why did you want it
to happen?"

Sputtering, Pompo struggled from his chair. Coffee dripped from his
beard, and his swollen neck was dark. As he stepped forward, Zammit
swung his left leg in an arc that swept Pompo off his feet. Fringes
flying, the guru landed on the hollow floor with a bang.

"Two bad things in a row," said Zammit.

Pompo tried to struggle to his feet, hairpiece askew, got tangled in
his beadwork, and fell to his knees. Zammit stood and faced the
audience.

"What you've just seen is science. An observable, repeatable
experiment that proves the truth, or in this case the falsity, of a
particular proposition. Beware of false prophets, especially when they
make a profit." He stalked off.

Cairo Jackson stood with his back to the stage facing two men, one
stocky and ruddy with curly black hair, the other lean and blond with a
triangular face and bloodshot blue eyes. Obviously barring their way.

Zammit could see the tension in the big man's broad back and knew that
right now he was as alert as a pit bull and twice as dangerous. Zammit
wondered what was going on. When they saw him approaching, the two
tried to move forward but Jackson held them back.

"This is America, fellas. Knock it off."

Zammit stood beside Jackson, his anger ebbing but still not gone.

"Well, Dr.
Zammit," sneered the blond one in an Irish accent. He mispronounced it
deliberately--Zammeet.

Zammit stepped forward and thrust his face close to the other man's.

They were the same height. The reek of whiskey enveloped him like an
aura. He hoped his breath still smelled of all the garlic he'd eaten
in Russia the past week. He leaned even closer, gazing deep into the
man's bloodshot eyes.

"It's Zammit. Rhymes with dammit."

The blond tried to stare him down. Zammit knew the man could see the
aggression in his eyes. The blond poked Zammit in the chest, hard. He
stopped when he saw the scientist raise his right fist.

"Come on," said Zammit.

"Do it again. I'll hit you so hard they'll find your head in
Cleveland."

The blond hesitated until Jackson stepped forward, his looming
250-pound presence as menacing as a black death star. The blond
blinked, then backed away.

Zammit let Cairo tug at his arm and pull him away. The dark one called
out, "We'll meet again, Zammeet!" As they walked out of the building,
Zammit turned to Jackson.

"Have I suddenly become a thug magnet, or what?"

Republic of Tuvanistan, august 28

"Sir, would you like a woman today?"

Abdul Jamal turned away from the window. He glanced at Wurban Ice,
then at his Rolex.

"Yes. But let's avoid a repetition of last time. You know how I hate
it when they kill themselves."

As Ice plodded away, Jamal again twitched the curtain aside. From his
suite of rooms he had a panoramic view of the soldiers patrolling the
electrified fence that surrounded the palace of President Ivan Popov
and his First Lady, Anastasia.

He could also see the edge of a vast plain filled with oil wells, their
pump heads moving rhythmically up and down like a vast herd of
disoriented elephants.

Oil fueled the wealth of this renegade state carved from an ex-Soviet
republic.

The death of an empire is a messy business, he reflected. But chaos
created opportunity for the clever and ruthless. The demise of the
Soviet Union multiplied his business opportunities like so many
cancerous cells. But money wasn't enough. For all his wealth, he had
no home. He was just a guest in this vulgar palace, in this pitiful
excuse of a country. His refuge had been purchased by a cash payment
to Ivan and Anastasia. His favorite haunts were denied him--the Plaza
Athenee in Paris, the Excelsior in Rome. No nation of laws would
welcome him. His lips tightened as he recalled the past few years,
slipping from banana republic to tin pot dictatorship to gangster
haven, all around the world.

But soon he would have a country. His own.

He heard sounds of struggle behind him. A new acquisition. He did not
turn around, savoring the anticipation of seeing her for the first
time. He stared at the swarming streets of Blavatsk, Tovanistan's
chaotic capital, as ugly as its name. It was a wonderful source of
supply. He enjoyed cruising the streets in his armored car,
appraising, selecting, abducting. Or he would send Ice to do it. He
had a good eye for the fiery ones. Soon the whole world would submit
the way his women did. It wouldn't be easy, but submit it would. And
he would have a country.

Jamal turned away from the window. Two presidential bodyguards leered
in the center of the room. They were thugs who would run at the least
sign of trouble.

He also knew that Anastasia Popov took an unhealthy interest in his
sexual appetites and that the guards would ensure news of his latest
acquisition soon reached her avid ears.

The guards held the new victim, a manacled young girl with
sherry-colored hair and crocus-blue eyes, a Kurd, perhaps, or a
Circassian. A bruise purpling under one eye, her mouth taped shut. She
was very pale and clearly terrified. A refugee, probably no family.

She would never be missed. But she was beautiful and frightened.

Jamal found other people's fear a marvelous aphrodisiac. He couldn't
wait to sample the nectar from this particular bud.

"Get her prepared, with a minimum of bruising," he said to Ice.

"Make sure the harness is secure, administer the new sedative, and
remove all sharps from the vicinity. Then call me." He waved
dismissively.

"I want to read my bible."

As Ice turned away, Jamal remembered.

"You've arranged for the donations to the Imam Hatip?"

"Yes, sir. The response has been grateful, as usual."

"Good."

As Ice and the guards dragged the girl away, Jamal poured himself more
cognac.

Now he could cross his annual zakat from his list of tasks. It was
advantageous to fulfill the injunctions of the Koran, especially when
they coincided so perfectly with his business interests. Zakat, one of
the Five Pillars of Islam, required rich Muslims to give money to poor
ones. As a wealthy man, even though an international fugitive, Jamal
chose to pay his zakat to the Turkish schools called Imam
Hatip--Parson-Preacher schools. The Turkish separation of church and
state was almost as rigid as it was in the United States, but these
schools were allowed to provide a religious education to those who
wanted it. As a powerful patron, he kept an eye on the best pupils,
the boys whose intelligence and personality suited his needs. Upon
their graduation he financed their university education, hired them to
work for him personally, or got them jobs in organizations where their
loyalty might prove useful in the future.

As for the thousands of children he did not choose as star pupils, they
received a free education at his expense. He improved the lives of
others and at the same time paid his zakat to Allah. What was wrong
with combining religious obligations with business? The generosity of
the one more than made up for the rest of it.

He sipped his cognac. Zakat. The Prophet Mohammed had a good idea
with that one.

A clever man. He looked at the amber liquid in the snifter. He chose
to ignore some of the other teachings of Islam. He listened to the
sounds of struggle coming from the bedroom. Ice had chosen a fiery
one.

Jamal walked over to a gilt and ivory rococo table. A silver tray held
fluted glasses and a pitcher filled with mineral water. He poured a
glass and drank. It was imported especially for his use. Blavatsk's
water supply system was a tangle of broken pipes beneath its teeming
streets. With the influx of so many refugees, it had been overwhelmed
with raw sewage. There were constant outbreaks of cholera, dysentery,
and typhoid.

Which was how he had gotten his brilliant idea.

Beside the table lay a lumpy metal object the size of a large
footstool--a fused block of ancient coins. Jamal stooped to peer at a
face staring out of the lump.

He could discern worn Greek lettering on the button-sized coin. He
winked at the unseeing eye of the dead god Apollo that stared back at
him. Probably Sicilian, he thought. Others also stared at
him--Alexander the Great from Thrace, Silenos from Naxos, Poseidon from
Salamis.

"So many gods, and they're all dead," he said aloud. He wagged his
finger at Alexander.

"And the empires that created them, too."

Three hundred pounds of didrachmas, deca drachmas and tetra drachmas
worth millions. His men had recently looted it from an ancient city,
eventually to be inundated by the waters of a reservoir. There were
some 200 such lost cities in southeastern Turkey, untouched by
archaeologists. Once drowned, they never would be. He wanted to loot
them all, but there wasn't time.

He straightened and lifted a leather-bound book from the table, the
book he regarded as his bible. He settled in the Louis XIV chair and
opened the volume at random. His eyes fell on a sentence:

"The character of peoples varies, and it is easy to persuade them of a
thing, but difficult to keep them in that persuasion. And so it is
necessary to arrange things so that when they no longer believe, they
can be made to believe by force."

Jamal smiled. He closed both the book and his eyes, then let the
volume fall open. As he read again he laughed silently: "When you
acquire those states which have been accustomed to live at liberty
under their own laws, there are three ways of holding them.

The first is to plunder them; the second is to go and live there in
person; and the third is to create within the country a government
composed of a few who will keep it friendly to you." He had read this
before. He intended to do all three.

He reviewed his list of tasks. Call in the debts of loyalty owed to
him by the recipients of two decades' worth of zakat. Karl Marx said
religion was the opium of the people. So it was, and a most useful
drug too. He thought of his Russian partners. Lenin described those
the Bolsheviks exploited and then ruthlessly discarded as "useful
idiots." His Russian partners were merely useful idiots.

He looked up as Wurban Ice approached.

"She's asleep." Jamal laid the book on the table. As he walked toward
the bedroom, the setting sun shone on the gilt letters of the
well-thumbed volume--The Prince, by Niccolo Machiavelli.

Sevastopol, Crimea, Republic of Ukraine, August 28

Onstage, Jesus Christ writhed on his cross as the music boomed.

Rivulets of blood running down his forehead from the crown of thorns
looked black in the acid-yellow neon light. His tossing head lashed
sweat-soaked ropes of hair against the wood. The fingers of his nailed
hands fluttered in agony and his chest heaved as he struggled to
breathe, slowly suffocating as his weight dragged him down the wooden
shaft.

A blue fog of tobacco smoke hung from the nightclub ceiling like a
storm cloud.

A tall man in a coarse brown monk's habit suddenly appeared on stage,
his pale face framed by shoulderlength greasy black hair and a black
beard, a red Christian cross painted on his forehead. His bulging eyes
were as big as eggs and the gray color of badly rinsed glassware. The
audience screamed the Russian name for a peasant holy man, "Starets!

Starets!" Ignoring the crowd, the monk glided up to the man on the
cross and observed him closely, then walked off stage.

Strobe lights flashed as the music pounded. The audience of a thousand
people tossed their heads in unison, a bloody cross painted on each
forehead. Most were soldiers and sailors, young men with the shaved
heads and emaciated faces of abused recruits. They sang and swayed to
the music, the pupils of their eyes as big as dimes from the drugs they
had taken.

At a table near the rear of the club, a huge man in a green uniform
with red tabs paid no attention to this modern staging of Christ's
Passion. He tossed back a brimming shot glass of vodka.

"DemocraziaV He pronounced the word with spit and loathing. He wagged
a finger at his even drunker companion.

"Lieutenant, what Russia needs is a strong leader. A tsar he shouted,
slamming his fist on the table.

Two young soldiers turned to stare. He glared at them. A look of
panic crossed their faces. They hurriedly rose and darted to another
table. He did not notice the slim young private who remained alone at
the next table, apparently stoned beyond the ability to move.

"In the 19th century the Russian Empire conquered an area larger than
the entire continental United States. And we didn't do it with
democracy. We did it with a tsar, Not with a drunken pig like
President Bugarin."

The lieutenant slurred, "General, do you hate him because he's a drunk
or because he's a democrat?"

The huge man threw back his enormous shaved head and roared, "All
Russians are drunks! A Russian without a drink is like a man without a
soul." He gripped the lieutenant's arm.

"It is against our traditions. Russians are used to venerating one
leader. A strong leader. A religious leader."

He belched.

"The communists failed because they tried to replace the one true
religion with a theory of economics. Dreamed up by that idiot Karl
Marx in the British Library, where he hid from his creditors because he
couldn't figure out even the economics of his own household. Who the
hell can worship a theory of economics?"

The general stared around blearily.

"Those politicians in Moscow, they should be selling vacuum cleaners.

We don't need politics, we need a tsar'." He shouted the word like an
anthem.

"Someone who will act against those destroying Holy Mother Russia." His
eyes narrowed viciously.

"Jews. Muslims. I say we march into those Islamic republics and pave
them with bones."

He pounded his chest with a massive fist.

"Between 1941 and 1945 our armies ground the Nazis into sausage meat.

Our sacrifice bled Hitler to death. Our so-called allies didn't even
launch the D-Day invasion until 1944. You know how many Americans died
in that war? Three hundred thousand. You know how many Russians?

Twenty-seven million. And the Americans strut around saying, "Look how
we won the war." And then tell us we can't have Eastern Europe!"

He raised his face to the ceiling and laughed, a terrifying series of
crazy barks.

"In the Cold War the Americans had nuclear missiles right at our
borders.

We were surrounded, wrapped in nuclear barbed wire. When we gave them
a taste of their own medicine by putting missiles in Cuba, America
wrung its hands like a virgin about to be raped." He gripped the table
with both hands as if to tear it in half.

"Krushchev should never have backed down. We would have won a nuclear
war. That rich boy Kennedy, he looked like a dance instructor."

He swelled with drunken self-pity.

"We've paid for everything in blood, and now what? Do you know,
sometimes I can't even pay my troops? It's like the Roman Empire, with
the barbarians surrounding you, and you need soldiers but you can't
pay them, and suddenly everyone's running away through the sewers and
it's over. Our Russian civilization, the greatest ever known, over."

He swept his arm to encompass the sailors and soldiers in the room.

"I have to deal with the mafia and worse, just to get food and vodka
for my men." He leaned forward conspiratorially.

"We need a strong leader, a holy leader, allied with God, to overwhelm
our enemies. All the enemies, everywhere."

At last he noticed the music had stopped. The nails had been removed
from the wrists and feet of the dead Christ as he was taken from the
sweat-soaked, bloody cross and laid on the stage. The tall monk in the
coarse brown habit knelt over the acolyte of his cult, one of the few
who was permitted to undergo this agonizing initiation ritual and
achieve, in their own minds at least, a Christlike sanctity. The
audience rose, hands clutched to their mouths as they awaited the
miracle.

The holy man prayed, arms to heaven. He leaned forward, made the sign
of the cross, and pressed the voluminous robes of his left arm to the
dead man's chest.

The corpse twitched. Suddenly the whole body convulsed. Gasps and
screams from the crowd, as hysterical prayers rose to heaven.

Lurching from his table, the general staggered toward the arisen
Christ, now sitting up on stage with his blood-streaked arms wrapped
around his legs. At the sight of the uniform the crowd parted. Falling
to his knees with a crash that shook the building, the general tenderly
removed the crown of thorns. As people gasped in ecstasy, he pursed
his lips and smeared them back and forth along the bloody forehead.

The monk raised his grotesque staring eyes to heaven at this display of
devotion, but as the devotee somehow regained his feet and staggered
back to his table, they followed him with a sidelong reptilian
interest.

Lips be slobbered with blood, the general leaned toward his nearly
unconscious companion. The monk half emerged from the shadows and
listened as the general looked around in a drunken caricature of
conspiracy, his voice louder than he realized.

"No longer hidden, the Holy Chosen One awaits. Soon our new tsar will
be crowned in the rose-red church, Hagia Sophia. He will reign where
he should reign, in the holy city, no longer called Istanbul, but its
rightful name, Constantinople. And then--" He looked up, startled, as
the monk leaned over and whispered in his ear. For the next two hours,
as he pressed shot after shot of vodka to his blood-caked lips and
poured them down his throat, he didn't utter another sound.

He didn't notice the slim lone figure at the nearby table, dressed in a
private's uniform, rise and slip through the still chanting, still
swaying crowds.

SeattlE, august 28

As Cairo Jackson drove the car away from the television studio, Mike
Zammit could tell the big man was watching him from the corner of his
eye. He gazed at the skyscrapers of Seattle's downtown, their tops
hidden in a swirl of gray fog.

Wipers slashed at the sheets of water cascading down the windshield,
and colored lights gleamed blearily through the rain.

Finally Jackson said, "You think Pompo's going to charge you with
assault?"

Zammit shrugged.

"I don't care if he does or not."

"What about his goons?"

"You heard those accents. Couple of Belfast hard boys. Ex-IRA, Provo
Army.

Strange company for a New Age scam artist."

Zammit gazed at the scudding clouds as they exited Stewart Street and
entered the stream of traffic on the 1-5. "Let's look into it."

Five minutes later they took Exit 170 off the 1-5. After a three
minute drive along Lake Union, its deep blue surface covered with
whitecaps, Jackson dropped Zammit at the front door of a nondescript
building on the shores of the lake and went to park the car. Several
of the world's most innovative biotechnology firms were located beside
the big lake in the heart of Seattle, including the three-story
warehouse that housed the headquarters of the International
Environmental Response Team. A discrete yellow sign said INERT.

Zammit's people loathed their organization's acronym, chosen years ago
by some faceless bureaucrat, and never lost an opportunity for wordplay
with it.

As Zammit walked through the automatic doors into his agency's
headquarters, he felt his fatigue slowly infused with something close
to happiness. Home.

He'd designed the building himself. From the cavernous lobby a white
metal staircase spiraled up to connect all three floors. The
artificial waterfall had been turned on, its plume filling the air with
energy-inducing negative long as it cascaded from the third floor to
the first, splashing into a rock-filled pool near the entrance to the
gymnasium, kitchen, boardrooms, and studios. The constantly refreshed
air kept the staff alert, happy, and productive. There was a dock at
the back, facing the lake, where DeHaviland Turbo Beaver pontoon planes
rolled up to deposit the bright yellow biohazard containers with
samples taken from the sites of environmental crises all over the
world, samples that needed urgent analysis, the core of INERT's
business. The third floor was his apartment, while the second
contained the forensic laboratories, a machine shop, and other
facilities INERT needed for its operations and Zammit needed for his
inventions.

Zammit had come to the agency in 1994 after running his own business,
ZAM Research Instruments Corp." inventing customized tools for DNA
analysis, biomedical research, and environmental cleanup. After
registering a series of patents, he found his products in use all over
the world and came to the attention of the federal government. With
budget cutbacks, the environmental protection agency INERT was dying
from lack of money just as ecological crises around the world became
more frequent and severe. Asked to take over, Zammit drove a hard
bargain. He offered to roll most of the income from his patent
royalties back into INERT in exchange for a virtually free hand in
operating the agency. To his surprise, the government agreed, although
the noninterference clause hadn't worked as well as he would have
liked.

As Zammit walked past the workstation area, Dikka Spargo waved him
over. He'd hired her, now nineteen, after hearing about an experiment
she had done in high school two years previously. An inventor himself,
Zammit recognized ingenuity when he saw it.

For a school science project, Spargo had made a couple of insect
robots, one the size of a thumb, the other the size of a hand, using
cast-off electronics that cost less than fifty dollars. She had taken
silicon chips from old computers, wiring cannibalized from microwave
ovens, twenty-five-cent hardware store hinges, old three pronged plugs,
obsolete sensors, and other debris, soldered them together to make
artificial creatures, and then given them life through some highly
creative programming. Citing the pioneering research of robotics
expert Mark Tilden, Dikka had said, in the brief but cogent four-page
paper explaining her robot life forms, that all artificial intelligence
projects had failed miserably over the previous twenty years because
they concentrated on building robotic intelligence from the top down,
which she maintained was impossible. Her inspiration was to follow
Tilden's ideas and mimic evolution by building intelligence from the
bottom up. There were now about thirty of the insectoids roaming
through the building. Spargo's creatures had three basic commands
built into their software, the first and most important of which was
Always be on the lookout for food.

More than one pompous congressman, on a tour of INERT headquarters, had
jumped three feet off the ground as a metal and plastic tarantula
scuttled down a hallway, found a wall socket, inserted its plug for a
quick fix, then darted away, all the while evolving bizarre behaviors
that were impossible to forecast.

The insectoid Zammit found most intriguing was the biggest so far, from
metal tentacle tip to tentacle tip slightly larger than a dinner plate.

In addition to being the biggest, it was also the most complex and
intelligent, its brain consisting of an entire motherboard taken from
an old Aptiva. Zammit had named it Catula because it had somehow taken
an aversion to the resident feline, named Cat, and stalked it
constantly. Zammit figured that Cat had probably batted the insectoid
around when it first started to roam, and in some unfathomable robot
way Catula remembered and resented it. He'd finally asked Spargo to
reprogram the metal cat hater to spare the organic creature any further
torment. He couldn't wait to see if the behavior reestablished
itself.

Dikka Spargo looked up with a faint smile. She had sparkling hazel
eyes, freckles, an astonishing variety of body piercings and tattoos on
her slender frame, and long brown hair, at the moment tied up into a
haphazard chignon that was rapidly coming apart. She had stuck a
variety of pens and pencils in her hair. Her powers of concentration
were amazing. Zammit had once found her on the floor in a dead faint
and discovered she had been so intent on a project that she'd forgotten
to eat or sleep for three days.

A slowly rotating three-dimensional neon red, blue, and yellow
simulation of a molecule floated on her computer screen.

"Hey, boss. Not exactly an inert performance."

Chats with Katz was broadcast live, so he should have known they'd all
see it or hear about it.

"Dikka, with all that metal in your body, stay away from magnets." As
she grinned, he leaned over to look at the screen.

"What's this?"

"Tissue analysis of those marine corpses floating in the Gulf of
California."

Zammit nodded. There had been mysterious kills of sea birds, pilot
whales, dolphins, and sea lions in a sparsely populated area.

"Identify anything?"

Spargo turned the monitor and pointed at the image of the molecule.

"The killer.

Cyanide."

"From what? There aren't any macjuiladora factories in that part of
Mexico."

"There's a theory we came up with while you were gone. Actually, us
and the Feds." Dikka's chignon finally came apart, and a tousled
curtain of brown hair suddenly veiled her face like that of some
unlikely teenage oracle, as pens and pencils hit the floor. She pushed
at her hair impatiently.

"Apparently the Gulf is used as a transfer point on a drug route from
Colombia through Mexico.

Shipments are dropped by plane into the water. To mark the dropoff
spot, the smugglers have started using a photosensitive dye called
NK19. It shows as a red stain during the day and a blue phosphorescent
glow at night. When NK19 decomposes, it releases cyanide. Bingo,
bouillabaisse."

She pulled the screen back toward her.

"Sure tells you how active drug traffic is in that area." She piled up
her mane and reached into her white lab coat for a couple of barrettes,
clipping them into her hair in an ineffective effort to bring it under
control.

"Good work," said Zammit.

"Any news about Turkey?"

"Not that I know of."

After checking with the technicians working on other projects, Zammit
walked across the soundproofed flooring to the reception area, where
Frances Fitzgerald Richards was going through a sheaf of files. She
had returned from Russia two days before, as Zammit flew to Moscow to
deliver his report on Dzerzhinsk. Her title was Deputy Director,
Technical Operations, her training in botany and molecular biology,
particularly DNA sequencing. Thirty-four years old, she was tall for a
woman at five eleven, just two inches shorter than Zammit. She had a
heart-shaped face, hair the color and texture of corn silk, tied back
in a ponytail, and green eyes the color of new leaves. They were
always alert. She often appeared sardonically amused at something or
other, her fair skin crinkling naturally into laugh lines at the
corners. She looked like a friendly Viking. Her looks were
marred--endearingly, Zammit thought-by a slight over bite and a crooked
nose, the result of a childhood fight with her brother.

It was supposed to be her day off, but since the disappearance of her
husband, Adam, eighteen months before, she had never taken a day off. A
paleobotanist, Adam Richards had been on a field expedition collecting
medicinal specimens in the primary jungles of Sumatra when he simply
vanished. Frankie had taken it very hard. As hard as Zammit had taken
the death of his wife, Claudia, from cancer three years before.

"Frankie, it's supposed to be your day off. Why are you here, and if
you're here, why aren't you in the lab or your studio?" He always
tried a half-hearted I'm-the-boss routine with her, and it never
worked. He suspected she was smarter than he was, but it didn't bother
him.

"I'm here because I wanted to look at some test results. I'm not in
the studio because I'm stalled on a portrait. Also, I had to meet a
potential client today."

"And the result?"

"It appears he'll get his ego rubbed and I will get lots of money."

"So, Renaissance Woman. Is this new commission in your career as a
famous portrait painter going to interfere with your scientific duties
here?"

"Not at all."

"May I ask who the client is?"

"I don't want to say the name. I'm sure you can guess anyway. A
wealthy man with a huge ego who owns a lot of real estate in New York.

Wants me to paint two portraits of him. One with his family, all
smiley and decent. The other of him stark naked, posing as a Greek
god. In a winged helmet, throwing a javelin."

Zammit raised an eyebrow.

"You're kidding."

Frankie Richards shook her head.

"Obviously leads a rich fantasy life."

Richards was much in demand for her portraits. Trained in Italy and
France in traditional techniques, she had an uncanny instinct for
color, proportion, and perspective. Despite lavish enticements, she
refused to license the reproduction of her work, so the rich and famous
pursued her relentlessly, eager to be immortalized by a talented
original artist, someone whose work would be forever one of a kind.

Even though he knew she could handle herself, Zammit always felt
protective of Richards. She wasn't as tough as she pretended to be.

Hell, he thought, I'm not as tough as I pretend to be.

Zammit said, "Just make sure you're in a situation where you can
protect yourself, in case this naked fan of Greek mythology decides he
wants to play Mars to your Venus. And if you're not sure, call me."

Her eyes flickered, and he changed the subject.

"Speaking of protecting yourself, is Cat still having problems with
Catula?"

"I would never have believed it, and Dikka swears she erased the memory
of that nasty little thing. Stalking my cat indeed. It's doing it
again."

Zammit blinked, intrigued.

"Well, both creatures live in the same environment, and that hasn't
changed. The pattern of behavior has again become the same. An
interesting insight into convergent evolution."

"Not really," disagreed Richards.

"They don't compete with each other for anything. It's not as if Cat
and Catula fight over who gets first dibs to stick themselves into a
wall socket."

"True," admitted Zammit.

"But its memory of cat-hating was erased, yet it still reverts to
cat-hating. Must be some sort of evolutionary pressure. Maybe
space."

"You're telling me that glorified toaster on legs is territorial?"

Zammit shrugged and gave in to the impulse to tease.

"Apart from shedding some light on evolution, you know what this
means."

"What?" challenged Frankie, warily.

"Any creature with minimal intelligence, natural or artificial, is
smart enough to figure out it hates cats."

Richards threw a playful punch at his arm. Zammit said, "OK, enough
fooling around. Anything important happen?"

Frankie examined her nails.

"You mean apart from a possible dry-cleaning bill from the pompous Dr ...

Pompo? I'm sure he won't demonstrate much inertia in demanding
restitution."

Zammit groaned.

"Why can't I have a straight man around here instead of all you
comedians? Well?"

Richards reached for her coffee cup.

"Lab results, some promotional stuff, and tons of general agency
e-mail, most of it the usual waste of bandwidth."

"Anything more about Turkey?"

"Rumors, bits and pieces, dribs and drabs. Nothing useful. Terse
phone calls from important people who should know what's going on but
obviously don't because their voices contain too much brown and gray
with shrill little yellow highlights. That always means ignorance with
flashes of panic."

"What does it tell you, Frankie?"

Her face was impassive.

"We're in the eye of the hurricane, the calm before the storm. This is
going to be a nasty one."

As Zammit absorbed this assessment, her sardonic green eyes appraised
him.

"You look awful. If you promise not to throw it at me, I'll get you a
coffee."

"Thanks." He rubbed his face and thought for a moment.

"I want a briefing on the results and anything else that came up while
I was in Russia. Have somebody run the protocol and retrieve anything
interesting from my private e-mail address.

I'll be down in fifteen minutes."

Richards waved Dikka over, then headed back to her office. The teen
sat down in front of the monitor and keyed the sequence that would
automatically scan the electronic mail that had built up in Zammit's
personal file during his absence.

A controversial and aggressive agency despite its name, INERT was
constantly dealing with politicians, animal rightists, and
environmental extremists, including the occasional eco-terrorist. They
liked sending e-mail. Most of it was electronic junk. To cope with
the volume, INERT used a software program that recognized key words and
addresses. Any mail containing them was pulled and the rest trashed.

But the addresses of the world's known re mailers were also pulled
automatically. Offering anonymity to people who wanted to send e-mail
but didn't want the recipient to know where it came from, re mailers
stripped off the sender's electronic address as easily as slitting open
an envelope, then substituted their own address--in effect, putting the
message in a new envelope--before sending it on. Zammit figured that
anyone who didn't want him to know who or where they were was someone
whose threat might be very real.

As he headed upstairs to his apartment, Zammit felt eyes watching him.

He turned. Glowering down from the wall was a life-size portrait of
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. He'd been given it a few months earlier by a
grateful Moscow official after breaking a crime ring that had been
smuggling thousands of tons of illegal ozone-eating chlorofluorocarbons
from former Soviet factories under the brand names of legal
refrigerants.

The bureaucrat had shrugged and gestured at the portrait, taken from
storage, saying vaguely, "We have so many of them ... " Like the insect
robots, it was a surefire conversation starter with visitors.

Sevastopol, August 29

Dressed once again in civilian clothes. Jack Morgan, his face flushed,
stood before his boss and argued.

His all-American good looks seemed out of place in the shabby
19th-century room.

Modern steel desks and computers contrasted strangely with the rest of
the head CIA shell corporation called the AmeriSlav Import-Export
Company. Dusty French-looking furniture with worn velvet upholstery
stood against pale green wallpaper that rose two-thirds of the way up
the walls, faded and peeling away at the corners. Above the wallpaper
rose cream-colored plaster covered with a crazed network of thin
cracks.

Morgan's lanky limbs gestured in frustration.

"Sir, my Russian is fine. And it wasn't just him babbling about a Holy
Chosen One being the new tsar and reigning in Constantinople. It was
his uniform. He was a general. This area houses two of the world's
most important military and naval bases. We're the CIA, for Christ's
sake. I think we should investigate."

"How old are you, and how long have you been here in the Crimea?"

"Twenty-eight. I've been here six months." As you damn well know, he
thought.

Yarham's chair creaked as he clasped his hands behind his head and
leaned back, making a pretense of thinking deeply. He always did this,
and Morgan detested it. Lance's head was round and his skin yellowish
from hepatitus B contracted in Guatemala early in his career. He had
dyed his thinning hair an improbable shade of red, but half an inch of
gray root was showing. The combination of yellow skin and reddish hair
looked so peculiar that Morgan assumed the man's eyes must be going.

Yarham had already gone to fat, and the act of leaning back in his
chair thrust his bulging belly, like a half-full sack of wet sand,
farther over his straining belt. He was close to retirement and had
given up even the pretense of staying in shape. And, as far as Morgan
could see, even the pretense of doing his job.

"Six months," Lance Yarham said complacently.

"Harvard, Langley, then six months at this station. And already you
know something huge, something nobody else has ever heard of."

Before Morgan could reply, Yarham slowly lowered his chair and leaned
on his elbows.

"I'm what you'd call an old Russia hand. I've studied the former USSR
for twenty-five years, since you were barely out of diapers ... "

Inwardly Morgan seethed at this patronizing lecture.

"... and I can tell you this for sure. In the old days, under the
tsars if you tried to do anything against the system, the Okhrana-the
secret police--beat the shit out of you and sent you to Siberia for a
couple of years.

"Under Lenin, if you tried to do anything, the Cheka--the Bolshevik
secret police--tortured you before beating the shit out of you. Then
they sent you to Siberia for twenty years.

"Under Stalin, if you so much as thought of doing anything against the
system, the NKVD came along, tortured you, beat the shit out of you,
and wrecked your brain with drugs. Then they either shot you or sent
you to Siberia for life."

Lance Yarham gave a weary shrug.

"And now the whole country is run by gangsters, and their pathetic
currency doesn't even make good toilet paper. So they drink vodka to
blot out their horrible lives. Sing sad songs, weep about their
country's awful history, and talk big before they slide off their
chairs in a drunken stupor."

He wagged a finger at Jack Morgan.

"My point is, despite all the big talk, they never actually do
anything. A thousand years of serfdom and secret police have kicked
all initiative out of them. The only thing that would get these people
aroused to do something would be the reincarnation of Christ
himself."

"But sir, he was a general."

"You've had a chance to review the security files by now. Did you
recognize him from the photos?"

"No, but--"

"Did you see him arrive or leave in a staff car?"

"No, but--"

"And he was at one of those rituals staged by that creepy
monk Smegyev? In the old days you moved up the ranks in the Soviet
army by being a good Communist, which meant being an atheist. The
person you're describing would never have gone into the army in the
first place."

Yarham looked up sharply, his first crisp movement since the young
agent had been at the station.

"You were there. Does he really raise the dead?"

"I assume they're not dead. But they have doctors there, with monitors
and stuff. You can check the equipment. No life signs before they're
revived. How they fake it I don't know. But the general, sir. And
what he said."

Yarham waved his hand dismissively.

"Just some drunk talking big at this country's equivalent of a
backwoods revival meeting. Forget it."

Morgan tried one last time.

"But the uniform ... "

Yarham sighed.

"You've seen the street demonstrations. Members of the Monarchist
Party wearing old tsarist uniforms? Doesn't mean they're military men,
does it?

I could walk out of this office and be back in fifteen minutes with a
genuine Russian general's uniform I bought from a street vendor for a
five-dollar bill.

Everything is for sale in this country. This is a place where young
women aspire to be hard-currency prostitutes because they make real
money and meet men who don't stink of vodka and despair."

He turned away and reached for a pen. Morgan knew he never used his
computer if he could avoid it.

"I know we have to keep tabs on all these weird cults, and I appreciate
the fact that you volunteered for that duty, but where this general is
concerned, forget it, kid. File a report, but forget it."

"Yes, sir," said Morgan as he turned and walked out the door. He had
no intention of obeying Yarham's order.

Boris Kazov stared at the cuticles of his fingernails, brimming with
bright red blood.

He leaned back into his big leather armchair, put his hands to his
face, and tried to rise. A sudden wave of nausea pitched him forward
over his cluttered desk as he gagged. Through eyes teared with pain,
he finally found a steady visual reference in his battered leather
briefcase propped against the wall.

Breathing shallowly, back aching, he tottered like an old man over to
the mirror that hung on the wall across the room and straightened with
an effort. A gray face he barely recognized as his own stared back,
slick with the sheen of sweat.

His eyes were bloodshot and his hair was falling out in clumps. He
tried to take a deep breath and a stabbing pain made him snort, sending
two rivulets of bright red spurting from his nostrils. He wiped with
the back of his hand, grimacing at the rusty taste of his own blood,
and shook his head.

Think. The mysterious illness had now plagued him for two weeks. At
fifty-five he knew he had a weak liver and bad lungs from the
hard-drinking, chain-smoking life of an investigative journalist, but
why would that make him bleed from practically every pore? He held up
a shaking hand and touched his throat. It was hot, swollen, and sore.

He tried to stick out his tongue and choked from the pain.

For the first time he realized he was dying.

Like an animal at the end of the hunt, sick and exhausted, his bleary
eyes roamed the familiar confines of his office as if searching for a
way out. There was none. It was time to save what he could.

Slowly he dropped to his knees and crawled over to his briefcase, taken
from a storage locker that morning. Panting, he inserted the key in
the lock and lifted the flap. It was all there. Luckily he had taken
the material home with him the night his office had been broken into
and every filing cabinet ransacked. He pulled out the sheaf of folders
and papers, bound with elastic bands. Clutching the documents to his
chest, he slowly rose to his feet and groped for the desk.

Dizzy, he reached for the edge to steady himself, his arm brushing a
stack and sending a cascade of paper crashing to the floor. He sat
down again in his chair, gasping with the effort.

The office door opened.

"I heard a noise. My God, Boris." Irina Markova, his best young
journalist, stood in the doorway.

After decades of reading the lies in Pravda and grinding his teeth,
Boris Kazov had made the best of it after the collapse of Communism. He
founded his newspaper, the Glory of Sevastopol, and built a reputation
searching out corruption in the new capitalist countries carved from
the carcass of the USSR, He never had to search far, and he made
enemies by the hundreds among the rich, the powerful, the brutal, and
the bought. But even he couldn't uncover every filthy secret alone.

He hired Irina Markova after a story he ran about a slave prostitution
ring enraged a mafia kingpin and he was attacked on a lonely night
street and beaten almost to death. Irina, fresh from school, had
visited him in the hospital, bringing vodka and cigarettes.

"You need some help, I think," she had said. They argued for hours,
and she had finally talked him into hiring her.

It was the best decision he had ever made.

She knelt before him and took his hand. Her violet eyes were filled
with concern.

"You are much worse. I'll get the doctors."

Boris Kazov shook his head.

"They didn't know what was wrong a week ago, and now it's too late," he
whispered. With trembling hands he thrust the package at her.

"You know what to do."

She kissed his hand and then his face, now streaked with tears mixed
with blood as he sobbed with pain.

"I'm getting the doctor anyway. You stay here."

"You know what to do," Kazov rasped.

"Do that first."

Her eyes searched his face, then she caressed his cheek with the back
of her hand and strode from the office. For almost a minute he was
able to continue sitting slumped in his chair. Then he started to
pitch forward, face first, and with slow surprise found he couldn't
even lift his arms to break his fall.

Seattle, August 29

Zammit rubbed his face as he walked through his loft home on the third
floor of the INERT warehouse.

On marble pedestals stood busts of Roman emperors, frowning with
imperial disdain at small squat figures carved five thousand years ago
from golden yellow stone on the Maltese islands. The tiny figures from
the dawn of history looked so modern they could have been sculpted by
Picasso. Persian carpets covered the floor. The loft's vast expanse
was separated into sections by folding screens, silk carpets hanging
from bronze rings set in the ceiling, and arrangements of rich leather
furniture.

In a far corner, half-hidden in shadow, stood a suit of armor. The
mailed right hand grasped the pommel of a huge sword. It was
tarnished, leaned a bit, and was badly dented. Mike Zammit smiled at
his most prized possession. He patted it fondly on the shoulder as he
headed for the shower.

He undressed quickly. In the bathroom he turned the water on as hot as
he could stand it and adjusted the shower nozzle to spit out stinging
needles. Just as he felt the heat making him drowsy, he turned the
water to cold. Breathing hard, he forced himself to stand completely
still under the icy torrent for sixty seconds.

Toweling his numb body, now thoroughly awake, he walked back into the
bedroom and reached for the remote control, aiming it at the TV in the
big entertainment unit against the wall. He watched the screen as he
pulled a pair of chinos and a black turtleneck out of his closet. Some
male action star was being shot three times by one of those improbably
huge and menacing weapons he'd seen only in action movies. The fallen
actor, spouting fake blood from containers concealed under his
clothing, writhed briefly and unconvincingly on the pavement, then
sprang to his feet, pulled his own phallic ally large gun, and sprinted
down the street after the bad guys. Zammit shook his head. Only in
the movies. In real life when you got shot like that, all you wanted
to do was curl up in a little ball and start whimpering for your mama,
before you went into shock. He clicked the remote to CNN.

As he dressed, images of angry crowds, deserts, and soldiers told him
that the big news was still the ongoing drought in the Middle East and
the unrest in Istanbul. No mention of the deaths downstream of the
Ataturk reservoir. Zammit remembered the first time he'd met the
Turkish prime minister, Thamar Amurkhan, at the beginning of her
political career, when she was the junior cabinet minister in charge of
environment. There'd been a problem with Russian oil tankers dumping
contaminated bilgewater into the Bosphorus. He had found it hard
dealing with her, not because she was difficult--on the contrary, she
was intelligent and charming--but because she bore a disconcerting
resemblance to Sophia Loren, and he always found himself tongue-tied in
her presence. I must be a romantic, thought Zammit.

He bent to pick up his favorite pair of battered brown loafers and
started violently. Two little red eyes stared at him from under the
bed. As he leapt back, the metal insectoid scuttled rapidly out of the
room. Zammit took a deep breath. Of course. Spargo's second
programming command: Hide. He made a mental note to talk to Dikka.

Although he encouraged innovation and creativity among his staff, the
situation was getting out of control when he was as twitchy as Cat. At
the age of forty, he didn't fancy being given a heart attack by one of
Spargo's little experiments.

Zammit looked at the screen as he sat down to put on his shoes.

Suddenly a repellent image appeared there--pale face framed by long
greasy black hair and a scraggly black beard. On the forehead was
painted a red Christian cross. The gray eyes bulged, as big as eggs.

"... Lazar Smegyev. The mysterious monk heads a cult that preaches
the need for a religious revival and the fulfillment of Russia's
historic destiny.

Hysterical riots preceded his arrival here as word spread of his
alleged ability to raise the dead. Sources in Moscow say the monk has
gained an influence unprecedented since the days of Rasputin. Like
that infamous monk, who held the last Russian tsar under his spell, he
appears to be protected by powerful elements in government. As stories
circulate about bizarre initiation rituals, it is rumored ... "

Zammit turned off the broadcast. Another cult. He thought of Pompo
and his cult, his exploitation of people's search for meaning. At
least he didn't claim to raise the dead.

The dead. He glanced at the stack of videocassettes hidden in shadow
at the back of the entertainment unit. He selected one and looked at
the label. After a moment's hesitation, he pushed the cassette into
the VCR and turned on the TV.

Four years ago. A summer picnic. His wife, Claudia, mixing potato
salad. Sleek and dark and interesting looking, a wide smile on a face
like a Renaissance portrait. Not like the end, wasted and wan in the
palliative care unit. Adam Richards at the barbecue, wearing a white
Tilley hat and a big grin, cooking steaks. Balding, his short beard
peppered with gray, he appeared every inch the academic, even in an
apron. Looking at him, you'd never suspect he spent months on end in
the most dangerous and inaccessible jungles on earth hunting for rare
medicinal plants. For the hundredth time, Zammit wondered where and
how he had died in Sumatra. Frankie Richards, in slacks and a
sleeveless blouse, eating chocolate ice cream. A messy kiss for Adam,
his cheek now smeared with chocolate. Frankie blew a kiss at the
camera as Claudia held two fingers up behind her head. Foolish fun.

The frolicking dead.

He thought of Frankie, never taking days off since Adam disappeared,
not knowing how he had died, not wanting to be alone with her grief.

His own loneliness, now Claudia was gone.

He watched for a few minutes, then turned off the VCR and walked back
into the bathroom. He splashed cold water on his face and stared in
the mirror. Short black hair, sea-blue eyes, hard lines around the
eyes and mouth. He waited until he looked normal before heading
downstairs.

As Zammit walked toward his office overlooking Lake Union, Frankie
handed him a steaming cup of coffee and a pile of folders. Her
appraising gaze told him she knew he felt | badly about losing it on
the Molly Katz show. She also, somehow, picked up on his recent
distress from watching the video.

"Thanks. I promise I won't throw it at anyone."

"I appreciate that," smiled Richards.

"By the way, it's been on the news.

Everyone comments on your terrific aim. Also, I intend to avoid the
board meeting. I want to complete a polymerase chain reaction."

"I know you hate meetings. We'll be discussing routine stuff. No need
to waste your time, and PCR is fascinating. You still investigating
the Abominable Mystery?"

"Yes."

"Great. Let me know what you find I see a Nobel Prize in your future.

Unless some news comes in from Turkey, we're on our own."

"OK." Frankie walked away toward her lab.

Cairo Jackson's massive frame was wedged into a chair in front of his
workstation. His office was a few feet from Zammit's. The big man was
forty-one, and his face shone like a basalt star. He always wore a
white shirt and tie to the office, usually with an expensive Italian
suit. Through sheer intelligence, hard work, and a couple of big pay
days during his brief career as a heavyweight, he had scrabbled out of
the projects, obtained both a law degree and an MBA, and was now Deputy
Director, General Operations at INERT. Zammit had once asked him why
he hadn't continued as a boxer. Cairo had growled, "I like my eggs
scrambled, not my brains." Zammit stuck his head into Jackson's
office. Cairo swung around, brown eyes alert. His eyes never looked
anywhere long, and never without a purpose.

"In addition to checking on our Irish elves, could you put together a
briefing on Pompo? You ever read any of his stuff?"

Cairo shrugged.

"The usual New Age crap. Crystals, channeling, UFOs, after-death
experiences. Lights at the end of the tunnel and choirs of angels, my
ass."

"So why read it?"

"Because my kids are getting into it through their friends at school.

It's a form of hysteria, I think, since the beginning of the new
millennium." He crossed his arms across his chest.

"By the way, since we met at the TV studio and not the airport, I
didn't have a chance to ask how things worked out with Connie. Did he
go nuts not being able to spend hours in the gym?"

Zammit knew Cairo had doubts about Constantine Constantinovich Palaeov,
the twenty-four-year-old Russian student who had joined INERT several
months before to learn environmental science.

Part of the agency's mandate, insisted upon by Zammit, was the training
of young people from other countries. Palaeov had written to Zammit
personally from St ...

Petersburg, begging for a job. Taken with the kid's eagerness, and
knowing that Russia was one of the world's most polluted countries,
Zammit had pulled some strings to get the kid sponsored. It was
Frankie Richards who nicknamed him Connie, explaining, "Constantine is
way too formal, and I'm not going to call anyone Con. Besides, he's
cute, and Connie is a nice warm burnt sienna kind of name."

At first they had struggled with Palaeov's lack of idiomatic English.

During his first week with INERT, he had come to Zammit holding a
newspaper and a dictionary, black eyes burning, bony face flushed with
frustration, straw-blond hair askew, his rawboned limbs quivering with
frustration.

"I know what is food.

I know what is junk. But what is junk food?" Apart from language
difficulties, now resolved, the intense, hard-working Russian was
devoid of a sense of humor, something Zammit would ordinarily have
found intolerable. But, he reflected, remembering the little he knew
of Connie's personal history, if I were an orphan who'd been raised in
a monastery in Siberia during the collapse of the Soviet Union, I don't
think I'd be inclined to see the funny side of life, either.

Besides, Zammit had a soft spot for underdogs, and he intended to give
the young man every opportunity.

Connie spent many of his off hours in INERT's gymnasium using the
weight machines and free weights. He got big so fast that Zammit
became alarmed. Cairo Jackson had said, "I've been watching too. He's
not using steroids. He's just an insecure kid from a screwed-up
country trying to build himself a living suit of armor so he can hide
behind all those muscles."

Zammit had pondered this insightful observation. One day in the gym,
as he worked his circuit, from skipping rope to calisthenics to speed
bag to heavy bag, he tried to talk to Palaeov as the Russian strained
at the weights.

"You know, I used to do that. Got bored with it. Maybe you'd like to
try swimming or boxing or karate. You could spar with Cairo. Speed up
your reflexes and build some endurance instead of just show muscle." He
went to the kitchen next door and took two big crisp apples from the
fridge. He gave one to Connie.

"Watch. This is a trick the Roman Emperor Tiberius used to do."

Placing his second ringer and his thumb on either side of the hard
fruit, he squeezed his muscular hand, effortlessly penetrating the
apple until ringer and thumb met at the core.

"You try."

The kid had tried, muscles bulging, and only made a couple of small
dents.

Zammit shook his head.

"Connie, show muscles are no good." But the kid ignored his advice,
lifting weights with renewed vigor, and he hadn't pushed it.

Zammit shrugged at Cairo.

"Connie worked out well. Kept his head when we confronted the local
thugs. I left him in Dzerzhinsk for a few days to do some more
analysis, but he'll stay away from those red-hot nuclear garbage pits
in case it provokes another visit by the knuckle-draggers." He looked
at his watch.

"Boardroom."

Frankie Richards entered her lab.

The room was a long rectangle. To her left, lab benches, the
centrifuge, and the oldfashioned hand-controlled microtome for seck
sectioning specimens. There were computerized ones on the market, but
she preferred to do it by hand. She even sharpened the steel blade
herself, using her own special combination of mineral oil and volcanic
pumice, which led to jokes about Crusaders whetting their swords before
going into battle. But the jokes always stopped when they saw the
results. Zammit often remarked on her "touch" and the fact that she
could, by hand, section a specimen so fine it was only two microns, so
thin it was almost invisible, like gossamer. It was an art, just like
painting, and it was the elegance of the controlling hand that
determined the result, a result no computer could match.

There was a fume hood to waft away the poisonous solvents she used in
fixing specimens. Under the fume hood, the storage containers for the
acetone, toluene, xylene, and other solvents and chemicals. And a
1200-degree Celsius autoclave for incinerating contaminated equipment
and rotting specimens.

To her right, windowed cases were filled with equipment. Glass jars,
slender glass tubes called pipettes, racks of glass slides and covers,
bottles of hematoxylin and eosin dyes, and plastic baskets containing
thousands of Eppendorf tubes, from 0.2 to 1.5 milliliters--the small
ones the diameter of a thin pencil and the length of a thumbnail, the
big ones as thick and long as a little finger.

For the experiment she was about to perform, she'd use the little
Eppendorf s.

Their walls were incredibly thin to conduct heat, and they had
flexible, hinged contamination lids that expanded so the tiny tubes
wouldn't pop open during the extreme temperature changes involved in
the polymerase chain reaction and ruin the results.

Richards walked to the far end of the lab, which contained her vasular
plants her barium of dried specimens and her greenhouse of live
ones--her passion, apart from painting. It had originally been both
hers and her husband's passion, but with Adam's disappearance in
Sumatra she was determined to continue the work.

Her favorite photograph of him was pasted to the glass wall of the
greenhouse:

in a jungle somewhere, balding, short beard peppered with gray, big
smile, holding a rare white orchid--and hard as iron, despite his
professorial appearance. She stopped in front of it, a ritual she was
determined to keep--never, ever would this image become so familiar
that it was just another object the eye glided over unseeing. The same
thoughts always ran through her mind: We were such a great team. You
always called me an introverted extrovert--content to be completely
alone, doing my research for weeks on end, and then hitting the social
circuit in a cocktail dress, being charming, in my role as a society
painter. How could you die? You were so strong.

The loss of Adam had been an agonizing sharpness that slashed her soul,
but now, thanks to time's grace, the memory of him was being coated
with nostalgia, just as the grit inside an oyster is transformed into a
pearl.

By the greenhouse entry. Cat was grooming herself in her basket;
sleek, snow white, short haired with pale blue eyes. Frankie picked
her up and gave her a kiss and a snuggle.

"Poor baby, being hunted by that awful spider thing."

She put Cat back in her basket, entered the greenhouse, and quickly
shut the door as the heat, humidity, and scent enveloped her. She
closed her eyes and inhaled. As a child she'd spent a couple of months
a year on her grandparents' estate in Hawaii, and scent and heat always
made lush, exotic images dance in her head. Even then, she'd been
fascinated by flowers.

After a few moments, Frankie opened her eyes. Time for business. She
suspected that somewhere in this protected environment lurked the
secret of what Charles Darwin had called the Abominable Mystery--the
origin of flowers. I love this place, she thought as she inspected the
humidifier nozzles and squinted into the lights.

"Hello, babies," she said to the strange array of plants.

"Which one of you is it? Who can unlock the mystery?"

It was a struggle to keep them alive in the same space. Ginkgo, a
primitive, weird, spindly tree, here about four feet high, with a
bilobed, fan-shaped leaf unlike any other. Familiar to the dinosaurs,
it used to cover the planet but was destroyed in the last Ice Age,
apart from remote pockets in Northern China. Now extinct in the wild,
it survived only because Buddhist monks had recognized the medicinal
value of its cherry-sized nuts and the tea that could be brewed from
its leaves, a tea that miraculously restored memory, and so had
planted it in their monastery gardens and worshipped it.

Frankie drank gingko tea every day.

Magnolia. The scent was intoxicating. Another very primitive
flowering plant.

The only one on earth whose floral parts were arranged spirally instead
of in whorls. Why?

An aquarium filled with African water lilies. Her recent experiments
had shown they were far more primitive than anyone realized, throwbacks
that predated even the narrow-leaved mono cot grasses.

The newest addition, perhaps--just perhaps--the oldest living fossil
among the flowering plants, just recently discovered. A tiny flower
called Amborella trichopoda that grew only on the remote Pacific island
of New Caledonia, near Australia.

And the ugliest plant in the world, now surviving only in the deserts
of southwestern Namibia. Belonging to an ancient group of gymnosperms,
the hideous Welwitschia mirabilis could live for a thousand years or
more. Lying partially buried in the ground, the barrel-sized plant
produced only two strap like leaves, which grew continuously until they
reached lengths of thirty feet or more. It also grew a tap root almost
thirty feet long. There was a huge box filled with sand beside its
case to accommodate both leaves and root, so the thing could grow in
comfort. It looked as if it belonged on Mars, not Earth.

Which one was it? thought Richards. Or none of them? Which held the
key to the Abominable Mystery? The question had driven Darwin
half-crazy. According to his theory of evolution, there was no reason
at all for flowers. A hundred and thirty million years ago they had
appeared in the blink of an eye, in evolutionary terms, competing with
seed plants and grasses. Petals, stamens, anthers, pollen, all
together. Why? And flowers had to coincide with pollinating insects.

How had that happened?

Darwin's theory had holes, and Frankie was determined to plug them all,
once she had solved the current puzzle. Which of these primitive
plants was genetically closest to the first flowering plants? There
was only one way to find out, and that was to do a series of polymerase
chain reactions and analyze their DNA.

Frankie left the greenhouse and walked to a lab bench. She paused in
front of the Tyler Research T-96 Thermal Reactor. A foot and a

half high, a foot wide, with a laptop computer on top, it had a
CD-style rack hidden in the middle. It didn't look like much until you
saw the results. Other thermal reactors on the market used boiling
water baths and robotic arms, with the attendant difficulties of
scalding, mechanical breakdown, and inability to regulate temperature
precisely. She had tested them all, and this was her favorite. The
Tyler machine was completely self-enclosed, used hot air, and could
ramp from temperature to temperature, from 5 to over 100 degrees
Celsius and back down again, in a few seconds.

Frankie pulled out the rack, preloaded with eighty-eight tiny Eppendorf
tubes.

Each tube contained several substances. First, a miniscule fragment of
DNA (she had clipped tiny pieces of leaf with a pair of scissors,
although dried, long-dead specimens worked just as well--she called it
the Jurassic Park effect). Second, ultra purified water. Third, DNA
primers, called prima se to start the whole process. Then a big dose
of the four DNA nucleotide bases (adenine, cytosine, guanine, and thy
mine known as A, C, G, and T. A and I always joined with each other, as
did C and G, to form the DNA double helix, the root of all life, its
twisted strands held together by hydrogen bonds.

Finally, the polymerase itself, called Taq. Taq was to biology what
the atomic bomb was to physics--it revolutionized everything. It
allowed researchers to Xerox millions of copies of DNA in a matter of
hours from the tiniest samples.

Taq was derived from Thermus aquatic us a bacterium accidentally
discovered in the hot springs of Yellowstone National Park. To analyze
DNA sequences, you had to first "denature" the DNA--unzip it--making
the double helix fall apart by dissolving the hydrogen bonds. The only
way to do it was through heat. The problem was, most enzymes capable
of scissoring unzipped DNA into usable lengths were heat sensitive. Not
Thermus acjuaticus. Its DNA copying mechanism remained stable at high
temperatures.

All three parts of PCR took place in the same tiny Eppendorf vials.

Frankie typed commands into the computer that rested on top of the
reactor, and stared at the readout display that would precisely
determine the timing, sequence, and results. First, denature the DNA
by heating it to 90-95 degrees Celsius (165 degrees Fahrenheit) for
thirty seconds. But the prima se couldn't bind to the DNA at such high
temperatures, so the vials had to be cooled within seconds to 55
degrees Celsius (100 degrees Fahrenheit). At this temperature, the
prima se would bind, or anneal, to the ends of the DNA strands. This
took twenty seconds. The timing was crucial because otherwise the two
strands of the double helix would re zip

The final step of PCR was to make complete copies of the denatured DNA
template--biological Xeroxing. Since Taq worked best at about 75
degrees Celsius (the temperature of the hot springs in which it was
discovered), the reactor would ramp the heat accordingly, again within
seconds. Taq would then begin adding loose nucleotides to the prima se
which would then bind at the appropriate A, C, T, and G points of the
unzipped strands. The end result would be a precise copy of the
target

DNA.

The three steps of PCR took less than two minutes. But Taq was durable
enough that the sequence could be repeated thirty times or more. Each
time, whatever DNA was in the vials would be duplicated exponentially.

At the end of a few hours you had millions upon millions of copies,
which you could then analyze at your leisure.

Today Richards intended to examine the genetic differences between
magnolia and Welwitschia mirabilis. She pushed the tray back into the
reactor, noted the Tray Interlock light, and typed commands. Thirty
cycles. The screen glowed. The Reactor Power and Primary Turbine
lights blinked as the chain reaction began.

Now, the agarose gel and the horizontal electrophoresis system.

Agarose came from a family of polysaccharides called agars, obtained
from seaweed. They had amazing antidessication properties--one gram
(one twenty-eighth of an ounce) of agarose could bind up to twelve
liters of water.

The food industry used thin agarose as an ingredient stablizer to make
jelly, ice cream, whipped desserts, and other products. Frankie used a
thicker agarose for her biochemical experiments.

Once the PCR cycles were completed, the contents of the Eppendorf vials
were transferred to the gel and then into the horizontal Tyler
Electrophoresis System, just sixteen inches long, nine inches wide, and
less than four inches high. Trays of agarose were slipped into the
unit, which had positive and negative electrodes at either end.

Depending on the charge of the DNA sequences, they migrated through the
gel to one electrode or the other with the gel acting as a sieve, the
smaller fragments moving faster than the larger ones. A stain was then
used to make the DNA stand out for easy visualization. Of the three
stains available--all blue--she didn't much care for Carolina Blue or
methylene blue. She preferred the faster and more stable ethidium
bromide, even though you needed an ultraviolet trans illuminator to
make it fluoresce.

Richards looked at the reactor's blinking lights as it flashed through
the series of chain reactions. She'd had some fun with PCR and INERT's
staff.

Bringing them into her lab, she had them use small plastic spatulas to
scrape cells from the inside of their cheeks (such cells contained the
gene sequence of their entire bodies). Then she'd done PCR to
determine their genetic heritage.

Because the human genome was so large, about 3 billion DNA base pairs,
and she wasn't targeting anything specific, it was like sticking your
hand into a bowl containing lottery tickets--you never knew if you'd
pull out something valuable.

But she'd had some interesting results. Dikka Spargo, despite her
protestations that her family was pure Irish, had some odd genetic
sequences which indicated unequivocally that she had ancestors who were
Basque, from northern Spain, the aboriginal people of Europe, long
predating the Indo European invasion of 40,000 years ago. Zammit's
chief computer wizard, Kitson Kang, was Japanese, but some sequences
showed he had ancestors who were bear-worshipping Ainu, the ancient
Caucasian population of Japan, now surviving only on a couple of remote
islands.

Zammit had declined to participate ("I know who I am"), and so had
Cairo Jackson ("My ancestors were slaves, for God's sake. Where they
came from, I don't know and I don't care"). It was also intriguing
that after these initial experiments, which she had thought were fun,
no one was interested in going any further.

She checked the reactor, then punched a button on the CD player beside
it. The cool rhythmic tones of the Blue Note Jazz Quintet provided the
sort of kinetic mind space that allowed her thoughts to free-associate.

It worked best this way.

No interruptions. Her time, her space. That was the wonderful thing
about INERT's environment--they all respected each other's space.

Except Mike Zammit. He'd barge unannounced into her lab or studio
whenever he felt like it, without phoning first or knocking. He was
always intense and preoccupied, always full of questions. Often the
questions were about a crisis somewhere in the world, but sometimes
they were trivial--the biochemical composition of chocolate, why the
print on newspapers rubbed off on your fingers but the print from
magazines didn't.

Often he'd slam through the door to announce a theory or conclusion,
seeking her endorsement. Any flaws she pointed out were usually
dismissed on the spot, but it always came to her attention that they
were surreptitiously looked into anyway. God, he could be
irritating.

Zammit often reminded her of an overgrown boy sitting in a patch of
dirt with a forgotten half-eaten candy bar beside him, fiddling
intently with some kind of mechanical device. She'd seen him like that
many times, in his lab and machine shop or conferring with the
technicians. No wonder he and Dikka Spargo got along so well--the same
self-absorption, endless curiosity, physical and intellectual stamina,
and twisted sense of humor. At least he didn't insert metal into his
body.

And then there were the other times.

The times when his cold, handsome face would get that look, and he
would deduce something no one else could deduce. He and Cairo Jackson
pounding each other in the boxing ring in the gym, two big guys trying
to destroy each other but not really, because they were friends. His
muscled frame, gleaming with sweat, chest heaving. Lying on a couch,
sea-blue eyes fixed on the ceiling as he figured something out,
something he--maddeningly-wouldn't talk about. His tenderness when his
wife was dying. The time when they were about to be shot to death
outside an illegal insecticide factory in a Colombian jungle, and
Zammit had faced down eight heavily armed thugs through sheer cool and
bravado, using a Spanish dialect she didn't even know he knew. It was
his apparent lack of fear that was scary, and the thugs felt it. She
suspected that in a very real way he truly did not care if he lived or
died, and that was the scariest thing of all.

The polymerase chain reaction was finished. What would it show?

As Frankie removed the tray of Eppendorf tubes, she felt something
rubbing against her leg. Cat. Demanding. She wanted attention and
wanted it now. Tray in her left hand, she picked up Cat in her right
hand, gave her a kiss, put her on the counter, and moved toward the
electrophoresis equipment to analyze the PCR results.

Suddenly she heard an unearthly scream and started violently.

The tray hit the floor, little Eppendorfs scattering everywhere. She
saw Cat launch herself from the counter, flying five feet through the
air onto an adjacent bench, back arched, teeth bared, like some
Halloween cartoon. She turned to look.

Catula.

The insectoid was at the counter's edge, red eyes glowing, as if
contemplating making the jump itself.

"Go away, you evil thing! And leave my cat alone!"

Catula scuttled away, dropped to the floor, and disappeared
somewhere.

How had it gotten into the lab, much less onto the counter? She
searched for Catula and Cat and couldn't find them. Poor Cat-probably
cowering someplace. A thought struck her. Natural creation versus
artificial creation. Was God's work being overtaken by man's?

She knelt and began collecting the scattered tubes. A lot were broken,
and razor-sharp shards were everywhere. She paused, knowing she'd end
up cutting herself. Why does Zammit allow Dikka to make so many of
those damn things and let them roam around at will? Two days' work
ruined, thanks to that bloody robot.

Dikka Spargo was in the boardroom, along with Kitson Kang. At
twenty-five, clad in a tight black muscle shirt and camouflage cargo
pants, the wiry Japanese-born computer | expert was a younger version
of martial arts movie star Jackie Chan.

He grinned as he tugged at the gold earring that made him look like a
samurai turned pirate.

"Boss, I understand today you made your TV fight debut. Hey,
Cairo--how are things in the Valley of the Kings?"

Cairo grinned good-naturedly.

"I've said it before, I'll say it again. One more Egyptian joke, and
you're a dead man."

Kang turned to Spargo.

"Is that a new one? It's hard to tell, there's so many of them. How
do you breathe with all those rings through your nose?"

She grinned and fingered the new silver hoop inserted through her left
eyebrow.

"Like it?"

"I guess. But Dikka, if you put any more metal through your face you
won't be able to lift your head off the pillow."

Zammit smiled as he sat at the head of the table and sipped his coffee.

A glowing panel of neon-bright colors occupied the entire north wall,
showing the location of some two dozen actual or potential
environmental hot spots around the world. He studied the wall closely.

The new Turkish crisis was on the screen as Code Red.

Zammit briefed them on the Dzerzhinsk situation, then Spargo expanded
on the NK19 dye problem.

"Anything else?" asked Zammit.

"Yeah," said Cairo.

"Recall that guy who invented the super sorbent for mopping up chemical
spills in any kind of weather? He asked for our assessment of the
stuff."

Zammit nodded, remembering the product.

"You spray the sorbent foam onto the spill, on land or water, and
whether it's heavy crude oil at forty below or pulp mill effluent in
the tropics, it soaks up every last bit. Sounded good to me."

Cairo Jackson's chair creaked as he leaned back.

"Every silver lining has a cloud, as my sainted grandmother used to
say. Stuff works like a dream. Only one problem. Let's say you use
several tons of this sorbent to mop up a big nasty spill. The ground
or the water is pretty clean, but now you have tons of contaminated
sorbent. You can't landfill it because it's hazardous. So you have to
burn it. Dikka, I believe you are our current expert on this
particular substance."

She grinned, pulled another barrette from her lab coat, and clipped it
in her hair.

"Whereupon it emits such enormous quantities of hydrogen cyanide gas
that no smokestack scrubbers currently on the market can get rid of
it."

Zammit shrugged.

"Back to the drawing board."

They discussed how to avoid paying so much for the huge amounts of
chemical reagents, glass pipettes, Kleenex-style Kirnwipes, and other
material they used when doing lab analyses.

"I've checked out some suppliers and prices," said Kang. He reached
under the boardroom table for his briefcase, then let out a yell. There
was a fingernail-tapping-on-a-table sound, fading as something ran
away.

"Sorry." Kang took a deep breath, blew his lips out, and stared across
the table.

"Jesus, Dikka, do those things have to be so ugly? Can't you make them
so they have wheels and look cute, like R2D2? I've got a thing about
spiders, girl."

Dikka Spargo tried to look sorry and failed.

"No can do. Kit. Things with wheels are unstable. If wheels were
sound evolutionary strategy, we'd all be rolling along like shopping
carts. Too easy to knock over. I employ Mark Tilden's BEAM
principles--biology, electronics, aesthetics, and mechanics. I make
them like spiders because the thorax is flat and oval, which makes for
easy engineering.

With the body mounted on the eight articulated legs, the guts of the
thing are like a weighted trampoline on springs. Very low center of
gravity. Can't be easily knocked over, and if it is, it can right
itself. A thing with wheels can't do that. The little retractable
hooks on the ends of the tentacles mean it can climb, it can--" Zammit
knew what Spargo was like when she got going.

"Dikka, I feel pretty much like Kit does. I'm glad we now lock them up
at night in the storeroom, but I think something more is needed." He
had insisted on this after waking one night to find a particularly
beady-eyed specimen sitting on his chest. Dikka had sulked for a week
because the robot had smashed to pieces when he hurled it against the
wall. They decided that putting the robots in the storerooms was
preferable to switching them all off every night and then having to
turn them on again. It was Spargo's responsibility to round the
creatures up every evening, which would ordinarily have taken hours
since they were often in hiding, obeying the second programming
command. To resolve the problem, she installed a switch in each
creature that responded to a particular sequence of tones on her cell
phone. It still struck Zammit as odd to see the long-haired Spargo
dancing down the hall, waving her phone like a high-tech Pied Piper of
Hamelin, leading a trail of scuttling insectoids.

Dikka's face fell in disappointment. To cushion the remark, Zammit
said, "Can't you have them make a noise or something? Anything so we
don't get taken by surprise all the time?"

The teenage inventor's face was instantly thoughtful. She fingered her
new eyebrow hoop.

"I could modify the sensors and the video card and install little
speakers." She brightened.

"When they get within five feet of someone, I could have them make a
noise like the roadrunner in the Bugs Bunny cartoons. You know, 'meep
meep."

" Zammit struggled to keep a straight face.

"Whatever. I'm sure Cat would appreciate it as well."

Spargo was suddenly distraught.

"But being programmed to make a noise like that is not evolutionarily
sound, because it draws attention to you. It--"

"Dikka, think about
it. Flashing lights, a siren, 'meep meep," right now I don't care.

Just come up with something." Zammit yawned uncontrollably.

"I'm beat. I'm going upstairs for some shut-eye. Don't wake me unless
we hear more about Turkey."

As he stood, Frankie Richards stuck her head in the door.

"Earl Stone is on the videophone. I don't think he wants to give you
an Oscar for best actor."

"Not now," said Zammit.

"There's something else. He didn't say, but it must be Turkey."

He rubbed his eyes.

"OK. All you guys, stay here. Frankie?"

Richards nodded.

"I'll be in right away. Had a little accident, have to clean it up."

As she closed the door she punched the button to activate the video
screen and the room's cameras.

Zammit jabbed at the speaker console as Stone's furious face appeared
on the flat five-foot by-seven-foot display panel at the far end of the
room.

"Hello, Earl."

Stone noticed the other men in the room. His news anchor baritone was
accusatory.

"Make yourself at home, Mike. Hit somebody."

"Come on. Earl--"

"All this effort to get you on that show. The theme
is animals, protecting the environment--a natural. Fits perfectly with
the work you're doing identifying whatever's killing those creatures in
the Gulf--"

"Cyanide," said Zammit, stifling a yawn as he realized he
was going to have to let Earl vent.

"But do you play to the crowd, being warm and huggy to get some
first-class exposure? No. You spend your time figuring out how to use
coffee as a weapon."

"Sorry, Earl. Won't happen again. Not this week anyway. Incidentally,
where are you?"

Stone took a deep breath and finally regained his composure.

"Washington, D.C."

"What's up?"

"Thamar Amurkhan contacted the White House a few hours ago and asked to
use your services immediately. She thinks you can walk on water after
what you did for her last time. Apparently they've got a really ugly
situation."

"We've heard," said Zammit.

"But we don't know any details."

Stone ran his hand over his hair.

"Randy Berkowitz is on the president's staff.

I told him a few days ago you were in that ghastly place in Russia
whose name I can never remember. He called me a few minutes ago and
wants to talk to you urgently."

"What kind of situation?"

"According to Randy, they're still trying to figure it out. Thousands
of people are dying of something. But he also used the word
Armageddon."

"I don't know if I'd call it Armageddon," said Colonel Walter
Graves.

"Description's a bit biblical for my taste. But based on what we've
learned so far, it could lead to an all-out war in the Middle East and
the deaths of millions of people."

Speaking from Washington, the colonel's rugged face filled the video
screen as he briefed them on the situation in Turkey. He peered over
the top of his half-moon glasses, eyes red with fatigue beneath bushy
gray eyebrows. Sixty years old, a former Marine, he was now with the
CIA and an adviser to the president. They had worked together on a
dozen crises over the years, and his attention to detail and meticulous
planning were legendary. Constant worry had carved deep lines in his
face, and he looked very worried now.

"The Turkish government has ordered nonstop emergency airlifts of fresh
water," continued the colonel.

"Trucking it in too. They've evacuated some of the local population,
which is a problem because of the Kurdish insurrection in the area.

They've also shut off the dam and cut all nonmilitary access to the
region.

Place is closed up tighter than a tick."

Zammit interrupted.

"How many casualties so far?"

"About 100,000 people have drunk enough water to become violently ill.

I understand about 20,000 have died in the last few days."

Zammit scribbled notes. Twenty percent kill rate, so soon.

"Thousands of animal deaths have also been reported. It's a good thing
this part of the country is a virtual zone of occupation, so military
resources are on the spot and the media is kept away. And that it's
sparsely populated.

Unfortunately, that particular demographic changes once you move
downstream."

The picture on the video screen suddenly kaleidoscoped. Now Colonel
Graves was a tiny figure walking through a virtual reality landscape.

"I'm afraid our enhancements aren't based on optimal data. All we've
got so far is what the Turks gave us, and they're confused as hell."

He stopped by the banks of a river.

"As you can see from our simulation of the death plume, the number of
fatalities decreases proportionately the farther away you get. This
suggests that whatever is in the water is diluted as it moves
downstream. The problem is that we don't know what it is or where it
came from, much less how to get rid of it. And based on what we've
heard, the concentration is likely to get higher and higher. That's
where we're counting on you. Doc."

"OK. But I'll need a lot more background on this dam and reservoir.

And eventually I'll have to talk to the Turks directly."

Graves nodded.

"I realize that. I didn't think the Turks would like hearing some of
what I have to say, which is why I'm giving you this preliminary
briefing.

The geopolitical implications of this are crucial. Mishandled at any
level, we could have a catastrophe on our hands."

Graves continued walking across the virtual landscape.

"To summarize: The Middle East has always been short of water, even in
antiquity. The region is currently suffering the worst drought ever
recorded. The only country with a decent supply of fresh water is
Turkey."

Suddenly the colonel was standing in the midst of a desolate landscape
of low rolling brown hills.

"The two countries with the worst water problems lie to Turkey's
southeast: Syria and Iraq, side by side. Until the end of the First
World War and the defeat of the Turks and their German allies, both
countries were part of the Ottoman Empire. They still hate and fear
their former overlords."

Graves pointed to a thin blue-green ribbon snaking its way through the
chocolate-colored desolation.

"Syria's main water source is the Euphrates River.

After flowing all the way through Syria, on a diagonal of about thirty
degrees, the Euphrates carries on into Iraq, where it eventually joins
up with the Tigris River and they flow to the sea. The Tigris is
Iraq's only other source of water, but with the drought, the flow is
nonexistent. Which means the Euphrates is vital."

Another dizzying kaleidoscope of colors, and the colonel was standing
in front of a glowing multicolored political map of the area. The
number of countries, both large and small, made it look like a
patchwork quilt sewn by a blind man.

"The headwaters of both rivers rise in the barren highlands of
southeastern Turkey and flow through that area before entering Syria
and Iraq. Three decades ago the Turks looked at all that water
dribbling away in the desert and figured they could make better use of
it. They started building one of the world's largest irrigation and
hydroelectric complexes. It's called the Southeastern Anatolia
Development Project--the Turkish abbreviation is GAP."

Zammit interjected.

"I'm no expert on the subject, but these huge dams are almost by
definition environmental disasters. They alter the ecology of entire
regions."

Graves nodded.

"So I understand. That may be the cause of the present problem.

GAP has been under construction for over two decades now--twenty-two
dams and nineteen power stations. The project services an area larger
than Austria."

"Holy cow," said Dikka Spargo.

"The Turks use the water for two purposes. The first is generation of
hydroelectric power. They sell it to their electricity-starved
neighbors, including Russia and those crummy little gangster countries
like Chechnya and Tuvanistan. The second purpose is irrigation."

Suddenly the colonel was standing in front of a gigantic concrete
wall.

"The centerpiece of the whole project is this monster, the Ataturk Dam.

It's the last one and the closest to the Syrian border. It's four
times larger than the Aswan Dam. The fill material used in this thing
is sufficient to build a three-by-three-foot wall circling the equator
twice, with three thousand miles to spare. Has a reservoir ten times
larger than the Sea of Galilee."

"Wow," breathed Kitson Kang.

Now the colonel was dwarfed by the vast pipe in which he stood.

"The water irrigates the Plain of Harran. The Turks figure they can
get three crops annually off that land and improve agricultural
productivity twenty fold And in the process turn an impoverished
desert back into the Garden of Eden and make the Kurds happy. The
Turkish government has stated that GAP will make Turkey the breadbasket
of the whole Middle East. Thanks to the Ataturk, that arid wasteland
recently had endless fields of high protein crops and cotton. That is,
until this drought. With the water shut off, under the blazing sun,
all those crops are already dead."

Zammit stood and paced.

"What's the bottom line?"

"The Ataturk Dam gives Turkey absolute control of water resources in
the region.

They can literally turn off the lifeblood waters of both the Tigris and
the Euphrates whenever they want. It makes them the most powerful
nation in the whole Middle East, nukes or not. Turkey has the biggest
land area and the second biggest population of any NATO country east of
the Atlantic. lready their neighbors complain about a new Ottoman
Empire. As a result of all this, the Syrians and Iraqis are scared
shitless."

Graves now stood in the midst of a rumbling herd of Iraqi tanks.

"Both states appealed to international tribunals, trying to either stop
the project or get the Turks to bring them in as partners. But the
Turks are proud and stubborn.

They've said all along that no one is going to tell them what to do
with a resource that originates within their own borders. That pretty
much summarizes international legal opinion too."

The tanks clanked on in a computerized never-never land.

"In 1975 and 1986, the Iraqis rolled their tanks right up to the
border. They had to back down because Turkey has a standing army of
half a million men, the biggest of any NATO country, including us, and
they are fearsome soldiers. An attack would be suicidal. Unless, of
course, they have nukes. We don't believe they do."

Once again. Colonel Graves's craggy face filled the screen.

"That's it. Syria and Iraq are drying up and blowing away. They tell
the Turks to release more water, and the Turks won't do it because
there's something in the dam's reservoir that's killing their own
citizens downstream, and they don't know what it is. Earlier I
mentioned demographics. The Turkish part of the Euphrates basin is
thinly populated. But just one hundred miles downstream from the
Ataturk is the first big city, Aleppo, in Syria. Population over two
million. Their sole source of water is the Euphrates."

Zammit leaned forward.

"Something lethal is in the reservoir's water. The Turks can't release
more water because they'll kill their own citizens and eventually
millions of Syrians and Iraqis downstream. But if they don't release
more water, millions will die anyway, of thirst and famine. It's a
no-win situation. But in either scenario, the two nations can't stand
idly by."

"Exactly," said Graves.

"Remember how relieved we were when Saddam Hussein was assassinated? It
never occurred to us that his son Anwar would be even worse than the
old man. In a fit of paranoia, Anwar may conclude that the Turks have
hatched some sort of plot. And do something stupid."

The colonel took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes.

"I can't emphasize how important this is. Turkey stands now where West
Germany did during the Cold War.

Right on the front line, face to face with our biggest geopolitical
problem--that rancid mix of oil, fanatical Islamism, and decrepit
dictatorships called the Middle East and Central Asia. We need Turkey
as a powerful buffer between us and the Syrians, Iraqis, and Iranians.

It's not only a deterrent to aggressive nations in the area, it's the
world's only successful Muslim democracy. It's a shining example to
every other Islamic country on the planet that you can be prosperous
and respected without fundamentalism. If it weren't for Turkey we'd be
seeing a lot more crazy mullahs returning their countries to the Middle
Ages. And even Turkey has fundamentalist factions." He sighed
heavily.

"I know the president is worried. Turkey is a faithful ally and a
member of NATO. If anything happens to Turkey, we get dragged in
too."

Frankie Richards interrupted.

"Colonel, could I have another look at the geographic map of the area
side by side with the political one?"

"Of course."

"There's another problem. See where the Tigris and Euphrates join?

Right at the bottom of Iraq? And then the two flow to the sea?"

Cairo Jackson nodded.

"Into the Shatt al Arab delta. So?"

Zammit said, "And from the Shatt al Arab into the Persian Gulf."

"From whence," said Richards, "using the world's largest desalinization
plants, all of the bone-dry Arab oil states get their sole supply of
water."

Graves had gone pale.

"Oh, swell," said Cairo Jackson.

"Not a regional crisis, a global one. My fave."

"Colonel," said Zammit, "I need the names and numbers of the
appropriate Turkish officials. I want White House authorization to
contact federal departments and agencies if I need more people. And I
want the last three weeks' worth of scans from the Terra
earth-observing satellite system."

"Of course," said Colonel Graves.

Mike Zammit turned to his staff.

"Showtime."

Talitsa, Crimea, Republic of Ukraine, August 30

On the bright auditorium stage, a choir of brown-robed monks chanted
the hypnotic liturgical music of Old Russia. The rows of seats, which
stretched into the darkness, were filled with hundreds of young men in
uniform. On the wall of the auditorium, a huge square of red cloth.

General Vladimir Bled strode to the microphone, boots creaking,
red-tabbed green uniform immaculately pressed. A thin sheen of sweat
gleamed from his bullet-shaped skull, evoked by the hot lights and a
thudding hangover.

At the podium and microphone, he pulled himself to his full height,
gazing imperiously at the rapturous faces in the audience. As the
music swelled, he pointed at the drape of red cloth. The chanting
suddenly stopped.

With a hiss the drape drew aside, revealing a huge icon. It was an
ancient portrait in the traditional Russian and Byzantine perspective
less style. A melancholy dark-haired man of about forty-five, in
armor, loomed out of the picture. There was a cross behind him but not
the traditional gold ring of a halo to indicate a saint. The striking
impression was of a strong man shouldering an unendurable burden.

"Constantine XI!" boomed Bled.

"The last of the Roman Emperors. The Ottoman Turks had reduced the
Byzantine Empire to a single city. Constantinople. The birthplace of
our religion. The great walls endured twenty-one sieges in 1100 years.

They would not endure the last."

Bled gripped the podium as if to tear it in half.

"Tuesday, May 29, 1453. The day the city fell to the infidel. The
emperor had fourteen miles of walls to defend and only 7,000 men. Led
by Sultan Mehmet II, the Turks had a 100,000 soldiers. The emperor
fought courageously, but a swarm of Turks overwhelmed him and he
disappeared."

His voice dropped to a sepulchral whisper.

"But his body was never found." A ringing, expectant silence.

"There was a Russian monk in the city that day.

Nestor, a visiting novice, from the remote monastery of St ... Sava, near
Keremovo, on the far side of the Ural Mountains. Knowing the battle
was lost, the emperor entrusted his greatest treasures to Nestor, to
spirit them to Russia where the Turks could not pursue. The holy icon
of the Virgin Eleousa, painted by Saint Jerome himself; the gold crown
of Constantine IX Monomachos, encrusted with emeralds and rubies; the
diamond-rimmed chalice of the Emperor Romanes, carved from a single
sapphire; and the emperor's gold signet ring.

"Nestor escaped. So did the emperor. Near death, he was taken first
to the Despotate of Morea. When the sultan conquered Morea, he was
taken in secret to the St ... Sava monastery, where Nestor waited with
the treasures. He took years to recover and lost the ability to speak.

In old age he married and fathered a child, so the dynastic line was
continued. To ensure their safety, all was concealed and the monks
took a vow of silence, which they have kept to this day.

Nestor lived to be almost a hundred and wrote an account of the city's
fall. The Secret Chronicle."

Bled held up a leather-bound, gem-encrusted book.

"In it, Nestor prophesies that one day Constantinople will be retaken.

The Holy Chosen One, a descendant of the last emperor, will reign as
tsar and sit again upon his golden throne in the rose-red church called
Hagia Sophia."

Bled touched the book to his lips.

"In the 17th century, a copy was discovered, but its contents were
dismissed as myth and legend."

He wiped his brow and took a sip of water.

"So fell the last tiny fragment of the Roman Empire, just thirty-nine
years before Columbus discovered America.

Without Constantinople to block them, the Ottoman Turks poured into
Europe, brimming to the gates of Vienna, subjugating Greece, the
Balkans, and Hungary and raiding Italy and France. All Christendom was
aghast. But none was more horrified than Ivan III, Grand Duke of
Moscow. He brooded on the fate of the lost city. He married Sophia, a
niece of the last emperor. She brought with her to Moscow the ancient
imperial rituals of Constantinople. Ivan took the title
tsar--Caesar--and added the two-headed eagle of Byzantium to his coat
of arms.

Enslaved eastern Christians lifted their eyes in hope during the long
centuries of bondage, knowing that in Russia the true faith still
lived. The memory of Constantinople did not fade. Down all the dark
centuries, they told their wide-eyed children, late at night by the
fireside, how the city was defended, of the heroic emperor, abandoned
by his allies, who refused to abandon his people.

How he fought courageously to the end until his enemies overwhelmed
him--and he disappeared, to bide his time in the darkness, in a secret
place, until the dawn should come and the empire, like a phoenix, be
reborn."

Bled pointed at the icon, his voice hoarse with emotion.

"The dawn has come."

There was a sigh from the audience, as from some huge, suddenly aroused
beast.

"Four times in the past four hundred years we were within a few hours'
march of the city. Each time our enemies prevented us from seizing the
prize."

Another sigh, louder than before. Bled leaned forward. Time to really
let them have it.

"Holy Mother Russia is being raped." Enraged screams from the
audience.

Bled raised his hand to stop the outburst.

"Raped by foreigners. Americans and their Jew overlords. German
businessmen, Nazis without uniforms. We beat the Nazis. Now veterans
stand on streetcorners and sell their medals for kopecks, as Germans
speed past in their limousines. We are mocked by gangsters from
Chechnya and Georgia, little countries we once ruled with a fist of
iron. They loot our gold and uranium, our forests and oil. They buy
our women and use them as prostitutes. And all the while they laugh at
us."

There were hoarse shouts from the audience, the sound of stamping feet,
the sweaty smell of rage. Bled blinked furiously and held up both
arms.

"They laugh and mock where once they feared. They will fear again.

Marx and Lenin said history is driven by class struggle. They were
wrong. History is a titanic spiritual battle between Russian, Western,
and Muslim civilizations. Always, satanic forces have conspired
against us. We have become spiritually empty. We are materialistic,
rootless, weak. And so the parasites gather to feed on the carcass."

He pointed again at the icon.

"We will fulfill Nestor's prophesy. We will establish dominion over
the inferior peoples who wash over a border less world like garbage in
a tainted sea. Faith will be our shield and our sword. We must
recover our lost territories and lost greatness."

His voice rose to a hoarse shout.

"We will have dominion! We will rule again, from the place where we
should rule, the birthplace of our religion. We will have a tsar. The
Holy Chosen One will reign as emperor in the once and future imperial
city, Constantinople. A strong Russia! A spiritual Russia!"

He paused as cries of

"Derzhava!" and

"Sobonost'I rang out. Sweat
trickled down his face and neck, staining the tight collar of his
uniform.

"But I am just a simple military man." He spread his arms wide.

"You all know me. How many of your fellow men at arms do not get paid,
so their families are forced to sell everything they own to the Jews
and the Nazis?"

There was a roar.

"Do I not pay you? Do I not feed you?" Shrieks of affirmation echoed
through the cavernous room.

"Our cause has many enemies. But with God's help we will crush them,
we will kill them all!"

To deafening cheers he backed away from the microphone. As the choir
again began to chant, a figure in a coarse brown monk's robe emerged
from the shadows on sandal-clad feet. Bulging eyes stared straight
ahead as the hot lights shone on his long greasy hair. The audience
roared the name for peasant holy man, "Starets! Starets!"

At the podium he lifted his arms and his great staring eyes to
heaven.

"Russia is God's instrument." Wild cheers.

"Church and state, working together, the union of the tsar with the
people, is the best bulwark against Satan. Always we must guard
against the enemies of righteousness. It is in the New Testament
itself. Saint Paul's letter to the Corinthians. There can be no
intercourse between righteousness and lawlessness, as there is nothing
in common between light and darkness, the true God and false
idols ... "

As the starets spoke in his hypnotic monotone, an odorless, tasteless
mist so fine as to be invisible wafted down from the pipes and nozzles
concealed in the distant gloom of the ceiling. As they inhaled the
atomized drug, the audience began to scream. By the time the choir's
voice soared majestically and General Bled and Lazar Smegyev left the
stage, the soldiers and sailors in the audience would have invaded hell
itself.

Bled threw himself onto a laboratory bench and wiped his gleaming head
with a handkerchief. Smegyev followed him through the foot-thick
stainless steel security door that separated the research laboratories
and manufacturing facilities from the auditorium.

"Good speech." The monk rubbed the eye he had pressed against the
sensor so that it could read the pattern of his iris and make an
indisputable identification.

Bled grunted and gestured irritably. An aide hurried over with a
dispatch box. He opened it and withdrew a glass and a bottle of
Stolichnaya.

"It's thirsty work."

Smegyev's distended eyes bulged with disapproval. Bled shrugged and
took out another glass. He filled both and offered one to the monk.

Bled raised his glass to make the toast that always accompanies
drinking in Russia: "To success." Both men downed the vodka in a
single gulp, the only acceptable way of drinking. Bled tilted the
bottle to fill his glass again, but the monk laid a hand on his arm.

"Enough. When you drink too much, you talk too much. You must keep a
clear head."

"Very well, starets." Bled replaced the bottle and glasses in the
case.

"Besides," said the monk, "we have work to do." The two men walked
into the adjacent cavernous room, with its laboratory benches, computer
monitors, and storage facilities. They stopped at a surgical table
with a uniformed body strapped to it. The young soldier stared
vacantly, his face deathly white beneath his shaved head, saliva
trickling from the corner of his mouth.

"As you can see, the dosage is very important," said the technical
director. Dr ...

Bratko Cabrinovic. His nervous fingers plucked at the lapel of his
white lab coat. To stop himself, he shifted his pen-based computer
tablet from one hand to the other. He cleared his throat and continued
in a thin piping voice.

"With something this powerful, there is a fine line between
suggestibility and senescence."

Bled leaned over and stared into the young man's unseeing eyes. He
grunted.

"Nobody home." He fixed his gunmetal gaze on Cabrinovic and noticed
with satisfaction how the physician flinched. He reminded Bled of an
emu, and the general always tried to play the lion, to keep this
birdlike man twitching and alert.

"Is the damage permanent?"

The doctor tried to meet Bled's gaze and failed.

"Yes. We're still adjusting the mix of the two drugs. With the first,
they must be suggestible but not to the point of complete docility and
still capable of understanding and carrying out orders. With the
second, they must be physically unimpaired, able to make quick
decisions, and incredibly strong and aggressive."

Cabrinovic bounded over to a bed where another soldier was lying on his
back. A metal helmet covered his head and face, and electrodes and
wires trailed across the pillow to the glowing monitor next to a stack
of graph paper and digital scan images. As the technical director
leaned over the bed, he turned his head and stared at the helmet with
one eye, like an emu contemplating a defective egg.

"The problem is that everyone's physiology is a little different, so we
must find the optimal range of effectiveness."

With spindly fingers he fanned the sheaf of scan images.

"Positron emission tomography, or PET scan. Investigation of brain
physiology and neural activity.

Look here." He pointed to a series of scan images.

"The blue area, before the drug is administered. It is the
hypothalamus, the conductor of the body's hormonal orchestra. Along
with the pituitary gland, it coordinates, among other things, body
temperature, hunger, and manifestations of rage. Blue indicates areas
of low uptake." Another series of images.

"After the drug is administered." Now the hypothalamus was bright
red.

"Red indicates areas of increased uptake. It's now lit up like a
Christmas tree. Tremendous activity."

Bled grunted again.

"Is it reliable? How, precisely, does it work?"

Cabrinovic straightened and gazed into the middle distance, as if
taking an exam.

"The drug suppresses the production in the brain of the enzyme mono
amine oxidase, or MAO, which is one of the key inhibitors of aggressive
behavior in humans. Based on the information provided by our supplier,
natural MAO production can be impaired in early childhood by physical,
sexual, or even extreme verbal abuse. This is why so many serial
killers and other psychopaths, all with very low levels of MAO, have
been found to be victims of such abuse."

"But will it work?" insisted Bled.

"The technology is still too new for me, or anyone else, to have built
up a reliable database. Our supplier doesn't have much data either.

But mix this with methamphetamine, beta-endorphin, the other hormones,
and drugs, and there's no question it will work. Any soldier who takes
the mixture will be incredibly aggressive, absolutely fearless, and
capable of fighting for days on end without food or rest."

"How long before you refine the final mix?"

"A few days."

Smegyev fingered his greasy beard.

"Excellent. Keep going. If you need more subjects, just ask." He
smiled at Bled.

"The general has a plentiful supply."

As they walked away the monk asked, "Has anyone resisted?"

"They do what they're told," growled Bled.

As with many cults, they had discovered that bad food, lack of sleep,
and unremitting bullying were perfect conditions for brainwashing.

Using a variant of the carrot and the stick. Bled maintained iron
discipline but made sure brutal hazing rituals didn't get out of hand,
while ensuring that his men got paid. As a result, the general was
both feared and revered by his men and obeyed unquestioningly, even
when it came to medical experimentation. The situation was also helped
by the drugs supplied by their partner, which ensured that Bled's men
were extremely suggestible.

As they walked through the cavernous room, warehouse shelving units
rose forty feet high, towering over the laboratory benches, beds,
isolation chambers, and other equipment far below. The shelves were
stacked with crates and drums made of wood, white plastic, or black
metal. Every one had on its side a sign or symbol indicating its
contents. Some held weapons, from antitank guns and machine pistols to
surface-to-air missiles. Others had the international symbol for
radiation or the black and yellow emblem of a circle intersected by
three horned crescents that indicated a biohazard.

"How is our arsenal coming along?" asked the monk.

"We'll have the best-equipped fighting force in the world," said
Bled.

"And the most motivated. No one will dare attack us. How is the Holy
Chosen One?"

"He is here. No one suspects a thing."

"It is stupid to risk the future tsar like this. He should be in
seclusion, praying and preparing."

"He insisted. A God emperor must be a warrior emperor, and he must
prove himself. And how are our silent partners?"

Bled smiled grimly.

"Which one? The green one or the brown ones?"

"All three."

"The green one is succeeding even beyond our expectations. Our first
brown partner doesn't care much for his present residence or his hosts.

But I understand he is amusing himself in his usual way. I know he is
impatient. As for Anwar, he is impatient as well."

"Have you acquired the smallpox yet?"

"I don't understand why you want it. Our scientists have supplied us
with sarin, ricin, anthrax, tularemia, botulinum, bubonic and pneumonic
plague, plus we have enough polio virus to wipe out a galaxy--"

"I want
smallpox," insisted Smegyev.

"It is the most destructive disease in history. There is no cure,
ninety percent of the world's people have no immunity, and no one in
the industrialized nations has been vaccinated against it in
decades."

Bled knew that since the eradication of the dread disease in the wild
in 1977, only two samples of smallpox virus officially existed in the
world. One was under impenetrable security at the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention in Atlanta, the other at the Russian virology
institute called Vector, outside the city of Novosibirsk in Siberia.

The general shrugged irritably.

"All right, I'll arrange to have it stolen. An old babushka with a
crowbar could get into that institute, but it's still risky.

Even those idiots in the Kremlin are going to figure it out sooner or
later. And that business with the cobalt-60 was stupid. If I'd known,
I would have stopped it."

"Soon it won't matter," said the monk. They approached the research
laboratories and isolation chambers near the manufacturing facilities.

In a clear plastic tank, a naked young man was soundlessly screaming as
he convulsed, his back arching at an impossible angle. Even though the
clear walls were so thick as to be virtually soundproof, they could
still hear thumping sounds as his thrashing limbs shattered on the
thick, unyielding plastic. His eyes stared at them beseechingly as his
jaws clamped again and again on his thick protruding tongue.

Finally it severed and lay on the floor as he gave a final twitch
before he died.

Smegyev fingered his beard.

"We are all God's children, and we all serve His purposes." He made
the sign of the cross.

"A martyr to the faith. May he dwell in Heaven forever, with the Holy
Father."

Seattle, august 31

Rain pounded on the roof like jungle drums. Holding yet another cup of
coffee, Mike Zammit stared at his reflection in the boardroom window as
water cascaded down the glass. It was three in the morning. He'd
always hated this long dark night of the soul, when the rich colors of
day turned into stark black and white, like one of Goya's prints about
the horrors of the Peninsular War. He'd been through this more times
than he cared to remember, that time of night when a man sits exhausted
and stares at the carpet, and his whole life sits on the carpet and
stares balefully back. Through the night's darkness and the fog,
against the lights of Seattle's skyline, smeared like a doused
watercolor, he could dimly see whitecaps on the storm-tossed surface of
Lake Union.

So much water.

Throughout the night they had tried to find out what was happening in
the parched deserts of southeastern Turkey, in the reservoir of the
Ataturk Dam.

They had examined the images from the earth-observing satellite system
known as Terra.

The brilliantly colored photos, taken hundreds of miles above the
earth, had revealed a startling picture. The filters and lenses used
by the special cameras picked up changes in light emissions, and when
the photos were artificially enhanced by computers and false color
images produced, whatever contamination was in the dam could be made to
stand out visibly from the water in which it was found. The latest
images showed a huge purple stain hard against the Ataturk Dam.

"That was taken today," said Kitson Kang. He looked wearily at his
watch.

"Or rather, yesterday." He punched a few keys.

"This was a week ago." The violet smear was smaller and fainter.

"This is two weeks ago." A barely detectable smudge.

"This is three weeks ago." Nothing at all.

"Well, it tells us something's there," said Zammit, forcing himself to
concentrate on something other than the buzzing boardroom lights and
the smell of stale coffee.

"A lot of something that got there fast. But it doesn't tell us what
it is." He knew he had to force his people to concentrate too.

"Let's review the theories so far."

The INERT team was sprawled around the table. No one looked fresh or
alert.

Prankie Richards was wearing jeans and a heavy black turtle-necked
sweater. She was rocking back and forth and had her sleeves pulled
down over her hands like a little girl, the way she always did when she
was cold. Zammit knew she got cold when she was very tired. He gazed
around the table. It wasn't the first time they'd brainstormed most of
the night, nor would it be the last. It wasn't the nature of crises to
be booked months in advance.

Cairo Jackson rubbed his face with both hands.

"OK. Theories so far. Industrial pollution. Chemical spill."

"Logical first choice," Zammit agreed.

"Only there's no industry of any kind in the area, and with the
drought, and all the crops dead, there's just brown rolling hills with
the river running through them, then the reservoir, then the dam."

Spargo spoke.

"They're using something at the dam that's leaking. The stain is right
up against the dam, so it's logical it comes from there."

"I don't think so. We know they've got eight huge turbines for
generation of hydroelectric power, some 90 billion kilowatts since the
thing fired up. But as far as we can tell, there's nothing they use to
run the turbines, or anything else at the dam itself, that is
poisonous."

Richards said, "It could be something that got into the river before it
flows into the reservoir. The Euphrates is over a thousand miles long.

Contamination could get into it anywhere along the way, and it would
inevitably end up in the Ataturk reservoir."

Zammit couldn't stop himself from yawning.

"But that reservoir covers over six hundred square miles. If the
contamination had been introduced that way, then we should see it where
the Euphrates initially empties into the reservoir, in the north. But
that's not where it is--it's at the far end, hundreds of miles to the
south, right against the dam itself. Besides, there are other dams on
the river.

Stuff would have to get into the Euphrates between the second last dam
in the GAP complex." His mind suddenly went blank from fatigue.

"What's it called again?"

Kitson Kang's gold earring gleamed under the bright halogen lights as
he shone the beam of the laser pencil on the huge geographical computer
map of southeastern Turkey glowing on the far wall. The beam stopped
and automatically magnified the name on the map so it was readable.

"The Karakaya," he said.

"Right. Between the Karakaya and the biggest and last, the Ataturk.

Once again, nothing there but shepherds and their flocks."

There was a beep, and INERT's communications director. Earl Stone,
appeared on the video screen

"Got him."

Colonel Walter Grave's right-hand man in Turkey was Lloyd Lavender.

Stone had been trying for hours to reach him.

"Finally," said Zammit.

"Cross-reference the imaging, and put him on."

Lloyd Lavender's face was jowly, his hair strawberry blond. His blue
eyes were as opaque as marbles under sandy lashes. Parchment skin
webbed with fine lines now sagged with exhaustion and worry.

"Hello, Dr. Zammit. I've got some information for you."

"Go ahead."

Lavender started to read from a sheaf of papers in his hand, as Zammit
scribbled notes.

"Twenty thousand downstream civilian casualties confirmed. People die
horribly, literally vomiting their guts out. Their skins turn yellow
as their bodies swell with fluid like balloons. In the final stages,
they either drown in their own vomit, suffocate from the fluid filling
their lungs, or suffer cardiac arrest. The whole process takes two to
three days."

Zammit frowned.

"All the symptoms of poisoning, liver disease, and congestive heart
failure combined."

"No theories at all as to the type of toxin in the water," continued
Lavender.

"And one military casualty as well, at the dam itself."

Zammit's head snapped up.

"What?"

"A corporal. Died while taking a sample from the reservoir."

"Died how?"

"Vomited to death."

"Did he drink any water?"

"No."

"Did he/ fall into the water?"

"No. The Turks say he was heading to the water to collect a sample
when he suddenly fell, started vomiting, and couldn't stop. Then he
died."

Jackson stared at the screen in disbelief.

"It's lethal by inhalation as well?"

"I wouldn't be surprised," said Lloyd Lavender.

"The stuff in the reservoir stinks like you wouldn't believe. Since
the corporal's death, no one goes near the water without wearing an
oxygen unit."

"Don't assume anything," said Zammit.

"Ask the Turks to do an autopsy on this soldier. And what is this
'stuff in the reservoir' you just mentioned?"

"Masses of slimy green organic material, nature and origin unknown.

Tons of it.

That's why they've had to shut off the turbines. This stuff is thick
and gluey, and it's clogging the dam's intakes, penstocks, and the
machinery. It smells like rotting meat."

There was dead silence. Zammit had never heard of anything like this
before.

"Enough. We're guessing. I hate guessing. I want evidence. I gather
they have succeeded in obtaining samples?"

Lavender nodded.

"They're in Urfa, the regional capital. About a half hour from the
Ataturk."

"We need somebody on the ground to analyze those samples. The only
member of the team in the general area is Connie." He turned to
Frankie Richards.

"Contact him, brief him, tell him to drop the other stuff and get to
Urfa pronto."

Cairo Jackson objected, "Mike, do you think he has enough experience? I
don't know what sort of lab facilities they have over there, and he
might have problems."

"It should be easy enough. He just patches through a satellite feed to
our computers here." He turned back to the screen.

"Thanks, Lloyd. I'll be in touch.

Anything else we should know?"

The pale face lifted briefly in a baggy, humorless smile.

"You know everything I do. Sayonara." The screen went blank.

"Masses of slimy green material," echoed Zammit. He turned to
Frankie.

"Some sort of organism. You're the botanist. What could it be?"

"I have no idea," Richards replied.

"It would be different if the Euphrates were like the Nile, laden with
silt and nutrients. In the reservoir of the Aswan Dam, as the water
sits stagnant under the blazing sun, an amazing variety of pests breed
out of control. But according to my information, the Euphrates is
nutrient-poor. And that still doesn't explain how the contamination
got there in the first place or why it's growing so fast."

"Then we'll have to study the samples. Where's Stavros Costopoulos?"

"Somewhere in Thessalonica, last I heard. Maybe Athens by now. He was
supposed to deliver a paper at some academic conference."

"I want him to meet me in Malta." Frankie nodded distractedly, her
face suddenly blank.

"What's the matter?" asked Zammit, concerned that she was exhausted.

It wasn't often she looked stunned.

"Wait a minute." Richards strode from the boardroom and returned
moments later with a piece of paper.

"When Dikka finished the scan on your private e-mail yesterday, the
only thing that stood out was this. It got automatically pulled by the
program because it's from that re mailer in Sweden--we've had
significant stuff from him before. It read like nonsense, and I was
going to throw it out.

But now I'm not so sure."

Zammit read the brief message aloud.

"Greetings, gallant knight, help of the helpless. Your sword is of no
use against the primordial soup, and by the rivers of Babylon you will
lie down and weep."

"I don't get it," said Kitson Kang.

"Me neither," said Dikka Spargo.

Zammit gazed intently out the window, like a man trying and failing to
remember something. Richards watched him for a few moments, as if
trying to read his mind. Finally she said, "There are other names for
those two rivers."

"I know that," said Kang.

"We been encountering them all evening. In Turkish the Euphrates is
called the Firat and the Tigris is the Dick."

Zammit spoke.

"Before they had those names, before there was a Turkish language or a
Turkish people, about 4,000, 5,000 years ago, they were the heartland
of Mesopotamia, the Fertile Crescent." Again he looked at the
message.

"The rivers of Babylon."

Once more he seemed lost in reverie as he stared at the strange
message.

"What is it, Mike?" asked Cairo Jackson.

"The re mailer has stripped off the date the message was sent as well
as the address of the sender. Did anyone scan my e-mail between my
leaving for Russia and yesterday?"

"No," said Dikka.

"We never check your personal mail unless you ask us."

"So yesterday was the first time in a week. Kit, how long does it take
a re mailer to pass on a message?"

"Depends how busy he is. It's not like he's the post office and has to
make daily deliveries. Might be two minutes, might be two days. Maybe
more. Why?"

"So this thing could have been sent eight or ten days ago."

Cairo Jackson grasped the situation before the others could speak. He
turned to Zammit.

"I have three questions. One, how did this person know about the
contamination at the Ataturk Dam before the Turks did?"

"And," said Richards, "why does he want you to know that he knew it?"

Jackson nodded in agreement.

"Second, how can you threaten somebody with soup?"

Faced with silence, he turned and pointed at the sole decoration on the
east wall, a big white Maltese cross embroidered on a red background,
lovingly hand-stitched by Zammit's Aunt Julia, far away on the
sun-baked island of Gozo.

"Finally, how does this person know you're a knight?"

When Mike Zammit came downstairs after a few hours of restless sleep,
it was still raining. Kitson Kang still sat in front of his computer
looking haggard and frustrated. Empty cans of Pepsi littered the floor
around him.

"Anything?"

Without taking his eyes from the screen, Kang said, "In the merchant
marine they have a saying. When you're sailing around but not getting
anywhere, you're steaming to Bamboola." He flicked at his gold
earring.

"I'm steaming to Bamboola."

He turned away from the screen.

"I've been running hundreds of scenarios since our meeting broke up.

The program keeps spitting out the same one it did before." He handed
his boss several sheets of paper.

"Exactly the same one. So the program is telling us the only possible
scenario is the one we all agree is physically impossible."

"Take a break and get some sleep. I'll be in touch when I'm in Malta.

Did Frankie find Stavros Costopoulos?"

Kang nodded.

"He's going to meet you on the island. Frankie's painting in the
studio if you want to talk to her."

"Okay. You and Dikka work in shifts. Grab any other staff you need to
help you."

Zammit headed for Frankie's studio. She always said she thought better
when she was painting.

A riot of color greeted him as he opened the door. Richards was a
brilliant artist but not a neat one, and the walls and floor looked
like the aftermath of a multihued paint bomb explosion. He inhaled the
thick scent of oils and the sharp sting of turpentine as he walked over
to where she was frowning at a canvas, in a paint smeared smock, her
hair tied back in a ponytail. She sighed.

"Don't you ever knock?"

"Sorry. I always forget." She wasn't wearing makeup and her face
looked pale and drawn.

"How did you sleep?" asked Zammit, concerned.

"Badly. I had that nightmare again about Adam, the one where he's
lost in the jungle and so weak he can't stand anymore and he falls and
the fire ants swarm into his eyes and he calls for me--"

"Please,
Frankie," said Zammit.

"Don't do this to yourself." It wasn't like her to be so wound up. To
get her off the subject, he asked, "What are you working on?"

"A disaster." She began scraping wet pigment off the canvas with her
palette knife.

"I just can't concentrate. Has Kit found anything more?"

"No. We have the same scenario we did last night--it's impossible for
any kind of organic contamination to be in the reservoir. We won't be
able to figure out anything until we get some samples. In case
Connie's analysis doesn't tell us anything, I'll pick up the prototype
micro lab I've been testing in Malta."

"I got hold of Stavros in Athens. I didn't tell him much in case the
lines weren't secure, so you'll have to give him a complete briefing.

When do you leave?"

"Three hours. Lots to do before then."

Richards seized a sable brush, dabbed it in a gleaming, copper tinted
pool of chocolate color on the palette she held in her left hand, and
smeared a wide arc of burnt sienna on the canvas.

"I've been thinking about last night and how peculiar this is. How can
there be anything in the Ataturk reservoir, especially something that
lethal? The Euphrates is nutrient-poor, and with the drought
everything's dead, so there's nothing for miles in any direction except
dust."

"I've racked my brains. I'm sure I've never heard of anything like
this before," admitted Zammit.

"And I can't get that damn message out of my head."

She faced him.

"There's something fishy about the whole thing. You know my instincts
are good. I think you're being set up, for God knows what reason. You
be careful."

Zammit forced himself to grin. Her instincts weren't good, they were
superb.

There was a beep from the paint-encrusted intercom. She put down her
brush and reached for it.

"I'm amazed that thing still works," said Zammit.

"Why don't you try boiling it in glue to see if you can finally manage
to destroy it?"

"The creative mind is not necessarily a neat one. If I wanted things
tidy I'd be a maid."

She listened to the handset for a moment.

"It's Cairo. Wants to know if you want him in Malta too." She smiled
and spoke into the mouthpiece.

"You can't fool me, Mr ... Jackson. You just want to go fishing in that
gorgeous clear sea."

Zammit took the handset.

"Cairo, I think it's best if you stay here and act as liaison with
Colonel Graves and the White House. Depending on what the analysis of
the samples reveals, we might need help from other agencies. Frankie
will start working on a solution as soon as I can send data. Besides,
Connie will be there to help me."

As he hung up, Richards said, "Optimist. If there is a solution."

She suddenly leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. He was so
startled he was speechless.

"You be careful, mister. If you don't come back alive, I ... " But she
didn't finish the sentence. They gazed awkwardly at each other. Zammit
couldn't read her expression. To lighten the suddenly heavy mood, he
said, "I'll come back alive. All you have to do is hold down this fort
while I'm at the other one."

"Fair enough," said Frankie, picking up her brush, as well as on his
attempt to cover their discomfort.

"Say hello to Aunt Julia and Rocco for me."

Malta, august 31

As the plane made a lazy descending circle in the scorching azure sky,
Mike Zammit stared out the tiny window at the Mediterranean far below.

The brown hills of his ancestral home rose from the aquamarine sea like
five tanned knees.

He returned to them often, although he had been born in the United
States to parents who had emigrated from the islands.

The flight from Seattle to Heathrow and the final leg from London on
Air Malta had been uneventful. He had discussed with Colonel Graves
using an air force plane, but they had agreed it would be too obvious.

The United States had no bases on Malta, and someone would be bound to
ask unwelcome questions. Zammit used the time to catch up on his sleep
and ponder the scenario the computer program had identified, its
machine certainty not acknowledging that it was impossible. He thought
about Frankie, how much she enjoyed the islands, and wished she were
with him.

"Bongu," he said in the Maiti language to the smiling immigration
official who greeted him and stamped his passport. Although most
Maltese spoke good English, Zammit liked to practice the language of
his ancestors, which was unlike any other. Originally derived from
ancient Phoenician, a Semitic, tongue, it had also been influenced by
Arabic, Old French, Spanish, and Italian. It was the only Semitic
language that used the Latin alphabet. Rendering Semitic consonants
was a problem, leading to some weird-looking words, with lots of xl and
xx combinations. Many times Zammit had given directions to
head-scratching tourists who were unable to pronounce the names of
their intended destinations: Mgarr (Imgar), Xhagra (Shagra), Xlendi
(Shiendi), and the one that always baffled them, Marsaxxiock (Marsa
meant "harbor", xxlock--pronounced schlock--meant "of the southeast
wind"). Another one that threw them was that Pope John Paul II was
Papa Gwanni Pawlu.

He collected his bags and walked out of Luqa International Airport.

After the rain and fog of Seattle, the hundred-degree heat made him
gasp. He squinted in the harsh sunlight that glowed on the yellow
limestone buildings. Located ninety-five miles southeast of Sicily
and just over 200 from the coast of North Africa, most of the Maltese
archipelago was as hot and brown as a freshly baked loaf of bread.

At the heliport office he bought a ticket for the chopper flight to
Xewkija, on the neighboring island of Gozo. The twenty-seat helicopter
had only a handful of passengers. There really was no better way to
see the islands, reflected Zammit as they circled Luqa airfield. Off
in the distance he could see the capital city, Valletta, and the squat
menace of the massive fortifications of the Grand Harbor, the medieval
equivalent of a nuclear deterrent, turning golden orange in the late
afternoon sun.

It took only minutes to traverse Malta, the main island, just nineteen
miles long. Sweeping over Mgarr Harbor, he could see bobbing in the
waves the gaily painted traditional fishing boats used by Maltese
sailors. They might bear the names of saints, but each had open,
ever-watchful eyes painted on either side of the prow to ward off evil,
just as they had since Phoenician times. Although a deeply religious
people, converted to Christianity by Saint Paul after he was
shipwrecked on the main island in 60 a d." the Maltese, like all
people who live by the sea, knew it was wise to hedge their bets.

As they landed at the Xewkija helicopter pad and disembarked on the
eight-by four-mile island of Gozo, Zammit heard his name shouted and
looked around.

"Hey, Mike! Over here!" Waving at him from the parking lot was his
eighteen-year-old cousin Rocco Pullicino. He was sitting behind the
wheel of the small white Mercedes convertible Zammit used to get around
in whenever he visited. Zammit fetched his bags and walked over. The
blinding sun reflecting on the white paintwork made him wince even
behind his sunglasses.

"Hello, Rocco. Been taking good care of my car, I see."

"Of course." The handsome teen's teeth looked even whiter than usual
in his mahogany complexion as he pushed his jet black hair out of his
eyes.

"It's strange to see you here in the summer."

Zammit smiled as he tossed his luggage into the backseat.

"At this time of year the climate is only fit for nudists, Germans, and
Brits. Man, it's hot."

As they drove leisurely down the narrow winding roads, they passed a
few other cars and the occasional wooden cart pulled by a sleepy mule.

Malta was crammed with tourists, discos, and fastfood joints, while
Gozo, less than four miles away, half the size and much greener, had
never lost its pastoral simplicity. The misty green terraces wrinkled
their way up the low hills of the island's interior like the face of
some friendly, mossy ancient.

Fifteen minutes later they arrived. The square golden tower of
Lascaris by the edge of the sparkling sea had been built by the Knights
of Malta, known also as the Knights of the Order of Saint John of
Jerusalem, Hospitallers, in the 17th century. A member of the U.S.
chapter of the Order since the age of twenty-seven, Zammit was one of
several thousand modern Knights of Malta in the world. He found it odd
to be both a scientist and a member of an eight-hundred-year-old Order
of crusaders whose military role in fighting evil had ended so long
ago. Now the knights delivered humanitarian services in Third World
nations. Personally, he would rather concentrate on his scientific
endeavors, but he'd joined when asked because of his family's historic
connection with the Order.

Perched on a sheer cliff near Ramla Bay, the old fort was Zammit's home
away from home. After the success of ZAM Instruments, he'd spent a lot
of money renovating the place. When his Aunt Julia's husband died, she
and Rocco had moved from their small villa and now lived there
year-round. Zammit liked to visit during the spring and late fall. It
was close to Europe and Asia and a quiet place to think and reflect.

A steep path led down to a tiny sandy beach, almost entirely hidden by
craggy pillars of sea-worn limestone. It was a great place to go
fishing or diving. The sapphire and cobalt blue waters, the cleanest
in the Mediterranean, had a visibility underwater of more than 100
feet.

Rocco helped him lift the bags from the car and carry them up the four
broad, shallow steps.

"Michael!" It was his Aunt Julia, Rocco's mother, waving from the
immense stone doorway. Like many Maltese women, she had ivory skin,
huge hazel eyes, jet hair, and a full figure, a legacy of Greek, Roman,
Arab, Norman, and Sicilian genes. She looked remarkably like her older
sister, Zammit's mother, Adriana, who had disappeared with his father,
lost at sea in their yacht during one of the terrible winter storms
that could spring up so suddenly. Now, twenty-eight years later, he
found it curiously comforting to know that there was a living reminder
of what Adriana might have looked like.

"Hello, gorgeous." At fifty-six she looked ten years younger. He
kissed her on the cheek and put his arm around her shoulders as they
turned and walked into the cavernous coolness of the great entryway.

"I'm parched."

Julia led the way to the back of the old fortress as Rocco took the
luggage upstairs. Their footsteps banged hollowly on the flagstones in
the dim passageway that led into the kitchen. Despite its rusticated
appearance, modern wiring and plumbing serviced the gleaming
appliances. Zammit opened the fridge and pulled out a bottle of
Hopleaf ale.

"Is Costopoulos here yet?"

Julia shook her head.

"He phoned. All he said was, he'd be arriving tonight in time for
dinner."

Zammit nodded.

"Ordinarily I'd take you all to the Sea View and we could eat and
listen to Line's guitar and watch the boats come in. But Stay and I
have some business to discuss and I'm afraid it's private. Rocco,
could you drive back to the heliport and pick him up? You won't have
to wait long, and besides, in that Mercedes you should be able to
attract a girl or three."

As the teen clattered down the stone hallway Julia said with mock
severity, "I always forget what a bad influence you are on that boy."

"It never hurts a guy to become a man of the world," smiled Zammit.

He finished his beer and went outside as Julia started getting the meal
ready.

He strolled slowly around the old fort, along brick red paths whitened
with fine dust blown all the way from the Sahara. Under an enamel blue
sky, he passed fields of sharp stones and even sharper gray thorns and
cactus. Only heat-stunned lizards watched him, and the hot air stood
on the ground in shimmery waves.

He walked back to the kitchen through the dark, cool stone hallways and
sniffed experimentally. He peered over Julia's shoulder, knowing what
the answer would be.

"I'm setting a bad example for a modern sensitive male. Can I help?"

She shooed him away.

"Take a bottle of wine and wrestle with this problem you hinted at on
the phone." Her hazel eyes were shrewd.

"You've been doing a lot of work in Russia. Another Chornobyl?"

"No. Hard to believe, but it might be worse than Chornobyl. In
Turkey." He looked at her closely.

"Heard anything on the news?"

"Just about the riots and the election campaign." Her nostrils flared
in distaste.

"Turkey. What, are they massacring people again?"

Zammit had to smile in spite of himself. Like most ancient peoples,
the Maltese had the memory of a collective elephant, and what they
remembered best was how they had saved Christian Europe from a Turkish
invasion in 1565.

Through treachery, the Knights of Saint John, after two hundred and
fifty years on the island of Rhodes, were forced out by Suleyman the
Magnificent in 1522.

They finally relocated to Malta, given to them as a gift by Emperor
Charles V. The Order, formed in the early 12th century as a crusading
Order of nurses, had been forced into militancy as the early crusading
successes came under attack.

The knights were the most fabulous heroes in Christendom, deploring
violence but more than capable, as a last resort against unspeakable
evil, of climbing into suits of armor and proving their worth. Out of
gratitude for Charles's donation, the knights sent him every year the
gift of a Maltese falcon.

The Turkish Ottoman Empire expanded rapidly from 1300 to 1680. In
1564, at the age of seventy, Suleyman decided he wanted to conquer
Sicily, then Italy, then recapture Spain. The only thing blocking him
was Malta. He sent 200 warships and 40,000 soldiers to besiege the
tiny islands, which were defended by 8 galleys, 450 knights, 400
Spanish auxiliaries, and some 9,000 native Maltese. If they had lost,
the whole history of Europe would have been different.

But they didn't lose.

Suleyman thought the whole thing would be over in three or four days.

He was wrong.

Almost the entire four-month conflict took place in about half a square
mile, with Turkish forces throwing 70,000 artillery shells at Fort
Saint Elmo and the fortified peninsulas of Senglea and Birgu. The
defense was led by the Grand Master of the Order, Jean de la Valette,
who like his arch enemy Suleyman was over seventy. A man of superhuman
toughness, Valette out thought outfought, and outlasted the Turks, who
finally slunk home in defeat.

Two hundred and fifty years after the Great Siege, Voltaire said it was
the most spectacular event in the history of mankind. With some
prodding, he was persuaded to add, since the birth of Christ.

Riches poured into Malta from grateful kings all over Europe. Valette,
anticipating another attack, used the money to build an impregnable
series of fortifications. Suleyman got tied up conquering Hungary and
never renewed the assault. Zammit's ancestor John had been one of the
knights who fought in the defense, and it was his suit of armor that
was in Zammit's Seattle apartment.

"That's ancient history, Julia," said Mike Zammit.

"Turkey's a democracy now, just like this country. Time to kiss and
make up."

Julia snorted.

"Your ancestors fought the Turks, and don't ever forget it.

Fought them and beat them. You're a knight of the Order as well. That
toughness is in your blood. You'll need it someday."

"Ancient history," repeated Zammit.

"The knights don't fight anymore, remember?

We do good works."

The thunderous look on her face gave him some idea what the Turks might
have faced during the siege of 1565. "Lighten up," he protested.

"Remember when the Turkish ambassador visited a few years ago and was
given a tour of Fort Saint Elmo? They took him down into the depths,
where the knights had tended their wounded. He looked around and said,
I am humbled to realize I am the first Turk in history ever to enter
this place." He was graceful about the fact that we'd beaten the crap
out of them."

He opened the fridge again and grabbed a bottle of ice cold Marsovin
Special Reserve. As he opened it he said, "I'm going to have a look at
the micro lab

Call me when Stavros and Rocco get back."

He leaned over a pile of fish on the counter.

"So, what's everyone else going to have for supper?" Julia grinned and
pushed him toward the door.

To loosen muscles stiff from hours of air travel, Zammit bounded up
the worn steps two at a time to the top of the three-story fortress. He
walked down the hall, passed his | bedroom, and went into the next
room. Panting from exertion and the heat, he drank from the bottle,
already beaded with moisture. Setting it on a stone bench, he fetched
the lab and carefully opened the case. He smiled fondly at the array
of gleaming glass and metal and said under his breath, "Honey, I shrunk
the lab."

He'd been working on this for a long time. The size of a suitcase, it
contained tiny factories, labs, and micromachines. The first set of
shelving held glass wafers the size of credit cards. Chemical etching
techniques allowed him to use hydrofluoric acid to sculpt hundreds of
tiny channels less than half the width of a human hair to produce a
microscopic network of capillaries. These tiny molecular labs could
detect concentrations equivalent to an aspirin tablet dissolved in
twelve Olympic-sized swimming pools.

The second set of shelves held silicon wafers, tiny factories complete
with conveyor belts, mixing vats, and separation systems. The mixers
and movers in the miniature factories used a phenomenon called
dielectrophoresis to harness the small electrical charges generated by
every living thing. Dielectrophoresis relies on the fact that the
capacitance and resistance of a microorganism's cells determine how it
responds in an electric field, and it allowed him to work with samples
100,000 times smaller than normal and to perform an analysis in five
minutes rather than five days.

The third component was the newest. Frankie Richards, who had come up
with the idea, called them "disease dipsticks." Glass wafers coated
with a plastic polymer called polydiacetylene film were able to target
different microorganisms and their toxins. Depending on the toxin, the
film simply changed color like an oldfashioned piece of litmus paper.

Finally, there was a miniature gas chromatograph mass spectrometer. It
was very fast, required only minute samples, and was preprogrammed with
the spectrums of tens of thousands of known compounds.

When it was hooked up to a properly programmed laptop and a satellite
link, Zammit expected the lab to be the latest in environmental science
technology. Soon it would get its first real field test. He sat down
on the bench, drank some more wine, and contemplated the lab. So much
money, time, and effort invested in this project. He went to the
bedroom to fetch his laptop so he could conduct a final test, but
seeing the two suitcases on his bed, he decided to spend a couple of
minutes hanging up his clothes.

After emptying the first suitcase, he bent to open the second. He
dialed the combination, threw back the lid, and pulled out the top two
shirts.

In a convulsive reflex, Zammit jumped back so far he crashed into the
antique armoire in the corner. Eyes closed, breathing hard, he counted
to five. Wiping his sweaty forehead, he walked over and gazed into his
suitcase.

Catula.

The insectoid was motionless on top of a pile of clothing and its eyes
were blank. Following the second command to hide itself, it had
obviously gotten into his luggage after he had packed but before he'd
closed the lid and locked it.

Unable to feed during its long imprisonment, it had run down and was
now asleep.

Gingerly Zammit took it out with both hands. He had never picked it up
before and it was surprisingly light. Asleep, its tentacles hung down
like an octopus's. He half expected it to be warm like a living
creature, or to suddenly start thrashing its eight legs. He didn't
like this thought at all and quickly knelt to lay it on the stone
floor. As he spread it out, the articulated metal tentacles made a
series of tiny clicks as the weight of the body settled.

What the hell am I going to do with this? thought Zammit. As he
considered whether or not to plug it in and revive it, he heard quick
footsteps coming up the stairs, and Aunt Julia appeared in the
doorway.

"Michael, it's His Highness, the Prince Grand Master. He's dropped by
for a visit. I ran into him at the market yesterday in Valletta and
mentioned you were coming. If you could give him a few minutes--he
thinks so highly of you. He--" Her eyes fell to the floor. She
clutched both hands to her mouth.

"No. Please."

Zammit moved quickly toward her but not fast enough and flinched as she
let out a piercing scream.

"It's all right," he said soothingly.

"It's just an experiment. It's asleep."

"Asleep? You mean it's alive?" Her voice rose like a jet engine
preparing for takeoff.

"You bring something that looks like that into this house? Are you
pazzo?" Zammit never liked it when people shouted, much less screamed,
and he wondered if the visitor could hear it. He took her by the
shoulders and explained about Dikka and her insect robots.

"I didn't intend to bring it," he concluded.

"Honest. It just crawled into my luggage."

Wildly her eyes searched his.

"It crawls into places? Well, you are certainly taking it with you
when you leave tomorrow. There it can crawl around all it wants. Let
it make the Turks pazzo!"

"Julia, I don't need it in Turkey. I want to leave it--"

"No! That
malevolent creature is not staying in this house!"

"Julia, it's not malevolent, because it's not alive." Zammit glanced
over at the robot and sighed.

"It just looks malevolent. It's asleep, and you can simply lock it up
somewhere until I come back." Suddenly it occurred to him that it
would be just like Dikka to install a small battery to jump-start the
thing awake after a certain length of time, just enough power so it
could drag itself to an energy source. He remembered his own explosive
terror at three in the morning and figured that in a similar situation,
Julia would have a stroke. What was it he'd read somewhere? All human
beings have an instinctive aversion to snakes, centipedes, and
spiders.

They both turned as they heard the scrape of hesitant footsteps on the
stairs. A tall elderly man of ascetic features and spindly build
appeared in the doorway and bowed slightly, with the elegance of long
practice. He had always reminded Zammit of a kindly praying mantis.

His jet black hair, dyed through vanity, was combed straight back. His
eyebrows were dyed the same color and made his already pale face look
paper white. Replace the expensive navy blazer, aqua-blue shirt, blue
and gold tie, and green slacks with a crimson-lined cloak, thought
Zammit, and you had a benevolent Dracula. In contrast with his
physique, his baritone voice was fat with wine, grappa, and good
cigars.

"Con permesso. Ordinarily I would never dream of intruding, but I
heard this ghastly scream ... " His eyes fell to the floor. He stepped
back a pace.

"Madonna Hesitantly he leaned forward and peered, then smiled
beatifically at Zammit.

"Some sort of experiment, I suppose? Science and all that?

Fascinating."

"Hello, sir. I thought you were usually in Rome at this time of year,"
said Zammit. Damn, he thought, I don't have time for this.

Fra Angelo Fortucci, Grand Master of the Knights of Malta, entered the
room and they shook hands. The old man's pale eyes were keen as they
searched the scientist's face, and he knew they could see the
discomfort there.

"I'm here only briefly. As you know, we are completing the
computerized cataloging and indexing of the Order's archives. The
Jerusalem section has some inexplicable gaps in the 12th century. Also,
there is the annual homage to prepare for."

Zammit nodded as he remembered. September 8 would be the 438th
anniversary of the raising of the Great Siege of 1565. Every year the
knights gathered at the Conventual Cathedral of St ... John to pay
respect to the dead who had saved European civilization.

"Will you be attending his year?" inquired Fortucci.

"Probably not," replied Zammit.

"I have some urgent work to do." He hadn't attended in a long time. He
wondered if his black ceremonial robe with the white satin cuffs and
stitched with the white Maltese cross was falling apart or covered with
dust.

"That's a shame," said Fortucci.

"I can't tell you how much we appreciated what you did in Venezuela
after those mud slides devastated the tenements. Or how grateful we
are for your very handsome annual donation. It is unusual for a
Catholic knight to also be a scientist."

That's the problem, thought Zammit: I live in a divided house of faith
and reason. The death of his parents had badly shaken his adolescent
faith, which had never been strong in the first place, and the
lingering, painful death of his wife had made him even more cynical. He
thought of Adam Richards's disappearance and Frankie's anguish. He
looked at Catula. Maybe God was a spider, weaving dense webs of
destiny into which people blundered and became enmeshed, forever unable
to free themselves. Yet there was the historic connection between his
family and the Order, so he felt compelled to remain a member. Because
the Order was wholly reliant on donations from its members, he assuaged
his guilt with a large sum every year, and when asked helped the
organization in its primary work, disaster relief. He remembered
something his father had told him--how much the Lord hates
hypocrites.

"I must say, that is a remarkably evil-looking creature," said
Fortucci. Zammit realized that the old man had followed his gaze.

"By design or by accident?"

"Design. The woman who made it likes them to look that way."

The elegant black eyebrows arched, and the Grand Master looked quickly
around the room.

"Them?" Once again Zammit explained about Spargo.

"I see. At least it has only the appearance of being evil. Have you
thought any more about the problem of evil since our last
discussion?"

"Yes. You remember Stavros Costopoulos?"

"Of course. A most interesting man. I'd like to speak with him more
often."

Aunt Julia interrupted.

"He's coming tonight. Why don't you have supper with us?"

"I would be both honored and delighted."

"I'll leave you to your discussions," said Julia as she left.

"What a lovely woman," said Fortucci.

"You were saying?"

Zammit looked around his bedchamber with its single chair.

"Why don't we go into the other room and sit down. Would you like a
glass of wine?"

"Please."

He picked up Catula and placed the insectoid back in his suitcase
because he didn't know where else to put it. From the bathroom he
fetched a couple of clean glasses, and they walked down the hall to the
adjoining room. Zammit poured the wine and they sat down.

"Sante," he said as he clinked glasses with the old man.

"To continue. A few weeks ago Stavros introduced me to a forensic
psychologist who works for the FBI."

Fortucci raised an inquiring eyebrow.

"Someone who analyzes the criminal state of mind."

"Ah."

"This guy has made something of a specialty of serial killers, mass
murderers, and the like. I remembered our discussion and asked him if
he believed these people were mentally ill or evil. It was pretty
obvious he'd thought about that question before."

Fortucci sipped his wine.

"And?"

"He said he'd worked on a couple of hundred cases and that in his
opinion almost all of them were mentally ill, as a result of organic
brain damage, abuse, whatever. There was always evidence of a cause to
explain the effect."

The old man's eyes were keen.

"Go on."

"Except for two or three of them. He said they looked human and you
could talk with them, but when you looked in their eyes there was
nothing there. He'd studied one of the female members of the Charles
Manson family because it's unusual to find a woman who's a mass
killer."

"Go on," said Fortucci.

"This is fascinating."

"This psychologist said her eyes were like that. They'd run tests and
determined she wasn't schizophrenic. He said that if you gave this
woman the opportunity to either say good morning to you or slit your
throat, it's fifty-fifty which one she'd choose to do. She simply was
not human in any important way he could recognize. She was morally
insane, a psychopath. In his opinion, she was just plain evil."

The Grand Master nodded thoughtfully.

"Do you agree with him?"

"I'm inclined to respect expert opinion."

"I don't know," said Fortucci. Zammit raised an eyebrow--he had taken
it for granted that the old man would agree with the FBI
psychologist.

"Why not?" he asked.

"It sounds as if this woman functions as a sort of automaton. Does
terrible things without forethought, out of some sort of compulsion.

That spiderish thing of yours--it looks evil, but we know it isn't
because it's just a machine. It sounds to me as if she can no more
control her behavior than a robot, that her ability to make choices is
severely impaired."

Zammit could tell where this was heading.

"You mean she can't exercise free will."

"Precisely. The problem of evil is inseparable from the problem of
free will. A truly evil person is one who is mentally sound but
chooses to do bad things.

It's the element of choice that counts. I think true evil is actually
very rare.

Then again, believers in determinism won't accept that there is such a
thing as free will."

Zammit shrugged, suddenly bored.

"I know my will is free, and that's the end of the debate, as far as
I'm concerned."

The Grand Master smiled.

"A very commonsense approach."

They sat awkwardly for a couple of moments. Fortucci pointed at the
lab.

"What's that?" Zammit explained briefly. The old man shook his
head.

"Amazing." Once again, the keen gaze.

"You like your machines, don't you?"

"Yes. I have a lot of faith in them."

"More faith than you have in your faith, if I may put it that way?"

Zammit didn't want to lie.

"Yes," he said bluntly.

Fortucci didn't seem surprised.

"I'm a practical man who does practical things, not a metaphysician,"

Zammit continued.

"Someone once defined metaphysics as a blind man in a dark room looking
for a black cat that isn't there. I guess that's where faith comes
in:

You say to yourself, I just know that cat's in here somewhere.

Personally I can't bring myself to believe it's there at all."

"The question of faith is important, but we were talking about evil. It
does exist, and we have always fought it."

Another awkward silence, as the Grand Master nodded slowly, formulating
another thought. Zammit glanced at his watch, knowing the old man
could talk about this kind of thing for hours. Basta--enough. Before
Fortucci could say anything more, Zammit said, "Look sir, I have to
test that micro lab before I leave tomorrow morning. I want to do it
before Costopoulos gets here."

The old man put down his glass and rose to his feet.

"Of course. I've been wasting your time." Before Zammit could say.

No, that's not what I meant, Fortucci spoke again as he walked to the
door.

"Perhaps as a man of science, you'll listen to another man of science.

At the end of his life the British physicist Sir James Jeans said,
"I've always thought the universe is a great machine, and now I realize
it is a great thought."

" Before Zammit could reply, the Grand Master was out the door and down
the hall.

His deep voice echoed back.

"Always a pleasure talking to you, my son. I'll keep your aunt company
until dinner."

Zammit spent almost an hour checking the equipment and the computer
until he was satisfied everything was functional.

He sat on the stone bench by the window and finished his wine, staring
unseeingly at the micro lab The computer monotonously spitting out the
same impossible scenario--but it simply wasn't possible for any kind of
organism to exist in the reservoir in such huge amounts. The e-mail
message. He pulled the tattered piece of paper from his pocket and
read it again. Who had sent it, and why? He was filled with a sense
of terrible foreboding. He couldn't shake the suspicion that what was
happening at the Ataturk Dam wasn't natural.

Republic of Tuvanistan, august 31

Abdul Jamal lifted his heavy gold fork and took another mouthful of
Veal Foyot.

He'd tasted the real thing many times at the old Hotel Foyot in Paris,
and this greasy mess didn't even come close. Where was their chef
from, Albania? He sipped quickly from the gold-rimmed wine goblet. At
least they couldn't ruin Leroy Chambertin 1983.

"Pretty good, huh?" asked Ivan Popov, president of Tuvanistan.

"Nothing but the best. The best."

Jamal smiled politely.

"I assure you, it is absolutely extraordinary."

Popov beamed with satisfaction.

For the time being he had to be polite. They could do what they wanted
because they had their own country. Once he had his own country he
could do what he wanted as well. He looked at Ivan, the huge head, the
hairline that started two inches above his eyebrows, the ferrety eyes,
weak chin, and wet lips. He was perfumed like a woman, sported a
diamond pinkie ring and a cabochon ruby, and wore lifts in his shoes to
appear taller than his five feet six inches. Perhaps once he had his
own country he could start a war with theirs. The thought cheered
him.

He picked at the congealed cabbage dumplings that accompanied his
flabby veal, then gave up. For a gourmet this meal was the culinary
equivalent of first-degree murder. He watched as Anastasia wolfed down
her food. Her huge breasts threatened to tumble out of her garish red
dress, which was precisely the wrong color for someone with orange
hennaed hair. She had once been attractive, in a coarse, peep-show
sort of way, but she had gone to fat, and her hips bounced like
saddlebags on an overweight mare. In contrast, her face had the sleek,
tight, wind-tunnel look of someone who had face-lifts almost as often
as they bathed. Her eyes were a brilliant, unnatural
turquoise--obviously colored contact lenses.

To avoid the sight, Jamal looked around the vast banquet hall.

Financed by Tuvanistan's oil revenues, the Popovs had spared no expense
on this enormous vulgar palace. He knew all about the Popovs from the
research he had done before approaching them for refuge, and idly ran
through some of the details.

Ivan was rumored to have started his career as a paid police spy who
specialized in luring "degenerates" into homosexual encounters in
public washrooms.

Anastasia had started hers as a stripper and prostitute, although it
was worth the life of any Tovanian to so much as hint at the fact.

Their respective beginnings as whores led naturally to success in
Soviet-era politics, and both rose to occupy prominent positions as
party apparatchiks. With the demise of the Soviet Union, Tuvanistan
had voted for independence and held its first and last democratic
election. Presidential candidate Ivan Popov had stolen a narrow
victory, which he promptly consolidated by murdering his opponents and
declaring a temporary period of martial law. This suspension of the
constitution had now lasted for ten years.

The Popovs' primary preoccupation was money. They were determined to
have more of it than anyone else. To this end they treated their
oil-field workers as virtual serfs, forcing them to work eighteen-hour
shifts in health and safety conditions that would not have been
unfamiliar to a 19th-century coal miner.

They had a complete list of all the world's 385 billionaires and their
assets and were determined to move up from their present ranking of
number 137. Jamal had been careful to avoid any discussion of his own
wealth, but he also liked to keep score, even though, as a fugitive, he
was not on the list. He estimated that he was number 131. The very
mention of the world's two richest men, the Sultan of Brunei and Bill
Gates, was enough to send Anastasia into paroxysms of jealous rage.

Jamal liked mentioning their names as often as possible without being
too obvious about it. Everyone knew she was the brains of the two.

But not all the money in the world could buy taste or class. He looked
at the giant picture facing him above the priceless 15th century gilt
Venetian mirror.

Painted on aquamarine velvet, a portrait of Anastasia's favorite white
Persian cat stared at him with eyes made of genuine sapphires. He
suppressed a shudder.

"Abdul, would you like more food? More wine?" asked Ivan.

"No more food, my friend. I must watch my weight. But the wine is
excellent."

Ivan clapped his hands and shouted. A cringing servant in bright
yellow livery peeled himself from the wall to pour more Burgundy into
Jamal's glass.

Jamal watched the little man play with his diamond pinkie ring. It was
the sort of gaudy thing he'd seen before only in Las Vegas.

"You know how much of that wine I have?" asked Popov.

"Fifty cases. Cost a fortune. It is the best. One evening I drank
three bottles of it. Next morning, no headache at all. The best."

Jamal sipped as Ivan continued, "It is not often a Muslim drinks wine,
is it?"

He concentrated on replying coolly but courteously.

"There are different kinds of Muslims as there are different kinds of
Christians. Some drink alcohol. But I think very carefully before
cracking open a bottle of cognac in front of the faithful."

"Of course, of course. I didn't mean to offend," said Popov hastily.

He changed the subject.

"I notice you are taking advantage of the palace's communications
system. It is the best. The best."

"Yes it is," agreed Jamal. It was state-of-the-art, and they allowed
him unlimited access to the control room. But he always made sure to
scan the room first electronically to ensure he couldn't be filmed or
recorded by hidden cameras or microphones. And he changed his
encryption protocols twice a day.

"So, business is good as well as brisk?" probed Anastasia, dabbing at
her greasy mouth and removing a lot of her bright red lipstick in the
process.

"I have some deals under way," said Jamal carefully. This was
delicate. The Popovs tried to pump him for information about his
businesses and made unsubtle hints about forming partnerships. That
was the last thing he wanted. His family had been merchants in Oman
for 500 years and had developed an enviable reputation. Of Jamal's
father it was said that when you shook hands with him on a deal, you'd
better count your fingers afterward. Like virtually all former
Communists, the Popovs had about as much understanding of finance as a
Mongolian yak herder. They were looters and gangsters, not
businesspeople, and he had no intention of letting them form part of
his plans. He was here only because it was a refuge, not because he
liked it. Or them.

He watched Anastasia smear a coin-sized bit of toast with truffle and
cognac pate imported from Fauchon in Paris. He felt a sudden stab of
nostalgia for the city where he had spent his youth, and which he could
never visit again.

"With Anwar Hussein?" she asked craftily.

Jamal acknowledged the hit with a tilt of his head. He hated being
surprised.

Were they monitoring his communications after all? He had assumed they
weren't clever enough and made a mental note to double-check.

"A valued client. The Iraqi economy has still not recovered from the
oil embargo and UN sanctions over weapons of mass destruction. And it
is the right of every sovereign nation to defend itself."

"A weapon is defensive or offensive depending on whether you are in
front of it or behind it," sneered Anastasia.

Jamal felt a surge of rage at her tone. Maybe I'll kill her one day,
he thought.

But he smiled and replied, "What they do with their armaments is not my
concern."

Ivan Popov interrupted.

"Speaking of business, are you still into pharmaceuticals? I hear
there's a lot of money in these new drugs, the ones that can be put
into water supplies and such."

Popov was rarely subtle, and even Anastasia winced. He'd brought the
subject up before. He wanted something he could administer to his
people en masse to turn them into docile zombies. It might be a
valuable source of income in the future, but it was a mistake to give
anything away now.

"There are such substances. It might be possible to obtain them." He
shrugged and lied.

"But as always, the mainstays of my business are the more traditional
drugs."

There was a clatter of footsteps and a troop of palace guards burst
in.

"Protector of the Fatherland, Genius of the Caucasus," panted the
leader, "the oil workers are marching on the palace." Dimly Jamal
heard the rattle of gunfire.

Ivan Popov's eyes bulged and his tongue flicked wetly.

"What are you waiting for?" screamed Anastasia. The turquoise eyes
blazed like a viper's in the suddenly reptilian face.

"Kill them all or be killed yourselves!"

The three turned and fled. Abdul Jamal rose to his feet just as Wurban
Ice entered the room with his heavy measured tread. He felt Ice's hot
breath on his ear as he whispered his report.

"Poorly armed, badly led. Hundreds were electrocuted as they tried to
swarm the fence. When it shorted out I killed two of the guards as
they turned to flee, to make the others stand their ground. It is
under control, but some of the workers made it into the palace."

Jamal nodded.

"Go immediately to the control room and protect the communications
equipment. I'll follow. The only people you do not have my permission
to kill are the Popovs."

Ice turned and jogged heavily from the room, unholstering his 9 mm
pistol. Jamal followed, reaching for his own weapon, a small silver
Beretta. In the hallway Ivan wrung his hands as Anastasia shrieked
orders to a milling throng of servants and troops.

Jamal frowned. He was sensitive to political atmosphere, and this
place stank of incompetence, cruelty, and the very real possibility of
revolution. As always when something occurred that he could not
control, a feral snarl transformed his handsome face into something
frightening. The Popovs were idiots. They had their own country, oil
fields, a virtual license to print money, and they were throwing it all
away. You could build yourself a throne of bayonets but you couldn't
sit on it for long. Not without something more.

As he neared the control room he saw a sudden movement out of the
corner of his left eye. Instantly he pivoted and fired three times.

It was an oil-field worker in filthy overalls. Two of the shots had
passed through his throat and the third had drilled him through the
forehead. He was dead and staring.

Jamal heard Ice thudding back down the hallway and waved impatiently to
tell him to make for the communications center. Jamal turned and
continued walking.

Although alert to his surroundings, he was thinking hard.

He made a mental note of whom to contact as soon as the palace was
secure. He could not stay here much longer. Time was of the essence.

Men most fear in others the motives they feel predominant in
themselves, and most of all Jamal wanted to avoid being the victim of
treachery before he could betray his partners.

Malta, Augus 31

"It is good to trust, but it is better not to trust,"

" quoted Dr. Stavros Vyronos Costopoulos.

"An old Roman proverb. Especially when it's a computer program. More
wine?"

Zammit and Costopoulos lounged on the roof of the Lascaris fort next to
the satellite dish, gazing out over Ramla Bay. The night sky arched
over them, strewn with stars like diamonds from the hand of a celestial
benevolent. A fat Mediterranean moon glimmered on the surging sea far
below the towering cliffs.

The scientist studied Costopoulos's hawkish profile with affection.

Forty-eight years old, five foot ten, and a trim 160 pounds, the Greek
was built like a middleweight fighter, even though he didn't like
exercise. He reminded Zammit of the portrait of a man found in the
ruins of Pompeii--thinning black hair combed forward like Julius
Caesar's over a bulging forehead, as if the skull were too small to
contain the overactive brain, a thin impatient line of a mouth softened
by the expression of thoughtfulness in the big brown eyes. They had
met at a conference in Helsinki, had a tremendous argument about
something he couldn't even remember, gone out drinking to continue the
argument, and become fast friends.

Because it was too hot to eat on the roof of the fort, they dined in
the old banquet hall. The long table was made of blackened timbers
taken from the hull of a 16th-century ship that had foundered on
Malta's rocks. The table was strewn with silver utensils, traditional
Maltese earthenware, and lit by a dozen candles. Zammit loved
candlelight. He breathed the smell of hot wax and old cold stone and
enjoyed the way the candles threw everyone's faces into sharp relief,
planes of light and dark, like a painting by Rembrandt.

Supper had been wonderful, as always. Julia had outdone herself with
traditional Maltese delicacies. The most spectacular dish was a
scorpion fish. Its flesh was so fine it was impossible to fry because
it would disintegrate. Instead the whole fish was steamed over boiling
water in which a few fennel seeds had been strewn.

The snow white mouthfuls reminded Zammit of eating a delicately
scented cloud.

The Grand Master and Costopoulos received the choicest delicacies, the
gills.

They also had roast lamb with garlic and oregano, tomatoes fried in
virgin olive oil with onion, garlic, and eggplant, and the cheese
pastries known as pastizzi.

Fortucci drained his wine and sighed.

"Julia, you have surpassed yourself. If I ate like this every day I'd
put on a hundred pounds."

Costopoulos grinned.

"I agree. I shouldn't have had that third helping. But one must
soldier on. What's for dessert?"

"Mqaret," said a blushing Julia, fetching a tray from an antique
sideboard.

They each had several of the diamond-shaped pastry shells filled with
dates mixed with sugar and flavored with aniseed. Julia served
espresso coffee and thimbles of fiery grappa.

The Grand Master was always inquisitive.

"Stavros, I've never known your full name before tonight. Your middle
name is Vyronos. I've never encountered it in the classical
literature."

Costopoulos sipped his grappa.

"Because it isn't there. I'm named after Lordos Vyronos. That's Greek
for Lord Byron, the poet. We've always appreciated the fact that he
fought with us in our war of independence against the Turks in the
1820s. Vyronos is still a common boy's name."

"Fascinating." Then Fortucci got onto one of his favorite topics.

"Are you an active member of the Greek Orthodox Church, or do you have
the good fortune to be Catholic?"

Stavros smiled.

"Let's just say I am amiably agnostic. Ever heard the story about the
philosopher and mathematician Lord Bertrand Russell? He was a pacifist
during World War I, and as a result was arrested. The jailer had to
fill out a form. He asked Russell his religion, and Russell replied,
"Agnostic." The jailer stared at him for a moment, sighed, asked how
to spell agnostic and then said, "Oh, well. At least we all worship
the same God." Russell said that as he sat in his cell, this remark
kept him cheerful for a week."

Fortucci threw his head back and laughed.

"Marvelous."

Costopoulos continued, "I do believe there is an ordering intelligence
in the universe, but what it is, I don't know. As far as organized
religion goes, what's the definition of a cult?"

Zammit had heard this one before.

"The church down the street from yours."

Stavros went on, "I don't like this business of encouraging people to
buy their way into heaven. A few years ago I talked to this old man, a
Greek.

A terrible reprobate, a cheat and a liar. Ninety years old and he's
just given $50,000 to the Orthodox Church. I reminded him that the
only time he was in church his whole life was when he was baptized. His
whole life, nothing but drinking, gambling, and whores. I asked how he
could do such a thing. With tears in his eyes he told me he didn't
want to go to hell. I told him he was thinking like a peasant, that
God is like a headwaiter in a restaurant, you slip him a few bucks to
make sure you don't get a bad table and he's going to make everything
OK. He cried, "But Stavros, I don't want to go to hell." What can you
do with such people?"

After more banter, the Grand Master said his farewell and disappeared
into the warm blue velvet night, waving a thin praying mantis arm and
smoking a Sobranie Black Russian in an amber holder. Julia and Rocco
began clearing the dishes, Zammit took a bottle of wine, and he and
Costopoulos climbed to the roof to have a talk.

The distant surf sounded like the beat of some ancient heart as Zammit
finished briefing the Greek scholar. Costopoulos looked thoughtful as
he filled their glasses with strong Gozitan wine.

Stavros had many talents. Fluent in over a dozen languages, he was
also an expert in the arcane field of cognitive anthropology. INERT
often worked in different cultures to investigate environmentally
harmful practices that might be age-old. Understanding how people
thought about those problems was vital, so the skeptical Greek's
expertise in the history of thought and human psychology was useful. He
was defiantly low-tech, loathing television and computers.

"The day I need machines to help me see and think is the day I blow my
brains out," he'd once said. Like his intellectual ancestor Plato, he
loved theory and abstract thought but didn't have much use for
practical, applied science. Zammit found that their different ways of
looking at the world complemented each other, so when Costopoulos
spoke, he listened.

Stavros spoke now.

"Based on what you've said, there are two theories."

"Which are?"

Costopoulos shrugged.

"You're the field scientist. You tell me."

Zammit sipped his wine.

"Environmental degradation leading to some sort of bizarre organic
contamination. It's happened before. There have been water problems
in the region for thousands of years. That parched desert was once
crammed with people, filled with the richest cities in the world. The
ancient chronicles are full of stories about mysterious outbreaks of
plague and waterborne diseases. Then the barbarians came and wrecked
everything for good."

"And the problem with this theory is?" probed the Greek. Stavros was
addicted to the Socratic method of patient questioning to elicit
understanding.

"Contamination of that nature, whether it's red tides or whatever,
always has an identifiable cause, usually pollution, overpopulation, or
dramatic climatic changes. In this case, there's no industry, no
population pressure, and even though this drought is the worst ever,
it's still part of a cycle as old as civilization itself. So the
environmental theory is out."

Costopoulos nodded as his mind made one of those lizardlike dodges that
many people found disconcerting.

"You know, I love reading the old Greek poets--nymphs, green leafy
places, and water. Always water. A lot of Greece is now sun-bleached
rock. It's like the old gods dried up and blew away. The ancient
Greeks destroyed their environment."

Zammit stood and stretched.

"Just like these islands. World headquarters of the Mother Goddess
cult for thousands of years. More than thirty megalithic temples, far
older than Stonehenge. There used to be dwarf rhinoceroses here, so it
must have been a verdant, watery paradise. My great grandfather was
Sir Themistocles Zammit. He developed a theory that what destroyed the
culture was environmental exhaustion."

Costopoulos filled his glass.

"I've always meant to ask you more about Sir Themistocles. I know he
excavated many of those megaliths. Did he actually find the
Hypogeum?"

Zammit shook his head.

"It was 1902. Someone was excavating the foundation of a house and hit
big rock. Tried to dig it out and crashed through the dome of the
Hypogeum. That's when they called him in. A big underground Neolithic
cathedral.

Looks eerily modern even today."

The Greek gazed out to sea.

"That's what fascinates me about cognitive anthropology. Look at all
the temples here. So many of them, a fantastic exertion for a
Neolithic people with stone tools.

Why did they do it? What did they think they were doing? I've spent
my whole life trying to figure out such things. People always have a
reason for doing something, however bizarre it may seem."

He looked at Zammit, pacing along the battlements.

"Which brings us, I believe, to theory number two."

Zammit sighed.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Frankly, I've been waiting for this for years. The e-mail message is
the clincher. But it still isn't physically possible, at least
according to those damn machines of yours."

"They're just machines. As a detective, I appreciate what Sherlock
Holmes said--when you've eliminated every possible explanation,
whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truth." Zammit
looked at his watch.

"It's midnight. I have to call Cairo."

"I'm not going anywhere. Do you have anything to read?"

"I'll meet you in the library. I have to do some work tonight
anyway."

In the small communications room, the connection came through almost
instantly.

"Cairo. Any news?" asked Zammit.

"Yeah. All bad. The Turkish air force shot down four Iraqi MiGs that
violated their airspace on a flight path toward the Ataturk Dam. Anwar
is moving troops to the border. Assad in Syria hasn't said a word,
which is a bad sign. To top it all off, the Russians and Ukrainians
have started full-scale military and naval maneuvers along the north
coast of the Black Sea. The Turks are upset they weren't notified. The
president can't get an explanation from the Kremlin or Kiev about what
the hell is going on. Mike, you don't have a lot of time."

Zammit briefed Cairo on his discussions with Stavros Costopoulos. There
was a long silence at the other end of the line.

"Damn," said Jackson finally.

"When do you leave?"

"Early this morning. I want you to contact Lloyd Lavender. Who else
am I meeting at Urfa?"

"Colonel Hakim Yildiz, Turkish Chief of Intelligence. Expert in
counterinsurgency. Supposed to be smart."

"Do I see Prime Minister Amurkhan?"

"No. She's fighting for her political life against the
fundamentalists."

Zammit rubbed his face.

"Have you heard anything at all from Connie?"

"Yeah. A few minutes ago. Apparently something went wrong with the
refrigeration facilities at Urfa and the samples are useless."

Zammit thought quickly.

"I don't want any more mistakes. Tell Lavender and Yildiz I want to go
directly to the dam instead."

"OK."

"Anything else?"

"Yes. Remember you asked me to look into that New Age fake Edward
Pompo and his two Irish goons?"

"I'd forgotten all about it. It's not important now."

"I wouldn't be too sure. Checked with the FBI and the CIA. Very
interesting.

Pompo makes a fortune off of other people's gullibility, but apparently
he really does believe all that crap about post industrial society and
the rest. I doubt his two goons do. Fergus Cronin and Roy Dool,
ex-IRA turned freelance bodyguards because they've been terrorists for
so long they're unfit for any other kind of work. And guess what?

Pompo's institute, the Spiritual Brotherhood of the Shit-Eaters or
whatever it's called, is international. He does a lot of work in
Ireland, where I guess he picked up Cronin and Dool. Also, he's
apparently been doing business in Russia, of all places. In fact, he's
there now. I understand his institute's emphasis on shamanism, prayer,
faith healing, and back to-the-landism strikes some sort of chord with
the Russkies. He left for St ... Petersburg right after you made him
look like a fool on the Molly Katz show."

Surprised, Zammit tried to digest this information, which seemed
significant in some way he couldn't put his finger on.

"Mike, you still there?" asked Jackson.

"Yes." Zammit abandoned his attempt at analysis. Stop being
compulsive, he berated himself. Despite their increasing frequency, he
was always surprised by the synchronicities that occurred as a result
of the increasing globalization of the world's economy and the ease
with which people, industries, and ideas moved around the planet. All
of what Cairo had just said had to be mere coincidence.

Irritably he shrugged off his original suspicion that it was more than
chance.

You could spend your life in a fog of paranoia if you let yourself
worry about such things.

"So now we know the Russians are as gullible as Americans.

Why am I not surprised. What about the Ataturk Dam and reservoir? Any
more deaths?"

"No. The whole thing is shut down. Syria and Iraq aren't getting a
drop of water. Reuters and Associated Press stringers have been
sniffing around, and the Turkish military has put them in detention.

With their arrest, the downing of the fighter planes, and the rhetoric
from Iraq, pretty soon the media is going to be on this big time."

After a few more terse words Zammit rang off and went into the
library.

The Greek looked up from a leather-bound volume and listened as Zammit
summarized what he'd learned from Cairo Jackson.

"Stay, you might as well go to bed. As a result of our discussion I'm
going to run through this again."

Costopoulos looked at the computer in distaste as he left the room.

Far into the night, as waves crashed on the rocks and threw tangy,
sea-scented spray into the perfumed air, Mike Zammit traveled back
through time to the cradle of civilization, Mesopotamia, and its
lifeblood, the rivers of Babylon.

Alternating between glowing screen and musty books, he sifted through
all the information at his command. As he read, it seemed that thin
shapes formed and moved in the deep shadows of the great room. Ghostly
armored soldiers re fought desperate battles now known only to
scholars, faint voices shouted in fear and rage, empires secular and
religious came and went. Clouds of dust marked the passage of mythic
armies, themselves now nothing but myth and dust. And old gods died,
and new ones were born.

ATATURK Dam, September 1

As the huge black helicopter thundered over the Ataturk Dam, Mike
Zammit wished the sound weren't so loud. He'd drunk too much wine the
previous evening and he was short of sleep. He stared out the window.

He'd seen pictures of what it was supposed to look like, but nothing
had prepared him for this sight.

The acronym DSi was displayed on the gray face of the giant dam in huge
white letters--the Turkish abbreviation for the Southeastern Anatolia
Development Project's builder, the State Hydraulic Works. On one side
of the dam, where there should have been sky blue water, there was a
lumpy greenish mat. As he tried to ignore his queasy stomach, it
struck Zammit that the reservoir looked like a colossal toilet bowl
filled with green vomit. On the other side, nothing but parched
riverbed and aimless eddies of dust.

Connie Palaeov tapped his shoulder and pointed. Below them was the
helicopter pad. Whirling blades slashed the hot air as they descended
into a melee of tense-looking engineers and shouting soldiers.

After landing at Urfa airport, Zammit and Costopoulos had gotten a
briefing from Palaeov and Lloyd Lavender. Connie said the samples had
been stored in refrigeration units whose power supply failed before he
could start testing.

According to Lavender, such a failure was a common occurrence,
especially during the summer, although the Turks angrily denied such a
thing was possible at their facility.

As they stepped from the helicopter. Lavender and Palaeov helped
Zammit lift the padded cases that contained the micro lab and other
equipment onto the tarmac.

Ripples of superheated air shimmered on the asphalt. The smell of fear
was pervasive, as was the smell of something else.

"Christ Almighty," said Lavender, blinking sandy lashes over opaque
blue eyes as he squinted in distaste.

"Stinks like a Marseilles sewer in July." The fetid stench was
everywhere, and Zammit could already feel it penetrating his clothing.

He swallowed hard and tried not to think about his queasy stomach.

Definitely too much wine.

There was something familiar about the appearance and smell of the
greenish mat.

He tried to remember. Another body of water somewhere, long ago.

Suddenly he had it. Twenty-one, the scientific member of a hotshot
forest fire fighting crew in northern Canada, investigating the effect
of random burn patterns on boreal forest wildlife. Cut off from his
crew, forced to the edge of a lake by a wall of fire, he had leapt into
the water, penetrating a layer of blue-green slime and ingesting a fair
amount of it as he thrashed around, struggling to remove his heavy
boots and flak jacket before they pulled him under. It had smelled a
little like this, and he'd been ill for several days afterward. Itched
like hell too. What had it been? Some sort of algae. No, that wasn't
quite right. He couldn't recall anything more. Was it algae in the
Ataturk reservoir? If so, what species could be so lethal and grow so
fast in an environment with virtually no nutrients?

A stocky man of medium height approached them as they ducked under the
helicopter blades and away from the turbulence. The gold braided
military cap and immaculate dark blue uniform contrasted strangely with
the cigarette that stuck rakishly from the corner of his mouth.

Lloyd Lavender shouted in Zammit's ear, "Colonel Hakim Yildiz, Turkish
Chief of Intelligence. He speaks English."

Yildiz's dry firm grip was different from the usual limp Middle Eastern
handshake, which was like squeezing a damp rubber glove half-full of
warm water and made you want to wipe your hand on your pants. Zammit
stared into a swarthy face with a thick black moustache and big sad
brown eyes beneath eyebrows as heavy as black caterpillars. He saw an
intelligent but worried man.

"Did anyone ever tell you that you look like Omar Sharif?"

"Often," replied Yildiz sardonically.

"I even play bridge."

Zammit grinned in spite of himself. This guy was quick. He introduced
Connie and Stavros.

"Merhaba," Costopoulos greeted the soldier in Turkish.

Yildiz's eyes were suddenly hard and appraising.

"I don't wish to be rude, but no one told me there would be a Greek
coming. This is a restricted facility, and for reasons of national
security I'll have to ask--" Zammit had anticipated something like
this. Creeks and Turks mixed like oil and water. They had fought
several wars in the past hundred years and were still feuding over the
island of Cyprus.

"He's with me," he interrupted.

"And he stays with me. If he goes, I go, and you can deal with this
mess on your own."

Yildiz finally shrugged.

"Russians, Americans, Greeks." He flicked his cigarette onto the hot
tarmac.

"So much for security."

He turned and gestured for them to follow. Soon they stood 600 feet in
the air on the narrow walkway of the dam's crest, more than a mile
long. Zammit looked out over the wrinkled, fetid green carpet of
contamination in the reservoir far below him, imprisoned behind the
concrete wall of the Ataturk Dam. Then he walked a few feet to the
other side and stared at the dry riverbed of the Euphrates, meandering
toward the horizon, Syria, and Iraq. The poison's only outlet. He
frowned. He lifted his arm and pointed his index finger at the horizon
along the track of the dry riverbed, then jerked his finger as if
pulling the trigger of a gun.

"What are you doing?" demanded Colonel Hakim Yildiz.

"Thinking. Remembering." Zammit turned away.

They descended to the control room. The silence was eerie--the thrum
that would ordinarily have filled the facility was gone. Colonel
Yildiz waved at the array of blinking monitors and panels.

"As you can see, the complex is completely closed down. The turbines
are not running, and no water is being released."

"Have you tried filtering the organic material and the poison from the
water?"

asked Lavender.

The Turk gestured irritably.

"Of course. The filtration system can remove occasional debris. It
could even remove the organic material, given time. But not the poison
it secretes. This is a dam, not a water treatment facility."

He turned to Zammit.

"I have been instructed by the prime minister to give you every
assistance. How do you wish to proceed?"

"I want to collect some samples from the reservoir directly."

"But we have been collecting them ourselves. We have several large
tanks filled with both water and organic material, and we have
laboratory equipment."

A few quick questions were enough to determine that the samples were
old enough to have decayed significantly. Besides, Zammit had his own
agenda, which he had worked out with Costopoulos on the way to Urfa.

After explaining the purpose of the micro lab and how fast it could
complete an analysis, he said, "But there's no reason not to test your
samples as well.

Connie, you and Stavros check out those tanks. I'll get suited up for
a trip to the water's edge." The two nodded and were escorted from the
control room.

Zammit turned to Yildiz and asked a question, hoping for a negative
answer.

"Any more deaths by inhalation?"

The Turk shook his head.

"We have been very careful. That terrible stink is everywhere, and
many of the personnel have come down with headaches and other maladies,
but no one else has died. The stench is worst near the water's edge,
and whenever anyone ventures near they wear oxygen equipment."

"Have you completed the autopsy on the soldier who died?"

"No. But we should have the results today."

Zammit nodded.

"Any more ventures into your airspace by the Iraqis?"

"No. And there better not be," he said grimly. He turned to Lloyd
Lavender.

"I

understand we have some strategy to discuss?"

Lavender nodded.

"The White House and the Pentagon have researched several probable
scenarios. I'd like to brief you as soon as possible."

"Do it while I'm running the tests," said Zammit.

"Where can I change?"

Yildiz escorted the two of them to the locker room and Zammit opened
his equipment bag. He took out the orange protective suit and began
checking the seams and breathing apparatus as Yildiz lit another
cigarette. He held the pack of extra-strong Birincis out to Zammit,
eyes alert through the pungent blue cloud of Turkish tobacco smoke.

"No thanks." The Turks were among the world's heaviest smokers and
proud of their most famous product.

"Why not?" said Lavender.

"I quit months ago, but I'd rather inhale cigarette smoke than that
godawful stench."

As Lavender accepted a light from Yildiz, Zammit said, "Tell me a
story, colonel."

"What kind of story?"

"About this dam. About that stinking green muck out there. You must
have a few theories."

As he pocketed his lighter, Yildiz blew two columns of smoke from his
nostrils like a sad-eyed dragon.

"You have to remember what we have been through with this project.

More than thirty years of planning and hard work. No other country,
no bank syndicate, not even the World Bank, would lend us any money. We
had to finance the whole thing ourselves, all 32 billion dollars. The
government sold bonds and the people bought them, like financing a war.

Only it was a war of economic development.

Every Turkish citizen feels they have a stake in this, that they own
it."

"Why wouldn't they lend you the money?"

"Because they think we're a Third World country, that the project is
too big for us. That it will cause environmental damage. Because of
threats from Syria and Iraq."

"And the Kurdish problem too," said Lavender, as he transferred the
Birinci cigarette to his left hand and ran his right through suddenly
damp strawberry blond hair. Zammit noticed that he was even paler than
before and sweat was beading on his upper lip. Dizzy from the
unaccustomed powerful tobacco.

Yildiz raised his shoulders toward his ears and his eyebrows toward the
ceiling.

"Officially, there is no ethnic group called Kurds. Officially, they
are called Mountain Turks."

"Name games aside," replied Zammit, "as I recall from my briefings,
you're an expert in counterinsurgency?"

Yildiz nodded as he watched Zammit program his cell phone.

"That's why I know this area so well. Half our army, almost 300,000
men, is tied down in this part of the country trying to keep things
under control. It costs us 6 billion dollars a year."

"They want their own country, right? Kurdistan?" asked Lavender,
stubbing out his half-finished smoke.

"I understand the Kurds are the largest ethnic group in the world
without their own nation."

"Yes, they want their own country. It would mean taking most of this
area, southeastern Anatolia, and part of northern Iraq, as well as
chunks of Iran, Syria, and Azerbaijan. The area known as the Kharkurk
Triangle." He inhaled moodily.

"It is like your Bermuda Triangle. Every year we launch a cross-border
offensive at their base camps, and every year all we do is make the
Iraqis and Iranians furious and watch thousands of troops and billions
of dollars disappear. The Kurdish population is spread over all five
nations. But they can't have their own country."

"Why not?" asked Zammit.

Yildiz sighed.

"Turkey was founded in 1923 from the shattered remnants of the Ottoman
Empire. There are dozens of ethnic groups--should we let them all have
their own country? We must concentrate on making a Turkish identity.

We are surrounded by hostile nations.

The Kurds live in a political entity called the Republic of Turkey, and
they must be Turks. That is one of the reasons we have such high hopes
for this project. We will turn the Plain of Harran into an
agricultural Eden, what this part of the world was 4,000 years ago.

Prosperity for everyone, including the Kurds. Maybe wealth will make
them forget this nonsense about nationhood."

"Somehow I doubt it," said Zammit.

"Based on what I've heard, what they'll remember is that you've forced
the evacuation of thousands of their villages, all of which will be
drowned when the drought ends and the reservoir finally starts filling
to capacity."

Yildiz shrugged.

"It was necessary. You can't break an omelet without making waves."

"What?" asked Lavender.

The Turk frowned.

"It is not correct? American slang is very hard to keep straight."

"Never mind," said Zammit, suppressing a smile.

"Tell me more about the Kurdish problem."

"It is like a fight within a family. I seem to remember a similar
situation in America. Some states wanted independence, their own
government and country, and there was a terrible war."

"The Civil War."

"That's it. I don't know how many Americans wanted to leave, but there
are more than 25 million Kurds in total, and they make up almost twenty
percent of the Turkish population. It's not like they are some tiny
minority." He sighed.

"I'm half-Kurdish myself." Zammit looked at him, surprised.

"So is the deputy prime minister. Just like your American Civil War,
this war is like a fight within a family. It's horrible."

"What about the green muck and the poison? You must have some
theories, some suspicions."

Yildiz blew a smoke ring.

"I suspect everyone. It's my job." His gaze was appraising.

Zammit didn't like the look.

"Even us?"

Yildiz shrugged.

"Even though you are an American, I have been briefed.

Historically, the Maltese and the Turks have not exactly been the best
of friends."

Lavender cleared his throat nervously to defuse the tension.

"You don't have to worry about us. Who else do you suspect?"

"Kurds. Iraqis. Syrians. Greeks. Martians. Everyone."

Zammit stepped into the orange suit and tucked the helmet under his
arm.

"I wish this had an air-conditioning unit built into it." He punched a
button on the phone.

"Just testing, Stay. I'm heading outside. Anything interesting in
those tanks?"

He listened.

"I didn't think so. Keep at it anyway." As he slipped the phone into
its holster he said, "I'll relay data to my headquarters back in
Seattle via satellite link." He picked up the micro lab and paused by
the door.

"I'll meet you back in the control room," Yildiz said to Lavender.

Graves's man nodded and left.

Yildiz picked up the case containing the communications gear and led
the way to the utility shaft. They took the elevator down to the
ground level and walked through the maintenance garage. It was filled
with big trucks, maintenance vehicles, tanks, hoses and soldiers.

They stopped by a Jeep.

"You want an escort of soldiers? A driver, at least?"

asked Yildiz.

"No thanks. I'm the only one who can do this, and watching me perform
the tests is about as exciting as watching water evaporate. I won't be
long."

Yildiz frowned suspiciously.

"Why don't you get the samples and come back here to do your analysis
and transmission instead of carrying all this equipment?"

Zammit thought fast. He didn't want to explain his theories just yet,
and depending on what he found in the reservoir, he didn't want Yildiz
listening in on his conversation with Frankie Richards.

"This is the first field test for this equipment. I want to see how it
performs in the wild, so to speak. As for the transmission, this
facility is crammed with electronics, and there might be interference.

It's best if I do it out there."

Yildiz shrugged as Zammit put the micro lab and communications gear
into the rear and climbed behind the wheel of the Jeep, his suit making
it awkward. He put the orange helmet on the seat beside him and turned
the ignition.

"Showtime."

Yildiz thrust his arm in front of Zammit's face. The scientist stared
at the watch for a moment, then grinned. There was no doubt the
colonel's command of American slang left something to be desired.

"Thanks. I'll be back before you can say cracker-jack." As the Turk's
heavy eyebrows contracted, Zammit engaged the gears and drove out of
the garage and onto the maintenance road that accessed the reservoir.

While on the dam's crest he had decided where he was going to take his
samples. He squinted up into the sky, glowing like an inverted enamel
blue bowl.

In the distance he saw a couple of squat hills with shaved-off tops
through a shimmering smoky heat haze, quite unlike the rolling hillocks
that characterized most of the brown and dusty landscape. He knew they
were ancient settlements or cities, untouched by any archaeologist.

There were hundreds of them throughout southeastern Turkey, once the
richest part of the Roman Empire before it had reverted to desert with
the coming of the barbarians.

Almost a mile from the dam, he stopped the Jeep, wiped the sweat from
his face, put on his helmet, and adjusted the flow of oxygen. Then he
drove down the service road to the edge and stopped. Leaning his
muscular forearms on the wheel, he frowned at the blanket of green muck
and the strange greenish-black bulbs growing from its surface.

Underneath the orange suit, he wore a collarless, long-sleeved black
Gore-Tex shirt and black slacks of the same fabric. A trickle of sweat
down his spine again reminded him of the searing heat. He looked
around as he got out of the Jeep. Apart from a patrol of soldiers a
hundred yards away, there was no one in sight. He carried the two
cases to the top of the slight rise, set them down, and gazed at the
brown desolation that stretched to the horizon.

Zammit opened the communications suitcase and contemplated its
contents. As usual he'd brought too much stuff, but then he never knew
what conditions he might have to work in.

He removed the dual-mode satellite adapter, the size and shape of a
sniper's scope, and snapped it into the Qualcomm-made multimode cell
telephone. Now he could communicate anywhere on earth through the
Globalstar Satellite Communications System, a series of geosynchronous
satellites orbiting the earth.

Now the lab.

Zammit intended to perform several tests. He wanted to determine the
morphology of the organic material through visual examination under the
microscope as well as conduct some basic DNA sequencing. Then the
molecular labs, disease dipsticks, and GC mass spectrometer would help
him identify the toxin in the water. Or so he hoped.

He tore the plastic wrap off an empty specimen container and tucked it
under his arm as he prepared the underwater sample retrieval device. He
fitted a sterilized reinforced glass ampoule to the end of a syringe.

After plugging it into the barrel of the gas handgun, he inserted a gas
cartridge into the butt.

It took only a few moments to program the gun to detect resistance so
that the ampoule would come to rest in the water once it had penetrated
the layer of green muck. He selected a container of distilled water,
snapped the seal off the spout, and walked down the slope to the
water's edge.

For a few moments he contemplated the foul green carpet that spread
before him, gleaming under the bright sun as if it were coated with
oil. Then he knelt and scooped a containerful of the green muck. It
was slimy and dense, the color and consistency of thick green oil paint
but heavier. He carefully sealed the container, rinsed it and his
glove with distilled water to clean off the residual contamination,
then laid it on the ground.

He aimed the gas handgun. Knowing the recoil was terrific, he used
both hands to fire the projectile into the muck at an angle of thirty
degrees. After a few seconds the wire securing the syringe to the gun
was taut. He looked at the gauge and whistled softly. Twenty feet.

What was this stuff? He thumbed the button to open the syringe and
obtain a sample of the water underneath the green slime, then pushed
the retrieve button. He watched as the wire re spooled and brought the
ampoule back to the surface. Holding it at arm's length, he rinsed it,
then picked up the container of green muck and walked back up the rise
to where he had left his gear.

From the micro lab he removed the equipment he needed for the moment.

Reaching into a coverall pocket, he took out what looked like a slab of
metal. He unfolded it and laid it over the micro lab He'd figured
that when working in a desert, it would be wise to place an aluminum
sheet over the equipment to reflect sunlight so it didn't overheat and
incapacitate the miniature systems in the lab, perhaps by melting the
plastic film on the disease dipsticks.

Miniaturization was always a tradeoff--small and fast was great, but
the price was fragility and vulnerability.

Zammit knew he'd have to work quickly. He held up the container of
slimy green organic material.

"You first, you nasty bit of whatever-you-are."

He took a small amount and mixed it in another container with distilled
water to obtain a dilute solution, then smeared some on a sterile
slide. Using a clean glass pipette, he added purple dye to make the
cells stand out from the gelatinous mucous sheath surrounding them and
covered the slide with another thin glass sheet to prevent the sample
from drying out. He examined the slide under the miniature microscope,
then started keying information into the laptop.

Ten minutes later he stopped, frowning at the image on the screen. It
matched the image under the microscope almost exactly.

"Impossible." He stared out over the expanse of fetid green muck that
stretched to the horizon.

"But there it is."

He loaded some of the water sample into the receptor ends of the glass
slides and silicon wafers that made up the miniature molecular labs. As
the analysis proceeded, he took one of the disease dipsticks and
immersed it in the water sample as well. Next he used a pipette to
load a sample into the spectrometer.

All three tests worked perfectly and he had the results in less than
five minutes.

Zammit stood. He reached up, disengaged the oxygen unit, and pulled
off his orange helmet. He lifted his face toward the scorching sky. He
could feel the sun drying the moisture on his brow. The putrid flesh
smell was so powerful he could taste it as well as smell it. He felt
his gorge rise and swallowed. It might stink, but breathing it
wouldn't kill you.

He felt a vibration and pulled the phone from its holster.

"Stay?"

"Mike, the results just came in from the autopsy on the corporal. He
had an aortic aneurysm, one of those silent congenital defects. The
violent vomiting caused by the foul smell triggered a heart attack. I
assume a healthy person can't die by inhalation."

"I figured that out already."

Zammit threw his helmet on the ground, thinking furiously. It was the
only possible explanation, and based on his research it was certainly
plausible. He spoke again into the phone.

"Is Colonel Yildiz there? Good. Ask if the Turkish army has ever used
organophosphate chemical weapons against the Kurds in this area. And
inform him as nicely as possible that if he lies to me I'll shove his
cigarettes up his ass."

He had to wait only a few moments.

"No? Is he telling the truth?"

He sighed.

"OK. If you think so, I trust your assessment. Don't say anything
more. I've got an approximate structural identification and a toxin
verification as well. Also, there are some odd compounds in the water.

The probability of all this stuff being here naturally is about as
great as finding a McDonald's on the moon. I'm going to transmit the
data to Frankie in Seattle, then drive back. We have an ugly problem
here, and I want to be sure about our results before we tell the Turks
anything." He ended the transmission.

He unplugged the laptop from the micro lab and stood the case up on one
end to minimize contact with the hot soil. Draping the aluminum sheet
over it, he put the satellite phone on top of the case, punched a
button to dial, then hit the speaker function and wearily sat down on
the ground.

"Mike?"

"Frankie, I hope you're alert as well as awake. I've got a poison ID.

The concentration is incredibly high and climbing. It's an endotoxin,
an alkaloid with a chemical signature similar to cocaine."

"Anything more?"

"Not about the toxin. The detailed analysis is up to you. But that's
not the weird part. I remembered something that happened to me years
ago when I was fighting forest fires in Canada. I jumped into a lake
filled with blue-green algae. Using that experience, I was able to do
a very directed investigation.

The organic material that generates the Ataturk contamination is a
massive bloom of cyanobacteria. Appears to be stromatolites, believe
it or not. Ring a bell?"

"Yes," said Frankie.

"Wait a sec, I'm doing a search. Here it is. Until 30 years ago
cyanobacteria were called blue-green algae. It's one of the most
ancient life forms on the planet, originating more than 3 billion years
ago. The name change was the result of the discovery that it isn't
really algae at all but a weird intermediate life form, one of the
earliest rungs on the evolutionary ladder. A type of bacteria that,
like a plant, uses photosynthesis to thrive."

"As I recall, there are several species. Cyanobacteria can survive
anywhere, from the tropics to the Antarctic. But I've never heard of
anything that kills on this scale."

Frankie Richards continued.

"Ordinary pond or lake scum is often cyanobacteria.

It's relatively harmless, if unsightly and smelly. But you say
they're stromatolites? They're the most ancient of all cyanobacteria,
found in very few places. Billions of years ago, stromatolites slowly
began filling the young Earth's atmosphere with oxygen. Without
stromatolites and the oxygen they produced, the Earth would be barren
of all oxygen-based life forms. But some species produce nasty
toxins."

"So," said Zammit, "they gave life, and they can take it away. But
what's the stuff we're dealing with here? I can't do a lot of DNA
sequencing with this equipment, but I did a little. A lot of the base
pairs don't line up at all with any known species of cyanobacteria.

This thing is really strange."

"May I suggest a next step?" Lots of static.

"Frankie, this transmission is breaking up. Make it quick."

"Transmit your data to me, so I can determine what kind of
cyanobacteria it is and the toxin it generates. But we also have to
figure out how to kill it."

"I agree," said Zammit.

"And although we've got an ID, we still need an MO--how the hell did it
get here? Incidentally, I've figured out part of that e-mail
message ... "

Suddenly Zammit noticed movement out of the corner of his eye. The
drape of the aluminum sheet reflected distorted images like a funhouse
mirror, and the shapes moving up behind him didn't look like anything
he wanted to see.

Without turning around, he said, "Got trouble. Transmitting now.

"Mike, what's wrong? Are you OK?"

He quickly plugged the laptop into the satellite phone. He typed fast,
trying to keep one eye on the monstrous shapes approaching him. They
halted briefly, and he heard a word barked in a language he didn't
understand. Pretending not to hear, he typed commands as fast as he
could. He forced himself to concentrate on what he was doing, forced
himself not to look at the looming danger.

Another barked order as a giant shadow suddenly darkened over him. He
hit the transmit key just as something very hard hit the base of his
skull. And then all was night.

It was still night when he awoke, only it was starry night. It took
him several moments to realize that the stars were in his eyes.

The back of his head ached. He rolled over onto his side, suddenly
stopped by a wave of nausea. In front of him he could dimly see the
orange sleeve of his right arm. He managed to raise himself on one
elbow and looked groggily around.

He seemed to be buried alive.

The chamber in which he lay was the size of a suburban bedroom but made
entirely of some strange white rock that glowed eerily. A lantern on
the floor cast a dim light. A shadowy silhouette in the doorway called
someone, his voice echoing hollowly. Zammit closed his eyes and lay
back again.

He was roused by a blinding light. He tried to shield his eyes from
the flashlight's beam. As it dimmed he became aware of several people
around him. A woman knelt at his side. Her jaw was square and set.

Short ebony hair framed unfriendly pale gray eyes. She was about
thirty years old, with a badly broken nose and a long scar on her left
cheek. She was pointing a .45 automatic at his groin. She said
something guttural in a voice of command.

Zammit replied, "Think of me as a dog. I only follow orders I can
understand given by someone I know."

The pale gray eyes appraised him.

"You speak English. You are not a Turk?"

"No. American."

"Lucky for you. If you were a Turk we'd kill you." She jabbed his leg
with the gun.

"Where does that filth in the reservoir come from? Did you put it
there?"

"I don't know where it comes from, and I didn't put it there."

"Did the Turks put it there?"

"No."

She gestured at the micro lab and the communications suitcase,
half-hidden in a gloomy corner.

"What are those?"

Zammit didn't like her attitude.

"I'm a traveling salesman. I must say the markets here suck."

She swatted him across the face with the pistol barrel. When he could
raise his head again, she was across the room, removing her quilted
jacket. After tossing it in a corner she strode back toward him. She
was heavily muscled for a woman, the kind of long lean muscles that
mean hours of training and that spell power. She wore heavy black
combat boots, a sleeveless green tank top, and khaki combat pants. Her
arms, on the inside elbows, were heavily scarred with crazed slashes
everywhere. As if she had tried to commit suicide with a razor and
wanted to die so badly she couldn't wait.

"Failed your correspondence course in home surgery, I see."

She lifted the pistol again and he braced himself. Nothing. He opened
his eyes.

She was looking at him intently. The others in the room were all men.

Two wore camouflage, the others the flowing trousers, bomber jackets,
wide sashes, and coiled turbans he recognized as traditional Kurdish
dress. The two men pointing AK-47 Kalashnikovs at him had wild,
romantic countenances, with hooked noses, great shocks of long black
hair, and dark, intense eyes.

The effort of holding his head up to talk to her was making him
giddy.

"A pirate movie. Where's Errol Flynn?"

"Shut up."

"Mind if I get up?" She pointed the .45 at his forehead.

"Whatever you say."

"What is your name?"

"Michael Zammit."

"What is your profession?"

"Environmental investigator." She nodded thoughtfully.

"And your name?"

"You may call me Sultana."

"And your profession?"

"Freedom fighter." Her gray eyes were as cold as dirty ice.

"You're a Kurd?"

She nodded.

"I am a member of the Kurdish Workers' Party."

Zammit gingerly touched his face. The skin wasn't broken.

"The PKK. You're one of the Kurdish guerrilla groups keeping half the
Turkish army tied down." He looked around the ancient stone room.

"I like your ultramodern headquarters. Got a fax machine I can use?"

"Your sense of humor is very tiresome," said Sultana.

"And your English is very good."

"I was educated in the United States. I came back here as a teacher
to help my people by working in the more remote villages. I realized
it wasn't enough to do good works. Then I ran into ... some troubles.

It made me hard, and I joined the PKK."

Zammit glanced again at the broken nose, the facial scar, the slashed
arms.

"I'm sorry about your troubles."

She stared at him for a moment, then started pacing.

"I recognize your name from when I was in America. Beluga whales in
the St ... Lawrence Seaway, their carcasses so filled with industrial
chemicals they had to be classified as toxic waste."

"You have quite a memory."

"What are you doing here?"

"There's poison in the reservoir, generated by the green slime. It's
killing people downstream. The Syrians and Iraqis are angry. The
Turks asked me to investigate."

"Most of those killed downstream are my people." Her gray eyes smoked
like banked fires.

"The Turks can try to find us. We will cut their balls off."

"Have the Turks used chemical weapons against your people?"

"No. The Iraqis have, several hundred miles away, but not the Turks.

Why?"

"There are high concentrations of organophosphates in the reservoir
water, as well as poison. If there was intensive agriculture in this
area and lots of pesticides being used, that might account for it. Or
if the Turks were using chemical weapons, it's just possible it could
be a natural phenomenon.

Otherwise, such material just can't be there."

"Unless someone put it there," said Sultana.

"Unless someone put it there," agreed Zammit.

She knelt beside him.

"What if I told you the Iraqis did it?"

He gazed up into her battered face.

"Look, do you mind if I get up?"

She held out her hand. He grasped it, and with surprising strength she
heaved him to his feet. He felt the blood drain from his face and
swayed dizzily. Three of the men braced the muzzles of their rifles
against his body.

"It's OK, guys. I promise not to fall down."

Sultana said something and they backed away. Zammit turned to face
her.

"Everyone knows the Iraqis have chemical weapons. They're not shy
about using them. But why would they poison their own water supply?

And how would they get the stuff into the reservoir? I understand
this part of the country is sealed up so tight a Kurd can't walk out of
his tent at night to take a leak without the Turks knowing about it."

She crossed her muscled arms across her chest.

"How they would plant it in the reservoir, I don't know. And if the
Turks have this area sealed up so tight, how are we able to keep
fighting, and abduct you from right under their noses in broad
daylight?"

"I concede the point," admitted Zammit.

"Everyone knows Anwar Hussein hates the Turks. And since when has the
welfare of his own people ever kept him awake at night?"

"Once again, good point. But does he strike you as an email kind of
guy?"

As she stared, Zammit said, "Never mind."

"We know it's the Iraqis," she continued.

"They were moving troops and armor to the border even before people
started dying downstream. They tell UN monitors it's to combat us, but
it's a lie. They knew the water was going to be poisoned.

We shot down one of their aircraft right on the border. One of the
passengers was a top general. We interrogated him. He didn't tell us
much before he died, but he confirmed what our spies already told us.

Something big is being prepared."

"He can't possibly be thinking of invading. Half the Turkish army is
here. It'd be no contest. And it still doesn't answer the question
why Anwar would poison his own water supply."

"There's something else," said Sultana.

"Several weeks ago we were approached by representatives of the
Resistance Army of Allah. They asked if we wish to participate in the
liberation of Turkey from the corruption of Westernism. They seem to
think the government will be overthrown soon."

"Aren't they behind the riots against Prime Minister Amurkhan?"

Sultana nodded.

"Fundamentalists. They specialize in bombings, mostly in Istanbul and
Ankara. They also assassinate Turkish diplomats abroad. What were
they doing here, where they've never operated before?"

"What did you tell them?"

"Not interested. We're political fighters for Kurdistan, not religious
zealots.

It is a known fact that Anwar has been cultivating them for his own
purposes, whatever they may be."

Zammit shook his head.

"It still doesn't make sense."

"There's more. Other people have been observed in the area. I don't
know who they are. They ignore us, so we ignore them. They are
heavily armed, stealing antiquities."

"Antiquities? Where?"

Sultana gestured at the cool dim stone room.

"Places like this. The whole area is filled with ancient cities and
temples, most never excavated. This was once the richest part of the
world, and treasures are buried everywhere. The geology is mainly
limestone, so there are miles of caverns and tunnels. But this is the
only underground temple we have found."

"Underground?"

"Yes. I believe it was a Hittite temple, probably to the moon goddess.

Sin, carved out of the rock thousands of years ago. It is well hidden
and close to the dam, so we use it as a staging area. We found it by
accident and haven't even explored the full extent of it. It goes on
for miles. There is a huge treasure here. We're not sure what to do
with it."

"What kind of treasure?"

"Statues in gold, silver, elect rum and bronze. Big blocks of coins.

In temple complexes worshipers used to throw coins and other precious
objects into the fountains that always played around the statues. After
centuries they fuse together. It's an amazing sight."

A Kurd came into the room and whispered something to Sultana, who said
to Zammit, "The Turks are looking for you. Helicopters and armored
cars everywhere.

We must warn our comrades of this intensified activity."

"Since you know I'm a good guy, I take it I'm free to leave?"

"No. Perhaps you are not who you say you are. Perhaps you are in
league with the Turks. Perhaps you were awake when you came here and
remember the location."

"Out cold."

Sultana spoke briefly with the men. She was obviously the leader of
the group.

"You'll stay here for the time being. I must check with our regional
commander."

Zammit thought quickly, wondering if the data he'd transmitted to
Frankie Richards had arrived at INERT headquarters.

"Look, there's a political and environmental catastrophe happening out
there. I may be the only person on earth who knows what's in the
reservoir."

"Later. Anything that causes discomfort for the Turks is good for
us." She gave an order to her men.

"We will take you across the hall and restrain you. Ordinarily we
would post a guard, but we have a skeleton crew, and everyone will be
needed."

A Kurd started to say something and she snapped at him.

"Despite what he thinks, you can't possibly escape. This corridor is a
dead end with only one way out, and that's through us, at the end of
the hall. And after all, you're just a scientist, aren't you? Even if
you free yourself, we are deep underground. This labyrinth was
designed to kill intruders. Without us as guides, you could never find
your way out. You'd get lost, and a thousand years from now someone
would find your skeleton." She smiled thinly.

"And wonder why the ancients wore orange polyester."

"Look--" She gave an order, and three of the men seized his arms and
dragged him to the room across the corridor. He just had time to
glance quickly right and left. To the right was a rough-hewn corridor,
a narrow hallway the shape of a very long keyhole. There were lights
at the end, where the PKK guerrillas were staying. To his left the
corridor ended a few feet away in solid rock.

Across the corridor there was an even smaller room made of the same
glowing white stone, where he was thrown to the floor, hands bound
behind his back and ankles tied together.

"I'm not a rodeo calf," grunted Zammit.

"Not so tight. You think I'm Houdini?"

As they trooped out of the room. Sultana raised a muscular arm in
mocking salute.

"Save the whales."

Zammit could hear them talking as they headed down the corridor. The
only illumination was from the lights at the end of the hall almost
fifty yards away and the strange soft glow from the white rock walls.

They'd taken his phone, but underground it wouldn't work anyway. He
fanned through his options and decided.

He rolled onto his side, arched his spine, and bent his knees so his
bound hands touched his feet. They had obviously searched him while he
was unconscious, but how thorough had they been? There were a lot of
pockets in the protective suit, including two small ones around his
ankles. His straining fingers grasped the edge of the Velcro flap on
his left ankle and tugged. A faint rip.

The tiny pocket opened. He rolled as much onto his back as he could,
lifted his bound legs in the air and shook them. A tiny tinkle on the
stone floor told him the body search had not been thorough enough.

Suddenly a weird yellow glow appeared on the wall of the room across
the corridor. The glow moved along the wall and disappeared. Must be
a PKK patrol with a flashlight. He realized the underground complex
was like a buried building with rooms and corridors. But how could
light be seen through a rock wall?

He scraped along the floor, squinting, trying to see the flat two
inch-long half-moon of orange plastic. He fumbled blindly with rapidly
numbing fingers until he finally grasped it, then felt along the small
object until he found the tiny black plastic slide on the side of the
orange casing. He pressed the slide with his thumb.

The half-inch-long rectangular razor contained in the little OLFA
Touch-Knife was incredibly sharp. He always carried one around for
cutting pages from magazines or sectioning specimens. Or cutting ropes
in underground prisons. He sawed the tiny blade back and forth against
the rope. It parted in less than a minute. He shook his hands free
and sawed at the rope binding his ankles.

Then he stood, rubbing his wrists and ankles to restore circulation.

Slipping to the doorway, he looked carefully down the corridor. Empty.

He'd have to work fast. If they did regular patrols, it was certain
they would check on him.

He unzipped the orange suit and laid it on the floor. In his black
garments he was now virtually invisible in the shadowy gloom.

He peered around the corner again and quickly ducked back. One of the
Kurds in traditional dress, carrying a Kalashnikov and a flashlight,
had turned the corner from the main room and was heading his way.

As the guerrilla entered the room, Zammit snatched the flashlight from
his hand and cracked it over his head. He had not foreseen the
cushioning effect of the turban and had to hit him again. He laid the
unconscious Kurd on the floor and checked the rifle's magazine. How
much noise had he made? Everything was still.

He darted across the corridor to the other room. A soft snick as he
opened the latches of the micro lab He flipped the switch that
activated the interior light. A quick search and he found what he
wanted. As he slipped back across the corridor he saw the Kurd's right
leg slowly scraping across the floor. Damn. The guy's skull must be
two inches thick. He didn't want to hit him again. Zammit seized one
of the sleeves of the orange uniform and hacked off a scrap of cloth
with the razor. He popped open the plastic container, poured some
liquid onto the cloth, knelt, and pressed it over the Kurd's nose and
mouth. He wasn't sure how long he could apply the poisonous liquid
without inducing cardiac arrest and wished he had chloroform instead of
formaldehyde. After fifteen seconds the man's body went rigid, then
relaxed. Zammit checked his pulse. Still alive.

He slipped the container and cloth into his pocket, dragged the Kurd
over to the orange uniform, and began undressing him. Within two
minutes the Kurd was zippered into the orange suit, bound, and gagged,
and Zammit wore the guerrilla's clothes. They were tight--he still had
his black garments on underneath, and the Kurd was smaller than he was.

He hoped he'd coiled the turban in a plausible manner.

He looked down at the flowing trousers. Tres chic. He patted a bulge
in the tight bomber jacket and opened the pocket. Cigarettes and a
lighter. As he picked up the Kalashnikov, he heard faint voices at the
end of the corridor.

As Sultana rounded the far corner, Mike Zammit slouched casually
against the stone door frame, knees slightly bent to reduce his height,
lighting a cigarette. He shone the flashlight down the hall so she was
momentarily blinded.

Lowering it, he allowed three seconds to let her eyes partially
readjust to the dimness, then hefted the gun on his shoulder and
exhaled slowly, wreathing himself in a cloud of smoke to obscure his
appearance. He gave a small wave--having no idea whether Kurdish body
language was expansive or repressed, he figured less was best. She
stopped and called something softly. He nodded, desperately hoping the
ruse would work so he wouldn't have to shoot her.

She turned and walked back up the corridor. Zammit blew a plume of
smoke in relief, then crushed out the cigarette. He checked the Kurd.

Still out, breathing shallowly. He slipped across the corridor and
propped the rifle in the corner. He turned the flashlight off so that
no one from the end of the hall would see the beam moving around and
wonder what was going on. His heart sank as he opened the
communications suitcase. All the phone equipment was missing, even the
antennas, high-capacity batteries, and his pager. The compass and
laptop were gone. The computer didn't matter because the database
information would be destroyed the instant anyone tried to hack it. He
just hoped the information had gotten to Frankie Richards.

No satellite phone. No means of communication at all.

For the first time, he was thankful he'd brought too much gear. He
fetched the flashlight again, but now it didn't work--he must have
damaged it when he whacked the Kurd. He rummaged through the case and
finally found the secret tab that allowed him to lift the panel
separating the bottom compartment from the top. He smiled--they hadn't
found it. He slipped the MPR SAT FIND personal locator beacon into his
Kurdish sash and wrapped the Generation IV ITT Night Mariner goggles
around his neck. He remembered what Sultana had said and tucked the
miniature metal detector into the sash.

He had to move fast, and he didn't want to move against a hail of
bullets.

He walked over to the rock wall, where he'd seen the glow of the
flashlight through the stone, and placed his hands on it. The rock was
pure white, finely grained, and strangely translucent. He scratched it
with his fingernail and it left a cloudy white mark. He closed his
eyes and tried to recall his college courses in geology. Finally it
came to him. A form of gypsum, a hydrous calcium sulfate formed by the
drying of bedded deposits precipitated from evaporating ancient seas.

Alabaster.

His eyes searched the white stone room. No wonder the Hittites had
decided to carve their underground temple here. A giant deposit of
alabaster was about as easy a stone to work as you could find. For
thousands of years used mainly for statuary, it was soft and easily
broken. A sheet of alabaster could be carved so thin you could read a
newspaper through it.

With all his weight Zammit pressed hard against the wall. It was thin
enough to see a strong light through but too thick to be broken by
muscle power alone. He thought for a moment, then returned to the
micro lab He removed two suction cups, a glass container, a plastic
container, and an atomizer. From the microtome next to the microscope
he carefully removed the super sharp steel blade used for sectioning
specimens.

Back at the wall, a quick inspection told him it was carved in a
concave fashion, thinnest in the middle and thickening toward the
edges. He adjusted the nozzle of the atomizer to deliver a thin sharp
stream. Carefully he removed the cap from the glass container and
poured the contents into the atomizer. He uncoiled part of the turban
from his head, pressed it over his mouth and nose, and held the
atomizer at arm's length, the nozzle four inches from the middle of the
alabaster wall.

He sprayed quickly, a three-by-four-foot rectangle. Acrid white vapor
hissed on the wall as the hydrofluoric acid ate through the soft
calcareous stone. He waited a few moments, then sprayed the rapidly
deepening furrows with distilled water to dilute the acid. When the
vapor dissipated, he seized the microtome knife and started hacking at
the etched furrows. He was surprised at how little time it took.

He picked up the two suction cups and pressed them against the stone
section framed by the acid furrows. Once they were secure he finished
cutting through most of the stone, leaving just four thin connecting
pieces on each side to hold the cut-out section in place. Firmly
grasping the handles of the suction cups, he heaved against the stone.

There was a crunching sound and a few rock splinters pattered on the
floor. He lifted the heavy slab of alabaster and leaned it against the
wall.

Nothing like seizing a window of opportunity.

He leaned out of the newly created exit into the corridor. No one. He
quickly replaced everything in the micro lab and heaved it through the
window. He'd taken everything useful from the communications suitcase,
but the lab was his baby and he wasn't going to leave it behind. He
contemplated taking the rifle. Too much to carry. Besides, with a
head start he wouldn't need it.

He carefully wiped the bottom frame of the window to remove any
residual acid and swung his legs over. He pulled the Night Mariner
goggles over his eyes and adjusted the gain control on the image
intensifier. The unit had a tiny infrared light source, invisible to
the human eye but within the range suitable for light amplification of
the image intensifier. The goggles magnified available light 500,000
times.

"Just a scientist," he whispered as he grabbed the micro lab and headed
down the glowing stone corridor.

Seattle, September 2

Frankie Richards stared at the screen. Her lab door was closed and
locked. Cat was with Kitson Kang, and she'd ordered Dikka to put all
the robots to sleep.

Solitude and silence. Concentrate.

She thought. God, I wish I had samples. Zammit's data from the
Ataturk reservoir was workable, but PCR would be so much faster. She
typed an equation. The elusiveness was maddening, like a Rubik's
cube-everything neatly aligned except for one annoying little section.

Why can't I find it? Please line up. But the DNA base pairs did not
line up. She pulled all the information she had on cyanobacteria, then
compared it with Zammit's data. Nothing made sense.

She walked to the greenhouse, opened the door, closed it, breathed the
humidity and the scent. It always relaxed her, allowed her thoughts to
free-associate.

The transmission from Zammit had ended so abruptly. What happened? He
said he had trouble. The shouts, that awful crunching sound, then
silence and static.

She put her hands over her face. No time to think about that. The
thought of Adam's disappearance intruded on her thoughts like a
nightmare.

Concentrate. She gazed at her bizarre collection of plants. She
thought of Cat and the ruin of her recent experiment because of Catula.

Natural versus artificial creation. She had it.

She left the greenhouse, returned to the computer, checked the data
again. It was the only answer.

She got on the intercom.

"Has Cairo left for Turkey yet?" When Zammit had disappeared in mid
transmission the big guy had insisted on going to help with the
search.

"No? Good. I have to talk with him."

She waited a few moments until he came on the line.

"Cairo, come to my lab. I've figured something out. We have a
problem. A big, big problem."

It seemed to Zammit that he'd been walking for hours.

They'd taken his chronometer. He didn't know how long he'd been
unconscious, the date, or the time. The micro lab was heavy, and the
Night Mariner goggles gave him a crashing headache.

He activated the MPR SAT FIND personal locator beacon, but since the
Turkish army didn't arrive, he concluded that it didn't work below
ground. He turned it off to conserve the batteries. He looked at the
metal detector. When Sultana had described the underground temple as a
labyrinth designed to kill intruders, she had not exaggerated.

The complex was built in layers, like an anthill. There were winding
stone staircases that led up or down to other corridors. Corridors
branched off into other hallways that turned out to be dead ends.

Although the corridors were narrow, they were high. And extremely
dangerous. As he crept along in the crepuscular gloom, there'd
suddenly be a hole in the floor big enough for a man to fall through.

There was no predictable pattern to their location. Given the height
of the corridors, a fall onto the hard stone floor of the corridor
below would be enough to break your leg or spine.

It was like walking through an enormous booby trap. Zammit had a good
idea who the booby was.

The place was stifling. But occasionally there would be a strong blast
of sweet fresh air from some hidden access to the outside world. The
blasts of air must be for ventilation, probably narrow pipes to the
surface. The gusts always occurred just before or after one of the
holes in the floor. He felt queasy as he realized how devilishly
clever it was.

When the complex had been built thousands of years before, the only
light available to someone walking through the darkness in either
direction would have been a flaming torch made of rushes and bitumen.

If that someone was an unwelcome intruder who did not know the plan of
the complex and the placement of the vents and holes, the blasts of air
would unexpectedly extinguish his torch.

Trapped in impenetrable blackness, the intruder would then fall
through the floor, and there he would lie with broken bones until he
died of shock or thirst.

The only saving grace, apart from the Night Mariner goggles, was the
metal detector. Sultana had said there was an enormous mass of
treasure somewhere in this complex, and he knew he was heading toward
it. Unfortunately, he couldn't head for it as the crow flies but had
to follow the looping hallways. All he could rely on was his knowledge
of how temples had been built on Malta. His great grandfather Sir
Themistocles Zammit had discovered that all ancient temple complexes
had the god or goddess shrine at the center, with pathways leading from
there to the outside world. If he could find the center, he could find
a way out. Presumably there were multiple entrances and exits, and
that would make it easier.

Suddenly he heard an echo, the sound of booted feet above his head,
then voices.

He looked up and saw one of the deadly corridor holes right above his
head and the crazy flitting beams of flashlights being swung around.

Somehow they were on his trail. And very close.

He adjusted the image intensifier and peered at the end of the
corridor. A winding staircase. Someone was coming down it. The light
from their flashlight was blinding. He tore off the goggles and ducked
into a side corridor. He blinked to get the stars out of his eyes. He
should've brought the Kalashnikov.

The booted steps sounded along the stone floor to where he was hidden.

It was obvious the person was shining the torch down every
intersection. Before he could be blinded again Zammit sprang around
the corner.

It was Sultana.

He knocked the pistol from her hand and grabbed her. She dropped the
flashlight, and he heard a tinkle as the lens shattered and it rolled
to the edge of the corridor. He spun her around, pressing his chest
against her back, his arms locked around her, grasping her wrists. He
was confident his strength would hold her tight.

He was wrong.

At the touch of his body she twisted like an elemental force of nature.

He knew she was strong, but this was incredible. A right elbow slammed
into his belly, followed by a left that almost dislocated his shoulder.

When he grunted with pain it seemed to madden her even more.

The flashlight's beam threw their monstrous black shadows on the wall
as he tried to parry a series of backward blows while hanging on to
her. Her hands tore at his clothing as she suddenly shifted her
weight. Just as her heavy boot kicked up, aiming for his groin, he
threw his entire weight up and forward.

Strong though she was, she pitched slowly forward and collapsed to the
floor.

Zammit slipped his arms under hers so she was helpless in a full
nelson. She wept as she struggled.

"I don't want to hurt you," he whispered.

"I'm just trying to get out of here."

She thrashed and kicked. Low moaning noises told him she was not
susceptible to logic and still extremely dangerous. He slipped his
right arm from underneath hers and wrapped it around her neck so that
the V formed by his biceps and forearm pressed against both the
arteries that fed blood to her brain. Choke hold.

As she struggled Zammit hissed, "Listen to me! I'm going to render you
unconscious. Nothing more. You understand? Nothing more!"

Finally she was still. He rolled off, panting, and turned her on her
back. No sound from the corridor above. By the light of her damaged
flashlight he leaned over and gazed at her battered face, the scarred
flesh inside her elbows. Softly he said, "I hope whoever the bastard
was, you find him someday. And make him pay."

He took off his turban, tore it into strips, and bound her. He
considered a gag but didn't know how well she could breathe through her
broken nose. Prom underneath his Kurdish clothes he took the strip of
orange cloth and the formaldehyde and administered a fifteen-second
dose. He left the flashlight on and by her side so the other Kurds
could find her. He put on the goggles, looked at the metal detector,
and slipped away.

It might take them two minutes to find her or two hours. Got to hurry.

He shifted the micro lab from one aching arm to the other. With alarm
he noticed that his sense of balance and distance was deteriorating
from exhaustion and the mounting confusion in his brain, unused to
analyzing glowing green artificially enhanced images for hours on
end.

He still tried to hurry. He looked at the metal detector just as he
rounded a sharp corner.

And then he was falling. He managed to heave the micro lab around and
slam it on the floor as he fell through the hole. The lab was heavy
enough to act as a counterweight, and he hung suspended, his rib cage
jammed against the hole's stone lip. Blearily he looked straight ahead
and saw the lab caught behind a bump on the floor. The protrusion
barely held the lab--and him--in place. Zammit gritted his teeth as he
saw the handle slowly turn, saw the end of the lab start to rise off
the floor. Once it got high enough, it would slide over the protrusion
and he would fall. He kicked and lunged forward. The lab dropped. He
looked down to the corridor beneath him.

A fall of at least twenty feet. He would fall backward, landing on the
stone floor as a V, shattering his pelvis, or flat on his back, an X,
crushing the base of his skull.

What a stupid way to die.

He scrabbled desperately. Once again the base of the case started to
rise from the floor. With a convulsive effort he managed to get his
left leg over the edge of the rim. He thrust powerfully against the
stone floor and out of the hole, just as the lab slipped over the
protrusion. He rolled over onto his back, pulled off the goggles, and
laid them on his heaving chest. Dancing green auroras spun through his
retinas.

Blackness.

When he awoke, he didn't know how long he'd been unconscious or where
he was.

The sensation of being stifled reminded him. He still clutched the
goggles to his chest. They were important, he thought vaguely. Slowly
he put them on again, his arms leaden. There'd been a hole in the
floor. He felt for the wall and painfully rose. He picked up the
micro lab and metal detector and stumbled down the corridor, slowly
this time, his hand scraping against the wall to help him stay on his
feet.

Twenty minutes later the corridor suddenly widened into a yawning space
of rough-hewn yellow stone. A vault rose into the gloom, like some
primeval cathedral, with crude oblong niches hacked in the rock.

Zammit started as he saw two eyes staring at him from a face of
timeless beauty.

It took a few moments to realize that it was a statue, a naked woman,
her weight resting gracefully on her left hip as she gazed sightlessly
at him. He walked closer to the bronze figure and noticed that the
whites of the eyes were of alabaster, the irises made of emerald or
jade. Classical Greek or Roman.

There were other statues in the room. Blocks of fused coins littered
the floor. The room had obviously been used as a repository for
antiquities gathered from a variety of places, perhaps by some
long-dead treasure hunter who never survived to haul away his loot.

While looking around he noticed that the walls were no longer as white.

They were yellowish and lacked the smoothness and finish of alabaster.

The Hittites had found this stone more difficult to work.

A large square niche at the far end of the room was identical to the
one in the Hypogeum on Malta. The priestly oracle would have spoken
from it during religious ceremonies, and the acoustical properties of
the circular temple would have served to echo his voice. Zammit
wondered if the niche had the same acoustical properties as the one on
Malta.

All around the circular vaulted room, doorways framed with pillars and
lintels had been carved out of the living rock. He was at the center
of the complex, and the pathways would lead to the outside world. But
which ones?

He stood in the door frame of one of the exits and thought. He didn't
want to get lost again. He opened the micro lab removing the
fluorescent red felt-tipped marker he used to identify glass slides in
the field. With the OLFA razor he trimmed the nib to make it broader
and flatter. He drew an arrow on the yellow stone above his head. The
red mark was easily visible if you knew where to look.

Pen in one hand, micro lab in the other, Zammit headed down the stone
corridor.

Every few feet he reached up and made an arrow mark, always on the wall
to his right. If this exit from the temple led further underground or
ended abruptly, he'd be able to find his way back and start over.

There was no sound except his labored breathing and the scraping of his
feet.

Several times he almost plunged through holes in the floor. They were
ingeniously carved so that you couldn't see them until you were almost
on top of them.

Suddenly he inhaled a lungful of sweet fresh air. He paused and
breathed deeply.

The corridor began slanting steeply upward. Keeping a keen eye on the
floor, he walked faster. Ahead, a dim light illuminated a set of
carved stone stairs. They divided at the top, with a broad set of
steps angling around to the right and out of sight, while the other set
was narrow, crudely carved, and twisted away to the left, appearing to
vanish into nothingness.

The smell of fresh air was almost intoxicating. He quickly mounted
the stairs. Where they divided he chose the broad set of steps that
wound to the right. Just as he was about to bound around the sharp
corner, he stopped in midstride. He stared at the steps curving out of
his sight, then looked back over his shoulder at the narrow, uneven,
uninviting ones that angled sharply to the left and seemed to disappear
into darkness.

He'd seen this before. Just like the oracle niche, in the Hypogeum.

Returning to the bottom, he set the micro lab at the base of the
stairs. Slowly he walked back up the broad steps that spiraled to the
right. Where they rounded the corner, he stopped and peered carefully
around the rock wall.

Into nothingness. There was a sheer drop into a narrow, smooth walled
rock chamber. He couldn't see the bottom. It looked like the opening
of a very deep coffin.

Which was exactly what it was.

Next he cautiously mounted the narrow, dangerous steps that spiraled to
the left. They rose higher and higher and wound around the central
pillar of living rock until they connected with another broad flight of
inviting steps leading downward to his left.

Suddenly he realized how ingenious it was. If a thief found this
entrance to the underground temple, the prospect of riches would ensure
that he was hurrying. If he was descending, he would take the broad
inviting set of stairs that wound down to the right. And fall straight
into the stone crypt, from which it would be impossible to escape. If
the intruder had somehow made it into the temple through another
entrance and was trying to exit through this one, he would also take
the broad set of steps, falling into the trap.

Zammit felt an icy finger slowly trace a trail down his spine at the
sheer ingenuity of it. Anyone would choose the broad, well carved
steps. And it was a nice touch to have them winding to the right--most
people were right-handed, and if the inviting nature of the stairs
didn't ensure that they were chosen, the victim's natural handedness
would.

Zammit picked up a rock. As he leaned over the entrance to the narrow
crypt, he noticed a thick stone lid propped against the wall. Of
course. You wouldn't want the stink from an intruder's decaying corpse
to pollute the air.

He dropped the rock into the crypt. Silence for a couple of seconds.

Then, instead of the sound of stone against stone, a rustling thud, the
sound of stone hitting a carpet of bones and clothing.

How many bodies had the crypt claimed in the past four thousand
years?

Seizing the micro lab he edged his way around the left-hand staircase,
feeling stone underfoot at every step. Finally he reached the top. He
edged around a stone slab and walked into the desert air, the coolness
wonderful against his clammy skin. He took off the goggles and looked
up at the full moon and the star-studded night sky. The brown,
boulder-littered landscape was featureless, inhabited only by
knife-edged black shadows. No tire tracks or footprints to indicate
that this entrance to the temple had been recently used. If the PKK
hadn't explored the entire complex, they might not know this entrance
existed.

He turned around, seeing a pile of boulders and stone slabs and nothing
to show they were anything other than a natural formation.

Zammit gazed at the metal detector in his hand. There was one final
service it could render. He trudged back to the rock formation and
jammed it into a crevice. With the right equipment, even a dying
signal from the device would enable him to locate it again.

He had no idea where he was. He was desperately thirsty, hungry, and
exhausted, but he had to keep moving in case of pursuit. He started
walking but after 200 yards couldn't continue. Staggering down a slope
into a depression in the ground, he stiffly sat down. He ran his
tongue over his cracked lips as he opened the micro lab removed a
container of distilled water, snapped off the spout, and drank deeply
until it was empty. He opened another, his last, still feeling weak.

He'd sweated away a lot of salt and minerals, and in distilled water
there weren't any. A painful growl from his stomach told him that even
more than replenishing his body's supply of electrolytes, he needed
some calories to give him energy. But there was nothing to eat.

He opened the bottle of pure ethanol he carried in the micro lab to
sterilize equipment. Alcohol had calories. He drank most of the
second container of distilled water, poured in some ethanol, and shook
it like a cocktail shaker. He sipped like a connoisseur. It wasn't
bourbon, but it wasn't kerosene, either.

He'd sampled Russian moonshine, samogon, that tasted a lot worse than
this. He held up the container and proposed a toast to the fat moon,
beaming as if it was glad he was free.

"You're awfully good-looking, but I don't care much for your taste in
architecture."

He drank deeply, laid the container on the ground, and within moments
was fast asleep.

September 3

"There he is!" shouted Cairo Jackson. He pointed out the side door of
the Turkish air force helicopter, a Boeing CH-47D Chinook especially
designed for search and rescue missions.

Striding through the desolate landscape in the brilliant dawn light,
the tiny figure far below looked incongruous in flowing trousers and a
sash, carrying a large white plastic suitcase, like a tourist on Mars
convinced there was a space port nearby.

Zammit had awakened with the dawn. Deciding to walk toward the sun
rising in the east, he activated the MPR SAT FIND personal locator
beacon that the Turkish helicopter was now homing in on. When he saw
the chopper, he stopped and waited as it descended, whipping up swirls
of powdery dust.

Cairo Jackson leapt to the ground, followed by Stavros Costopoulos and
Dikka Spargo. Jackson stood with his hands on his hips.

"Sorry, I thought you were Mike Zammit, not Aladdin."

"I hate to break it to you, boss, but they finished filming Lawrence of
Arabia some time ago," said Dikka.

"Fetching," said Costopoulos.

"The latest from Armani?" Jackson noticed the rips in Zammit's Kurdish
clothing.

"Get into an argument with a cougar?"

"Something like that," Zammit smiled.

"And I'm glad to see you too."

Cairo leaned and sniffed.

"Where the hell did you find a saloon in this wilderness?"

"Wandering the desert wastes like a biblical prophet is thirsty work.

Couldn't find honey, but at least I didn't have to eat any locusts."

"Speaking of bees," said Costopoulos, "you were on a beeline away from
the dam, headed straight toward Iraq. It's a good thing we found you
before you hit the border and got your head shot off."

After piling into the helicopter, it was a thirty-minute flight back
to the Ataturk Dam. The pilot radioed ahead with the news that Zammit
had been found.

Although it was too noisy to do much talking in the chopper, Zammit
learned he'd been missing for almost forty-eight hours and that Cairo
Jackson had left Seattle to help in the search when he had disappeared.

Frankie Richards and Kitson Kang were still in Seattle analyzing the
data he had sent. Jackson's eyes watched Zammit's as he leaned over
and shouted, "Frankie said all she heard was you typing, someone
yelling, and then a sound like a watermelon being clubbed with a
baseball bat. She was beside herself!"

When they landed at the dam, Dikka Spargo headed off to help Connie
Palaeov.

Zammit told her to make sure they collected several of the fleshy bulbs
growing so quickly on the surface of the green mat. As Cairo and
Stavros accompanied him to the facility's infirmary, they were informed
that Colonel Hakim Yildiz was on a conference call with Prime Minister
Thamar Amurkhan. Once finished, he wanted to see Zammit as soon as
possible.

The infirmary's physician determined that Zammit's head was not badly
hurt and that apart from a few bruises he was fine. A medic applied a
heat pad to loosen the muscles of his aching back. He showered,
shaved, and changed his clothes, then wolfed down a couple of
sandwiches as he quickly filled Cairo and Stavros in on what had
happened.

"Underground," said Jackson.

"No wonder it was like you vanished into the ether.

All we found was the orange helmet and some tire tracks from the Jeep
that petered out in the desert in the middle of nowhere."

"I'm glad you got the information I transmitted," Zammit said.

"What has Frankie found?"

"She confirms the poison is an endotoxin. Anabaena toxin, to be
precise. And the massive bloom of cyanobacteria that generates the
toxin is in fact damn strange."

"Has she determined the species?"

"Anabaena flos-acfuae. With a caveat."

Zammit shrugged.

"Never heard of it. What's the caveat?"

Jackson flipped through a sheaf of printouts.

"Anabaena is extremely poisonous.

The toxin it generates attacks the liver. It grows primarily in
stagnant water during hot weather, so this climate is perfect for it.

The problem is that this particular strain is something new. In its
natural form, it's just a stinky thin green film that secretes toxin.

It does not form those dense thick carpets, which are called
stromatolites, or the big fleshy bulbs growing on the surface."

"How can it be new?" objected Zammit.

"This stuff has been around for almost 4 billion years and it hasn't
evolved at all. It's the Methuselah of biological organisms."

"Frankie says it appears to be anabaena, but it also has some weird
genetic bits--the mismatching DNA base pairs you mentioned, which might
account for the stromatolites and the bulbs," replied Cairo.

"It seems to be some sort of mutation, or perhaps a hybrid. In
addition to attacking the liver and the gut, the toxin also depresses
respiratory function. When the concentration in drinking water is over
one milligram per kilo of body weight, you're dead in less than an
hour. And there's enough anabaena toxin in that reservoir to kill
every human being on earth."

"Mutation? After 4 billion years it's decided to mutate?"

"Apparently. Frankie says this particular strain pumps out industrial
strength toxin at a fantastic rate and grows so fast you can actually
see it multiplying with the naked eye."

"Still," protested Zammit, "bacteria of this type can be killed with
algaecide."

"Afraid not. Frankie says the only thing that would work on this stuff
is copper sulfate and you'd need a million tons of it. And too much
copper is poisonous for drinking water and agriculture. You'd be
exchanging one toxin for another."

"All right then. Antibiotics."

Cairo Jackson shook his head emphatically.

"Not this stuff. Nothing kills it.

When I arrived here with Dikka, we started working with Connie based on
what Frankie had figured out. We've tried every treatment, including
antibiotics.

Penicillin, ampicillin, neomycin, vancomycin, even ciprofloxacin, you
name it.

This stuff is immune to every antidote known to science."

"That is impossible," said Zammit flatly.

Jackson shrugged.

"Them's the facts. There are millions of cubic yards of the stuff.

According to Frankie, even if we found an antidote that would kill the
cyanobacteria--assuming we can do it, given that we have very little
time--we'd need thousands of tons of it. How would we manufacture so
much of it so fast?

And the reservoir would still be full of toxin. How do we deal with
that? We don't have an antidote for that either. We don't have one
crisis, we have two--the green stuff and the poison."

Zammit rubbed his face.

"Every living thing has to eat something. Cyanobacteria eat nitrogen
and phosphorus. This stuff is growing so fantastically because of the
high concentrations of organophosphates in the water."

"True. But Frankie says the stuff grows like gang busters on very
little nutrition. It's like finding a ten-foot-tall gorilla that can
break concrete slabs in half but is happy and healthy on a diet of
lettuce leaves."

"Where do the organophosphates come from?"

Jackson shook his head.

"Not a clue. The only possible source would be huge quantities of
agricultural fertilizer, and there's no agriculture here except at the
Plain of Harran, and it's miles away."

Stavros Costopoulos interrupted.

"Which of course is why your original computer simulations kept
identifying this particular scenario as impossible. So if it can't be
a naturally occurring phenomenon, that leaves us with theory number
two, as we discussed on Malta."

Zammit remembered as well what Sultana had said.

"Somebody put it there."

He said to Jackson, "Before I was kidnapped I started to tell Frankie
that I'd figured out the e-mail message. Back in Seattle, you asked
how you can threaten someone with primordial soup. Well, you can if
it's a lethal bacterial soup from the dawn of time."

"I'm glad we're finally discussing something I can understand," said
Costopoulos.

"I don't know this bug stuff, but I do know psychology, and the
psychology here is fascinating. Do you have any idea who might have
sent you that message?"

"Yeah," said Jackson.

"Have you pissed anybody off lately?"

"What do you mean, psychology?" asked Zammit.

Suddenly a Turkish soldier stuck his head in the door and said
something.

Costopoulos nodded as he listened.

"Colonel Yildiz wants to see you. How much do you want to tell him?"

Zammit replied, "I'm not going to mention a couple of things. The
cyanobacteria and organophosphates got in that water somehow, and it's
possible someone here at the dam was involved. I doubt if it's Yildiz,
but until we know for sure, I'd rather keep certain things quiet."

Zammit was pondering other considerations as well. He thought of
Sultana and her battered face, her horribly scarred arms, the troubles
she had mentioned. He knew the Turks weren't gentle with dissidents.

Perhaps she'd been beaten up, imprisoned, and possibly raped by
Turkish soldiers or security. He remembered her frantic struggles and
didn't feel like giving any information that would allow the Turks to
find her. And her reference to good works rang a strong bell in
connection with his own reluctant membership in the Knights of Malta.

Crammed with filing cabinets and stacks of paper. Colonel Yildiz's
windowless, stuffy office was painted a sickly institutional green and
reeked of stale tobacco smoke. Zammit faced a barrage of questions. He
told the chain-smoking Turk everything about his capture and escape
except the fact that the place he'd been detained was an underground
temple--he described it simply as a series of interconnected caverns.

He also didn't mention that he'd planted the metal detector, and the
theft of antiquities was irrelevant.

"You don't remember at all where you were held?" frowned Yildiz,
plucking at one of his caterpillar-like eyebrows.

Zammit shrugged.

"It was dark, and I didn't have a compass. The landscape is
featureless. I got away as fast as I could in case they were on my
trail."

"I'm in a great deal of trouble," said Yildiz, savagely stubbing out
his cigarette in an already overflowing ashtray.

"To have someone like you abducted from this facility in broad daylight
is bad enough. Not to be able to find you for almost forty-eight hours
is worse. And not being able to punish the PKK is the worst of all.

The prime minister is furious, and Lloyd Lavender and your Colonel
Graves have been making my life a misery."

"I'm sorry to hear that, colonel. It wasn't your fault--I'm the one
who refused an escort when I went out to get the samples. Maybe it'll
help when you tell them we've identified what's in the reservoir."

He briefed Yildiz on what they had discovered about the toxin, and
their suspicions that the cyanobacteria had been deliberately planted.

Hakim Yildiz became more and more agitated as Zammit spoke. When
Zammit told him what Sultana had said, he suddenly slammed his fist on
the table, stood, and started pacing furiously.

"You are sure it isn't the PKK guerrillas who put the material in the
reservoir?

Or the Resistance Army of Allah?"

"Positive," said Zammit.

"Where would they get it from? They have no facilities for breeding
this kind of biological warfare agent."

Yildiz suddenly stopped pacing.

"Warfare agent?" Zammit nodded.

"You have the dubious honor, colonel, of witnessing history's first use
of a genetically modified organism as a biological weapon."

Istanbul, TurKey, September 3

Even with outriders of soldiers and police on motorcycles, they made
slow headway in Istanbul's teeming morning traffic. The city's air was
blue with diesel exhaust, and the fumes of leaded gasoline hung heavily
in the brilliant morning sunlight. The cacophony of horns in the
metropolis of 6 million people was deafening, penetrating the interior
of the armored official limousine. They had flown directly from the
dam, landing at the Ataturk Airport at Yesilkoy, an hour's drive west
of the city.

Mike Zammit gazed at the glittering waters of the Sea of Marmara. They
were driving east along Kennedy Cadessi, a broad avenue named after
JFK. The sea was the color of new denim. Huge tankers and merchant
ships plied the waters in the brilliant sunlight. Far off in the heat
haze he could see a gray battleship of the Turkish navy. He turned to
Colonel Yildiz.

"Are we going through Askaray district or around Sultanahmet?" He
wanted the Turk to say Sultanahmet so they could follow the curve of
the peninsula and see water all the way.

"Sultanahmet." Yildiz was surprised.

"You know this city?"

"I did the backpacking thing during college. Stayed in an old place in
the university area, near the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia, ate at
those cheap little restaurants called locantas. A buck a plate for
great food."

Zammit pointed at a ferry, one of the many that plied the Sea of
Marmara, the Bosphorus, and the Golden Horn a dozen times a day, a
necessity in a city divided by water.

"Before sunset I'd always catch one of the evening boats at Eminonu,
travel up the Bosphorus to Bekistas, then back again. Round trip,
about an hour and a half. Never got tired of it. From the water this
city is as beautiful as Venice. And the sunsets are spectacular."

The Turk's eyes were shrewd, as if he had learned something
unexpected.

"If I may say so. Doctor, you don't strike me as a romantic, or a
connoisseur of sunsets."

Zammit shrugged.

"I was nineteen years old." He didn't know what else to say. He
wondered what the eager adolescent he had once been would think of the
man he had become. Did anyone at that age think they'd end up alone,
angry, and full of scars, physical and emotional? No, at that age you
were convinced such things only happened to other people, and that
maybe they kind of deserved it, hadn't done things right, hadn't
planned properly, maybe were a little stupid. He looked in the mirror
every day, and the hardness around his eyes and mouth told him the
bitter truth.

He remembered his father telling him as a boy that people always ended
up with the faces they deserved. He tried to recall that coltish,
trusting, long-dead youth and couldn't--he was a stranger now. It
occurred to him that if he could somehow meet his younger self, he
wouldn't be able to resist the urge to slap him around, tell him to pay
attention, that life is filled with treachery and disappointment. You
started your journey through adulthood with a lot of energy, a lot of
hope--far more pluses than minuses. But the older you got, the more
the minuses multiplied until, in the end, you were left with zero.

As they rounded the peninsula he could see the Galata Bridge spanning
the Golden Horn. Then again, maybe he wouldn't slap his younger self
around. Instead, take him out for dinner, let him talk about his big
dreams. Let him enjoy his innocence. The kid would find out soon
enough.

He spoke again.

"During the ferry ride I'd stand at the railing, drink Turkish tea and
eat pistachios the whole time. What's the name for Turkish tea?"

"Cay." (Pronounced chai.) Zammit nodded as he remembered.

"I loved that stuff." He looked to his left, at the glittering office
buildings, incongruous amid the red tiled roofs of the older houses. A
forest of slender minarets stabbed toward the sky through the round,
breast like domes of the mosques. As they crossed the bridge, he knew
they were leaving the old part of the city, located in Europe, and
heading toward the new part, located in Asia. The only city in the
world that straddled two continents.

A question suddenly occurred to him.

"Colonel, when did the name change?"

"The name of what?"

"This city. Originally called Byzantium. Then in the 4th century the
capital of the Roman Empire moved from Rome to here, and it was renamed
Constantinople."

Yildiz nodded.

"It became Istanbul in 1930 as part of the effort to create a Turkish
identity, a Turkish nation."

"Does the name mean anything?"

The Turk frowned.

"Istanbul is a corruption of the Greek eis tin polls, which means 'to
the city."

" Yildiz looked broodingly out the limousine window, as if reflecting
on the unfairness of owing anything to the Greeks.

"Thanks." Zammit wondered if Costopoulos knew this. Probably. A few
moments later they passed the Tophane Fountain.

"Where are we meeting with Prime Minister Amurkhan?"

Yildiz still looked glum.

"The Dolmabahce Palace, residence of the last sultans.

We're meeting there because it's close to Taksim Square. The prime
minister has to attend a political rally there early this afternoon and
it can't be rescheduled. You'll have to be brief."

"Did you tell her about the Resistance Army of Allah? Their belief
that the overthrow of the government is imminent?"

Yildiz nodded.

"Personally I don't think there's anything to it, but we can't take
chances. I'd be a lot happier if we were meeting in Ankara instead of
trying to organize security in this chaos. But this is where the votes
are, so she has to be here."

The palace was right on the banks of the Bosphorus and overlooked the
sparkling blue strait. As they got out of the car, they were instantly
surrounded by soldiers and security men. Zammit spotted Costopoulos
and Jackson. They were in the same car as Colonel Graves, who had
flown from Washington after conferring with the president. A fleet of
big black limousines told him Amurkhan had already arrived.

Although he had seen it before on his ferry rides, Zammit had never
been inside the ornate building.

"It's always a shock to see this French palace in the middle of
Istanbul. What does

"Dol-ma batch-eh' mean?"

" Tilled-in garden,"

" replied Yildiz.

"In a fit of petulance one of the last sultans decided he wanted to
imitate Versailles, so he bankrupted the Ottoman Empire to build this
place. The world's only palace with a staircase made of Baccarat
crystal."

"I see. A man of moderation and taste."

Colonel Yildiz led the way into the building.

"Apparently we're meeting in the throne room."

A riot of color, with red, green, and purple marbles and red silk
wallpaper, as well as velvet and rococo gilding, covered every surface
and piece of furniture. There was the cold musty smell peculiar to
museums all over the world, and their footsteps echoed on the marble
floors.

"Louis XIV would've felt right at home," remarked Zammit as they
mounted the sparkling transparent crystal staircase. He pointed to an
ornate clock on the wall.

"It's ten in the morning. That says 9:05."

"The founder of modem Turkey was General Kemal Ataturk," replied the
colonel.

"He kicked out the degenerate sultans and caliphs in the 1920s and
transformed the nation from a medieval autocracy into a modern
democracy, even gave women the vote. He died in this palace at that
time on November 10, 1938. Every year the entire nation comes to a
halt in respect."

The throne room was spectacular. Zammit halted and stared at the
colossal chandelier spreading and sparkling like a giant crystal flower
above the long gleaming conference table, set with microphones,
pitchers of water, and glasses.

Yildiz noticed and grunted.

"Weighs 10,000 pounds. Biggest in the world. Another bloody
sultan."

Prime Minister Thamar Amurkhan, elegant in her trademark white skirt
and jacket with her sunglasses tucked into one of the pockets, walked
up with a smile.

Zammit shook hands, trying not to notice the resemblance to Sophia
Loren.

"Good to see you again. How goes the campaign?"

Her voice had the slightly nasal singsong typical of Turkish women, and
she spoke English with just a trace of an accent. Zammit liked the
sound.

"If I'd been able to do more with the economy it would be no contest.

Voters don't like an annual inflation rate of eighty percent."

He noted the dark circles of exhaustion under her almond shaped pale
green eyes as she leaned forward and spoke in a low voice. He could
smell Chanel from her short cinnamon-colored hair.

"This poisoning of the reservoir could kill millions and cause the
entire Middle East to erupt. Not to mention costing me the
election."

Zammit spoke with a confidence he did not feel.

"We're working on it."

An aide rushed up and whispered, tapping his watch. Amurkhan nodded
and took Zammit's arm. As she escorted him to the ornate chair by the
microphone at the head of the table, he whispered urgently in her ear.

She listened for a moment, then to his relief began nodding. As they
walked he noticed, in addition to secret service men and political
advisers, several preoccupied looking senior military men. He knew
they were members of Turkey's National Security Council, a body of five
senior army commanders and four civilian ministers empowered under
Article 118 of the constitution to take any action necessary to
preserve "the independence of the state" and "the peace and security of
society." They saw their role as that of safeguarding the republic in
the event of a crisis, and they had a reputation for moving fast and
brutally. He quickly set up the audiovisual unit, opening the two
by-three-foot flat display panel.

He was about to begin speaking when he noticed Graves pointing to his
own ear, in which there was a plug with a wire trailing to a
laptop-sized black box. Of course. They all gazed at Zammit
expectantly as he inserted the earpiece of the Universal Translator.

The computer would automatically translate any question or comment from
a foreign language into English. He checked the device--Turkish was
preselected. Several of the people around the table had similar
earplugs, their translators tuned to English. Yildiz was already
chewing his nails because smoking was forbidden. Colonel Graves
nodded, encouraging him to begin.

On the plane Zammit had rehearsed his presentation. He began to speak,
without notes.

"The oldest organized municipality in the world is Catalhoyok, not far
from here, founded some 10,000 years ago. In addition to being the
cradle of civilization, this country was once the heartland of the
classical world. The richest and most sophisticated cities on earth
were here. And then the barbarians came and wrecked it all."

Amurkhan looked puzzled. Graves pointed at his watch.

Zammit didn't want to be rushed. They had to understand what was going
on.

"I

assure you this brief history lesson is relevant to the present crisis.

A desert-based civilization relies for its survival on water and
everything that goes with it--pipes, aqueducts, irrigation canals,
dams, and reservoirs. It's as true today as it was two thousand years
ago. What does such a civilization have to fear most?"

An expectant silence.

"A barbarian with a pickax. In this case, a biological pickax."

He turned to the Hat display panel and aimed the remote control. A
multicolored three-dimensional model of anabaena's altered genetic
structure rotated on the screen.

"A couple of millennia ago it was real pickaxes that killed those
ancient civilizations by destroying their water supply infrastructure.

You're looking at today's pickax, a GMO."

"A what?" asked one of the soldiers, in heavily accented English.

"Genetically modified organism. GMOs of this type are collectively
referred to as the Fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse, to accompany the
traditional four mentioned in the Book of Revelation." He saw the
blank look on the Muslim's face and added, "The last book of the
Christian Bible. The Four Horsemen are death, war, famine, and
pestilence." He continued, "Of all the horsemen, this one is the worst
because it's not natural and because of its enormous destructive
potential."

Briefly Zammit explained what they had discovered about the
cyanobacterial stromatolites, the organism's altered genetic structure,
the lethal toxin it generated, its immunity to any treatment, and their
conclusions. Dead silence.

"Legitimate GMOs have been around now for a long time in the
agribusiness and food processing industry, particularly in America,
although some European countries still ban or try to regulate them.

Genes from one plant or animal are inserted into another to convey some
sort of advantage. Many people don't trust GMOs because they believe
they might interbreed with natural organisms, with harmful or at least
unforeseeable effects."

"You mean the contamination in the Ataturk reservoir is the result of
an agricultural experiment gone wrong?" asked Amurkhan.

"No. What we're dealing with cannot possibly be a commercial product.

It must be the result of a sophisticated and expensive biological
weapons research program."

Zammit took a sip of water.

"Poison weapons have been around for a long time. By poison I mean
both chemical and biological weapons. They have always been
universally condemned, and sometimes banned by law--the first
legislation was passed in India around 500 b c." He'd gotten all of
this historical information from Costopoulos.

"There have been isolated incidents of biological warfare--in the 14th
century the Mongols catapulted plague infected corpses over the walls
of Kaffa, in the Crimea, not far from here. A British officer in early
colonial America gave smallpox infected blankets to Indians. The only
instance in the last century was Japan's use of plague and other
bacteria against the Chinese during their invasion of Manchuria.

Chemical warfare is a little different. The use of poison gas during
the First World War was so horrific that the Geneva Protocol was passed
in 1925, banning the practice. Even Adolf Hitler respected this
prohibition, although Saddam Hussein was not as scrupulous, and neither
is his son Anwar. However, chemical weapons are not our concern here,
and I will now concentrate on bio weapons

Zammit pointed at the display screen and the image of the altered
anabaena.

"Both plague and smallpox are horrible diseases, but at least they are
naturally occurring organisms. Plague can be treated with vaccines and
antibiotics, although some resistant strains are now appearing. No
cure has ever been found for smallpox, which terrorized mankind for
10,000 years, but it doesn't exist anymore except under lock and key in
a couple of isolation containment labs."

He heard a tinny, robotic voice in his ear and searched the table to
identify the speaker.

"Why don't they just destroy it?" A heavyset Turk in a blue suit was
speaking.

Zammit thought for a moment.

"For the same reasons you don't want any other organism to become
extinct--you reduce the planet's genetic diversity. There's always the
chance it might prove useful. There have been plans in place for years
to have a sort of symbolic bonfire to destroy the last remaining
smallpox samples. A bonfire, since smallpox was known as the Great
Fire-it burns you up from within, dissolving your internal organs. It's
the most destructive disease in the history of mankind, even worse than
the Black Death. It killed 300 million people in the 20th century
alone. It is estimated that 1 out of every 10 people who ever lived
has been killed or disfigured by smallpox. The plans involve taking
the last remaining vials--there are a couple of hundred--and inserting
them in a 1200-degree Celsius incinerator. They'll probably vaporize
instantly, but just to make absolutely sure, they're going to run the
burn for twenty minutes. You don't take any chances with this stuff.

They haven't done it yet because what if it turns out that something in
a smallpox virus is vital in a cure for cancer?"

"I see," said the tinny voice.

"Please continue."

"What makes weapons-grade GMOs so terrifying is that no human being on
earth has any resistance to them because they're new. Also, because
they're new we don't have any vaccines or antibiotics that will fight
them."

A Turkish general interrupted.

"I don't understand. You say this is a biological weapon. War is
about strategy and tactics, minimizing your own losses while maximizing
the enemy's. With this, everyone loses."

Zammit nodded.

"An excellent point. We know what's in the reservoir and the poison
it's generating. Why is it there?"

Zammit gazed at Stavros Costopoulos, listening attentively a few seats
away.

"Everyone has a motive for doing something. I am a scientist and I
believe everything happens for a reason. Take the present situation.

No one in history has ever used bio weapons on a large scale, because
the disadvantages far outweigh the advantages."

Yildiz interrupted.

"How?"

Zammit pointed at him as if aiming an imaginary gun.

"Let's say you and I were sitting in a restaurant here in Istanbul and
I wanted to kill you. I could use a directed weapon, like a gun. I
point it at you, pull the trigger, and kill you and only you. Or I
could use a bio weapon which is indiscriminate. I'd kill you, but I'd
also kill myself, every other person in the restaurant, and half the
population of Central Anatolia. That's why no one has ever been crazy
enough to use a naturally occurring bio weapon much less a genetically
altered one.

There's also the risk that if you deploy a bio weapon it's permanently
deployed, because it's alive--it might survive and reproduce in the
environment forever.

It's like deciding to squeeze toothpaste from the tube--once it's out,
it's out."

He turned back to the screen. It now displayed a satellite photo of
the Ataturk Dam and reservoir.

"But this bio weapon has been well chosen. All the evidence shows that
a great deal of thought has been put into it. That it is, in fact, a
directed weapon."

He pointed at the image.

"The poison is in the concrete prison of the Ataturk reservoir. That
reservoir has only one outlet-downstream to Syria and Iraq. It is
unthinkable, from a terrorist's logic, that such a bio weapon would be
deployed in a sparsely populated area. What's the point? You can't
terrorize a wilderness. There's also the fact that most biological
weapons are lethal through inhalation or skin contact. Delivering a
toxin through a water medium is always inefficient, but particularly so
in this case. You just close off the water supply."

Zammit made a temple of his fingers and tucked it under his chin,
thinking hard.

"So what's going on? If a terrorist wanted to kill millions of people,
he'd use something he could release in the air, something that could
be inhaled. And he'd choose something small and portable." He held up
a pen.

"For example, a piece of crystallized polio the size of this pen nib
contains enough virus to annihilate everyone on earth."

Gazing at the grim faces around the table, he continued.

"And if someone just wanted to contaminate this particular water
source, it would be much easier to dump plutonium into the reservoir.

And plutonium, even though you can't buy it at your local supermarket,
would still be easier to come by than genetically modified
cyanobacteria and much easier to plant. It also doesn't have to
eat."

Zammit displayed four satellite photos showing how fast the infestation
had grown in the reservoir.

"This GMO had to be introduced. To introduce so much of it so fast by
conventional means, you'd need supertanker loads. The reservoir is in
the middle of a virtual war zone monitored by the Turkish army and
space satellites. And cyanobacteria eat organophosphates, which also
had to be introduced in significant quantities."

Zammit faced Yildiz.

"Since we are assured that during the last month a convoy of trucks
with Bio-War: We Deliver painted on the sides didn't pull up to the
reservoir, it's safe to assume that everything started at the dam
itself. Using a delivery system we don't yet understand."

Yildiz was pale.

"Ridiculous," he snapped.

"You have a wide variety of equipment and supplies at the dam?"

"Yes."

"And a wide variety of suppliers?"

"We purchase supplies from all over the world."

"I'd like to go back to the dam and have a look at some of your
supplies. And get the names of your suppliers."

"Of course," said Amurkhan.

"Today, if possible."

Cairo Jackson waved a huge hand.

"Cairo?"

"May I point out something the technologically inclined gentlemen here
have overlooked?"

"Go ahead."

"You mentioned earlier a barbarian with a pickax. All we've talked
about is the pickax. Who is the barbarian wielding it?"

Zammit smiled as the others around the table looked at each other,
coughed, and shuffled.

"Good point. Anything else?"

Stavros Costopoulos spoke.

"The identity of the barbarian is of course very significant to this
whole crisis, as is his psychology. The whole thing is just so, so ...
elaborate. It's hard to explain."

One of the generals interrupted impatiently.

"We all agree it's a good point, but I don't think psychology is our
primary concern here. Who are the candidates for barbarian?"

Mike Zammit turned to Graves.

"Colonel?"

Graves fiddled with his earplug and cleared his throat.

"According to our Office of Technology Assessment, there are at least
twenty-five countries that either have or are developing biochemical
warfare capability."

"What about America?" asked another general.

Graves's gaze was icy.

"I'm afraid I am unable to comment, sir." So, thought Zammit. We're
players in this nasty little game too.

The colonel continued.

"Since 1972 some 140 nations have ratified the Geneva Biological and
Toxin Weapons Convention, a treaty that bans their development and use.

Unfortunately, the convention has no provisions for verifying
compliance, which for all practical purposes means it's useless. We
also worked hard to establish the Chemical Weapons Convention, which
went into effect in 1997 with over 160 signatories. Same problem--no
adequate verification procedures."

Amurkhan interjected.

"Just how hard is it to develop a bio weapon

Graves waved at Zammit. The scientist shrugged.

"It's not hard at all. Anyone with a kit for brewing beer in his
basement can do it with relative safety, so long as you take
precautions to make sure you don't end up poisoning yourself.

It also doesn't take very long. Let's say a single bacterium divides
every twenty minutes. The growth is exponential--2, 4, 16, 256, 65,000
plus, and so on. Within ten hours that single bacterium will produce
over a billion more. At the end of a week ... "

Stunned silence. One of the generals muttered, "Allah," and in his
earpiece Zammit heard a faint, metallic

"God."

"There is no point in continuing this discussion," interrupted another
military man.

"As the PKK told Dr. Zammit, it's the Iraqis. They have biochemical
weapons factories, and Anwar hates us. And as Mr ... Jackson says, there
must be a barbarian. It must be them."

He turned to Costopoulos.

"Where psychology is concerned, we all know Anwar is insane, and this
is an insane thing to do. Everything fits perfectly. Madam Prime
Minister, I advise that we attack immediately."

"And there goes the election!" snapped Amurkhan. She and the general
glared at each other with open hostility.

"The fundamentalists support Iraq, and they'd use it against me."

Zammit interrupted before this exchange could escalate.

"I don't think it's a good idea either, but for a different reason.

Despite all the evidence, I don't think it's the Iraqis. It took some
skillful genetic engineering to produce this GMO, and if Anwar has that
capability, I'll eat this table."

"So who does?" demanded Amurkhan.

"We do," said Zammit, gazing at Colonel Graves, who gazed impassively
back.

"The Russians do. Or did."

"It has to be the Iraqis," insisted the general.

"America is our ally and has nothing to gain from this, and neither do
the Russians. You said the PKK told you Anwar had foreknowledge that
this was going to happen. It's obvious. We must attack
immediately."

Zammit was about to reply when Thamar Amurkhan's words rang out over
the rising chorus of angry male voices.

"I'm sure we all want to know who is responsible for this crisis and
punish them. But there is the crisis itself, which will soon turn into
a fullfledged disaster. We have international agreements to supply
water to Syria and Iraq, and we are not doing it. In a short time
millions of people will begin to die of thirst, as well as their crops,
so there will be starvation too. The first task is to find a solution
to this contamination. We can punish the perpetrators later. Dr ...

Zammit, what do you suggest?"

"My people are trying to find out how to kill the cyanobacteria and
destroy or neutralize the toxin. I want to go back to the dam. Finding
out how the bacteria got there in the first place will give us vital
clues."

"Very well. Keep me informed through Colonel Yildiz."

As everyone left the room. Colonel Graves pulled Zammit, Jackson, and
Costopoulos aside.

"How long?"

"I don't know. We're working as fast as we can," replied Zammit.

"Work faster. Turkey has a history of military coups. The army has
taken over four times in the last forty years. They only step into
certain situations--civil disorder, political corruption, or an outside
threat they feel a civilian government can't handle. A situation just
like this one."

"I know," said Zammit.

"Article 118 of the constitution."

Graves glanced around to make sure no one was listening.

"The problem is, fundamentalist factions have succeeded in infiltrating
the Turkish military, perhaps even at the highest levels. That's bad
enough, but you also saw how the National Security Council members are
itching for a fight. Most of these guys, even if they are in favor of
democracy, are still Muslims. They think Thamar Amurkhan should be at
home cooking meals and making babies."

Zammit nodded.

"Tell Yildiz and Amurkhan about fundamentalists in the military.

It could tie in with the Resistance Army of Allah's confidence in the
imminent overthrow of the government."

"Good idea," said Graves.

"And for God's sake, work as fast as you can."

Istanbul, September 3

He tried to imagine what it had looked like before it was desecrated.

Virtually alone in the early evening light, he walked through the
massive structure. Dedicated by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian in
a d. 537, shaken and damaged by earthquakes and scorched by fire, the
rose red church still stood after more than 1400 years.

Justinian, heir to the Roman Empire after the fall of the West, had
wanted the greatest building in the world and he had gotten it, from
his Greek architects Anthemios and Isidores. When it was finished,
Justinian, astounded, had held his arms to heaven and cried, "O
Solomon, I have outdone thee!" And indeed, the building was rumored to
surpass Solomon's temple in size, beauty of proportion, and richness of
decoration.

No mortar held it together--a secret combination of limestone and
melted lead had been used to fuse the stones forever. Twentyfour tons
of twenty-four-carat gold had been used to make the 18,000 square yards
of golden mosaics. The sanctuary, which only the priests could enter,
contained twenty tons of silver.

He remembered what he had been taught. Someone had said that all the
world fears Time, but Time fears the pyramids. As he walked slowly
through the ancient building, he thought that perhaps the pyramids
feared this church. Centuries after it had been built, the Venetians,
arrogant in the safety of their lagoon, proud of their independence and
originality, of their vast material wealth, which was matched by the
genius of their artists, had, when they came to build Saint Mark's
Church, meekly copied the design of this church, knowing that no
greater could be found.

He stopped at the cavernous entrance of the Orea Porta, the Beautiful
Gate. It led, through a cool darkness still spicy with 900 years of
incense, to the inner Imperial Gate, through which the emperor had
traditionally entered the nave.

Through which his ancestors had entered the nave.

He noticed deep grooves worn into the hard stone pavement. Over nine
centuries of bored imperial chamberlains shuffling their aching feet as
they fought to stay awake during the interminable ceremonies of Greek
Orthodoxy. The worn stone gave mute but eloquent witness to the
immense age of the place.

Then, in 1453, the ceremonies had ended. Soon they would begin
again.

The vast airy space that stretched away on all sides seemed as large as
the universe but more grand. Shot with veins of sunlight that poured
through forty windows, it was contained under a dome that seemed to
float, as if suspended in the air by a golden chain that descended from
the very anchor of heaven itself.

The huge marble columns that marched away into the gloom on either side
were from the lost Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, one of the Seven
Wonders of the ancient world; from the Egyptian Temple of the Sun at
Heliopolis; even from the Babylonian Temple of Baalbek. The marble
varied: deep green porphyry from Sparta, rose-red Phrygian from
Synnada; lass ian with blood-red veins on livid white.

Once again he ran through the list fixed in his mind, a list of the
work that would be necessary to restore the building to its original
appearance and function. He gazed reverently at the glistening mosaics
of saints, emperors, and Jesus Christ. The Messiah of the Orthodox was
no gentle American Jesus, meek and mild in a pink nightgown, eyes
soulfully upcast, ready to be sacrificed as the lamb of the Lord,
already floating to heaven on a cottony cloud. The Messiah of the
Orthodox was Christ Pantocrator, an emperor, not a shepherd. Grim,
humorless, and determined, lord and master of the universe, he was as
hard and glittering as the gold and black mosaics that portrayed him.

He remembered what he had been taught. Many mosaic images of the
saints had been gouged out over the centuries. The metal cross on the
dome had been replaced with Islam's crescent moon, covered with 50,000
fused gold coins in a futile attempt to compete with the solid gold
lining of the dome. The Muslims had found it impossible to lift the
giant building physically and turn it toward Mecca.

Instead they had built a mimbar and a mihrab for prayer, located at a
thirty-degree angle to the Christian altar, slanted across the general
floor plan, so they would both face the distant holy city of Mecca.

They had taken the greatest Christian building in the world and turned
it into a mosque. Kemal Ataturk had turned it into a museum but left
it looking like a mosque. And now Turkey's fundamentalists said they
would turn it into an active place of Islamic worship once more.

As he looked at the huge disks that hung from what should have been a
Christian dome, Muslim green gilded with gold Arabic characters, he
wanted to spit on the floor.

His eyes closed in ecstasy as he imagined what it would soon be like. A
thousand candles and lamps glimmering beneath the vast dome. The
images of Christ and His saints and of the emperors and empresses of
Byzantium, his ancestors, being carried through the adoring mob. The
bishops with their miters and white satin robes picked out with gems
and pearls, holding aloft the most precious relics of their religion,
the golden caskets and jeweled icons, as they glided chanting through
the supplicating crowds ... Suddenly he heard two men speaking Turkish.

They were giggling, eating baklava from paper napkins, and sneaking
cigarettes in defiance of the posted signs.

Shaking with fury, the Holy Chosen One turned on his heel and walked
out of Hagia Sophia, the rose-red Church of Holy Wisdom.

ATATURK Dam, September 3

The storage warehouse of the Ataturk Dam was cavernous, swarming with
soldiers, technicians, and maintenance staff. It smelled of oil and
gasoline, solvents and hot metal. Mike Zammit walked through it
accompanied by Colonel Hakim Yildiz.

They'd arrived at two in the afternoon, flying back to the dam from
Istanbul after the meeting with Amurkhan. It was almost
five-thirty--they'd spent more than three hours checking everything.

And finding nothing.

Costopoulos had stayed in Istanbul with Connie Palaeov to confer with
Colonel Graves, and Jackson and Spargo were in Yildiz's office with
Lloyd Lavender. No further information had come in from Frankie
Richards and Kitson Kang in Seattle.

"I see what you mean about getting supplies from all over the world,"
remarked Zammit, leafing through a list of the dam's suppliers and
equipment.

"I presume you inspect everything that comes in?"

Yildiz shrugged.

"Security is what you would expect at an industrial facility in the
middle of a desert. It's not like we're running a nuclear reactor. We
buy standard industrial equipment and chemicals."

"What are these?"

The colonel peered.

"Bill of lading. Materials inspected and signed for by the appropriate
individual." He pointed at another document.

"Hazardous materials manifest. Same thing."

Zammit gazed around, feeling the low swell of frustration.

"This could take days. We don't have days."

He began to pace rapidly, and the stocky Turk had to scurry to keep
up.

"In Istanbul I talked about the ineffectiveness of delivering a bio
weapon through water. There aren't a lot of options. You said the
only planes that fly over here are Turkish air force jets or cargo
planes and they never do aerial spraying."

"Correct."

"And you don't use organophosphate chemical weapons."

"Correct."

"And convoys of trucks don't dump anything in the reservoir."

"Correct. However, now that you mention it, there was an accidenta
couple of months ago. Two supply trucks ran into each other, and they
both ended up in the reservoir. The containers they were carrying were
lost."

Zammit halted.

"Did you recover them?"

Yildiz saw where this line of questioning was headed and his brown eyes
flickered.

"No. We don't have salvage equipment. They were just empty tanks."

"How do you know they were empty?"

"We examined the bill of lading and the manifest. Both said they were
standard black metal tanks used for taking water samples for
analysis."

"So the tanks themselves were never inspected?"

"No. They fell into the reservoir before they reached the warehouse.

As far as I know, no one even saw them."

"Where were the tanks from?"

"A regular supplier in Russia."

"Are there any routine procedures at the dam or reservoir that would
take employees down to the water with large pieces of equipment?"

"Of course. We routinely sample the water as a precaution."

"Using the same types of tanks?"

"Yes."

"Where are they kept?"

They walked to the tank storage area as Yildiz pointed out the great
coils of hose and explained how the samples were taken from the
reservoir.

"So the samples are sent to Urfa for testing?" asked Zammit.

"Yes. It is strictly routine. We've never found anything."

"But the tanks stay here?"

"Yes. To be used again."

At the storage area, Mike Zammit contemplated the huge black metal
tanks.

"Who actually does the sampling?"

Yildiz conferred with a tall Turk in a white lab coat as Zammit ran his
hands over the tanks nearest him.

The colonel returned.

"The sampling is done by the chief sampling protocol technician. He
does it himself--the procedure is fully automated. He is also the
person who signs bills of lading and manifests whenever the tanks are
delivered."

"In other words," said Zammit, "he would've signed the documents
certifying that the lost tanks were standard tanks and empty, right?

Even though he never saw or examined them?"

Yildiz opened his mouth to argue, then realized there was nothing to
say.

"Yes."

"Colonel, I want the lids taken off these tanks so I can examine the
interiors."

The Turkish colonel protested.

"Why these? I thought you were concerned about the ones that fell into
the water."

"I'm concerned about them all."

"But they've been cleaned."

"Believe me, that doesn't matter."

"Very well. And the name of the chief sampling protocol technician is
Ruslan Glinka."

"You have a Russian technician working here?"

"GAP has twenty-two dams and nineteen power stations. It's one of the
biggest projects of its kind in history and it takes a lot of people to
run it. As well as getting supplies from all over the world, we hire
from all over the world."

"Do you check your personnel as carefully as you check your
suppliers?"

Yildiz colored.

"Of course. References, recommendations, everything. Everyone is
thoroughly investigated."

"I want to check the tanks first. Then I want to talk to Glinka."

Working with a team of technicians and maintenance staff as Yildiz
watched, Zammit examined the interior of the tanks visually. They were
empty, but they had recently been rinsed and were still damp. He
opened the micro lab as Yildiz peered over his shoulder, fascinated.

"What are you going to do? Please explain."

"This won't take long," replied Zammit. He pointed to the silicon
wafer factories, the disease dipsticks, and the miniature GC mass
spectrometer.

"We don't need these. The rectangular thing is the spectrometer,
preloaded with the spectrums of tens of thousands of known compounds.

These wafers are miniature factories that measure dielectrophoresis,
the minute electrical charges generated by all living creatures. Same
with these glass slides-disease dipsticks. They're coated with a
special film--they identify different microorganisms and their toxins.

But we're not looking for an organism, we're searching for a
chemical."

He held up a glass wafer the size of a credit card.

"A molecular lab that can detect incredibly minute chemical
concentrations. Including the one we're looking for."

Zammit put on latex gloves and took swabs from the damp interiors of
ten tanks chosen at random. For each one he wrung out the residual
liquid into a container, then used a special syringe to load the liquid
into the silicon wafer factories. The process took ten minutes. He
hooked up the laptop and started typing. Three minutes later he said,
"Well, that was easy. Five are clean, five show unmistakable traces of
organophosphates at high concentrations, even though the drums have
been rinsed." The Turk's eyes went as cold as the surface of Pluto.

"Colonel, I think we should have a chat with Ruslan Glinka, in your
office. Try to make the invitation sound casual so he doesn't become
alarmed. Having soldiers nearby might be a good idea."

Yildiz barked orders as Zammit cleaned up the micro lab and saw to its
safe storage.

They went up to the colonel's office and briefed Jackson, Spargo, and
Lavender.

Jackson spoke first.

"So that's how nutrients were fed to the cyanobacteria.

What about those tanks still in the water?"

"I bet they contain, or rather contained, the original culture of the
cyanobacteria. Probably some sort of time release mechanism on the
tanks. We won't know for sure until we retrieve them. We'll ask
Colonel Graves to supply the equipment."

"But there's millions of cubic yards of the stuff out there. It all
came from a few tanks?" protested Spargo.

Zammit nodded thoughtfully.

"The genetic engineering on the stuff is very sophisticated. We
already know it breeds incredibly fast. Whoever developed it might
have had some way of drying it or otherwise treating it so it's super
concentrated Once in the water, in contact with ideal environmental
conditions and concentrated nutrients, it would start growing
explosively."

There was a knock on the door. A senior staff member with a large
purple bruise on his cheek entered the room.

"We found him. He was on the telephone with someone when he saw us and
immediately tried to run. The soldiers helped subdue him."

Soldiers dragged Ruslan Glinka into the room. He was disheveled, with
a bloody nose and torn clothing.

"Do you speak English?" Zammit asked. Glinka didn't answer.

"He does," said Yildiz, his face a mask of anger.

Zammit hitched his hip onto the edge of the desk.

"So you're the waiter who delivers meals to that poisonous muck out
there. Who's the chef?"

Glinka was defiant, a strange glint in his eyes.

"Jew!"

"Sorry to disappoint you. Interesting turn to the conversation,
though."

The Russian's head swayed back and forth like a cobra about to
strike.

"Satan!"

he hissed.

"He couldn't make it," said Zammit, wondering what was going on.

"Maybe next time."

Glinka's body suddenly went rigid, and he began to struggle in the
soldiers' grip. He screamed, flecks of spittle mottling his lips.

"Derzhava! A strong Russia! Sobornost! A spiritual Russia!"

"I couldn't agree more," said Zammit, baffled.

"But you're not answering my question."

Convulsively Glinka broke partially free and bit his wrist before he
could be restrained. Again he went rigid. Two seconds later blood
poured from his mouth, ears, eyes, and nose in a crimson torrent. He
collapsed to the floor like an emptying bag of hospital blood and
thrashed, leaving slimy orange-red smears as his legs scissored back
and forth. Then, just as suddenly, he was still.

"Holy fuck," said Cairo Jackson.

"I'm going to be sick," gagged Dikka as she darted from the room.

Lavender was pale, the soldiers and Yildiz stunned with shock.

Mike Zammit stared at the spreading red lake on the yellow linoleum
floor.

Irrationally he thought. Don't get any on your shoes. His nostrils
prickled with the never-to-be-forgotten rusted iron odor of cooling
human blood.

There was a thick newspaper on the desk. Zammit separated the sections
and threw them on the floor over the pool of blood to make a path to
the body. He walked gingerly over the paper, knelt, and lifted
Glinka's wrist. He looked closely.

"His watch. The lens is shattered and there's some residual liquid."

"Obviously it didn't contain vitamins," said Jackson.

Zammit was about to put the limp hand back on the floor when he noticed
something. He checked Glinka's other hand and wrist as well, frowning.

As he looked under the dead man's hairline, he said, "Cairo, take off
this guy's shoes and socks." Jackson wrapped his hands in newspaper
and pulled off the loafers and socks. Zammit checked the dead man's
feet.

"What on earth are you doing?" demanded Lavender. Zammit knelt by
the body as Yildiz handed him a box of Kleenex so he could wipe his
bloody hands.

"I know it sounds incredible, but at some time in the course of this
man's life, he was crucified'."

September 5

Navy Seal Peter Morris, in scuba gear, stared dubiously at the fetid,
oily green slime a few yards away, holding an oxygen mask over his
face. He squinted up into the scorching blue sky. Holding his breath,
he removed the mask and quickly exhaled the question to avoid inhaling
the stench.

"Sir, tell me again why you thought I might have to dive into this
crap?" He put the mask back on.

Bursting with impatience, Mike Zammit stood at the edge of the
reservoir shielding his eyes from the glare as he watched what was
happening a hundred yards away. It was noon, some forty-three hours
since Glinka had committed suicide. The modular components of two
vessels were being assembled by a swarm of technicians, half-hidden in
sprays of sparks from welding torches, with the ease and speed of a
couple of giant Meccano toys. One was the U.S. Navy vessel Alliant, an
experimental craft being tested by the technicians and crew of the USS
Carl Vinson in the Arabian Gulf. After hearing about Glinka and the
lost tanks. Colonel Graves had arranged to have the ship dismantled
and flown directly from the Vinson to the dam. The second vessel was
the state of-the-art salvage ship Deep Find owned by the Welsh company
Deep Redeemer Inc ... Deep Find was searching for treasure in the
Mediterranean when the vessel's owners were contacted. The U.S.
government agreed to pay a hefty fee to borrow the ship and crew and
fly them to the Ataturk Dam.

Zammit wiped sweat from his brow as he turned to Peter Morris, who was
from the Vinson as well.

"We have to find out what's happening underneath. This stuff is
growing downward. It's only a matter of time before it reaches the
bottom.

Because it's genetically altered, we can only guess at its life cycle.

We've stopped feeding it, but it's still producing toxin. We need a
visual examination and assumed it would have to be done by a diver.

Then we found out about those two vessels. They'll do it instead."

Morris looked grateful.

"Sir, this stuff is really thick. It'd be like swimming through liquid
concrete. Once I reached the water underneath there'd be no light at
all. You'd get disoriented pretty quick."

Zammit wondered whether to tell Morris about the toxin but decided
against it.

If anything went wrong with the two ships and they had to use the kid,
he'd tell him then.

"Apart from examining the underside of this crap, what else was I
supposed to be looking for?"

"Metal canisters. They used to contain this stuff."

Morris looked incredulous.

"All of it?"

"No," said Zammit.

"A concentrate of some sort."

He had used the micro lab to analyze Glinka's watch and the residual
poison it contained. The lens, instead of being crystal, was a hard
crystalline sugar designed to dissolve instantly when it came in
contact with certain enzymes found only in human saliva--not even salt
water, tears, or blood would melt it.

Since people never licked their watch lenses, it was a foolproof
containment for the poison.

"Something I've never seen or heard of before," he explained to
Yildiz.

"Seems designed to cause an instantaneous and catastrophic rise in
blood pressure. Its only use would be as a suicide weapon."

Now, in brilliant sunshine fouled by stink, he frowned as he
remembered. A biological weapon he'd never seen or heard of before. A
suicide drug he'd never seen or heard of before. Used by a Russian
technician of considerable education and with impeccable references,
none of whom mentioned that he hated Jews, had an obsession with Satan,
and just happened to have been crucified and somehow recovered.

What was going on?

His reverie was broken by Peter Morris.

"Sir, how are those two ships supposed to work together? I've heard a
little about the Alliant but not much. What's happening?"

Zammit reviewed the plan in his mind. If it worked, it was going to be
a masterpiece of improvisation, something that might prove useful for
decades to come.

"In the Arabian Gulf, the experimental craft Alliant is testing a new
type of sonar equipment called synthetic aperture sonar, or SAS," he
explained to Morris.

"The technology has the potential to produce pictures of the sea floor
showing detail with a resolution twenty times finer than conventional
sonar."

"What kind of detail?" asked Morris.

"In conditions where conventional sonar might locate an object the size
of a ship's hull, SAS can find something as small as a teapot. Current
sonar devices are essentially bolted to the ship that carries them,
but the Alliant tows a flexible array of sonar pods, each packed with
electronics, beneath and behind its hull."

"Man," said Morris, "I've never heard of that before."

Zammit recalled his briefing session.

"The pods can be lowered to depths of many feet to avoid surface and
subsurface turbulence--or, in this case, a carpet of green slime that
floats on the water. As they move beneath the water, each pod takes
simultaneous sonar readings--acoustic snapshots--of the sea floor.

Alliant's on-board computers then combine the data from each pod,
compensating for the range and the Doppler effect."

"The Doppler what?"

"The pod is moving. The sea floor is stationary. The result is that
you get different readings from the sonar waves depending on whether
you're moving toward an object or away from it. That wave
distortion--the Doppler effect--means you can't locate something
accurately unless you use a mathematical equation to compensate."

Seeing the confusion on Morris's face, Zammit said, "Never mind.

Anyway, the ship's computers produce a high-resolution image of
whatever is on the bottom. I expect the Alliant to pinpoint the
location of the canisters easily, but that doesn't solve the other
problem."

"What's that, sir?"

"Retrieving the things. Alliant can't bring them to the surface. Enter
the other vessel, Deep Find It's a salvage ship that will use its
hydraulic grab, a giant six-fingered claw with a four-yard span that
can lift three tons at a time."

"Jesus," said Morris.

"Can I stay and watch?"

Zammit grinned.

"Sure. The grab is equipped with underwater lights and a series of
low-light video cameras. It's suspended from the mother ship by an
umbilical cord loaded with electronics. The grab brings the canisters
to the surface and stores them in the cargo hold after they've been
disinfected. Then they come ashore. At least that's how we hope it'll
work."

Designed to function in deep water where no diver could go, the Deep
Find should have no problem hauling up the empty canisters from the
shallow depths of the reservoir. But Zammit was still worried.

"Fiendish," grinned Peter Morris.

Cairo Jackson jogged up, panting in the broiling sun.

"Gotta spend more time in the gym. They're ready. Good thing they
were both designed to be modular and can be taken apart and put
together again quickly."

"What about the modifications?"

Jackson wiped his face with a damp handkerchief.

"All in place. We've installed decontamination facilities on each
vessel--both antiseptic rinse and ultraviolet light array, just to be
sure. The big problem turned out to be modifying the video cameras and
low light array on the grab so they could be swiveled upward from the
claw. Fooling around with fundamental design is tricky. The builders
never considered the possibility of looking up instead of down."

Zammit nodded. To avoid risking Peter Morris's life, the cameras and
lights had to be able to look upward so that they could illuminate and
film the underside of the cyanobacteria.

"Let's go."

It took the Alliant an hour to find all the containers. There were 112
of them scattered on the reservoir floor within 200 yards of each
other--they had obviously rolled down the incline that led from the
water's edge to the reservoir floor. It then took another two hours to
transfer the location data from the navy ship's computers to the
salvage vessel's, which were different. By the time the appropriate
computer language translations were done and the links tested, it was
almost evening. It took another five hours for Deep Find to retrieve
the containers. By the time the task was done, it was dark.

They worked under a huge black sky so filled with stars that they cast
a ghostly blue light. Because of the darkness they rigged floodlights
or. Deep Find and on the reservoir shore so the salvage vessel could
do its job. Once the containers were decontaminated and unloaded, it
took Zammit two hours under the blinding floodlights on the shore to
examine the canisters and pry off the lids, grimly wondering what might
be left for him to test, given the length of time they'd been in the
water and the fact that they had been subjected to antiseptic rinse and
ultraviolet light.

Nothing. Not even residual traces of what they had once contained. He
felt a deadening sense of defeat. He also realized the micro lab was
running out of slides and reagents.

Then, in the last group of five, he found himself staring at the only
tank with an intact lid. He grinned. The only tank whose time
release mechanism had failed. He opened it carefully and began
analyzing its contents with the micro lab Fifteen minutes later, he
was done.

Back in the control room he stared at the results, feeling a rising
sense of frustration at his inability to figure out what was going on.

He waited as Colonel Yildiz patched through an audio-video feed to
Colonel Graves in Istanbul.

"Mike, what have you found?"

"The canisters. A hundred and twelve of them. All have time release
mechanisms.

One failed, so I was able to test the contents. Like I figured, all of
them once contained a super concentrated form of the cyanobacteria. It
was dried."

"You mean freeze-dried?"

"No. You can't freeze-dry a living organism without killing it.

Freezing creates ice, ice expands, the cell wall ruptures, and it dies.

It was dried using a desiccant, a sugar called trehalose. The sugar
dries and shrinks the living organism into a powder that looks like
green coffee creamer. Each grain of the powder is a tiny crystalline
sugar bead. The process also achieves a fantastic concentration. The
bacteria could stay viable for hundreds of years. Just mix it with
water and the right nutrients, and it's alive again."

"Where would this come from? Who's the barbarian?"

"It's definitely not off-the-shelf technology, and there's no way the
Iraqis could do it."

"Any word on a solution?"

"No. I'm sending a container of it back to the lab in Seattle. Also,
Frankie Richards is examining the contents of those bulbs that are
growing so rapidly on the surface. There might be something there.

I've done everything I can do at the moment. Colonel Yildiz, your
opinion?"

The Turk's immaculate uniform was losing its knife-edge crease and he
had loosened his collar.

"You do what you think best. Immediately advise me of any new
developments. I must go to Istanbul and brief the prime minister."

As Yildiz turned away, Zammit said, "I trust you're taking precautions,
as I advised? You might not take the Resistance Army of Allah stuff
seriously, but I do."

The colonel nodded curtly.

"I will meet secretly with Amurkhan at the Hilton on the banks of the
Bosphorus instead of at the usual ministries. No one can possibly
know."

Zammit rubbed his eyes as Yildiz left the room. He turned back to the
screen.

Graves nodded.

"Get some sleep. Tomorrow we go to the Crimea."

Zammit felt a sudden sense of psychic dislocation.

"What?"

"The president's assistant. Randy Berkowitz, got a package from a
buddy of his.

It was marked urgent. The guy ignored channels and he's going to get
his ass reamed out, but it's a good thing he did because otherwise the
report would've sat for days before anyone looked at it. One of our
people in Sevastopol. A CIA analyst named Jack Morgan."

Sevastopol, September 5

Gazing at the bowl of green-tufted rocky hills that cupped the bay, the
amethyst sea, the palm trees, colored parasols, and browning bodies
lounging on beaches, Mike Zammit knew he was on the same latitude as
Nice. It was almost possible to think he was on the French Riviera.

What gave it away was the cheap clothing worn by the many in contrast
to the expensive clothing worn by the haughty few, the Mongol features
of many people on the streets, the signs in the Cyrillic alphabet on
seedy-looking buildings, and the huge concrete block apartments. There
was no mistaking the tidal-flat mud color of Soviet concrete.

As they drove in the black Volga limousine along the beachfront
boulevard of the Crimean peninsula's premier city, a famous resort and
naval base, Zammit asked, "Where are we going?"

Graves rolled down the window to smell the sea air.

"Morgan's downtown. Ah, the sweet smell of raw sewage."

"Why are you keeping us in suspense?" asked Costopoulos. Zammit had
told Graves he wanted to bring the Greek along, and the colonel had
agreed.

"I don't know the whole story, and we should all hear it from the
horse's mouth."

The limo let them off on a street of run-down villas painted in lemon
yellow, ochre, pale pink, baby blue, and peppermint green. All had
white slatted shutters. Their destination was a pink one, in need of a
new paint job.

Obviously pre-Revolution, it had an air of neglect and decay, its
facade mottled with discolored white patches where the plaster had
fallen away. The entrance was filthy. The elevator was out of order,
so they trudged up the grand staircase, littered with garbage, to the
third floor and a brass plaque that said AmeriSlav Import-Export
Company in both Ukrainian and English.

A tense-looking aide let them in. The suite of rooms wore a look of
shabby gentility. Zammit imagined that it was once the home of a minor
aristocrat who could no longer stand the harsh winters in Moscow. The
modern desks and office chairs didn't fit with the antique furniture
along the walls. In the middle of the room, across from the
fireplace, a low round conference table sat surrounded by an
overstuffed sofa and easy chairs. The aide reappeared through one of
the doors followed by a short round reddish-yellow man and a tall lanky
one with the all-American good looks of a college football quarterback.

After they were introduced, the man identified as Lance Yarham
dismissed the aide, who seemed only too glad to escape into the next
room and close the door.

Hands on his hips, belly thrust forward, Yarham was obviously angry.

Zammit appraised the yellowish skin, reddish hair, round face and
belly, and thought the man looked like a decaying orange. Jack Morgan
looked as if he knew why Yarham was angry and didn't care.

"Coffee? Tea? Something stronger?" asked Morgan.

"I think I'll have something stronger."

"OK," said Mike Zammit.

A small smile creased Morgan's face.

"I've heard about you. Not often you meet a tough-guy scientist.

Slivovitz all right?" He pulled the cork out of a bottle and a sharp
sting filled the air. Zammit thought. What does this smell like? He
remembered. Ozone. Mixed with varsol.

"It's rocket fuel," apologized Morgan.

"I've had it before," said Zammit.

"Plum brandy. If you want a real treat, buy a jar of plums preserved
in slivovitz, pour it over vanilla ice cream, then set fire to it."

"Set fire to it?"

"Yeah," said Zammit.

"Slivovitz burns with an electric-blue flame. If you do it in a
darkened room it'll impress the hell out of your girlfriend."

"I'll have the same, if you don't mind," said Costopoulos.

"Minus the ice cream, the girlfriend, and the fire."

"Coffee," said Yarham curtly.

"Nothing for me," said Graves, raising a bushy gray eyebrow at
Zammit.

They sat around the conference table, stained with rings from years of
wet glasses and coffee cups. The tension was thick.

"So," said Graves.

"You sent some information to Randy Berkowitz at the White House."

"Goddamn it!" shouted Yarham.

"There are procedures around here! If you don't follow procedures,
everything's as organized as a bunch of guys fleeing from a burning
building!"

Morgan sipped his drink and stared at the floor.

"It's called initiative, sir. You said you liked it when we showed
some. I did try to explain."

"I told you it was bullshit!"

"I disagree," said Morgan softly.

"And of course I can't touch you because you're best buddies with--"

Colonel Graves's voice sounded like a ton of coal rumbling down a
chute.

"Stop shouting. You know we have a crisis at the Ataturk Dam?"

Yarham shrugged irritably.

"You've just stated everything I know about it.

Nobody's telling us fuck-all." He tilted an aggressive chin at
Zammit.

"The only other thing I know is that wonder boy here was supposed to
have it solved by now."

It was obvious the old CIA agent intended his presence to be
obstructive rather than helpful. Zammit put his glass on the table and
stood.

"I want you to leave."

"I'm the senior officer at this station. I'm in charge. I--"

"Out,"
said Zammit.

"Out," said Graves.

Costopoulos waved good-bye as Yarham slammed the door.

Graves leaned toward Morgan.

"That still doesn't mean what you did was acceptable. You'll answer to
Langley."

"I know," said Morgan.

"Do you have any idea how frustrating it is to deal with these
complacent old farts?"

"Take it easy. Jack," said Zammit.

"If you have anything, give."

Morgan nodded.

"What I sent Randy was a copy, with a translation. I've got duplicates
here." He reached into his briefcase and pulled out a pile of folders
bound with elastic bands.

"Begin at the beginning," said Graves.

"Don't leave anything out."

Morgan took a long pull on his slivovitz.

"I have a lot of contacts. One of them was the editor of a local paper
called the Glory of Sevastopol. Boris Kazov.

Investigative journalism." He gave a mirthless smile.

"In this country, the surest way to an early grave, apart from a firing
squad. But Boris was very serious, and once he was onto something, he
wouldn't let go."

Zammit nodded.

"Go on."

"We'd get together secretly. I'd feed him stuff, he'd feed me stuff,
the usual routine. I liked the guy. He was working on something big
but wouldn't say what.

Said he could be killed at any time. If he thought he was in danger
he'd send me a package."

Morgan held up the sheaf of documents.

"He sent me this the day he died."

"How did he die?" asked Zammit.

Morgan's eyes flickered.

"I'd like to ask a favor."

Graves was impassive.

"Depends what it is."

The young CIA agent cleared his throat.

"It's a little unorthodox. You know, outside channels."

"Don't make a habit of this," said Zammit.

"You'll ruin your career."

"She worked with Kazov. Irina Markova. She knows everything."

Graves frowned.

"A woman? A Russian woman sitting in on a meeting like this? Are you
nuts?"

"Colonel," said Costopoulos, "I think we should meet this woman."

"I trust her, and it really is important," said Morgan.

"I agree," said Zammit.

Graves nodded reluctantly as Morgan pressed the speakerphone button.

"Send her in," he said to the aide.

"Where's Yarham?"

"Sulking in a bar down the street."

Irina Markova strode into the room, her walk as casually precise as a
fashion model's. Her handshake was firm. Her slender frailty was
belied by burning eyes that looked at Zammit as if she knew him. Her
auburn hair was tied back in a short ponytail. She wore tight burgundy
pants and a matching jacket over a bronze-colored blouse. As soon as
she sat down, she crossed her long legs, rummaged in a handbag, and
took out a pack of Marlboros. Her battered Zippo lighter produced a
flame the size of Zammit's thumb, and she inhaled deeply.

"I want Boris avenged," she breathed, in heavily accented English.

"I'm afraid we're not in the avenging business," said Zammit.

Her pale violet eyes were appraising.

"I have heard of you. Moscow. Mafia smuggling chlorofluorocarbons.

People made jokes when you accepted that picture of Lenin."

"I'm a fossil collector."

Her broad smile revealed a gap between her two front teeth. She
laughed a croaky, smoky laugh.

"So, we start where?"

"Boris Kazov. Your editor. How did he die? And why?" asked
Graves.

Her cheeks hollowed as she sucked the cigarette.

"He was burned from within."

"No riddles, please," said Graves.

"We don't have time."

"He had been sick for about two weeks. Went to the doctors, they
didn't know.

Hair falling out, bleeding everywhere, in agony."

She pointed at the bundle Jack Morgan held.

"Because of that."

She lit a fresh cigarette from the half-smoked one.

"His office was burgled about two weeks before he died. I think they
were looking for those documents.

But they were so important he always carried them with him, or hid
them. He died the same day I brought them to Jack. Boris was tough.

To die so fast, that way, was not natural."

As she said "not natural," Zammit's gaze slid over to Costopoulos. The
Greek was already looking at him.

"How wasn't it natural?" asked Zammit.

"I am like Boris. Aggressive and persistent. I hounded medical staff
at a local hospital. Found someone who had worked at the Chornobyl
nuclear reactor. They recognized the symptoms. We called in
specialists."

She crushed out her partially smoked cigarette and fumbled blindly for
another as her violet eyes filled with tears. Zammit rose and filled a
snifter with six ounces of Scotch whiskey. She smiled gratefully as he
handed it to her.

"Crimean investigators come into the office with a Geiger counter. The
counter is right off the scale. Finally they find it. Sewn into the
back of his leather armchair, where he always worked."

"What?" asked Zammit, already dreading the answer.

She wiped her eyes.

"A lead-sheathed rod of plutonium-239 salted with cobalt-60.

With a tiny pinhole drilled in it. The pinhole ensured that the beam
of radioactive particles emitted by the rod passed directly into his
spine. He died of radiation poisoning."

There was silence. From his past experience with radioactivity, Zammit
knew that plutonium-239 and cobalt-60 were two of the deadliest
substances on the planet.

Clean nuclear weapons--ones with relatively little fallout--were made
with uranium or plutonium. Other radioactive elements were added to
make weapons that were dirty, with lots of fallout. And the dirtiest
nuclear weapons of all were made with cobalt-60.

"Tell them the story he was working on," urged Morgan.

"There is a cult operating throughout Crimea, throughout the former
Soviet Union. That monk who raises the dead."

Zammit nodded.

"Lazar Smegyev. But there are hundreds of cults here. In America too.

You think a bunch of religious nuts killed Kazov?"

Her eyes were troubled.

"Yes and no. Boris found that Smegyev keeps his acolytes in line with
strange narcotic drugs. Most of the cults around are ordinary people,
ignorant people. In this one the acolytes are soldiers and sailors.

And not just junior people. Senior staff too. There are scientists
and government people who belong. Rumors of sophisticated machines and
computers. That is how this cult is different."

Morgan interrupted.

"I know Irina has more information, but I have to tell you that I was
able for the first time ever to penetrate one of Smegyev's secret
rituals. I speak the language, I had a uniform, fake ID, the whole
thing."

Markova pointed her cigarette accusingly.

"You never told me. Or Boris. It would make a great story."

"Sorry," said Morgan.

"But I can't share everything I learn."

"Keep talking," said Graves.

"I not only saw Smegyev raise from the dead some guy they'd crucified,
but I overheard a bizarre conversation. I reported it to Yarham, and
he dismissed it.

That's why I sent the package to Randy Berkowitz."

Zammit felt as if he were diving into a pool of crystal water with
something horrible lurking at the bottom.

"Someone crucified? And raised from the dead?"

Graves's bushy eyebrows were twitching. He looked at Zammit.

"Glinka."

"What?" ask d Morgan.

Graves leaned forward and stabbed a forefinger at Markova.

"This is not a news conference, and everything we say here is off the
record. If I get wind of any kind of story being prepared, young lady,
they'll never find your body."

The reporter in Irina Markova was wide awake. Her eyes burned like
violet laser beams through a plume of cigarette smoke, and she nodded
reluctantly.

Quickly Zammit told them about Ruslan Glinka and what had happened at
the dam.

He would have told Morgan some details about the contamination itself,
but not with Markova in the room.

The young agent frowned.

"Committed suicide, huh? With a strange drug. I know these guys are
fanatics, but man ... "

"What's this Jew and Satan business?" Zammit asked Markova.

"Smegyev preaches the destiny of Mother Russia. He says that destiny
will soon be fulfilled. The Holy Chosen One, a descendant of the last
Byzantine emperor, will be revealed and rule once more in
Constantinople. Russians have always believed in Jewish
conspiracies--it was the tsar's secret police who forged the Protocols
of the Elders of Zion to justify pogroms, the document that influenced
Hitler so much. And Russians have always believed the rest of the
world is in a satanic conspiracy to destroy them."

Zammit remembered his conversation with Grand Master Angelo Fortucci
about Satan and evil.

"Do you believe any of this?"

"Of course not. I was educated at Oxford. But Russians are a very
spiritual people, with a strong mystical, fatalistic streak."

Costopoulos asked, "Does this Holy Chosen One actually exist? Anyone
ever seen him?"

She shrugged.

"I don't know. According to the legend, he must prove himself against
a worthy opponent before he can be anointed emperor."

Zammit frowned.

"Did Smegyev make all of this up? Like L. Ron Hubbard did with
Scientology?"

"No. There is a historical basis." She pointed at Morgan's bundle of
documents.

"It's in there. A Russian monk named Nestor was in Constantinople the
day the city fell. He survived and returned to Russia. Wrote a book
called The Secret Chronicle. He claims the last emperor was not killed
in battle but somehow escaped. He says he helped to spirit the
emperor's treasures from the city, which is no doubt some sort of
fantasy. It is very hysterical and mystical, but it is that book, and
Nestor's prophecies about Russia's destiny, that Smegyev is using." She
hesitated.

"There is something else as well."

Zammit looked at her keenly.

"What?"

She stubbed out her cigarette.

"I do not think it is the nature of cults to form alliances."

"Alliances?" said Graves.

"Da. With other cults."

"That makes sense," said Zammit.

"If your cult is a bunch of loonies who believe in Holy Chosen Ones and
secret imperial treasures, you're unlikely to feel empathy for a cult
that believes the Great Pyramid was built by aliens."

"But that is what is happening," said Markova.

"What are you talking about?" asked Morgan.

"Early in his career, Smegyev had contacts with a Japanese cult called
Aum Shinrikyo--Supreme Truth. The ones who released nerve gas in the
Tokyo subway in 1995. I cannot believe the two cults had anything in
common. Except one thing.

It was also a high-tech cult and used drugs on its members."

"Well," said Graves, "that could form the basis of an unholy alliance.

Look at the Hitler-Stalin pact."

Irina Markova continued.

"Smegyev is also in contact with an American group with a strange name.

The Spiritual Brotherhood of the She-Manitou. What is a
She-Manitou?"

As he stared at her, Zammit felt the pieces of the puzzle whirling in
his brain, as if in a tornado, but everything was moving too fast and
he couldn't put them together. Cults. Pompo, head of the Spiritual
Brotherhood of the She-Manitou. A Japanese cult in contact with
Smegyev's. A chemical weapon used by the Japanese cult. A biological
weapon used at the Ataturk Dam. What possible ... ? The others were
staring at him. He filed the bits and pieces away with a sense of
foreboding.

"It's a sort of forest-dwelling great spirit," said Zammit
distractedly. He drained his glass and strode to the window, looking
down at the streets of this half-oriental version of Monaco.

"We can talk about other cults later. Let's concentrate on the problem
at hand. Irina, you say Smegyev's cult is popular?

Why?"

Costopoulos said something to Markova in Russian. Startled that he
spoke the language, she nodded.

The Greek sipped his brandy.

"The first Russian state was founded at Kiev in the 9th century by
Viking mercenaries. Four hundred years later, they were conquered by
the Mongols. The oppression of Russians by the Mongols was so brutal,
so notorious, it was the origin of the English word slave."

Graves interrupted.

"Interesting, Dr. Costopoulos, but I don't see--" Zammit interjected,
"Let him talk."

"That brutality entered their political system and the fabric of
everyday life.

They became a psychologically conflicted people, convinced of their
greatness and yet always suspecting they were inferior to Europeans,
who had not succumbed to the Mongols. The bulwark of their spiritual
strength was religion, which dominated every aspect of life."

Costopoulos drained his glass.

"Then along came a new religion, an economic one, preached by the
Bolsheviks. Many believed it. But in 1991 the USSR collapsed under
the weight of its own incompetence and corruption."

Markova interrupted.

"It is true. First people were amazed and despairing, then angry and
cynical."

Costopoulos nodded.

"The Soviet myth they believed in turned out to be history's biggest
bad joke. Once again they felt inferior to Europeans. Their money was
worthless. Western businessmen, bisnizmeny, flooded in. War heroes
stood on street corners, selling their medals for pennies. The Marxist
myth destroyed, they cast about in despair, reaching far back into
history, finding older myths.

Thousands of churches were reopened, and cults began to proliferate."

"That's true," said Jack Morgan.

"A lot of people go to church, and many listen to ranting peasant monks
like Smegyev."

"For several reasons," said Costopoulos.

"Russia has a long history of peasant holy men, Rasputin being the most
notorious. When doctors could do nothing, Rasputin hypnotized the
tsar's son to stop his hemophiliac bleeding. Smegyev crucifies his
followers, then somehow resurrects them. Both are a form of show
business. Smegyev is also popular because he takes an old myth about
the Holy Chosen One and dresses it in new clothes. He offers certainty
and greatness to an uncertain people who want to be great."

Graves spoke.

"Well, he's going to be in trouble when he has to produce the Holy
Chosen One and can't do it."

Zammit turned away from the window and began to pace.

"So, Ruslan Glinka, a highly educated Russian technician, was a member
of this cult. We know that because he was crucified. When he was
caught he committed suicide, using one of the strange drugs Irina
referred to. What does a Russian cult have to do with a Turkish
reservoir?"

He turned to Markova.

"Even in today's chaos, it can't be easy to get hold of a rod of
plutonium salted with cobalt-60. Where is it?"

"The authorities confiscated it. But I was able to find out something
important through my contacts at Minatom, the Ministry of Nuclear
Energy." She lit another smoke.

"There is an inventory system, so rods can be tracked. If one goes
missing, they will know."

"How?"

"Each rod is numbered. The number is engraved into the lead casing.

The system has broken down, and many rods have simply disappeared. But
my contact told me the number of this particular rod and where it was
stored before it disappeared."

"Where?"

"Penza-19."

Graves shook his head.

"I don't understand."

Morgan replied, "It isn't commonly known, even within the intelligence
community. I researched this during training at Langley. There is a
network of secret cities all over Russia. Maybe sixteen or seventeen.

All are sealed off with electrified fences and guard towers. The
residents are scientists and technicians lured there by special
privileges unavailable to ordinary citizens.

But once they go into one of these installations they are never allowed
out.

They die there. At Penza-19 they do nuclear research. We believe this
particular city has a population of over one hundred thousand, and the
fenced-off area is over forty square miles. These cities never appear
on any map, and officially they don't exist."

"What's the significance of the number?" asked Costopoulos.

Jack Morgan smiled grimly.

"For decades Western intelligence agencies drove themselves crazy
asking the same question. Where are the other eighteen Penzas?

In the case of Krasnoyarsk-45, where are the other forty-four? It
wasn't until recently we found out what the numbers mean."

"And?"

"It would be funny if we hadn't wasted so many resources on this over
the last five decades. It's a postal code."

A brief silence. Zammit laughed. This was ludicrous.

"Sorry," he said to Morgan.

"But it is funny."

"Is it important to know where this rod came from?" asked Colonel
Graves.

"At first I didn't think so," said Morgan.

"Then I had a good look at Kazov's notes." He undid the elastic bands
and opened a folder. He leafed through it, pulled out a photograph,
and placed it on the table. Everyone craned to look.

It had been taken with a telephoto lens, then enlarged. A closeup of a
face beneath the wide visor of a military cap. The face was square and
meaty, and the hard pale eyes were slanted, Mongol style. The mouth
was a brutal slit, compressed in anger, and the jaw, clenched in rage,
bulged in tight knots of muscle.

"Crikey," said Colonel Graves.

"Who's this gorilla?"

Morgan replied, "This is the only known photograph. General Vladimir
Bled."

"So that's him," said Graves.

"No one knows much about him, as I recall. Except that he's capable,
hard as hell, and twice as mean. What's the tie-in?"

Jack Morgan leaned forward.

"Smegyev's ritual, the one I got into. A big guy was there, in a
general's uniform, drunk half out of his mind, talking about the Holy
Chosen One being the new tsar enthroned in a rose-red church in
Constantinople. He and Smegyev spoke briefly, about what I don't know.

Then the big guy drank so much I thought he was going to die. He must
have a liver made of asbestos."

Morgan stood and started pacing.

"I didn't recognize him, and there were no pictures in the files.

That's why Yarham didn't believe me."

He leaned over and tapped the photo.

"It was him."

They heard the click of a cigarette lighter and turned to Irina
Markova. She spoke, her husky voice full of whiskey and smoke.

"And General Bled used to be in charge of security at Penza-19."

Dead silence.

"Wait a moment," said Zammit.

"We're talking about one of the toughest, most capable soldiers in the
former USSR, right? And he joins a cult like this?"

Costopoulos interrupted.

"Bled must have believed in Marxism, or at least in the might of the
Soviet state. Then it was proved to be a lie and a failure. For a
proud and serious patriot, the humiliation would be almost unbearable.

It's a process of transference. The intense conviction you felt for
the idea that betrayed you is transferred, intact, to something else.

If possible, its polar opposite."

Irina Markova looked thoughtful.

"Humiliation. I heard a story. Bled and other military men were
invited to meet with their NATO counterparts. Before the meeting, a
German protocol staffer went to our soldiers and gave them a
condescending lecture on how to behave--bathe, use deodorant, don't
spit, don't bolt your food, don't get drunk and throw up. I heard Bled
was so angry he destroyed an entire barracks with his bare hands and it
took four units of military police to restrain him."

Costopoulos nodded.

"Being made to feel inferior. And by a German."

Jack Morgan threw himself into a chair.

"There's more. You know the Black Sea military and naval maneuvers
going on? The ones nobody was told were going to happen?"

Mike Zammit was getting the picture.

"Let me guess."

"That's right," said Morgan.

"General Vladimir Bled. Drunk, religious fanatic, and commander of the
Fourteenth Army Division. And a thief."

"What?" demanded Zammit.

"Bled is not only connected with the mad monk Smegyev, but the Russian
mafia as well. That's the story Kazov was working on. If you wrote a
novel about this, no one would believe you. I've got the details
here."

"Do you have any more on this guy's background?" asked Zammit.

Morgan nodded. He opened another file and started to read.

"Not much is known about his personal life, not even his date of birth.

Wait a second, the career summary is in here somewhere."

Graves spoke as Morgan searched.

"I remember. Brilliant tactician, brutal as hell but gets the job
done. Wherever there's disaster looming, the Kremlin calls Bled. But
he calls the shots."

"What do you mean?" asked Costopoulos.

"They sent him to Chechnya a few years ago. The Kremlin ordered him to
bomb the capital city, Grozny, into surrender. Bled replied there were
Russian troops held hostage and refused to bomb it."

"He disobeyed orders?" asked Zammit.

"Worse. He disobeyed a direct order from the president of Russia, his
Commander-in-Chief. The way I heard it, he told Boris Yeltsin to go
screw himself. There was nothing Yeltsin could do about it."

Zammit snorted.

"Sure there was. It's called a court martial."

Graves shook his head.

"Bled gets things done. In today's Russia, not a lot gets done. A guy
like Bled knows he's indispensable. President Bugarin's stroke last
year turned him into a zombie, and his underlings are duking it out in
a power struggle. Under those conditions Bled, who is efficient and
has the loyalty of his men, can function as an autonomous warlord. The
Kremlin moves him around from post to post, trying to prevent him from
consolidating a power base. They thought sending him as military
liaison to the Ukraine, in charge of a single division, would cut him
off at the knees. Obviously it hasn't. They always give him the
tough jobs, hoping he'll screw up. But he never does, even though he's
a notorious boozer."

"Wait a moment," said Zammit.

"Bled is Russian. Sevastopol is in the Ukraine.

The Ukraine declared independence from the former USSR in 1991. How
can Bled have any influence here in the Crimea? This peninsula belongs
to the Ukrainian Republic."

"Ah," said Graves, eyes keen over his half-moon spectacles.

"That's what makes the post-Cold War world so interesting. Russia gave
the Crimean peninsula to the Ukraine as a gift in 1954. The majority
of the population is still Russian and they're agitating to rejoin
Russia. But the Russians retained control of Sevastopol because it's a
vital naval base. When the Ukraine declared independence, they said
they would take Sevastopol as their own, and all the Russian ships
harbored there too. The Russians said fuck you. They argued for
years. Finally in 1997 they signed a deal. They divvied up the fleet,
with the Russians getting four-fifths. The Russians also keep
Sevastopol on a twenty-year lease, paying a hundred million dollars a
year, while acknowledging that it is in fact Ukrainian territory. So
the Kremlin has a lot of military and naval people here on the spot to
keep an eye on things. Twenty thousand sailors, roughly the same
number of soldiers, and the Forty-Third Missile Army Group of the
Strategic Rocket Services guarding the nukes. That's Bled's current
assignment."

"Here it is," said Morgan. He started to read Bled's career summary.

"Graduate of the airborne training school in Ryazan. Served in
Afghanistan with distinction. Made lieutenant-general. You already
know about Chechnya and Penza-19. He was posted to Siberia a couple of
years ago when things got tense with China over that border dispute. He
was in charge of security for Biopreparat. Before that, he--"

"Wait a
second," said Zammit.

"Bio what?"

"Biopreparat. The old Soviet bio-war agency. We know almost nothing
about it except that some of the secret cities do research for it. It's
rumored they specialize in making biological warfare agents that are
immune to Western antibiotics. Why, is it important?"

An hour later, Mike Zammit stared in disbelief as Jack Morgan shuffled
together Kazov's pile of documents. The picture of General Bled still
lay on the table.

Over a weak protest from Graves, Zammit had provided a quick overview
of what was happening at the Ataturk Dam to explain the significance of
the fact that the cyanobacteria was genetically engineered to be immune
to antibiotics. Then Morgan began reading the material he'd translated
from Kazov's notes.

At the end of Morgan's presentation, Zammit broke the silence first as
he began pacing the room.

"So Kazov's best estimate is that Bled has stolen at least $100 million
in cash, weapons, and supplies over the last three years?"

"The weapons and supplies are in addition to the money," corrected
Irina Markova.

"To give an idea of scale, four months ago 1500 box cars, each carrying
twenty tons of artillery ammunition, went missing and were never found.

And that was just in one week."

"That's right," said Morgan.

"The amount stolen by Bled in the last twelve months alone is equal to
four times the British army's stored artillery. God knows how much
these weapons and supplies are worth, or where they are now."

"Or where all the money goes," said Markova.

"I have tried to find out, and I can't. I'm sure the Kremlin doesn't
know either."

Zammit turned to Graves.

"How is this possible?"

"The Soviet army was gigantic. And proud. Now the USSR is gone, their
currency is junk, and conscripts make less than twenty dollars a month,
if they get paid at all. Bled makes sure his soldiers get paid."

"Boris doesn't get into it, but that's how this whole thing got
started," continued Morgan.

"When Bled found out that post Soviet democracy couldn't pay the
soldiers, he took charge. The Kremlin liked it because it freed them
of the obligation. If Bled was in a particular post, whether it was
Siberia or Chechnya, he creamed the top of the local economy. The
Kremlin turned a blind eye. I bet they're regretting it now."

Markova interrupted.

"None of that was news. But to extort more money, he started using
intermediaries. Mafia. He sold them supplies from the stockpiles
because they need weapons."

"In effect," said Graves, "Bled has privatized his military command. He
decides what his troops will or will not do and has made himself
personally responsible for their welfare."

"Bled isn't the only commanding officer doing this," said Morgan, "but
he does it on a gigantic scale, and he's untouchable, for the reasons
we've already heard."

Zammit objected, "But this can't go on for long. The warlord gets
stronger, makes powerful friends, sees how incompetent the Kremlin is,
and thinks. Why not?"

Graves nodded.

"Russia can overcome its past and become a successful democracy with a
functional capitalist economy that isn't run by gangsters. Or it can
turn into the world's biggest and coldest banana republic."

"Your opinion?" asked Zammit.

"I'm investing in banana futures."

"Why?" asked Costopoulos.

"Russia has always been an autocracy or a dictatorship. First it was
the tsar, venerated as the embodiment of God's will. Then Lenin and
Stalin, the embodiment of History's will. Russians like having such
leaders. What they fear most is not a dictator but bespredel, anarchy.

Today there is no strongman in charge, just underlings who think they
could be one. Bugarin's stroke has made him unfit to govern."

"Surely there's a vice president to take over if the guy's
incompetent?"

protested Zammit.

Irina clawed tobacco off her tongue.

"The last coup attempt was led by the vice president, so the office was
abolished. Bugarin keeps all power for himself, appoints ambitious men
to junior posts, and gives them overlapping responsibilities. They are
so exhausted fighting among themselves they don't have time to plot
against him."

"Is there anyone reliable in Bugarin's government?" asked Zammit.

Markova coughed.

"Constitutionally, it should be the prime minister, but he has no power
base. Here, if you don't have a power base among corrupt wealthy
businessmen, the army and the mafia, it doesn't matter what your
position is on paper. But there is the new national security advisor,
Vyacheslav Radchuk.

Ukrainian. Military background. Just before Bugarin's stroke there
was a power struggle. Radchuk got control of the Federal Security
Service."

"Successor to the KGB' added Morgan.

"We have to find someone in the government we can trust. What's this
guy like?"

asked Zammit.

Irina shrugged.

"Too early to tell. Supposed to be a democrat. Supposed to have
integrity, whatever that means."

"Is Radchuk connected to Bled?" asked Graves.

"No," Morgan replied.

"Apparently they hate each other's guts. That's one of the reasons
Bugarin appointed him. He wasn't stupid enough to have a national
security advisor who's bosom buddies with a guy like Bled."

As Irina reached for yet another cigarette, Zammit rubbed his face and
coughed.

"Good God, woman, are you trying to turn your lungs into bacon?" She
slid it back in the pack.

Zammit threw himself on the couch.

"So what do we have? First, a member of Smegyev's cult feeding the
cyanobacteria."

Costopoulos nodded.

"Second, General Bled is a member of the cult."

"Third," said Markova, "Bled was in charge at Penza-19, which is where
the rod of plutonium salted with cobalt-60 came from, and at
Biopreparat--"

"Where the cyanobacteria came from," agreed Zammit.

"He's heavily armed and has lots of money," said Graves.

"Without permission from either the Russian or Ukrainian governments,
he is conducting military and naval maneuvers on the Black Sea," added
Morgan.

"And," breathed Markova, "he found out Boris was doing a story on all
of this and murdered him."

"Exactly," concluded Graves.

"You don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce that the mastermind
behind this whole thing is General Vladimir Bled."

"It isn't," said Stavros Costopoulos.

Incredulous, Graves stared at the Greek scholar.

"It's obvious! How can you say otherwise?"

Costopoulos shook his head.

"Think. Boris Kazov. He's doing a story on you. You find out about
it. You tell your partners, the mafia, whoever. You want him dead."

He stood and started pacing.

"How do you kill him? If you're a military man, a soldier, you don't
fool around. You shoot him down in the street as he walks to the cafe.

You toss a grenade through his window."

He turned to Irina.

"You say his office was burgled a couple of weeks before he died?" She
nodded, transfixed.

"And he was sick for two weeks before he died?"

Another nod.

"Who brings a radioactive rod to an office burglary?" asked
Costopoulos.

"One with a pinhole already drilled in it?"

Absolute silence.

"Someone who knew that whatever was found in Boris's office, he was
going to be murdered anyway. In a complicated way, using material hard
to obtain. To ensure he died a lingering, agonizing death. It is well
thought out. It is subtle. It is vicious. It is so, so ... "

"Elaborate," said Zammit.

"Precisely. We have seen this psychological signature elsewhere, yes?

At the dam."

Stavros walked over to the table and tapped his finger on the photo of
General Bled.

"This man is as subtle as a falling anvil. It can't be him."

"It isn't." Zammit rose to his feet. He pulled the tattered anonymous
e-mail message from his pocket and held it aloft.

"It's him The sour, vinegary stink of old-fashioned printer's ink and
solvent was almost as overpowering as the smell of stale tobacco smoke
in the offices of the Glory of Sevastopol. A battered wooden desk
covered with cigarette burns, a creaky credenza with a missing door,
dented green filing cabinets, a picture of Stalin on the wall with an X
drawn across it in felt-tip pen, a girlie calendar from 1995.

Frustrated that he didn't know Russian or Ukrainian, Zammit stood in
the middle of the room as the others threw open every drawer in Kazov's
desk and rummaged through filing cabinets and overflowing waste
baskets. They'd had to break into the room through the seals Crimean
investigators had placed on the door.

"How did he find anything in here?" panted Morgan.

"Hire detectives?"

Zammit was thinking hard, trying to concentrate over the banging of
drawers and the rustle of paper. He called to Markova. The cigarette
in her hand was dangerously close to igniting a stack of yellowing
newsprint on top of the filing cabinet she was searching.

"In the two weeks between the burglary and Boris's death, you're sure
he didn't mention any new information he'd uncovered?

Nothing about Bled having another partner apart from the mafia?"

"Nyet," she said curtly.

"I didn't see much of him. He had me working on another assignment.

Drug trafficking."

"Maybe the two stories were connected. The mafia controls billions in
drug trafficking."

"Nyet," she said distractedly, slamming the drawer shut and opening the
last one in the last cabinet.

"Small traffic. The mafia traffics in heroin, opium, cocaine. These
are strange drugs, never seen before. Administered in unusual ways."

The pinwheeling of her fingers through the files became slower and
slower, then abruptly stopped. Her violet eyes darted from side to
side. A bead of sweat rolled down the face of a motionless Jack Morgan
and he didn't brush it away.

Graves was bent over with his hand in a wastebasket, staring.

Costopoulos's head slowly rose as Zammit walked to the window and gazed
out through the grimy glass.

"Ruslan Glinka committed suicide with a strange drug. Lazar Smegyev's
cult uses strange drugs. Bled can't supply the cult with strange
drugs, because the mafia doesn't have them and Biopreparat makes only
biological weapons."

Zammit turned to face the others.

"Which means the drugs come from another partner, someone who is
working with Bled and Smegyev. That's why Boris Kazov had you working
on that drug trafficking story. Where are your notes?"

Irina opened the door and disappeared into the main newsroom.

As they waited, Zammit noticed Costopoulos staring fixedly at the map
of southern Russia, the Ukraine, and Turkey thumbtacked to the office
wall. Slowly the Greek walked over to it and placed the tips of his
fingers on the paper. His eyes searched the entire map.

"National Geographic," he muttered distractedly.

"Very good."

Idly at first, but with increasing intensity, he began tracing
something with his forefinger. Graves was staring at the Greek as
well.

"Michael," whispered Costopoulos.

"Could you come here for a moment?"

Zammit and the other two men strode over. Zammit studied the hawkish
profile, saw the gleam in the brown eyes, and knew he'd seen this
before. Costopoulos had figured something out. He stared at the map,
transfixed. Zammit knew he had to snap him out of it.

"You want us all to hold our breath until we turn blue? What is it,
Stay?"

Costopoulos scratched his cheek.

"One thing we didn't talk about in our rush to get over here. Bled.

The cult. The mafia. Stealing all that money, all those weapons.

Unexplained military and naval maneuvers." He looked into Zammit's
eyes.

"What for?" he said.

"Remember what the PKK told you? That Anwar Hussein knew about the
contamination at the dam before it was discovered? Can you think of a
better excuse for invading another country than having them cut off
your water supply?"

Zammit suddenly understood.

"Colonel, a country like Turkey is surrounded by hostile powers--Iran,
Syria, Iraq, Georgia, Armenia, Tuvanistan, Russia, and so on. What
does Turkey fear most?"

"A war on two fronts. So?"

Zammit pointed.

"Anwar is in the southeast, being provocative, and actually having a
good reason to do so. Half the Turkish army is there, trying to deal
with the Kurds but keeping an eye on him too. Suppose he invades. I
mean a serious invasion. Everything he's got."

Graves snorted.

"Hello, slaughterhouse."

"But what if it's part of a wider scheme?" Zammit persisted.

"I'm a spy, not a military strategist. I don't understand," said
Morgan.

Costopoulos pointed.

"Anwar ties up the half of the Turkish army that's in the southeast.

Once the Turks realize he's serious, the other half is also sent to the
southeast to finish him off."

"Leaving the rest of the country virtually defenseless," said Zammit.

Stavros continued.

"Most of the Russian and Ukrainian fleet is at the port of Sevastopol.

General Bled, having ensured that maneuvers are under way, launches
lightning air and naval strikes across the Black Sea."

Stavros did a rough measurement with his index finger.

"The strikes capture the largest city, Istanbul, and Ankara, the
capital. They are almost on the same latitude, about 400 miles from
Sevastopol. He also seizes control of the sparsely populated
300square-mile area between those two cities, control he can
consolidate later. It's over before any of Turkey's NATO allies, or
the Russians themselves, can even blink."

"But we'd retaliate and force him out," argued Morgan.

"Just the way an international effort forced Saddam Hussein out of
Kuwait in 1991. We already have aircraft carriers and fighters in the
Arabian Gulf to patrol northern Iraq."

Zammit said, "Jack, Saddam didn't have nuclear weapons. Colonel, how
many nukes does Bled have under his control?"

Graves's face was suddenly as white as his hair. Tonelessly he said,
"A couple of hundred. Maybe more." He glanced at Jack Morgan.

"And there aren't nearly as many troops, aircraft carriers, or planes
in the Gulf as there used to be. It would take weeks to get a sizable
strike force into the area."

"So," said Zammit, "once Bled has what he wants, who's going to take it
away from him? Is Russia willing to get into a nuclear war with one of
its own generals who knows everything about its strategy and
contingency plans? Is the United States willing to risk nuclear war
and possibly the incineration of the American heartland to save Turkey?

Is either of them willing to nuke the Turkish people when they haven't
done anything?"

"Oh, man Morgan moaned.

"But Bled isn't going to take and hold a country the size of Turkey
with just the Fourteenth Army Division and the Forty Third Missile Army
Group," Graves protested.

Costopoulos interrupted.

"I hardly think General Bled is the only senior army, navy, or air
force commander who is a member of this cult. As Irina said, there are
probably many more members of this conspiracy. It may even reach into
the Kremlin itself."

Zammit nodded.

"Besides, he probably doesn't want the whole country. He wants the
port city Istanbul, formerly Constantinople. For almost 2,000 years
it's been one of the most famous ports in the world. He also wants
enough territory to make a new country that is agriculturally and
industrially sustainable.

Turkey is one of only seven countries on earth that is self-sufficient
in agriculture. Most of that farming takes place in the area he's
planning to capture between Istanbul and Ankara. Once he's got the
cities and the farmland and can defend them with nukes, he's
invulnerable."

"Excellent point," said Costopoulos.

"He can't take the whole country, because the Iraqis have to get
something out of this. Anwar probably gets most of southeastern
Turkey--control of the major oil pipeline on Turkish soil, plus the
Ataturk Dam, which will permanently secure his water supply. Bled has
probably promised to protect him with nukes too."

"But it's not just the Turkish army and navy he has to defeat," argued
Jack Morgan.

"Turkey has a population of over 70 million. There would be riots all
over the country."

"I know," said Zammit. He thought of the poisoning of the Ataturk
reservoir and the deaths downstream. Did the conspirators intend to
kill millions of people?

"Maybe they have a way of dealing with that scenario."

Irina appeared in the doorway clutching a manila folder. They briefed
her on their theories. She listened intently.

"It sounds plausible, but don't you remember what happened in Chechnya?

General Grachev described the Chechens as 'medieval savages' and said
they would be defeated in a week. Instead they tore the army to
pieces. The Russian military used to be fearsome. No more."

Zammit remembered the cringing conscripts assigned to guard him in
Dzerzhinsk.

"You may be right. The Russian army is as corrupt as the Tijuana
police force and about as effective in an armed confrontation."

"Maybe we're jumping the gun," said Morgan hopefully.

Costopoulos still looked thoughtful.

"Many of the troops will be members of the cult. Fanatics. And there
are those drugs as well. What they could be for, I don't know."

He turned back to the map.

"But something's missing. This has been so well thought out except for
one thing."

"What?" asked Zammit.

"The poison in the dam, giving Anwar an excuse to invade. The timing,
so it happens at the crucial stage of the election campaign. Making
sure maneuvers are under way so Bled's strike will be lightning fast.

It's brilliant. But it's like in Chechnya, with the Russian army
running into so much trouble. They failed to take out the Chechen
leadership beforehand. Chop off the head and the body dies ... "

Pounding footsteps approached. Someone banged on the office door.

Markova threw it open. A young newsman whispered urgently in her ear.

She turned to the others, face ashen.

"Prime Minister Amurkhan has been assassinated."

Istanbul, September 6

Mike Zammit stared at the laptop computer on the steel desk and
waited.

The white room, made of painted concrete blocks, had an antiseptic look
and smell, a gray concrete floor, and no windows. Apart from the desk,
an office chair, and a telephone, it was bare. The basement of the
Istanbul offices of Turkish Intelligence was completely silent apart
from the quiet whirring of the ventilation system. He assumed it was
soundproof and tried not to think what sounds might be coming from the
terrorist members of the Resistance Army of Allah as they were
interrogated.

It had been six hours since he heard the news and flew with Costopoulos
and Graves back to Istanbul from Sevastopol. Before they left, Irina
Markova told him what she had learned while researching the story for
Boris Kazov. He found the story so bizarre he could scarcely credit
it, yet it had the odd little details that convinced him it was true.

Besides, he increasingly liked and trusted Irina. He kept compulsively
flipping it over in his mind, this bright coin of information, heads,
tails, heads, tails. What did it mean?

Zammit contemplated the laptop. Flip the coin, flip the coin. The
drugs must have come from another partner. But who was he, and what
were they for?

He turned as he heard the door open. Relief washed over him. It was
Kitson Kang and Frankie Richards, just in from Seattle.

"Hi, boss," said Kang.

"Never seen riots before. Or so many police. I thought we'd be
dragged from our armored cars and torn to pieces." He noticed the
laptop.

"That it?"

"Yes."

"Can I get started?" Kang was already moving toward the machine as
fast as Catula toward Cat.

"Be careful," cautioned Zammit.

"This is all we have. It may be nothing or turn out to be everything.

We don't know what's in there, or how it's guarded."

Kang sat at the table and contemplated the computer, fingering his gold
earring like Jackie Chan trying to figure out how to perform a
particularly difficult stunt.

Richards was wearing charcoal palazzo slacks, a black blouse with
silver stripes, and a black jacket.

"You ever been to Turkey before?"

"No."

"Don't go out alone. Turkish men are generally polite, but you'll be
mobbed."

Frankie smiled.

"I can take care of myself. But thanks for the advice. By the way,
I'm really glad to see you're OK."

There was an awkward pause as she watched Kit open the machine, then
turned to Zammit, all business.

"What's happening? Cairo gave me a briefing, but it was a little hard
to follow." She ticked the points off on her fingers.

"Kidnapped by terrorists, an ancient underground temple, finding
canisters in the reservoir, discovering what's in them, a mad monk who
leads a cult, a renegade Russian general, a possible invasion of Turkey
by both Iraq and said general, and something about a beautiful Russian
journalist. Sounds to me like you're turning into Indiana Jones."

Zammit filled her in on the temple, his escape, and the recovery and
analysis of the canisters.

"The Russian is Irina Markova. Investigative journalist. Her murdered
boss, Boris Kazov, had her working on a story about unusual drugs."

"Unusual how?"

"First, they're being manufactured illegally. They're also being
tested illegally, sometimes with fatal results."

Impatiently Frankie said, "Specifics, please."

"According to her investigation, over the past couple of years a secret
factory in Pakistan has been producing and testing, on an experimental
basis, a wide range of odd drugs, both amphetamines and narcotics, in
pill, liquid, and aerosol form."

"How did Markova get onto this?"

"Kazov assigned her to the story after learning that the mad monk Lazar
Smegyev used drugs to keep his cult members in line," replied Zammit.

"Continue."

"Persons unknown were administering drugs to street people, derelicts,
the desperately poor who for five dollars would take some 'medicine."

Boys, teens, those in the prime of life, the old-but always males,
never females. Many died, and since autopsies weren't done on people
like this, no one knew why. But some of the men who took the drugs
went berserk."

"That's a pretty strong word. Give me an example," said Frankie.

Zammit pulled several pieces of paper from his pocket.

"This is a summary of Irina's notes, in English." He flipped the pages
until he found what he wanted.

"The most spectacular case was a man, seventy-four years old,
reportedly a gentle soul whose favorite recreation was dominoes. After
swallowing a dose of something, the old man strangled his wife and
three of his grandchildren, slashed his best friend to death with a
saber, and went on a shooting rampage that killed twenty-two people.

When police found him, he was clinging like a rock climber halfway up
the rough walls of a medieval building, screaming curses. When they
shot him, he fell to the ground, almost thirty feet, then got up and
attacked the police. It took a dozen bullets to stop him, and even
after he was stone dead his limbs twitched for five minutes."

"Jesus Christ," said Richards.

"That's berserk, all right."

Zammit continued to read.

"Intrigued by this bizarre episode, a visiting British pathologist
volunteered to do an autopsy. Sections of the old man's brain were
sent to Britain for analysis. No physiological abnormalities were
found, but there was no serotonin in his brain at all, no
beta-endorphin, and no trace of another substance, an enzyme called
mono amine oxidase. Baffled, the police and the medical people finally
gave up, but for a long time afterward there were periodic reports of
similar occurrences, although never as violent. None of the drug
dealers were caught." He put the papers back in his pocket.

"That's it."

"What does it tell you?"

"The conspiracy involves the monk Smegyev, his acolyte General Bled,
and Anwar Hussein. But none of them has the expertise to make drugs
like these, so there has to be another partner, who is supplying
them."

"Any idea who it could be?"

"Not a clue."

Zammit watched Kang clenching and unclenching his fingers, like a
concert pianist about to tackle a Rachmaninoff piano concerto.

"What happened to Amurkhan? The news reports are garbled."

Zammit shrugged.

"Amurkhan got to the back entrance of the Hilton, a meeting place no
one was supposed to know about. A kid ten or eleven years old
recognized her and asked for an autograph. She said sure, then all
hell broke loose."

"How?"

"The kid had a small weapon in his hand, like a derringer, only plastic
and loaded with dum-dum bullets. One of Amurkhan's security men saw it
and lunged, but the kid shot her in the heart before he could get
there. Then five other assassins came out of nowhere. Half a dozen of
her security people were killed, along with some unfortunates who just
happened to be in the alley. The little assassin was killed too.

Several of the killers were captured. Apparently they're Islamic
fundamentalists, members of the Resistance Army of Allah. I think bad
things are happening to them right here in this building."

Richards grimaced.

"What now?"

Zammit shrugged.

"Who knows? But it could have been worse."

Her sardonic green eyes narrowed.

"It could have been worse? I thought you liked Amurkhan. The prime
minister of Turkey is dead and you ... " Her eyes were suddenly shrewd.

"Could have been worse?"

" she quoted.

"That's an odd verb tense to use. You're not telling me something."

This woman is extremely clever, thought Zammit, filled with a peculiar
sense of pride, as if her intelligence reflected on him.

"I've been sworn to secrecy," he said, feeling pompous.

"I'll tell you later."

He didn't want to say what was really bothering him. Yildiz had said
it was impossible for anyone to know that he was meeting his prime
minister at the Hilton. Yet somehow RAA not only knew but was able to
prepare and implement a complex and deadly plan on short notice. Zammit
knew that if an adult male had tried to approach Amurkhan for an
autograph, he would have been instantly buried under a pile of secret
service agents. The use of the boy was ingenious. He tried not to
think of the word, but it slithered into his brain anyway:

elaborate.

"How's the analysis going?" he asked Richards.

"I have some bad news."

Zammit suddenly felt very tired. He remembered how short of sleep he
was.

"The only kind of news around these days. What?"

"The cyanobacteria is genetically engineered. It's a hybrid, so it's
difficult to predict its life cycle. It appears to have three stages.

First, massive blooming. Second, generation of toxin. Soon it will
enter the third stage."

"What's that?"

"Reproduction."

"But it has been reproducing. That's why there's so much of it."

Frankie Richards shook her head.

"It's been altered. I've analyzed the stromatolites and those fleshy
bulbs that are growing on the surface. I'm not yet sure what they are
or what they contain. But they appear to be reproductive organs."

"Bacteria don't have reproductive organs," Zammit protested.

"They're asexual."

"I'm the microbiologist, Mike. Don't forget what a peculiar creature
this is. A few species of cyanobacteria reproduce through cell
division, fragmentation of colonies, then formation of sexual
reproductive organs called fruiting bodies.

But in natural cyanobacteria the fruiting bodies are microscopically
small. The basketball-sized bulbs in the reservoir are colossal by
comparison."

Wearily Zammit rubbed his face.

"How much work did Biopreparat do on this stuff, anyway?"

"A lot. What bothers me is the fact that it's a weapon. Who knows
what capabilities they built into it? There's another thing--"

"Piece
of cake!" cried Kang gleefully. He typed furiously.

"A five-year-old could hack this thing."

Richards took Zammit's arm.

"Mike, there's something else. The samples we're getting back in
Seattle. Analysis is taking forever because they're contaminated. All
of them."

Despite the earnest look on her face, Zammit smiled.

"How can you contaminate contamination?"

She punched him in the arm.

"Sometimes your sense of humor really bugs me. It isn't funny. It's
like they've been heated or something. Junk, weird stuff. We found
nicotine, of all things. Like somebody swished a cigarette butt
through the sample. We're trying to detect parts per trillion of
particular substances and this garbage swamps everything."

Zammit thought hard.

"The samples are coming from the dam. The Turks smoke.

Maybe there's someone at the dam besides Ruslan Glinka who's in on the
plot."

The door opened. It was Costopoulos and Yildiz. The Turk was pale as
he was introduced to Richards.

"Pleased to meet you, colonel. Mike has told me good things."

As Yildiz fished for his cigarettes, Zammit asked, "How goes the
interrogation?"

Yildiz flicked his lighter and inhaled as if he wanted smoke to come
out his toes, then shot two blue columns from his nostrils.

"Let's say it's in its terminal stages. I'm glad you told me about
the possibility of suicide weapons. We removed them in time."

"Any information?"

"They babble about the Koran. I hate fanatics. They're not
reasonable."

"Where's Graves?" asked Zammit.

"On the phone to Washington. They are very upset, so he had to tell
them."

Zammit's eyes were hard.

"The White House leaks like a sieve. The information has to be
completely restricted to the president and his immediate staff."

Yildiz coughed.

"Graves knows that as well as you do." He pointed at Kang.

"Does he know what he's doing?"

"Yes, I do," replied Kang, not taking his eyes from the screen.

"And I'm in."

As the others gathered around the table, Zammit whispered in the Turk's
ear, telling him what Frankie Richards had said.

"Contaminated?" Yildiz's eyes searched his.

"Could this be a natural phenomenon?" Zammit shook his head.

"No way."

The Turk's jaw muscles bunched.

"I'll call the dam immediately and have it checked."

As Yildiz left the room, Zammit walked over to where the others were
staring intently at the screen.

"Where did this machine come from?" asked Kang.

Zammit replied, "The Turkish police had a file on the leader of the RAA
assassination team, knew his address. They raided his apartment and
found the computer there. It was hidden under the floorboards. He
forgot that he'd set the clock alarm. It was beeping."

"I thought Islamic fundamentalists hated the West and Western
technology," said Kang.

"They've always been selective about what parts of Western culture they
hate," replied Costopoulos.

"Iranian mullahs who rant against America use television to tell their
people how awful it is. When the Ayatollah Khomeni was dying, he was
hooked up to every modern medical device you can name, and damn the
expense."

Kang grinned.

"I see what you mean. If they hate the West so much, why don't they
give up the Sidewinder missiles and go back to using bows and
arrows?"

"Let's concentrate on the task at hand," said Zammit.

"What's in there?"

"It's in a foreign language. But there aren't a lot of files. And
look here." He hit a few keys.

"This guy never cleans out his email. He's saved 388 messages.

Here's the first one."

Costopoulos peered.

"It's in Turkish."

"I thought Turkish writing was all that swirly stuff, like Arab
calligraphy," said Kang.

As he read the first message, Costopoulos said, "Racially, Turks and
Arabs are completely different. Kemal Ataturk wanted a new written
Turkish language, one based on the Latin alphabet. He called in a team
of scholars and asked how long it would take. They said six years. He
said, "You have six months." And they did it."

He touched Kang on the shoulder.

"Next."

He turned to Zammit.

"They did a nice job. It's a logical language, easy to learn.

Incidentally, if you want to make a Turk angry, call him an Arab. They
think of themselves as Europeans who just happen to be Muslim." He
read another message.

"Next."

After three more messages Costopoulos said, without taking his eyes
from the screen, "I need a pad of paper and a pen."

Zammit opened a desk drawer and found both. Stavros scribbled
furiously as he read. Ten minutes later he was done with the e-mail.

Kang opened the other files, and the Greek found nothing important. As
he sat on the edge of the desk reading his notes, Colonel Yildiz came
in.

"Nothing," he said to Zammit.

"No indication that other personnel would have the remotest connection
with causing contamination in the samples."

Zammit shrugged. He didn't believe it, but he knew the Turk had had a
rough day.

He wondered if the RAA terrorists were dead.

"OK. Let's see what Stay has."

The Greek flicked through the pages.

"Of the 388 messages, 264 are old or of no interest to us. But there
are 124 messages that are either to or from someone named ghazi.

Requests for weapons. Requests for dates, times. Requests for
drugs."

The Greek stared at the white ceiling, frowning.

"And some interesting ones inquiring about the role of RAA in the
structure of government in the new fundamentalist Turkey, once the
'unclean one' is dead."

"What does ghazi mean?" asked Richards.

"Warrior,"

" said Yildiz.

"The nickname for Ataturk, the great leader. In today's Turkey, to
call yourself ghazi would be like an American politician saying his
name was George Washington."

Costopoulos looked thoughtful.

"It seems to me we are dealing with someone who has a substantial ego.

Not to mention delusions of grandeur."

"Wait a second," interrupted Kang.

"There's a hidden file."

Costopoulos looked.

"Ghazi is a code name for someone called Abdul Jamal."

"Anyone heard of this guy?" asked Zammit.

A brief silence.

"Wait a moment," said Stavros.

"There's a reference to the rivers of Babylon and a knight. Pitiful
attempts at being cryptic."

Zammit pulled the tattered e-mail message from his pocket.

"My mysterious correspondent. Mr ... Jamal. Obviously the man who
incited the RAA terrorists to assassinate Amurkhan. Who is he? What
is he supposed to get out of this plot?"

"The reference to the overthrow of the government is obviously
connected with what the PKK told you about when RAA tried to recruit
them," Yildiz said to Zammit.

"And to a fundamentalist, the 'unclean one' is obviously Amurkhan."

"I beg your pardon?" came a cool singsong voice.

They turned and stared.

Standing in the doorway, in her trademark white skirt and jacket with
her sunglasses tucked in the pocket, was Thamar Amurkhan.

A small smile played over Amurkhan's mouth as she saw the looks of
astonishment on every face but Yildiz's and Zammit's.

As she walked into the room, she said, | "Thank you again. Dr. Zammit,
for suggesting at the Dolmabahce Palace that I use a body double."

"I'm so sorry she's dead. Who was she?"

"A member of our Secret Service. The resemblance was astonishing. She
died instantly, praise Allah. She knew the risks when she was
recruited, but you always hope it never comes to something this ugly.

I'll make sure her husband and family get a handsome pension."

Frankie Richards spoke.

"Why don't the news reports mention that you're still alive?"

Amurkhan's almond-shaped eyes appraised her.

"If what Dr. Zammit has told me is true, the conspirators will take my
death as a signal. If they know I'm alive, they might alter their
plans. I'll stay dead until two or three days before the election,
hiding with the help of Colonel Yildiz. Then I will reveal myself to
the people, along with details of the assassination attempt. The
sensational publicity should ensure victory. I'm sure even Muslims can
appreciate a resurrection from the dead."

"I agree with that strategy," said Zammit.

"We'll keep these guys in the dark, keep them guessing. They must have
a tight schedule. Let's see if we can ruin it."

"What about the riots?" asked Kang.

"We can keep them under control," replied Yildiz.

"We have a tremendous advantage because we know the prime minister is
alive and in control of events, and her opponents and the conspirators
don't."

Zammit turned to Costopoulos.

"Stay, find Graves and ask him to get some information on Jamal." The
Greek nodded and left. Zammit expanded on the two-front war scenario
and the contamination in the reservoir giving the Iraqis an excuse to
invade.

Eyes like green ice, Amurkhan said, "It all sounds plausible. Dr ...

Zammit, but we can certainly handle Anwar Hussein. I don't care how
many men or how much armor this General Bled throws at us, he will
find it impossible to win. Also, Ankara and Istanbul have a combined
population of 9 million. Even if by some miracle he wins, he will find
it impossible to govern the populace. And we will still have armed
forces in the rest of the country. We will counterattack."

As Zammit was reminding her that General Bled controlled several
hundred nuclear weapons, an army officer stuck his head in the door and
spoke to Yildiz and Amurkhan. Zammit felt a sense of foreboding at the
looks on their faces.

"What is it?"

Amurkhan was furious.

"The Iraqi army rolled across the border about ten minutes ago. Along
with the Syrians. We'll be fighting a war on three fronts."

Colonel Graves strode into the room with a sheaf of papers in his hand,
followed by Costopoulos.

"Our satellite surveillance has just shown--"

"We already know," said
Yildiz.

"What exactly are you facing?" asked Zammit.

They all listened intently, including Thamar Amurkhan, as Colonel
Yildiz spoke.

He had asked for a large map of the Middle East, now fastened to the
concrete wall with tape. Zammit was amused to see him adopt a fussy
schoolteacher manner.

"This is a brief overview--I cannot go into details in front of
foreigners, for reasons of national security. I'm sure you understand.

Army command assures me they have things under control, for the
moment."

He glanced at a sheaf of paper in his hand, then tapped on Iraq with a
pointer.

"Notice the border between Iraq and Turkey. It is only about 150 miles
wide.

That is a narrow space in which to jam large numbers of men and armor
for a full-scale invasion, given the very poor roads in the area. You
could end up with a bottleneck. It is almost 300 miles from the Iraqi
border to Urfa and the Ataturk Dam--how do you say it in American
slang?"

"As the crow flies," replied Zammit.

"Thank you. It also looks as if they may try for Ahlat, in the north,
on Lake Van. Same problems. All of this is very rough terrain, and we
will contest every inch of it. But that is not my main point."

"What about the air force?" asked Colonel Graves.

"Thanks to the United States and our membership in NATO, we have
modern aircraft. Iraq does not. We estimate they may have as few as
500 aircraft, many of which are not serviceable. Air power for the
Iraqis will be a neglible factor. And most of their tanks are still
old Soviet-era T-72s. Ground forces are the mainstay of their army.

But they do have very strong capabilities in antitank warfare, as well
as sophisticated tube artillery. May I continue?"

Graves nodded.

"Iraq has a population of some 25 million and a land area of about
168,000 square miles ... Yes?" Yildiz asked irritably.

Kitson Kang had muttered something under his breath.

"Sorry," he said.

"But calculations like this are one of my hobbies. Iraq is about twice
the size of Idaho."

Zammit grinned.

"To continue. Iraq is"--Yildiz gave a slight bow to Kang-- "twice the
size of Idaho. Active armed forces 350,000, reserves 650,000, 3000
battle tanks, and aircraft I have mentioned before."

He tapped the pointer on Syria, after glancing again at his papers.

"Their border with us is a little over 300 miles. Population 20
million. About 72,000 square miles ... " He looked at Kang
expectantly.

"Slightly larger than North Dakota."

"Thank you. Army 350,000, reserves 400,000." He flipped a page, and
then another.

"I ... I seem to have misplaced the information about their air force
and navy."

Amurkhan did not look amused but she said, "Never mind. Continue."

Yildiz cleared his throat.

"The problem is that with Iraq and Syria as allies, the front is 450
miles long. Also, Syria is less than 70 miles from the Ataturk.

But their armed forces are pitiful, and we are concentrating our
efforts at the moment on destroying them. Then we will concentrate on
the Iraqis."

"And then there's us." He tapped on Turkey.

"Population over 70 million. Our enemies' population, in total, is
only 45 million. Turkey's area, 302,000 square miles--" Kang said,
"Bigger than Texas."

"Army 525,000, reserves 400,000--" There was a knock at the door.

Yildiz opened it. He listened for a moment to a visibly tense army
officer, then turned and said, "Madam Prime Minister?"

Amurkhan strode over and listened as well. Zammit saw her lips
tighten.

She turned to them.

"Things are not going well. The Syrians are proving unexpectedly
difficult. We must transfer units from the north, despite Dr ...

Zammit's advice not to fall into the conspirators' trap. The lecture
is over. I must attend to business, and try to save my country."

"Once you move enough troops to the southeast. General Bled will
launch his invasion in the north," warned Zammit.

"You'll find yourselves in a three-front blood bath."

Amurkhan turned to Graves.

"We can count on American assistance?"

"Of course," said Graves.

"But our resources in the area are small. If you can't hold them off
until we assemble a strike force with our NATO allies, and if Bled gets
into the conflict with nuclear weapons, I can't guarantee anything."

Amurkhan turned to Yildiz.

"In case the conspirators have other surprises in store, I want to stay
here at your headquarters so I am absolutely safe. I want an immediate
briefing on the present situation. And, Colonel Yildiz, I would also
like to know why your intelligence people failed to pick up any hint
about Syrian involvement in this invasion."

With a curt nod to the others Yildiz accompanied Amurkhan out of the
room.

Zammit did not envy him the next several hours.

"Christ, what a mess," said Graves.

"Before Yildiz started his lecture, you came into the room with some
documents.

What are they?" asked Richards.

"CIA information on Abdul Jamal."

Zammit said to Kitson Kang, "Keep hacking that laptop in case there's
more information hidden somewhere. The rest of you come with me.

There's a boardroom upstairs with some AV equipment. I want to show
you something. Then I want to hear what Colonel Graves has to say."

They took the elevator up to the third floor and walked down a
carpeted hallway into the boardroom. The navy blue drapes were closed.

Zammit twitched them aside to reveal an immense sunset over the
Bosphorus. The cloth-of-gold sky was bleeding red, as if pierced by
the minarets on the horizon.

Zammit closed the curtains as the others chose their seats, then walked
down the hall to speak to a staff officer. Returning to the boardroom,
he said, "I asked for coffee and tea, and they fell all over themselves
saying that isn't enough.

I assume Thamar told them to give us the red carpet treatment. I hope
everyone likes Turkish food."

"There are four great cuisines in the world," said Costopoulos.

"Chinese, Italian, French, and Turkish."

Zammit took his seat.

"Some bells have rung in the past few hours. First, there's Lazar
Smegyev's cult and its involvement with the bio weapon in the Ataturk
reservoir."

He picked up a remote control and aimed it at the screen. The image
appeared to be a starburst on a field of grass. He pressed a button
and the picture was enhanced. The forms making up the starburst were
bodies in white robes. All were charred, as if they had been set on
fire and incompletely burned.

"What the hell is this?" demanded Graves.

"An aerial photo of the murder-suicide of sixteen members of a French
doomsday cult called the Order of the Solar Temple," replied Zammit.

"Cult members included professional people, politicians, and wealthy
socialites. Among other things, they believed that suicide instantly
transported them to a new world on the planet Sirius. To make it even
more pathetic, Sirius is not a planet, it's a star."

"Like the Heaven's Gate cult and their belief that suicide would
transport them to the spacecraft following 1997's Hale-Bopp comet,"
observed Graves.

"Exactly," replied Zammit.

"But at least the Heaven's Gate and Solar Temple members were intent
just on killing themselves." Once again he pressed the remote control.

The image of an ugly, heavyset blind man with long black hair and
oriental features appeared on the screen.

"Shoko Asahara, leader of the Japanese cult called Aum Shinrikyo, or
Supreme Truth. Asahara ordered his followers to release a chemical
weapon called sarin, a nerve gas invented by the Nazis, into a Tokyo
subway train. More than 5,000 people were injured."

"I remember this one," said Costopoulos.

Zammit continued.

"Asahara recruited scientists, government officials, and other
prominent citizens. He also had ties with the military and organized
crime. He conducted experiments on his acolytes and was amassing a
huge arsenal of weapons--conventional, biochemical, and nuclear."

"Yes," said Stavros.

"As I recall, their beliefs were quite bizarre, based on a series of
science fiction novels."

"Isaac Asimov's Foundation series," interrupted Frankie Richards.

"About the destruction of civilization and its reconstruction through a
small band of survivors."

Costopoulos nodded.

"Asahara intended to wipe out the human race and start over.

It was all quite insane."

"The terrifying thing," added Graves, "is that it was the first time in
history any independent group, without protection or sponsorship by a
government, had access to weapons of mass destruction. God knows what
could have happened if they hadn't been caught."

"True," said Zammit.

"And now the same thing is happening again. Only it's not based on
fiction but on historical fact mingled with myth and legend. But
although these Japanese cultists were insane, they still weren't crazy
enough to use a bio weapon certainly not a genetically modified one
whose effects on the environment would be inherently unpredictable.

They had the sense, if you can call it that, to use something whose
effects would be restricted to the immediate area."

"Interesting observation," mused Costopoulos.

Zammit turned off the AV.

"That's it for my dog and pony show. My point is, we have a peculiar
mix here. We've got cultists who believe some odd things. That's par
for the course, cult-wise. But we've also got Abdul Jamal, who likes
sending taunting email, invents drugs, and is obviously involved in
planting the bio weapon I'm baffled. Everything else about this
conspiracy is meticulously planned. I can't believe they'd use a GMO,
with its element of uncertainty and risk. There must be something we
haven't thought of."

There was a knock on the door. Costopoulos opened it. Four people
entered with steaming pots of coffee and tea.

"Haven't had coffee in what seems like ages," said Zammit.

"Smells great."

The four returned with a trolley loaded with trays of sliced tomatoes,
cucumbers, hard-boiled eggs, cold sliced lamb, feta cheese, four
different kinds of olives, thick yogurt the color of butter, and pita
bread. There was also a bottle of raki, a stack of plates, and a huge
dish of what looked like doughnuts floating in thick syrup.

"Aha!" exclaimed Stavros.

"My favorite Turkish dessert.

Kadin gobegi. The Turks are very fond of intensely sweet desserts."

"What does kadin gobegi mean?" asked Graves.

Stavros winked at Frankie.

"It means Tady's navel."

" Richards threw back her head and laughed.

"I'll leave that delectation to you gentlemen."

"I can smell the raki from here," remarked Zammit, pouring himself a
tiny porcelain cup of thick Turkish coffee and dumping in a teaspoon of
sugar. He downed it, careful to avoid the grounds at the bottom, and
poured himself another, as well as a glass of raki. He sniffed it
appreciatively.

"I love that licorice smell."

As they filled their plates and started to eat. Graves shuffled
through his papers.

"Abdul Jamal. Not much information, but enough to indicate he's
despicable."

Zammit opened up a pita and stuffed it with lamb, cheese, tomatoes, and
cucumber topped with a thick dollop of yogurt.

"Continue. Why would he send me an e-mail message, apart from the fact
that he seems to be a cocky bastard?"

"With a substantial ego, not to mention delusions of grandeur," added
Costopoulos, spooning syrup over his pastry.

Graves shrugged at the Greek.

"You're the expert on that kind of thing. All I know is what's in the
file. Jamal's from an old trading family in Oman, a feudal sultanate
in the southeastern Saudi Arabian peninsula, right on the Persian Gulf.

Lots of money, but although the family has a reputation as sharp
traders, they're apparently decent people. Jamal was the family's
pride and joy. They sent him to the Sorbonne in Paris, where he was
academically brilliant. In fact, he's rumored to be a genius. Offered
several academic positions, which he turned down in favor of business.

Then he went as bad as maggoty meat. Actually, it's obvious he was bad
from birth."

"How?" asked Frankie Richards.

"Criminal activity of various sorts. He's the kind of guy who, if he
was given the choice of doing something legally or illegally, and the
profit was going to be the same, would take the illegal route just for
kicks. Got involved in a variety of shady deals in sunny places,
mainly in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. Arms deals, drug
trafficking, the occasional financial swindle. Even slavery, which is
an old Omani standby. Apparently he can really turn on the charm if he
wants to, and his manners are impeccable, but he's rumored to have a
vicious temper and to have committed several murders though never
charged. He has a reputation as a gourmet, also as a sexual predator
and sadist."

"A man of appetite, you might say," observed Costopoulos.

Graves nodded.

"There've been a variety of rape and assault charges over the years but
no convictions. Victims and witnesses recanted their testimony before
trial or disappeared."

"Charming," said Richards.

"What does this psychopath look like?"

Graves sipped thick Turkish coffee as he slipped a couple of
photographs out of the file and pushed them over to her.

"Made a pile of money, lived in a ritzy neighborhood in Paris until a
financial scam backfired. Operated a complex Ponzi scheme in several
Eastern European countries a few years ago. Took advantage of the fact
that most former Iron Curtain citizens wouldn't know a legitimate
investment deal if they found it swimming in their soup. Bankrupted
millions of people with pyramid investments that collapsed. Made the
mistake of running the same scam in the former East Germany. It's
always a mistake to piss off the Germans. Law enforcement agencies got
involved, he killed a couple of his partners, been on the lam ever
since. Cuba, before it got too hot for him. North Korea, same thing.

Myanmar, formerly Burma, one of the most corrupt dictatorships in the
world. Now he's in Tuvanistan, which is the bottom of the barrel."

"I've heard of it," said Prankie.

"The dictators are Ivan and Anastasia Popov.

Supposed to be a dreadful couple."

"Official name is Republic of Tuvanistan, but if it's a republic, I'm a
Hindu dancer," snorted Graves.

"It's sandwiched between Armenia, Georgia, Chechnya, Ingushetia, North
Ossetia, Dagestan, Tatarstan, and those other alphabet-soup countries
close to Turkey's eastern border."

"Well, it's a perfect location for Jamal as far as this plot is
concerned. He couldn't get any closer to the action unless he was in
Turkey itself. So this creep is Muslim?" asked Zammit.

"He can't be a fundamentalist."

Graves spoke around a mouthful of stuffed pita.

"Nominally a Muslim.

"How're you going to keep him down on the farm, now that he's seen
Paree?" That kind of thing. Finds it useful to pretend, so he can use
fanatical Islamic groups, just like he manipulated RAA."

Costopoulos interrupted.

"Islam is a noble and profound religion, professed by roughly a billion
ordinary decent people who are not extremists. Judging Islam by Abdul
Jamal or Anwar Hussein is like judging Roman Catholicism based on the
behavior of the head of the Sicilian mafia. It's not a question of
religion, it's a question of gangsters."

Frankie Richards was examining the two photos of Abdul Jamal.

"What is it?" asked Zammit.

"He's handsome, but there's something desperately wrong with this man.

He's forty-five years old but has no lines on his face." Frankie's
instincts were kicking in.

"And there's a weird sort of glare at the back of his eyes."

"A youthful appearance is often typical of psychopaths," said
Costopoulos.

"Because they have no conscience, they never worry about anything, so
they never have trouble sleeping at night. No wrinkles."

"Speaking of gangsters," said Graves, "Jamal should feel right at home
in Tuvanistan. He's staying in the presidential palace with the
Popovs." Briefly he filled them in on the couple and their reign.

"It's like Germany under the Nazis," he concluded.

"The natural order of things is reversed. The decent people are dead
or in prison, and criminals run the place."

The door opened. Costopoulos listened, then turned to Zammit.

"Call for you.

From Sevastopol."

Zammit walked down the hall toward one of the duty stations. A soldier
handed him the receiver and he heard a familiar croaky, smoky voice.

"Irina?"

"I have news. Two pieces. First, you are dealing with a biological
weapon that was stolen. Correct?"

"Yes."

"Another has been stolen. Just had a call from one of my sources in
Novosibirsk, in Siberia. Last night someone broke into the virology
institute called Vector and took several vials of smallpox."

"Jesus Christ," said Zammit.

"How could they do that? Isn't it guarded?"

"There are two night watchmen. Or rather were--they were murdered. But
no money for any protection more sophisticated. The building is not
secure, and the intruders somehow knew how to get into the
refrigeration units."

Zammit was stunned.

"This is incredible. You guard something like that in a sealed vault
with an army division."

He heard the click of a cigarette lighter and the rasp of Markova's
lungs as she inhaled.

"You don't know how bad it really is. During the last coup attempt,
when the smallpox was still stored at the Research Institute for Viral
Preparations in Moscow, the institute's director was so worried about
rebels stealing the stuff that he opened the fridges, removed all the
smallpox, stuffed it in his coat and briefcase, and took it home with
him on the subway. He stored it for several days in his own
refrigerator. His wife almost had a stroke when he told her. That's
when they moved all the smallpox samples to Siberia, very far away, to
be safe. Obviously, not safe."

Zammit rubbed his face with his free hand.

"What's the other piece of news?"

"One of my sources at the Sevastopol naval base tells me that General
Bled has taken sudden leave of the maneuvers and gone out of the
country."

"Where?"

"Some hole of shit called Tuvanistan. It is located--"

"I know where
it is," interrupted Zammit.

"Irina, are you sure about this?"

"Of course. Bled can't go to the toilet without letting his senior
staff know where he is. According to my source, he signed out for
forty-eight hours to go to the capital of Tuvanistan, Blavatsk. The
contact number he gave is one assigned to the communications center of
the presidential palace. There aren't many people who know where
Vector is, or how to get into it and the refrigeration units. Bled may
have stolen the smallpox and is taking it to Tuvanistan."

Zammit's mind raced as the information sank in. He heard Markova say
something.

"What?"

"Tuvanistan is like something out of Kafka. You know, that story of
his. In the Penal Colony. Why would Bled go there with smallpox?"

"I think I know," said Zammit.

"What?" demanded the journalist.

"You know the routine: I feed you stuff, you feed me stuff. Why is
Bled in Tuvanistan?"

"I can't tell you now," Zammit replied.

"But if things work out, I'll feed you the biggest scoop of the last
thirty years and personally nominate you for the Pulitzer Prize."

"The what?"

"Never mind. In America it's a big deal. I'll be in touch."

He hung up and headed back down the hall. As he entered the boardroom
he briefed the others, then said, "Hey, Stay. You speak any
Tuvanian?"

The Greek's eyes narrowed.

"A little." He rattled off a series of throaty eating noises
interspersed with tongue clicks and retching sounds.

"Crikey," said Colonel Graves.

"That's the ugliest language I've ever heard."

Costopoulos shrugged.

"Non-Indo-European. Possibly Finno Ugric in origin. Or Old Caucasian.

I know enough to order a meal in a restaurant. Why do you ask?"

Zammit explained what Markova had said.

"Both in Tuvanistan and both at the palace!" exclaimed Richards.

"Exactly," said Zammit.

"Two bad apples in the same rotten barrel. And to mix in an Islamic
metaphor, if the mountain won't come to Mohammed, then Mohammed goes to
the mountain. According to Irina, Bled may have the stolen smallpox,
and we have to stop him. Colonel, what are the chances of sneaking
into this country?"

"You could sneak in," Graves replied.

"But you'd never get out. They hate foreigners, every third person is
a spy, and they shoot first and ask questions never. As far as getting
through the electrified fence and into the palace, forget it."

"There must be a way," said Zammit.

"Stay, could you function if we somehow managed to sneak into this
nightmare country? I could pretend to be a mute or something."

Costopoulos shook his head.

"As I said, I speak restaurant Tuvanian. We get a hundred feet into
the country, a secret police thug says something to me, I reply, "Eggs
over easy," and we're dead. Won't work."

Frankie Richards reached over, took Costopoulos's spoon, and ladled
some syrup into her mouth.

"I can get you in," she said loftily.

They stared at her. Finally Zammit overcame his astonishment.

"You can get us into this concentration camp of a country?"

"Yes/ I can."

"Let me guess. You're going to bat those big green eyes and those two
psychopaths are going to issue a gold-plated invitation?"

Frankie Richards batted her big green eyes and smiled.

"Precisely. And not just a gold-plated invitation. We're going to
walk in through the front door and be greeted with smiles and
champagne."

AIrborne, September 6

Zammit gazed at the fine bubbles streaming up through the golden
liquid. He sipped from his fluted glass and enjoyed both the taste and
the sensation--champagne always felt as if it was giggling in his
mouth. He held up the bottle and looked again at the black and orange
label.

"Stay, what does Veuve Clicquot mean?"

Costopoulos looked up distractedly from the files Graves and Morgan had
given him on General Bled, the Popovs, and Abdul Jamal. He had chewed
his pencil almost in half. Zammit had never seen him look so
worried.

"Veuve is French for 'widow,"

" he replied.

"Upon the death of Monsieur Clicquot, the founder of the firm, his
spouse took over and made it one of the world's great champagnes."

Zammit spooned a mound of black caviar onto the delicate square of a
blini and popped it in his mouth. He looked around the luxurious cabin
of the Gulfstream V jet that was part of the personal fleet of aircraft
belonging to Ivan and Anastasia Popov.

"So this is how dictators live. No wonder so many people want to be
one."

Despite his jocularity, he was worried too but couldn't think of any
other way to do things. He looked out the window at the whipped-cream
clouds far below.

They looked solid enough to land the aircraft on. The robin's-egg-blue
sky stretched away in all directions. Kang was at the dam with Connie
Palaeov, still doing analyses, and Cairo Jackson was in Istanbul with
Graves and Yildiz.

It was less than thirty-six hours since the assassination of Amurkhan's
double, and so far no one suspected that the Turkish leader wasn't
dead. As anticipated, her supposed assassination had set off riots and
violence. But Colonel Yildiz was managing to keep them under control
because Thamar Amurkhan was secretly working with the National Security
Council. Zammit couldn't even imagine how bad the situation would now
be if the RAA assassination team had killed the right person. He
assumed the Turkish government's ability to keep everything under
control was something Jamal and his co-conspirators had not
anticipated. And he hoped that not knowing the reason--that a crucial
aspect of their plot had failed--they were starting to feel uncertain
themselves.

Zammit wondered grimly what other surprises might be in store. Jamal
was obviously a meticulous planner who arranged things so that he was
always one step ahead of his enemies. He thought again about the
elaborateness of the reservoir poisoning and the murder of Boris Kazov.

But if you did something in a complex way, you increased the
possibility of accidents and failure.

The scientist shrugged. You could drive yourself crazy with this kind
of speculation. They would find out soon enough. It was obvious that
General Bled couldn't launch his invasion of Turkey until he returned
from Tuvanistan. Irina Markova said he had signed out for forty-eight
hours, which meant he would be in the Blavatsk palace for only another
eight hours. Not a lot of time.

Zammit glanced at his watch. They were just an hour away from landing
in Blavatsk. He had no idea what to expect except the possibility of
danger. Given what he'd learned about Abdul Jamal, he didn't want to
involve Frankie Richards in this mess, but she was the only way they
could get safely into the country and, most importantly, into the
palace.

He walked down the aisle. Richards was examining the contents of her
painting case, the size of a fishing tackle box. The cargo hold
contained several rolls of canvas, an easel, stretchers, and other
materials too big to go into the main cabin of the sleek corporate jet.

She was muttering to herself.

"Viridian, cadmium red medium, primary magenta, primary cyan, cerulean
blue, raw sienna"

From the next seat she picked up a couple of color photos the Popovs
had sent her over the Web, scrutinizing them so that she could make the
proper selection of colors for their portrait. Zammit leaned over her
shoulder.

"I still can't believe how easy this was. I thought we'd have to don
blackface and camouflage gear and parachute into the country at
midnight, armed to the teeth."

Frankie put down the photos and made a couple of notes.

"As I said, the Popovs contacted me several months ago when they heard
about my work. After discovering what sort of people they are, I
politely declined the commission. When I contacted them to say that I
was in the Crimea and able to accept the commission after all, they
snapped it up." The Popovs had insisted on sending one of their own
personal aircraft to pick up Richards and her traveling companions.

Her easels and paints had been air-expressed from Seattle.

Jack Morgan strolled up and caught the last part of the conversation.

"Explain to me how you got the paranoid Popovs to admit the rest of us
into the country as well."

"It was easy," said Richards.

"You have to know what sort of people you're dealing with. As a
sought-after portrait painter for the rich and famous, I'm a celebrity.

Everyone knows celebrities travel with entourages--bodyguards, personal
trainers, hairdressers, and the like. If you don't act like a prima
donna, nouveau riches like the Popovs think you're nothing special."

"What if they had refused?"

"That's easy too. If they'd balked at admitting all of you, I would've
thrown a tantrum prima donna-ish enough to make the eruption of
Krakatoa look trivial.

They would've caved in." She grinned at Zammit.

"I'm not a bad actress, you know."

Costopoulos came down the aisle and leaned over to pick up the
photographs.

"A

rabid dog would have enough sense to stay away from these two. The
more I ponder the files, the less I think this is a good idea."

"Speaking of acting," Richards continued, "you all have to remember
your roles.

It won't be hard, because they won't expect you to say anything. Mike,
you'll be a bodyguard." She turned to Jack Morgan.

"You're young and slim, so you're the hairdresser. Try to act
swishy--they'll expect it. Stavros, you're my official translator or
assistant or personal art historian or something. Look learned.

And you'll all have to be very attentive and deferential to me."

"Costopoulos has a point," said Morgan.

"What are we supposed to do when we get to Tuvanistan? Maybe the
Popovs are in on this plot too, although it seems a little large scale
for them. They're basically smash-and-grab types. How do we even know
we'll see Abdul Jamal? Or General Bled? That palace is huge. And
even if they do meet us, maybe neither of them likes surprises."

"I've explained it before. We're doing this because we don't have
enough time to play a waiting game," said Zammit.

"Also, the Popovs don't know who we are, and there's no reason for them
to tell Jamal or Bled that we're coming. That way we can take them by
surprise. Also, we have to find the smallpox."

Zammit said to Frankie, "Do the Popovs know you work for INERT?"

"I doubt it. As you know, I keep my work with the agency very quiet.

Anyway, people aren't interested. They think botany and microbiology
are boring."

"See what I mean?" said Zammit to the others.

"And even if the Popovs do find out who we are, what's it to them? They
just want their portrait painted. If they do smell a rat, the worst
they can do is toss us out of the country.

Graves, the CIA, and the White House know we're there, and they'll
raise a stink if anything happens to us. Frankie's a celebrity, and
the last thing a couple of social climbers like the Popovs want is to
get a reputation as bad hosts. And remember that Abdul Jamal is a
guest in their country too--it isn't as if he runs the place. We might
be able to pump him for information over cocktails or something."

"Abdul Jamal will talk to us, and it isn't a question of cocktails,"
said Costopoulos grimly.

"That's what I'm afraid of. He won't be able to resist. This thing
with the e-mail message to Mike was a flashy thing to do, very
theatrical.

He'll be dying to talk to Mike, for sure. I doubt if Bled will be
anywhere in sight."

"Good point," said Zammit.

"Just as Frankie's kept her involvement with INERT out of sight, very
few people know of my work with the Knights of Malta. How could Abdul
Jamal have found out? And why did he send me the message before
Amurkhan even made the request that I get involved? Is he psychic or
something?

How did he know I'd have anything to do with it?"

As Richards examined a new sable brush, Stavros took Zammit's arm and
whispered, "A few words?"

"Sure." They walked farther down the aisle and sat across from each
other.

"What?"

"I want to make some suggestions about how to handle someone like
Jamal."

"Shoot," said Zammit.

Costopoulos poured himself some more champagne and drained it at a
swallow.

"You are dealing with a charming, intelligent, and manipulative man
whose personality can suddenly switch to the most violent kind of
behavior. That is because he is a psychopath."

Zammit interrupted.

"You wrote a famous paper on this, as I recall. And a best-seller
based on the paper."

Costopoulos nodded.

"I needed money, and a popular textbook was the way to do it. I will
refresh your memory. People believe all psychopaths are killers, but
most are not. The characteristics that make up a psychopathic
personality are found in many people who never kill anyone--we call
them sub criminal psychopaths. As with everything else in life, it's
not black and white--you're one and I'm not. There are degrees, little
tendencies, personality quirks that don't necessarily have to turn into
anything monstrous but can do so when exacerbated by circumstance or
environment."

Zammit nodded.

"Go on."

"In fact, many successful, driven people have psychopathic elements in
their personalities. The ruthless back-stabbing executive, the
wheeler-dealer with the flashy lifestyle who turns out to have been
looting pension funds and defrauding widows and orphans. People
renowned for their risk taking and lack of regard for others."

"I get the general idea."

Costopoulos continued.

"They are often successful at what they do because they have an uncanny
ability to fool other people, to take them in. But this is accompanied
by a very low frustration threshold. Let's say a psychopath is
stealing from a business, which is common--after all, they are not
constrained by the conscience that would prevent you or me from
stealing. Their employer finds out and confronts them. To escape from
the situation, the psychopath invents a dying grandmother who doesn't
exist or a cancerous tumor they don't have. They will tell these lies
with convincing sincerity, because whenever a psychopath tells a lie,
he truly means it at the time he's telling it. It's merely a way of
getting what he wants, of taking you in."

Zammit poured them both more champagne.

"But if lies and charm don't work, what can they do? Argue, of course,
but arguing is stressful, frustrating. The last thing you want to do
is frustrate a particular type of psychopath, because without warning
they will lash out violently. The interesting thing--and it's one of
the key points about such people--is that after they have lashed out,
perhaps hit, maimed, raped, or killed someone, they will regard
themselves as blameless. They will think, it was the victim's fault
for not believing me--if only they'd believed me, they'd still be
alive."

Zammit nodded.

"Makes sense, in a bent sort of way."

"They often seem perfectly normal until their desires are thwarted.

Then they attack. They have no empathy for others, treating them as
things, as if human beings were cardboard cutouts the psychopath could
move around as he pleased.

But if a cutout refuses to be moved around, the psychopath will become
violent. It must do as he wishes, and after all it's only a cardboard
cutout, so where's the harm in hacking it to pieces and burying it in
the woods somewhere?"

Zammit looked at his watch.

"We're going to be landing soon."

"The e-mail message really bothers me. He seems to know obscure things
about your life. It's a form of provocation. It means he thinks he's
in complete control. Why is he so confident? This ties in with the
sexual stuff--he's obsessed with bondage, restraints. Once again, very
controlling."

Zammit said thoughtfully, "The drugs Jamal manufactures are the
ultimate in control. It's one thing to control a person's body,
another to control his mind."

Costopoulos blinked.

"I hadn't thought of that. Damn."

Zammit grinned.

"Stay, you think too much. You're going to give yourself a brain
cramp. Relax. We'll do what we can and move on. Fear is information
without the cure. We'll find the cure somehow."

The Greek shook his head.

"I can't let it go. Why does he think he's going to win? How can he
be so confident?"

Zammit yawned.

"Stay, we're building this guy up based on CIA files. Maybe he'll turn
out to be someone we can throw around like a ping-pong ball."

Costopoulos sighed.

"Perhaps. But psychos have weaknesses, and it's the nature of the
psychopathic personality not to recognize their own flaws."

"Such as?"

"In Jamal's case, he knows he's intelligent because he's been told that
by other people all his life. That means he probably thinks he's more
intelligent than he actually is, because psychopaths tend to be
narcissists. Any man who believes that about himself is going to make
mistakes. You could exploit Jamal's inflated assessment of his own
cunning."

Zammit nodded as he filed this information away.

"He is controlling. Make him feel not in control--it will upset him
very much.

Tell him something he doesn't think you could know--it'll rattle him.

The obsessive collecting of women, of art, of recipes--he's a greedy,
covetous man.

Greed is one of the seven deadly sins. If necessary, you could turn
Jamal's greed against him and make it truly deadly."

Costopoulos pointed down the aisle toward Frankie Richards gazing out
the window lost in thought.

"Her instincts are even better than mine.

Compared to her, when it comes to figuring out life, I have to read the
manual, line by line. She's worried."

There was a sudden whine as the engines changed pitch. They were
descending into the unknown.

Republic of Tuvanistan, September 6

"I've come to one conclusion for sure," said Mike Zammit as they
lounged in the gray leather interior of the white stretch limousine. It
smelled of fine leather, polished wood, and something else he couldn't
put his finger on. The limo was pulling away from the Blavatsk airport
and taking them to the presidential palace.

"What's that?" asked a glum Stavros Costopoulos.

"Nothing on earth inspires less confidence than the sight of a Tuvanian
policeman."

The airport was a ramshackle structure of peeling paint, cracked
concrete, and grimy smeared windows, despite being heavily fortified. A
high stone wall surrounded it, topped with barbed wire and wicked
scythe like shards of broken glass. As guests of the president they
had been greeted by a contingent of unhappy looking officials in cheap
Soviet-era suits. When one of these officials thought he was being
looked at, he would flash a white, sharkish smile so patently false it
was worse than no smile at all. Generally swarthy, with black hair and
eyes, there was a hint of Arab in some of the faces, although most had
the rounded skulls with flat backs typical of the ancient Ilyrians. But
it was the eyes that told everything. Deep black pools, bright and
wary, they glowed with hungry resentment.

They were the eyes of a people who had found themselves caught between
two tectonic plates of history--Christianity and Islam--that through an
accident of geography and religion just happened to collide in the
Caucasus and the Balkans.

They had endured and thrown off invasions by the armies of Rome,
Attila, Byzantium, and Genghis Khan before finally being smothered for
half a millennium by the dead weight of corrupt Ottoman rule.

They were the eyes of sheep stealers and bandits, of sharp traders with
sharper knives, of snipers who always aimed at the genitals, of people
who engaged in mindless vendettas that lasted hundreds of years and
left mutilated bodies to rot in lonely country lanes. Hard, cruel,
untrusting eyes, the eyes of people it would be unwise to turn your
back on.

As guests of the president, they did not have to go through customs,
and immigration was a perfunctory affair. It was never hard to spot a
state under siege--the presence of hundreds of soldiers and police was
a giveaway.

Once they left the fortified airport compound and hit the potholed
highway leading to the capital, Zammit remembered that there were two
airports in Tuvanistan, one about five miles west of the city and
another some twenty miles to the east. Having flown from Istanbul,
they had landed at the western one.

When he questioned why such a small country would need two airports,
Colonel Hakim Yildiz had said, "Two fast exits are better than one,"
obviously referring to the unstable political situation. With a spike
of unease, Zammit remembered the Turk's response when Zammit briefed
him on their decision to go to Tuvanistan. Yildiz had listened in
morose silence, shaken his head, then used his middle finger to pull
down the lower lid of his right eye. Zammit knew what this universal
Mediterranean gesture meant: Keep your eyes open--beware. Yildiz
escorted them to the airport and saw them off with the words

"Gechmis
olsen."

Zammit asked Costopoulos what it meant. Stay looked unhappy.

"Roughly translated, it means, "May it be behind you."

" As he contemplated the landscape, it occurred to Zammit that the
shiny American armored car was like a swan traveling down a river of
sewage. He had seen poverty in a lot of places, from Rio de Janeiro to
Calcutta, but rarely had he seen a landscape as blasted as this one.

Huge piles of rubble were heaped by the roadside between dead gray
trees and rusted vehicles. They passed the occasional sway-backed mule
hauling a wooden cart filled with giant bundles of rushes or twigs. The
drivers were gaunt and looked haunted. Farmland lay between the
airport and the city, but the crops looked sickly, as if they had been
poisoned or lay under a curse. Off in the distance Zammit could see a
pall of black smoke, no doubt from the oil fields. Under a leaden sky
he watched as peasants prodded staggering farm animals pulling plows
that would have been familiar to a medieval farmer.

As they approached the capital in its setting of trash, he could see
minarets and domes on the horizon, along with several towering milk
carton shapes that indicated Stalinist-era buildings, examples of
Soviet Brutalism. All were partially obscured by a brown fog of
oil-field smog that clung greasily to the trees and left oily streaks
on the windshield. There was a pervasive smell of burning
hydrocarbons, wood smoke, and ashes. He was reminded of Dzerzhinsk.

Suddenly he was hit in the face with a blast of strong scent. He
flinched.

Everyone else did too.

"What the hell was that?"

"Lilac," said Morgan.

"I really hate lilac."

"I rather like it," said Stay, "but this is awfully strong."

Richards was examining the side panels of the limo's interior.

"Little nozzles.

Looks like they're programmed to spray scent into the car periodically,
so the Popovs don't have to smell their own country."

As they entered the city, people stopped and stared, often darting into
doorways. Curtains twitched aside as invisible watchers observed their
passage.

Feral dogs snarled over piles of trash, and emaciated children with the
reddish hair of the chronically malnourished crouched on the cracked
and buckling sidewalks.

The limousine swerved left as they passed a column of men shuffling
down the middle of the road in leg irons. Their collective gait was
peculiar--none of them were moving their left arms. It gave the
creeping column the look of a centipede that had had a stroke which
rendered its left side immobile.

The men in the column were guarded by soldiers with rifles and clubs
and slavering German shepherd dogs on chains with choke collars. Some
of the men looked sideways as the limousine passed the column, with the
haunted eyes of those who wished themselves dead.

"Oh my God," whispered Frankie Richards. Zammit stared. In addition
to the shackles around their ankles, the prisoners were fastened
together, one to another. The red streaks of blood on their ragged
prisoner's uniforms told the tale. They were strung together with
yards of metal wire that had been inserted through the flesh of their
triceps.

Zammit's eyes grew cold and thoughtful. He remembered Irina Markova's
comment about Tuvanistan being like something out of Kafka's In the
Penal Colony and tried to recall the story. Slowly it came back--it
was about an island prison where the commandant had devised a machine
to which prisoners were strapped and then had the crime for which they
were being punished incised into their flesh by a slowly lowered device
of needles and razors called The Harrow. He'd first read it when he
was about fourteen, and it was still lodged in his brain like a
splinter.

In contrast to the gray and begrimed streets, they could see in the
distance a giant gilded dome rising into the sky. The white limo swung
around a corner, and suddenly they were on a broad boulevard. At the
end squatted the vast bulk of the presidential palace, secure behind
the pylons of its giant electrified fence. Armored vehicles and squads
of soldiers were everywhere. At the front gate of the palace the limo
stopped, surrounded by soldiers. Swarthy faces peered at the driver,
then at the passengers. The gates swung silently open, and they were
waved through.

The limo swung around the sweep of the grand driveway and halted in
front of the broad flight of marble steps that led up to the front
portico. Red carpeting covered the steps, and a group of people waited
at the top. Some wore suits, others balloon pants, fezzes, and
embroidered shirts, and they held a variety of odd looking instruments.

It took Zammit a moment to realize they were musicians.

Uniformed flunkies opened the doors of the limo as others started
removing their luggage and humping it up the side of the staircase.

As they trudged up the marble steps, the musicians began playing, a
squealing cacophony of oriental half-tones. As they neared the top,
the expressions on the musicians' faces reminded Zammit of beaten white
poodles at the circus, in red velvet hats, unhappily jumping through
hoops. As at the airport, there was a delegation of officials in dark
suits and big smiles topped with unsmiling eyes.

One of them spoke into a cell phone and waited expectantly by the grand
entrance, his eyes sweeping the surrounding area.

Men with machine guns looked alert, and even though the streets were
virtually deserted, squads of uniformed men patrolled the perimeter
outside the fence.

Zammit realized that they were there in case of snipers. He remembered
to stand behind Frankie Richards and look alert himself, as a bodyguard
should.

They faced the delegation. A well-fed man with a black moustache and
hot black, wary eyes stepped forward and bowed to Richards.

"Welcome to the presidential palace," he said in heavily accented
English. She smiled graciously and inclined her head. This was the
sign for a general round of bows and smiles where mouths smiled but
eyes didn't.

They were escorted into the palace, through doors that appeared to be
solid bronze. Despite the size of the palace entry, they found
themselves in a narrow hallway with metal walls, like cattle in a
chute, shuffling toward a security checkpoint and an airport-style
metal detector. It was obvious the Popovs had no intention of
allowing anyone into the building without a thorough check.

Zammit couldn't shake the feeling that a black presence was waiting for
them somewhere inside this palace. As he went through the metal
detector it squealed sharply. A man with a machine gun faced him and
held out his hand. Zammit reached into his jacket and pulled out the 9
mm automatic from the shoulder holster underneath his left armpit. He
handed it to the man.

Their guide smiled a non smile

"It is secure here. Dr. Richards will be safe.

Your gun will be returned when you leave."

Zammit looked at Morgan. Without a word the agent reached into his own
jacket, handed over his weapon, and strode through the metal
detector.

As they set off down the corridor away from the security checkpoint,
Zammit pondered what Costopoulos had said on the plane. As he reviewed
what they had seen on the drive into the city, he realized that this
visit might have been a mistake. One word kept reverberating in his
mind.

Defenseless.

Zammit sat on the edge of his bed and bounced experimentally up and
down. He had expected they would be taken directly to meet the Popovs,
but their guide had said, "I am sure you would like to be shown to your
suites. The president wished to be here to greet you personally on
your arrival, but pressing affairs of state require his immediate
attention."

"I wonder who's being executed," Morgan muttered to Zammit as they took
the elevator up to their rooms. They each had their own suite. The
suites were grouped around the artist's, which was the largest and most
ornate, with a pink satin canopy bed. Zammit's luggage was next to his
bed, which was round and the size of a patio. After a few moments'
puzzled contemplation, it finally evoked a memory--old 1970s photos of
Hugh Hefner in the Playboy mansion, on the same kind of bed, with a
velour robe, a pipe, a smirk, and lots of bosoms. Zammit sniffed--the
musty smell of disuse mingled with the delicate Middle Eastern odor of
attar of roses. At least it wasn't lilac.

There was a big TV in the room. He walked over and switched it on. It
appeared to be the beginning of a local program. It struck him as
familiar, yet bizarre.

A baritone in a blue suit, loud tie, and improbable hairdo was saying
something in a foreign language. From the
sound-and-fury-signifying-nothing soundtrack, he figured it was the
local news.

He picked up the remote and surfed the channels. Static and snow.

Obviously Tuvanians were expected to make do with just one station. He
returned to the single source of news, just in time to see a tracking
shot of a man he recognized as President Popov descending to earth on a
cloud to stand on a mountaintop in a crude video special effect. Once
earthbound, Popov stood, arms akimbo, looking stern and godlike as a
computer-generated breeze ruffled his clothing. The camera cut back to
the improbable hairstyle man, who began reading what Zammit assumed was
the news in Tuvanian. The news anchor had the chiseled features,
resonant voice, and general air of false sincerity of news anchors the
world over.

Just like the anchorman, the film clips were like TV the world over.

Most stories were trivial yet heightened with false drama because there
was air time that had to be filled and not enough real drama to fill it
with.

Clips showed Fopov touring an oil refinery, the president and his wife
at some official function, ruddy- checked peasants driving
state-of-the-art tractors, tending fertile fields bursting with
produce.

Zammit's eyes narrowed. He didn't know what the news anchor was
saying, but the modern machinery and baskets of vegetables didn't jibe
with what he had seen on the drive from the airport. Obviously
propaganda. Badly done propaganda at that.

Finally he figured out how this was different from American news
programs. U.S.

programs showed this kind of thing at the end, when they were desperate
to fill the last five minutes--stats on the Iowa corn harvest, the
welfare recipient who'd won the lottery. American programs always
started with a disaster, because every news producer knows that
channel-surfing viewers like to watch disasters.

That's why ninety percent of the interesting events in the world aren't
reported on the evening news. Unlike a train wreck or a plane crash, a
complex financial scandal doesn't come with an eye-catching film clip.

Besides being difficult to report, it's boring for viewers to watch.

Zammit also realized that in a perfect peoples' paradise like
Tovanistan, there could never, ever be disasters to report.

He turned off the TV and opened the minibar. More Veuve Clicquot. He
tossed some ice into a crystal goblet, selected a small bottle of
Glenfiddich, and poured.

He swirled the whiskey-covered cubes around, thinking hard. Based on
what he had seen so far, it seemed unlikely the Popovs would be part of
the complex plot they had uncovered--they wouldn't be clever enough to
think of something so elaborate, much less execute it. And based on
what he had learned about Abdul Jamal, it seemed equally unlikely that
such a controlling and suspicious person would discuss the weather with
the Popovs, much less anything more complicated.

Knowing they were in the palace somewhere, he wondered how to discover
the precise whereabouts of General Bled and Abdul Jamal and the
smallpox. He also wondered what he would say to them if they did meet.

He drained the goblet and shrugged. He'd worry about it when the time
came.

He stripped off his clothes and went to take a shower. The bathroom
was huge, tiled in blue- and ivory-colored marble.

Zammit noticed a pile of magazines with garish covers beside the
toilet. He picked up the top one and flipped through it. It was a
display of brutal pornography. Obviously the Popovs made certain
assumptions about the sort of hospitality that should be extended to a
guest's bodyguard. It was also obvious that they made those
assumptions based on their own tastes, or the tastes of their own
bodyguards. He felt a sickening lurch in the pit of his stomach as he
realized the sort of people he was dealing with.

He threw the magazine back onto the pile, then picked up the stack and
tossed it into a nearby closet, slamming the door. Now he really
needed a shower. As he unwrapped a bar of expensive soap, he felt a
faint reflex surge of adrenaline, remembering the pictures. Even
though they were pathetic and loathsome at the same time, at some deep
primitive level he responded to photos of other people having sex. As
he turned on the water, he reflected that God sure screwed people up
during the process of wiring their brains. No wonder the human race
was outbreeding everything but the insects, and could think up plots
like the contamination at the Ataturk Dam. He remembered his
conversations with Grand Master Angelo Fortucci and felt a black tide
of cynicism rising in his soul. God had to be a spider.

As he toweled himself under the ceiling's infrared lights, the heat
made him drowsy. On a gold hook near the marble sink hung an
ankle-length bathrobe in thick burgundy velour. He put it on and
walked back into the bedroom. As he lay down on the bed he wondered if
there was a surveillance camera in the suite. He assumed there was. He
scanned the room but couldn't spot anything. To hell with it. You
want to watch me snore, be my guest. He lay back, dozed, and
dreamed.

He started awake at the sound of a knock on the door. It took him
several moments to remember where he was. As he heaved himself off the
bed, he realized how tired he was. And he was still sore from his
ordeal underground. I must be getting old, he thought. Don't bounce
back the way I used to.

He opened the door. It was Costopoulos.

"I've been informed that dinner is at eight." He looked into Zammit's
eyes, concerned.

"You look ill."

"Bad dream," said Zammit shortly.

"Black tie and tails? Like they told Frankie when she called?"

Stay grimaced.

"Tuxedos at dinner. A gangster's idea of class."

Zammit pointed at the pen in the Greek's pocket.

"Is that on?"

"Yes."

"Good. The masking device will prevent anyone from overhearing our
conversation, in case they're listening."

Zammit smiled.

"It's not often I see you in a monkey suit. Remember to put the
cummerbund on right side up."

Jack Morgan appeared, pointing at his masking device.

"I hear we get to play Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers."

Zammit nodded.

"I have to keep reminding myself that I'm a bodyguard, and bodyguards
don't speak unless they're spoken to." He thought again of the
magazines and the unspoken truths they uttered about the mindset of the
Popovs and the nature of the country they ran.

Frankie Richards appeared in the doorway. She surveyed Zammit's
burgundy velour bathrobe.

"How are things at the Playboy mansion these days?"

"Groovy," deadpanned Zammit.

She gave him a searching look, sensing the same disquiet Costopoulos
had noticed.

"What is this cabal of my employees up to?"

"Discussing the upcoming ordeal," replied Stay glumly.

"I find it hard to smile at these people."

"They have trouble smiling at you," said Zammit.

"Frankie, when do we meet the monstrous couple?"

She glanced at her watch.

"Soon. We get a guided tour of the palace first, in about twenty
minutes. Then a formal introduction to the Popovs, just before dinner.

They want to meet all of us. Remember your roles, for God's sake."

"I hate fake identities," said Zammit.

"I tend to forget who I'm supposed to be, halfway through the job."

"Me too," said Jack Morgan.

"I failed that test once at Langley. As part of our CIA training we
had to do role-playing--how to survive interrogation, that kind of
thing. Once I had to pretend to be completely deaf while the other
guys in class played my captors and tried to intimidate me. Shouted at
me and so on. I was doing really well until they left me alone for a
few moments, then one guy looked over at me in horror and said,
"Christ, there's a cockroach on his head."

I reached up to brush it off and ... " The young agent gave a grin
that made him look even younger than he actually was.

As the others returned to their suites, Zammit closed the door. He
made himself do fifty push-ups to get the blood pumping and clear his
head. As he forced himself through the last five, he remembered that
Abdul Jamal was a notorious sexual predator. He put on his tuxedo,
struggling as he always did with the studs in the cuffs. On his third
attempt to get the tie on properly, he glanced over at Catula,
motionless and blank-eyed in the suitcase on the floor. He wished he'd
left the insectoid with Aunt Julia back on Malta. Too late now.

He gave his cummerbund a final tug, opened the door, and stepped into
the hallway.

The interior of the Blavatsk palace resembled a gigantic gold jewelry
box stuffed with furniture, antiques, and paintings, all jumbled
together. Purple embossed wallpaper, pink (velvet upholstery on faux
Louis XIV chairs, a fake Venus di Milo and a small-scale imitation of
Michelangelo's David, only in bronze, massive marble tables topped with
all sorts of third-rate antique knickknacks, with the occasional
priceless piece. Zammit got the impression the Popovs would place the
same value on a Picasso as they would on a black velvet painting of
Elvis. He remembered what Costopoulos had said--a gangster's idea of
class.

He stayed close to Frankie. She had her hair up somehow--the style had
a name, but he couldn't remember it--and wore an ankle-length,
high-necked black silk dinner dress with lace sleeves that stopped at
mid-forearm, with a string of pearls around her neck, a delicate gold
bracelet that looked as if it had been woven, and black shoes that
added about three inches to her height. She looked positively regal
and smelled great, and if she was wearing any makeup apart from a
little mascara, he couldn't tell. She was all charm when talking with
the guide, but when his back was turned she gazed about with a look of
horrified fascination.

The ballroom was at least thirty yards across, with white and black
marble flooring, pink satin wallpaper, and chandeliers in multicolored
Venetian Murano glass. The domed ceiling was a riot of white plaster
moldings, cherubs blowing trumpets, and pastoral scenes with voluptuous
half-naked maidens dabbling their toes in babbling brooks. Zammit had
had enough conversations with Frankie about the history of art to
recognize the rococo style when he saw it, with its cotton candy pinks
and baby blues, and these ceiling paintings were the worst imitations
of Tiepolo and Fragonard he had ever seen.

Jack Morgan sidled up to him and muttered, "Are they blind?"

There was a Las Vegas-style casino, with some thirty tables set up for
blackjack, as well as roulette, slots, and keno. It was empty of
players and lacked the usual casino stink of sweat, stale perfume,
cigarette smoke, and boredom. Dealers stood at attention behind each
table, decks of cards fanned out on the green baize in front of their
chip trays. They weren't the usual plastic tokens but real coins--gold
and silver, apparently, and mostly antique. Zammit wanted to examine
them, but it wasn't the sort of thing a bodyguard would do. It was
obvious the dealers were expected to stand at attention during their
shift, in an empty casino, in case the Popovs or their guests had a
sudden desire to play a few hands at three in the morning.

He'd seen similar places in the United Arab Emirates, where just a
generation before the 1970s oil boom the local sheik would have
considered himself fortunate to have a sand dune to pitch his tent on.

Now there were palaces and desalinization plants and lush lawns where
the sheik could take his shoes off and walk on fresh green grass, an
experience entirely unknown to his ancestors.

Desalinization plants. It struck him that unless they could find a
solution to the cyanobacteria, there wouldn't be any more functional
desalinization plants in the Persian Gulf states, and no more green
grass either.

The communications center was a jarring contrast to the rest of the
palace, with its banks of monitors and machine gun-toting guards behind
bullet-proof Plexiglas. They were not granted a tour. He made a
mental note of the center's location.

There was no sign of Abdul Jamal or General Vladimir Bled. Zammit
wasn't surprised--the palace was so big you could hide half the crowd
from a Super Bowl game in the building and never see them. Their guide
talked the whole time using the monotone of professional tour guides
the world over.

"This is the House of the Large Fountain," he announced as they walked
into a huge room.

"It is a replica of the original house found in Pompeii." Frankie
Richards made appreciative noises, and Zammit noticed that it was
indeed a precise duplicate of the residence excavated from the volcanic
depths of the buried city. In addition, it was stuffed with replicas
of ancient statuary made to look the way they would have looked when
they rolled out of some craftsman's workshop in the 1st century a d. It
was odd to see ancient statues as they had originally been--not the
pale clean stone of museum antiques, but heavily painted, with flesh
and hair tones, gilded clothing, and gemstones for eyes.

Zammit walked around the room, intrigued, and relieved not to see any
more pink, but trying to look bored because a real bodyguard wouldn't
be interested in this kind of thing. He found himself standing in
front of a Roman-era pornographic drawing scratched into the plaster
wall of the replica building. There was a graffito in Latin underneath
the drawing. He stepped back a couple of paces to get a better look so
he could decipher the inscription. He'd gotten as far as

"Livia's a
slut, Falco's a whore, if wishes had mouths they'd ... " when his heels
hit something.

He turned and looked behind him. A block of fused coins, about a cubic
yard in size. It was similar to those he had seen in the underground
temple. He stared at it. How had such a treasure gotten here?

Something this valuable would never have been put up to auction when it
was unearthed. It would have been whisked off to a Turkish museum
under heavy guard. Theft of antiquities in Turkey was a serious
offense.

Once again he felt the pieces of some complex puzzle whirling in his
brain, but they still didn't fit together. What was it Sultana had
said? Iraq had been moving troops and armor to the border before the
cyanobacteria in the reservoir had been discovered. He now knew the
reason for that. The Resistance Army of Allah had approached Sultana
and the PKK, asking for their cooperation. He now knew why. Suddenly
he remembered what else she'd said:

"Other people have been observed in the area. They are heavily armed,
stealing antiquities."

He stared at the block of coins. How had the Popovs acquired something
like this? Was it their employees who were the well equipped and
heavily armed people stealing antiquities from ancient sites around the
Ataturk Dam? If so, were they in on the plot too? Mentally he filed
the block's existence away for future reference.

They headed down yet another ornate hallway to yet another huge room.

"The presidential collection of modern art," announced their guide,
surreptitiously looking at his watch. Richards made appreciative
noises again, less enthusiastically this time. Zammit wandered to the
end of the room and stood before a locked glass case. It contained a
bronze plinth on which was mounted what appeared to be a piece of
driftwood with five rusty beer bottle caps nailed to it. He peered at
the discreet brass nameplate, which read mona lisa 23.

Costopoulos joined him. They stared at the piece in silence. Finally
Zammit said, "I think we ought to start a new school of art."

"Yeah?" said the Greek.

"We'd call it the Shit School of Art."

"Why?"

"Then people could stand in front of something like this and with
perfect accuracy say, "Look at that shit."

" They moved down another hallway. Zammit now only half listened to
the guide because the spiel was always a variation on the same
theme--the genius and sophistication of the Popovs, the marvels they
had performed for their country, the undying gratitude of the masses.

Frankie Richards was still smiling, but it was starting to look a
little forced.

"... and so the glory of the Fatherland is reflected in the
achievements of our brilliant leader and his consort," concluded the
tour guide. Consort? thought Zammit. What is this, the 18th century?

He looked at the guide and held his eyes. He raised an eyebrow in a
deliberately provocative way, as a test. Did he believe this crap? The
man's eyes flicked away. Nope.

The guide made a flourish, like a conjurer about to perform a
particularly difficult trick.

"And now, you will have the honor of meeting Their Excellencies Ivan
and Anastasia Popov."

A footman in yellow livery escorted them to the door of what appeared
to be an enormous library. Zammit looked at the shelves of books that
teetered into the air. All were | leather bound with gilt lettering on
the spines and looked as if they had never been opened. Another
footman in livery marched through the library door carrying a silver
tray filled with champagne flutes and a couple of bottles.

"More Veuve Clicquot," muttered Costopoulos.

"Must have a franchise."

As they waited, tense and lost in their own thoughts, Zammit walked to
the window and gazed out over the courtyard and the buzzing fence
toward the dilapidated town beyond. He sipped the fizzy golden liquid
without appetite. The window was a solid sheet of thick glass and,
from the look of it, could stop an artillery shell. A few moments
later he heard a noise and turned. Standing in the doorway were
President Ivan Popov and his wife, Anastasia.

Often people seen only in photographs are either smaller or larger than
expected when finally met. It was the same with the Tuvanian dictator
and his wife. From the photos he'd seen, Zammit had assumed Ivan would
be a beefy man of maybe six foot two and 280 pounds. Instead he found
himself staring at a round shouldered man of perhaps five foot six with
a head too large for his body. He noted the low forehead, ferrety
eyes, weak chin, and wet lips. He could smell a bucket load of some
sort of male cologne, even from where he stood ten feet away, and noted
also the two garish rings, a diamond pinkie and a cabochon ruby.

Anastasia was even more startling. A 44D, if Zammit wasn't mistaken,
her breasts like half-empty sacks of grain, with orange hennaed hair.

She had startling turquoise eyes, heavy makeup, and had obviously made
at least one plastic surgeon very rich.

The two of them smiled at Frankie Richards, which was a little like
seeing a couple of sharks wearing bonnets--it didn't come naturally to
them.

"Dr ...

Richards," said Ivan in surprisingly good English, an oily smile
greasing his face.

"How delightful to meet you. I am glad you could accept our
commission."

"So am I," said Frankie, with apparent sincerity. The woman really is
a good actress, thought Zammit.

"As I mentioned, I am here just briefly to discuss what poses you want,
clothing, and so on. I will then do the preliminary sketches and
certainly the faces, which are impossible to paint from photos. For
the clothing and background, I can paint from photos when I work on the
portrait back in America."

As Zammit listened to this exchange, he remembered that the term
"peasant cunning" had come up more than once in Graves's briefing on
the Popovs. They had isolated Tuvanistan from virtually all contact
with the outside world except for vicious right-wing elements in
Russia. The country was a strange amalgam of medieval and modern--a
style of government that would not have seemed strange to a
12th-century serf, conducted with incessant surveillance, torture, and
the latest weaponry. He thought of the train of shackled prisoners
with the steel wire threaded through their flesh and realized he was
reflexively clenching and unclenching his right fist.

Ivan Popov's smile vanished as an aide entered the room and whispered
urgently in his ear. A look of alarm crossed his face, and he appeared
paralyzed with indecision. He muttered to Anastasia, who barked
something in Tuvanian at the aide, who promptly fled.

"Will you excuse us for a few moments?" said Anastasia, seizing her
husband's arm and dragging him through a side door.

They stood and waited for the return of their hosts. After a few
moments Zammit walked over to Stavros and said quietly, "I get the
feeling President Popov is not exactly the sharpest quill on the
porcupine. No doubt who's the power behind that throne."

Costopoulos nodded.

"Poor bastard. That woman makes Lucrezia Borgia look like Mary
Poppins."

"He's probably being shorn of the last remnants of his manhood even as
we speak."

"I don't give this autocracy much longer."

Zammit drained his glass.

"Why not?"

"This country is a slave state, but Tuvanians are natural-born rebels
and have been for at least 2,000 years. Eventually it'll blow."

"I agree," said Jack Morgan.

"And apropos of nothing in particular, I don't like the way El
Presidente looks at me."

Costopoulos smiled.

"You're a hairdresser, remember? He got his start pimping for the
Communists. He has leapt to a conclusion about your sexual
orientation. Don't turn your back on him, and for God's sake don't
bend over."

"Bedfellows make strange politics," observed Frankie Richards.

Suddenly the door opened and the autocrat reappeared, his head still
nodding on automatic pilot as he received final instructions from his
wife. Before the door closed on a final burst of emphatic syllables,
Zammit caught a brief glimpse of flaming red hennaed hair and two
reptilian turquoise eyes. Anastasia was about to take care of
business, and Ivan was being left with the task of playing host.

As he sidled back into the room, the dictator made hand washing
movements and wet his lips with his tongue. He looked sheepish, as
befits a man who has just been shorn.

Morgan muttered in Zammit's ear, "To paraphrase Jerry Lee Lewis, whole
lotta grovelin' goin' on."

"You know, hands and eyes are the hardest things to render in paint,"
said Richards smoothly.

"Sir Joshua Reynolds, one of the greatest portrait painters, was so bad
at it that his subjects are usually portrayed with drapery hiding their
arms and hands."

Ivan Popov was obviously grateful for her effort to ignore what had
just happened. Zammit stared out the window. They had just learned
something important about the autocrat--he was dumber than his wife and
subservient to her.

Another footman appeared and spoke to Popov. Apparently the banquet
was ready.

The walk down the corridors to the dining room seemed to take forever.

Zammit wondered what would be served for dinner. He noticed shadowy
figures everywhere, muttering into cell phones. Secret police. He
reminded himself why they were there. Talk to Bled, if possible. Jamal
as well. Were the Popovs involved?

Mentally he braced himself to expect anything.

The banquet hall would not have been out of place in the palace of
Versailles.

Mirrors, chandeliers, white moldings, gilt. The gleaming mahogany
table was twenty feet long, laden with crystal, china, and gold.

Footmen in yellow livery stood along the walls, like actors in some
Ruritanian farce.

Costopoulos and Richards sat, with much fussing and pulling out of
chairs by footmen. Stayros was getting star treatment in his role as
Frankie's personal art historian. As a mere hairdresser, Morgan was at
the far end of the table. As a bodyguard, Zammit was next to
Frankie.

There were two empty chairs across from Zammit, each with place
settings. Other palace guests must be on their way. It occurred to
him that the dinner table atmosphere was much as it would have been on
the Titanic if passengers had known beforehand it was going to sink and
there wouldn't be a band.

Dinner was a succession of heavy foods in cream sauces. A cream of
mushroom soup. A salad of greens he couldn't identify, smothered in a
blue cheese dressing that appeared to be made with overripe gorgonzola.

Cabbage dumplings in sour cream. The main dish seemed to be lamb in a
white sauce sprinkled with capers, but the sauce had curdled, and the
lamb had a fatty, off smell. He noticed that Frankie was just picking
at it. Grimly he ate, trying to avoid the gristle. The china was
Limoges, the crystal Baccarat. From the heft, the knives and forks
were solid gold.

Frankie and the Popovs chatted back and forth. The Popovs appeared
intent on impressing her with the number of American celebrities they
knew. The names Zammit recognized were third rate movie stars whose
careers had faded long ago.

Frankie was handling it well, gracious and polite.

Anastasia had a white Persian cat. It groomed itself, sprawled on a
stool beside her on a pale blue velvet cushion. Zammit's eyes flicked
to the giant picture facing him above a priceless 15th century gilt
Venetian mirror. Painted on aquamarine velvet, the same cat stared at
him with eyes made of genuine sapphires.

His attention was caught by something Ivan Popov was saying.

"Perhaps we could have a seance later this evening. We have our own
personal medium who puts us in touch with the spirit world. Just last
week I had a conversation with Genghis Khan." I'll bet, thought
Zammit.

As Popov expressed his high opinion of Madonna's vocal talents, a door
opened at the far end of the room. A heavy-set but muscular man of
about six foot three, in a double-breasted tuxedo, approached the
table. Swarthy face, ebony hair silvering at the temples. He spread
his big hands and smiled dazzlingly.

"My apologies. Business. No rest for the wicked."

He glanced at the contents of the plates.

"Mutton again? Excellent! I see we have other guests. May I have the
pleasure?"

Ivan Popov wiped his greasy mouth and stood.

"Abdul Jamal, this is the world-famous artist Frances Richards. She
has agreed to paint our portrait."

"Miss ... Richards." Jamal took her hand.

"Or should I say. Dr. Richards?" Zammit felt an icy finger trail
down his spine. The Omani held her fingers to his lips, his eyes never
leaving hers. From Frankie's rigid posture, she was finding this
unpleasant. He remembered her reaction to the photos of Jamal.

Another smile. His charm was in overdrive.

"Of course I am familiar with your work. I know the human body can be
rather difficult." Zammit's stomach lurched.

"I mean, to portray. Tell me, is it true the two most difficult parts
of the human body to render convincingly in paint are the eyes and the
hands?"

"Yes," replied Richards. She was looking directly at Jamal, but Zammit
knew her well enough to know she was making an effort. He remembered
what she had said about the glare at the back of his eyes.

Jamal was introduced to Costopoulos, in his role as Frankie's personal
art historian. The two men shook hands. Zammit saw the look on the
Greek's face.

You'd have to know him to read the look. He's just realized Jamal
knows who we are. As the Omani pulled out his chair, he cast a glance
in Zammit's direction.

A faint smirk appeared on his face, then he leaned forward to talk to
Frankie.

But Jamal, no matter how dangerous, was just a guest. The Popovs ran
the place, and their eagerness to be courteous to Frankie was
palpable.

"I like Kandinsky and Klee," Jamal said.

"I suppose it's my Muslim upbringing, the fact that they are abstract
artists. As you know, Islam prohibits representational art. The
Impressionists are so boring don't you think?" His voice deepened and
darkened.

"Renoir's women, with their enormous breasts and vapid faces. And his
colors--his choice of palette made them look like fruit. Juicy,
edible, human fruit."

Even Ivan and Anastasia Popov picked up on Jamal's tone of voice. He
remembered what Costopoulos had said on the plane:

"Jamal thinks he's in control. Why is he so confident?"

Suddenly the Omani turned to Zammit. The switch from tormenting
Frankie was disconcerting.

"I'm always interested in meeting new people, learning new things. Your
bodyguard looks more intelligent than most. I am interested in his
opinion."

Zammit kept his face impassive.

"I don't know anything about art." No gun. He gazed down at his place
setting, noting what was there.

Jamal said, "Not art. Politics. The death of the Soviet Union makes
the world a much more interesting place than it was before." He
gestured toward the Popovs.

"Crisis is opportunity for those willing to exploit it. Today the four
largest nuclear powers are the United States, Russia, the Ukraine, and
Kazahkstan. In a world where a nation of camel-riding pastoralists can
be the fourth-largest nuclear power, anything can happen. Including
permitting our hosts to have their own country. It will also permit me
to have my own country."

Zammit remained silent, even though he was surprised--he had assumed
all along that the new country would belong to Bled and Smegyev. What
was going on? He remembered what the Greek had told him--rattle
Jamal.

Jamal turned to Frankie.

"Did you choose an idiot as a bodyguard?"

Zammit spoke.

"With freedom comes responsibility. Power must be tempered with
judgment and respect for others."

The financier smiled.

"An unusual opinion for a bodyguard. Did you enjoy your magazines?"

Zammit realized that Jamal, not the Popovs, had placed them in his
suite.

"You did, didn't you?" asked Jamal softly.

"At some primitive level, you responded to them." It was true. Again
the deep, dark voice.

"So, you see, we are alike, you and I."

What was going on? Zammit stared down at his plate. He's intelligent,
and he must know he's not normal, that other people aren't sexual
predators and killers. It must bother him somehow.

Suddenly he had it. I'm a contestant in some sort of competition. For
whatever reason, he wants me to admit the two of us are alike. That
because I responded to the pornography, even in a minimal way, I'm the
same sort of person he is. If I admit that, he'll think he's won a
victory over me. But I am not like him. I may be an animal in my
physiology, but I am more than a beast.

"No, we are not alike," said Zammit. Waiting for whatever was coming
next, he flexed his leg muscles underneath the table, surprised at how
rubbery they felt.

Jamal smiled.

"It was Shakespeare who said, "There is nothing either good or bad, but
thinking makes it so." That's why he could create a character like
Richard III, a villain who reveled in villainy. I love Shakespeare,
his instinctive knowledge that life is meaningless.

"We are such things as dreams are made on, and our little lives are
rounded with a sleep."

" Jamal leaned forward.

"Tell me, bodyguard, do you know what existentialism is?"

"Yes," said Zammit.

"The philosophical doctrine that man forms his essence in the course of
the life he chooses to lead. How you choose is who you are. Do you
cheat on your taxes? Fool around on your spouse? Watch a child being
beaten and do nothing about it? Hear someone tell a cruel Joke, and
laugh even though you don't feel like it? Have sex with a woman even
though she says no, stop? You do these things, and I can tell you who
you are. You are a cheat, a coward, a hypocrite, and a rapist, and it
doesn't take a lot of hand-wringing to figure that out."

"Very, very good," said Jamal.

"A philosophical bodyguard. But you've left out the rest of it."

"I'm listening."

"A person chooses the life they lead, but you are assuming some sort of
moral grounding. But a person's choices take place in a universe that
is purposeless and irrational. In a universe without meaning, all acts
are morally equivalent.

Man only knows he exists by doing. And in the overall scheme of
things, what he does, the choices he makes, doesn't matter."

Zammit recalled his conversation with Grand Master Fortucci on the
nature of evil. This man is morally insane. Of his own free will, he
chooses to do evil.

"I disagree."

Open-mouthed, the Popovs were trying to follow this exchange.

"I know you," said Jamal.

"You are a Knight of Malta, but you have no faith in anything but your
machines. I have faith in power. Mao Zedong said power grows out of
the barrel of a gun. What is a gun? A machine. How are we
different?"

Zammit thought. Why is he trying to get me to admit that we are
similar? He tried to explain, to himself as much as to Jamal.

"Imagine the captain of a ship embarking on a voyage. The ship is your
life, the captain is your soul. As you embark on the voyage, someone
gives you a book. It contains instructions for the voyage. But you
cannot open the book until you are out of sight of land. You are on
the infinite ocean with no means of navigation. Lost, you open the
book. But it is almost impossible to read. You can decipher certain
words, certain instructions. They give you some vague idea of which
way to go. You are frustrated because you can't understand the rest.

But because you have no choice, you follow the instructions, as best
you can, on your voyage through life."

Jamal smiled.

"I have such a book, and it is not as mysterious as yours. It's very
detailed. It is my bible. Perhaps you know it.

"I believe the worst about everyone, including myself, and I am seldom
mistaken."

"Machiavelli. The Prince. Not the choice I would make on my journey
through life."

"It works for me," said Jamal.

"In his own life he was a political failure. Why choose as a guide
someone whose ideas didn't work even for him?" Zammit gestured around
the room.

"If you're so smart, how come you're here and not in Paris?"

Jamal's smirking smile was suddenly fixed. There was a red flare from
his eyes.

"You will never find refuge, not even if you have your own country. You
will always be a fugitive because you are always fleeing from
yourself."

Jamal's face was suddenly congested. Too late Zammit remembered what
Costopoulos had said--the last thing you want to do is frustrate a
psychopath, point out his flaws, his lies, make him angry. It wouldn't
take much to push him over the edge. With cold detachment he evaluated
Jamal's size and probable strength.

Heavy hands. Bigger than I am by thirty pounds.

Zammit raised his glass.

"A toast. Here's to those who wish us well. And those who don't can
go to hell."

Jamal's voice was thick with rage.

"Despite what you say, we are alike. Dr ...

Zammit. A final quote.

"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does
not become a monster. When you look long into an abyss, the abyss also
looks into you." Nietzsche. Look into your own abyss. Dr. Zammit,
and see what is there."

"What is going on here?" demanded Ivan Popov.

"I don't understand any of this. I thought this man's name was Davis,
and he is Frances Richards's bodyguard."

The door opened and Wurban Ice plodded in. He whispered to Jamal. The
Omani's face changed, as if a mask had been ripped off. Zammit was
suddenly afraid.

The financier regained his composure and muttered something back. Ice
left the room.

"I have just been informed that millions of dollars worth of education
have been wasted. It appears that many of my star pupils from the Imam
Hatip have been arrested by a certain Colonel Yildiz. In particular,
seventy members of the Turkish military."

He looked at Zammit.

"I suppose I have you to thank for this?"

"Yes."

"Well," said Jamal, "the waste of money and effort is irritating, but
it doesn't matter. I always make sure I have a fallback position."

The room was filling with the Popovs' personal bodyguards. Ivan Popov
stood.

"I

didn't order you to come in here. Get out!"

Jamal spoke.

"Shut up, you clod-hopping authoritarian. They won't leave without my
orders."

Zammit realized that the financier had subverted the palace guard.

That's why he was so confident. Jamal turned to Zammit.

"I am in control here." He looked at Frankie Richards.

"Dr. Richards is a beautiful woman. She will come to realize it is
not an asset."

Zammit thought. There are at least ten men in this room apart from
Jamal. I can't fight them all. He gazed at his place setting. You
are a scientist.

Scientists use instruments.

Suddenly he heard a familiar sound. He stared at the floor.

Catula.

It had gotten out of his suitcase. As he had conjectured, Dikka must
have installed a battery to jump-start it after a certain length of
time. Its movements were hesitant. The robot didn't like open
spaces. Then Catula saw Anastasia's white Persian cat. The
insectoid's red camera eyes swiveled on their mounts as it stopped,
perfectly motionless.

Come on, thought Zammit. You really hate cats.

The white Persian had seen Catula too. It stood on its cushion, with a
hunting look. As it leapt off the stool, Jamal saw Catula as well.

"Get that cat out of here!"

Zammit had forgotten how fast the robot could move. The Popov's
bodyguards took one look at Catula and fell all over each other trying
to get away. Suddenly all was chaos.

Chaos was opportunity.

He seized a dinner plate from the table. He'd noted the shape before.

He threw it like a frisbee at the bodyguard closest to him. The plate
hit him in the forehead with a thunk. Costopoulos and Morgan were
following his lead, throwing glasses and plates. Zammit seized a
couple of dinner knives and hurled, saw them hit home. The bodyguards
weren't shooting, so they must have orders not to kill them. He saw
Catula battling the cat. The robot was winning.

He was a good fighter, but there were too many. He threw every
combination he could think of. Right, left, overhand right, make the
brain slosh around in the skull. Hit them hard, hit them often. They
were hitting him back, but he realized he could take it. At forty, he
could still do it.

But there were too many of them, and he was getting tired. He dropped
a couple of guards and found himself facing Wurban Ice, just as he saw
Morgan and Costopulos flee the hall. He couldn't see Frankie. The
Hungarian was holding his hands in a strange way. Karate expert. He
slammed Ice's face hard, two overhand rights in a row. But Ice didn't
go down.

He threw a left just as the Hungarian lowered his head and punched.

Zammit's hand slammed into the top of his skull. Stabbing pain as a
metacarpal snapped.

And then he was falling.

When Zammit came to, he couldn't move. He was imprisoned in some sort
of portable bondage harness, like the ones he'd seen in Jamal's
pornographic magazines, arms be- thind his back, wrists bound. He
twisted his 'aching head.

There was a chain attached to the wrist cuffs. The chain ran through a
pulley at the top of the harness's black metal frame. His feet were
flat on the ground, but if the chain was ratcheted up, he'd find himself
dangling in the air, as his shoulders slowly dislocated.

Blearily he looked around. The decor was the same as in the rest of
the palace.

It was a private suite, with high ceilings, furnished with gilt French
antiques, pink velvet upholstery, and purple watered-silk wallpaper. It
looked like an expensive bordello except for a large mahogany desk in
French Third Empire style against one wall.

Wurban Ice stood in a corner, red marks on his face where Zammit's
blows had found their mark. The Hungarian stared with flat hostility.

Zammit peered at something on the floor beside the bodyguard. A fused
block of ancient coins, like the ones he'd seen in the underground
temple and the Popovs' museum. It must have been Jamal's men Sultana
and the PKK had spotted looting the buried cities near the Ataturk
Dam.

There was someone else, sitting on a chair. A young girl with
sherry-colored hair and crocus-blue eyes. Hands on her knees, she was
completely motionless, staring straight ahead, like an ancient Egyptian
sculpture. Her feet were bare, and she was naked from the waist up. On
her lower body she was wearing what appeared to be a tight bikini
bottom made of black latex. He couldn't see very well, but her eyes
were wide open. They appeared vacant but alert at the same time, as if
she were drugged.

He forced his aching head around. Another woman in a chair, only she
was bound and fully dressed. He recognized the clothing.

Frankie. Her cheek was bruised.

He shifted his weight, ignoring the thudding in his head. He twisted
his wrists.

His bonds felt like leather cuffs. Leather stretches. You are
stronger than most people. He twisted harder.

His left hand felt as if it had been pounded with a sledgehammer.

"Frankie?" he croaked.

"Mike?"

"What the hell is this?"

"Jamal's suite in the palace. We were brought here after being knocked
out.

Morgan and Costopoulos escaped from the dining hall. I don't know
where the Popovs are."

Zammit raised his chin at the motionless girl.

"Who's she?"

"I don't know."

"She's Circassian," came a voice from the doorway. It was Jamal, in
his tuxedo.

"Acquired her a few days ago. She's being trained."

He stood in front of Zammit.

"Stupid thing to do, coming here. Had to ride to the rescue, didn't
you? I knew you would, if you figured it out this far."

"I didn't know you'd subverted the palace guard. That you control this
place."

"I'm always one step ahead of my enemies."

"Where are the Popovs?" asked Richards.

"Dead. Stupid people with bad taste in everything, even governance.

Good riddance." He walked to a marble table covered with bottles,
selected one, and poured himself a drink.

Zammit tried to think. Bled and Smegyev were partners, along with
Anwar Hussein and the Syrians. Bled supplied the big stuff-military
expertise, nuclear weapons, troops. Bled's men were fanatical members
of Smegyev's cult, which supplied morale. Smegyev and Bled together
were trying to fulfill the monk Nestor's prophesies about the
enthroning of the Holy Chosen One as tsar in Istanbul.

But Jamal was the mastermind of this plot. Why? All he supplied were
drugs.

Narcotic and hypnotic, plus powerful amphetamines. What were the
amphetamines for? What was he getting out of this? Zammit remembered
what Costopoulos had said: Jamal needs to talk, to explain himself and
his cleverness.

"This is very clever," said Zammit.

"But what do you get out of it?"

"I'm tired of running. I want my own country."

"But Bled has troops, nukes, Smegyev and the cult. It will be their
country.

You're just a dope dealer."

Jamal drained his glass.

"Why are the Iraqis and Syrians part of this plot? Do you think Bled
or Smegyev could broker a deal with them? Of course not. It was my
idea, and without me, it has no chance of success. They all know that,
which is why I'm in charge."

Frankie Richards spoke.

"If you want your own country, why not Tuvanistan?"

"My partners don't want Tuvanistan. For religious reasons, they want
Istanbul and a chunk of land between it and Ankara. They have nuclear
capability, and I don't. Besides, who wants this pigsty of a country?

Nothing but oil and misery.

An economy based on a single commodity is always vulnerable. I hate
being vulnerable."

Zammit knew what Frankie was doing. Keep him talking.

"I don't understand how it's possible to have your own nation. I can
see mounting a coup if you're part of the country's administration, a
politician or a soldier, but not if you're a foreigner."

"You're less intelligent than I thought," sneered Jamal.

"The Grimaldis of Monaco are Europe's oldest royal family. They have
their own country because in the 13th century the original Grimaldi, a
pirate, scaled the palace walls one night and simply took it. That's
the trouble with people today. No initiative."

"That was 700 years ago," replied Richards.

Jamal poured another drink.

"World War I. Four huge empires disappeared in four years, shattered
into new countries. 1991. The Soviet Union blows apart into seventy
nations and other autonomous regions. If that could happen a decade
ago, it can happen today."

He paced the room.

"The key thing is nuclear weapons. That's where Saddam erred when he
invaded Kuwait. I needed a partner with nukes and military
experience.

Bled was the only logical choice." He shrugged.

"Us having our own country is no more unusual than the Popovs having
theirs. But to create a viable state, you must have weapons,
agriculture, industry, legitimate leadership. You must also avoid the
Bolshevik mistake, where you expect people to worship a theory. You
must have more, which is why religion is such a godsend, no pun
intended. A wonderful tool of control. A fundamentalist religion is
even better, since it's simpleminded."

"Wait a minute," said Zammit.

"You enlisted the Resistance Army of Allah to assassinate Amurkhan by
pretending to be a devout Muslim. Most Turks are Muslim.

Smegyev's cult is based on Russian Orthodoxy, so Bled's army of
occupation will be Christian. How is that going to work?"

The Omani grinned.

"I thought of that already. Our little state will have freedom of
religion."

Zammit twisted his wrists.

"Aren't you worried about the reaction from other countries?"

Jamal laughed.

"The Americans and NATO will make outraged speeches, strictly for home
consumption. Then they will make deals with us. They have to because
we'll control Istanbul, one of the world's great ports. America did
business with the Chinese after the Tiannemen Square massacre because
they needed the trade. They launched the Gulf War to save Kuwait
because they needed the oil. Same with us."

"Even with freedom of religion, you aren't going to hold Turkey," said
Richards.

"The population will rebel."

"I have a solution," said Jamal.

"Got the idea from a book I read as a boy. A drug administered to the
population to keep them docile. Soma." It sounded familiar but Zammit
couldn't recall why.

Frankie's voice was heavy with irony. "O brave new world, that has
such people in it."

"Precisely," Jamal smiled.

"The idea of controlling people with a combination of biological
engineering, drugs, and religion was brilliant. Huxley's Brave New
World fused with my reading of Machiavelli, and so here we are. The
drug is called POCS."

"P-O-X?" asked Zammit.

"No. P-O-C-S. I like the acronym because it's so ugly when you say
it.

Population Control Sedative. I've been testing it for years."

A thought struck Zammit.

"You sent me an e-mail message before anyone else knew about the
cyanobacteria. Why? How did you know I'd have anything to do with
this crisis?"

"Don't be so modest. They always call you in on the big ones. Besides,
I was keeping tabs on you. Do-gooders are so trusting."

What was he talking about? Zammit pointed his chin at Frankie, bound
in the chair.

"Why all of this?"

The financier walked over and stood before Zammit.

"I am a vindictive man, and sooner or later I fix the wheels of every
wagon that ever ran over me."

"I don't understand."

Jamal made a temple with his fingers and tucked it under his chin.

"Several years ago. Pakistan. People getting sick from river water.

You were called in.

You found that the pollution came from a carpet factory discharging
toxic effluent."

"I remember. A huge release of chemicals. It contaminated a hundred
miles of river." He recalled the worst of it.

"The carpets were made by child slave labor. Hundreds of kids in a
firetrap warehouse, chained to their looms, their only food a bowl of
rice a day sprinkled with rotting fish. The windows were sealed and
the doors locked."

Jamal shrugged.

"That is not important. You found the factory. You persuaded the
American government to mount sanctions to halt child labor. You almost
ruined a profitable business."

Zammit stared into the man's eyes.

"So it was you. But there's something you're omitting. Before I could
investigate the factory itself, you torched the building. And everyone
in it. All those kids, burned alive."

"You were moving too fast, and I had to destroy the evidence."

"What evidence?"

"The carpet business itself was not important. But to make carpets,
you must use chemicals. In a place like Pakistan, no one is going to
check whether the drums entering the factory actually contain what is
on the label."

Suddenly it was clear.

"The factory was a cover for your drug research."

"Yes. You forced me to relocate to another part of Pakistan, at great
expense and inconvenience. That is why you are here. I want my pound
of flesh." Jamal turned and smiled a slow, rotten smile at Richards.

Zammit's face turned to ice.

"You can't harm us," said Zammit.

"Colonel Graves, the White House, and the CIA know we are here in
Tuvanistan. Frankie is a celebrity."

Jamal walked over to Frankie.

"I'll have fun with Dr. Richards. You, I will kill."

Desperately Zammit thought. He really means it.

"There will be an international uproar. You'll be hunted down like an
animal."

The financier looked at his watch.

"What's keeping them?" He threw himself onto a sofa.

"If the Princess of Wales can die in a spectacular car crash in the
middle of Paris because of a drunken limousine driver, the same thing
can certainly happen here. The Popovs are dead. Soon this nation will
be in chaos, which will increase its already phenomenal rate of traffic
accidents. I've arranged such crashes many times. If you do it
correctly, not even an expert forensics team can tell it wasn't an
accident. It's an underappreciated art form. Great crime has the
aesthetic quality of great art."

"Who are you waiting for?" asked Richards.

"My idiot partners. Bled has to get back to Sevastopol."

Zammit thought furiously. Jamal was controlling. Having partners
meant giving up control.

"What are you going to do with them, once you don't need them
anymore?"

Jamal yawned.

"Bled will be found dead after a bender or die in a drunken fall.

Smegyev will have a heart attack or something." He smiled at Frankie,
then blew her a kiss.

Zammit felt very cold. It was worth a try.

"I'll make a deal with you."

Jamal looked surprised.

"What's that?"

"I notice you have a block of fused ancient coins. I also saw one in
the House of the Large Fountain, in the Pompeii room. I know where
there are many more. If you leave her alone, I'll tell you where they
are and how to find them."

The Omani's eyes gleamed.

"I gave that block to the Popovs as a gift, even though it pained me
greatly to do so. Where?"

"Promise to leave her alone."

Jamal gazed up at the ceiling, musing aloud.

"Such treasures are extremely rare.

Rarer than women. I can always get more women."

"There are statues too. Greek originals. Also very rare."

"You'll tell me precisely where to find them?"

"Yes. If you promise to leave her alone."

"Deal," said Jamal.

"Where and how?"

"When I arrived at the Ataturk Dam, I took samples from the reservoir.

I was abducted by the PKK and taken to an underground temple they were
using as a hideout."

Jamal grinned.

"We wondered where you were. But you were unconscious when you
arrived, and it was dark when you escaped. How do I find this
place?"

"I escaped using a metal detector. When I reached the surface, I left
the device turned on and jammed it into a crevice by the temple
entrance. You'd be able to home in on the signal."

"Ingenious. Thank you. But you are obviously not a good
businessman."

Zammit felt a sickening lurch in the pit of his stomach. Richards's
face was white.

"Never, ever negotiate from a position of weakness." Jamal blew
another kiss at Frankie.

There was a knock on the door.

Wurban Ice plodded over and opened the door. General Vladimir Bled
strode in, carrying a large black box and an attache case. A faint
sneer appeared on his lips as he glanced around the suite. Without a
word he walked 'up to Jamal and handed him the box. Jamal gave it to
Ice, who left the room.

Then Lazar Smegyev glided in, fingering his greasy black beard. There
were stains on the front of his coarse brown monk's habit. The
starets's huge eyes stared at the motionless Circassian girl with
reptilian avidity. Just like Rasputin, thought Zammit--a holy man who
likes the ladies.

As Zammit twisted in his harness, three other men came through the
door. He stared in astonishment. One wore a fringed jacket and a gray
hairpiece chosen to match his Old Testament prophet-style beard. The
two others were carrying machine pistols. One was lean and blond, the
other short and ruddy with curly black hair.

Edward G. Pompo and his Irish bodyguards, Roy Dool and Fergus Cronin.

Pompo gave him the same faint smirk as on the Molly Katz show. He
remembered Irina Markova asking about cults forming alliances, about
Smegyev being in touch with Pompo.

So they were partners too.

"Gentlemen, please sit down," said Abdul Jamal.

"Anything to drink?"

"Why are we meeting here?" asked Pompo as he sat.

"This place is awful."

Jamal was oozing charm. Zammit realized he was trying hard to hold his
peculiar coalition together.

"Because we have reached a crucial stage in our plan.

Because telephone calls or e-mail can be intercepted. And--" Bled
shouted, "And because everything is going wrong!"

Jamal gazed at him. Softly he said, "Had a few drinks already, I
see."

The general's shaved, bullet-shaped skull gleamed with sweat. He
thrust a forefinger at Jamal.

"The political situation in Turkey is still stable, despite your
assurances. Your Imam Hatip pupils have been arrested. My men still
don't have Aggressor. Dr. Cabrinovic is behind schedule. I told him
if it isn't ready by the time I get back, I will have him shot!"

Jamal was soothing.

"Everything is under control. With a complex plan, things sometimes
must be rearranged."

Bled twisted around to look at Zammit, jaw muscles bunched, piggy eyes
bloodshot.

"He's figured it out so far. You told me that wouldn't happen."

"So he's figured it out so far," shrugged Jamal.

"Look at him. Completely helpless. This is as far as he gets. He
will die here."

"What is Aggressor?" asked Zammit.

Bled blinked.

"Methamphetamine cocktail. My men will be invincible."

"General, please shut up."

Bled twisted back toward Jamal and almost fell off the sofa. How drunk
was he?

"What for? You said this is as far as he gets."

He rose unsteadily and walked over to Zammit.

"How do you overcome a normal young man's reluctance to kill a stranger
who has done him no personal harm?"

"I don't know."

"Boot camp. Shave his head, exercise him to exhaustion, stand
screaming two inches from his face, make him clean a hundred latrines
with a toothbrush, make him cry like a baby. And he can't fight
back."

Bled leaned forward. The smell of alcohol was overpowering.

"You destroy his personality. Then rebuild it the way you want so he
will kill on command. But even this isn't enough. Soldiers must be
willing to die as well as kill. They must believe in something enough
to die for it. Communism wasn't good enough to die for. In World War
II soldiers didn't die for Stalin or Bolshevism. They died to defend
Holy Mother Russia."

He gestured toward the monk.

"Now Communism is dead. Everything is falling apart, and we weren't
even defeated in battle. People just gave up. We have our own
national personality, and democracy will not work. Thanks to the
starets, I realize the greatness of Russia must be rediscovered in its
glorious history.

Many others realize it as well. Aggressor will ensure success."

"Smegyev is protected by powerful elements in the government. Like
national security advisor Vyacheslav Radchuk?"

A look of loathing crossed Bled's face. That told Zammit everything he
needed to know. If they managed to get out of here, Radchuk was the
man to get to.

Jamal spoke.

"General, I think you've said enough." Bled didn't appear to hear.

"We must have a strong leader, a religious leader. We will have a
tsar."

"You mean the Holy Chosen One," said Zammit. Bled blinked.

"How do you know about that?" Zammit persisted.

"So who is this guy? Another partner?" Jamal's voice was rising.

"General!" He struggled to keep his face under control as he walked
over. He crossed his arms and contemplated Zammit.

"You must have found Kazov's notes. The ones we tried to find when we
ransacked his office. They contained information about The Secret
Chronicle by the monk Nestor. Did Kazov enjoy his cobalt-60?"

"That was stupid," growled Bled.

"If I'd known, I would've stopped it."

Zammit realized there was dissension between the partners. How to
exploit it?

Unsettle Jamal even more. He doesn't know we found the RAA terrorists'
laptop and read all the messages.

"So you had to assassinate the unclean one, did you?

Clever, using the boy, wasn't it, ghazi?"

Jamal's mask started to slip.

"How do you know that is my code name?"

"I know a lot more than you think I do."

More slippage. It was as if he were trying to approximate human
features and not getting it quite right.

"Excuse me for a moment," he said thickly. He left.

Zammit could hear water running in the bathroom. Bled walked to the
far end of the suite, opened his attache case, and began reading a
file.

Frankie Richards said to Pompo, "Why are you in on this?" Pompo
ignored her. He smirked and walked over to Zammit.

"A bad thing is happening to you. Dr ...

Zammit." He adjusted his hairpiece.

"I was the original partner on the religious end. American evangelists
were working in Russia, with great success. Show biz--we know how to
do it. Then the Duma passed a law favoring Russian Orthodoxy and
forbidding proselytizing by foreigners."

He leaned forward and whispered in Zammit's ear so Bled and Smegyev
couldn't hear.

"The Russkies are paranoid about that sort of thing--you know, foreign
influences. Drives them nuts." He raised his voice again.

"That's when Smegyev was made part of the deal--besides, he knows a lot
of stuff you can't even dream of, even though you're pretty good at
faking what you don't know. I told Jamal I still wanted in. He
thought it might be useful to have an American partner as well as a
Russian one. Knowing the media angle, that sort of thing. Plus, with
the Brotherhood of the She Manitou being tax-exempt because it's a
legally recognized church in America, it's a great way to launder
money."

Zammit tried to insinuate himself into the fanatic mind.

"How does laundering money, environmentalism, post industrial society,
and the She-Manitou fit in with an invasion of Turkey?"

"The spiritual environment must be cleansed. Western materialism and
consumerism are corrupt and spiritually unfulfilling. Not so in
Russia." He gestured at Smegyev.

"Russian religious sects have always prized the 'holy fool' as the
ultimate attainment of sanctity. With Jamal's drugs, we will have an
entire nation of holy fools to educate in the proper way to live.

Political systems are nothing, freedom of religion everything."

"So Jamal mentioned," said Zammit grimly.

"Besides, I should be able to make money selling my seminars. Those
who God blesses, he makes prosperous."

Zammit raised his chin at the monk, who was mumbling a prayer, eyes
closed.

"What about the mad monk?"

Smegyev roused himself and glided over. Even though his hair and beard
were greasy and his monk's habit stained, he didn't smell of anything
except cologne and hair oil. Zammit realized that the peasant monk
appearance was largely an act, to appeal to a culture-specific
expectation of what a holy man was like.

The wandering, filthy. God-blessed starets was a mythic part of
Russian culture, just as an American evangelist had to have a
swept-back, blow-dried pompadour, drive a Cadillac, and use his hands
as if he were chopping the air into blocks.

"I am not mad. Russian civilization is the greatest ever known. It
was Tsar Peter the Great who made the fatal error of embracing European
ideas 350 years ago, creating a gulf between the wealthy aristocrats in
their villas and the peasants who worked the land. Tolstoy and
Solzhenitsyn both knew this--Mother Russia is rural and deeply
religious, used to obedience. Everything foreign is corruption."

He pointed to his bulging eyes.

"These are big for a reason. So they can see into the future. And the
future is a tsar, enthroned in Constantinople, in the rose-red church
of Holy Wisdom."

"Bullshit," said Zammit.

"Your eyes look like golf balls because your thyroid gland is out of
whack. A little medication, you might look halfway normal." The
starets's eyes bulged in anger, but he turned away, sat on the sofa,
and began mumbling a prayer.

Zammit said to Pompo, "So how does Smegyev raise the dead?"

"It's amazing what can be concealed under a monk's habit. Whenever he
does the resurrection stuff, he has a defibrillator unit strapped to
his chest. An electrode runs from the unit to a prod attached to his
wrist. He also has a syringe with a retractable needle concealed in
his sleeve. The electrode jolts the heart back to life while the
syringe delivers a shot of adrenaline."

"We had problems during the testing and training phase," said Abdul
Jamal, toweling his face as he reentered the room. He now looked
normal. He glanced at the monk with evident distaste.

"Smegyev liked the show-biz part so much he would delay the
resurrection. Brain death begins within three to six minutes, and he
would wait too long, chanting and praying."

Jamal didn't like Smegyev. He had referred to Bled as an idiot. The
partners were all pursuing their own agendas. Zammit realized they
were each prepared to betray the others if the opportunity arose. He
had a good idea who the winner would be.

Jamal appraised the Circassian girl and Richards, then turned to
Zammit.

"I

suppose you believe in things like love, romance, the innocence of
children, and the sanctity of motherhood?"

"Yes, I do."

"Then you're a fool."

Dool and Cronin were staring at the floor, listening intently.

General Bled closed his attache case and walked over. He looked at the
Circassian girl and Frankie. His lip curled.

"I must go back to Sevastopol.

Starets, let's get the troops ready, with a blessing from Our Lord in
Heaven.

Pompo, a brief word. Accompany us to the limousine."

Pompo turned to Cronin and Dool.

"Stay here. I'll be back shortly."

"General," called Jamal. Bled stopped.

"Don't forget who hatched this plot. Do as I advise, and everything
will be fine."

Bled grunted, and the three men strode from the room.

Jamal stood in front of Zammit.

"I don't like you." He saw the punch coming, tried to roll with it.

Darkness, filled with pain beyond imagining.

When he awoke, he was still in the harness, arms numb.

"Frankie?" he croaked.

Jamal had taken off his tuxedo jacket and tossed it over a chair.

Seeing that Zammit was conscious, he strolled over to Richards. From
behind the chair, he plucked idly at her outfit.

"Good taste in clothes."

He buried his face in the nape of her neck as she twisted away.

"Italian. Aqua di Palma. Lovely scent. Although I'm sure not as nice
as your own."

He caressed her face as she snapped her head away. He turned to
Zammit.

"Yours?"

"Nobody's!" spat Frankie.

Jamal leaned over and looked her right in the eye.

"Mine," he whispered.

He walked over to Zammit.

"The world exists, in its meaningless way, so I can do what I want in
it. Everyone must do what I want." The Omani threw a hard left hook
to Zammit's rib cage. Zammit felt something snap. Dimly he heard
Jamal say, "So, Knight of Malta, Catholic defender against evil, where
is your God now?"

Zammit struggled to breathe. At least one of his ribs was broken. He
raised his head and looked around. Wurban Ice, smirking. The two
Irishmen, Cronin and Dool.

They were both staring at him. He realized that this was the first
time they'd heard he was a Catholic knight.

Desperately he twisted his wrists against the bonds, skin tearing.

Blood trickled down his hands. He could feel the leather cuffs start
to slide. He pulled his bound arms outward as his shoulder joints
popped. It was working, but not fast enough.

Jamal contemplated Frankie.

"You must belong to someone. A waste for you not to be an engine of
delight for a man." A rank goatlike smell came from him, filling the
air with a fetid stench, as if the rottenness of his soul were finding
physical manifestation. Richards stared at him, defiant.

The Omani leaned over the Circassian girl, still with her hands on her
knees, staring straight ahead, motionless.

"Haven't you wondered about her?" He walked over to the desk and
opened a drawer, removing a syringe and a clear rubber-sealed bottle.

He thrust the needle through the seal, filled the syringe, and walked
over to Zammit. He waved it in front of his face.

"Population Control Sedative. There are several types. This one is
particularly powerful. Hypnotic as well as narcotic." He tapped the
syringe to get rid of any bubbles.

"You've seen professional hypnotists?

Members of the audience crawling around on stage, barking like dogs?

This has the same effect."

He gestured at the Circassian girl.

"I told her to remain in that position until told otherwise. She will
do so until the drug wears off. She'll need another shot very soon.

The interesting thing is that anyone under the influence of this drug
will do exactly what they're told. Anything. And they are fully alert
while they're doing it. Fully aware." He smiled at Frankie.

"I can't wait to see how Dr. Richards performs."

Jamal walked over to the TV and VCR and inserted a cassette.

"You did belong to someone once." Rough footage, clumsily shot. A
waterfall. A jungle. A man, emaciated and ill, cuts and bruises on
his face, as from a beating. Balding, his short beard peppered with
gray.

"Adam!" whispered Richards.

Jamal paused the tape.

"Sumatra. My men were searching for medicinal plants needed to make
drugs. Searching a nature preserve, where collecting rare plants is
illegal. Your husband discovered what they were doing and had the
audacity to demand that they stop." He gestured at the screen.

"You can see the results."

"Where is he? What happened to him?" Frankie screamed as she
struggled against her bonds.

He held up the syringe.

"Perhaps I'll tell you one day. When we've gotten to know each other
much, much better."

He smiled at Zammit.

"Anyone can rape a body. It's an art to rape someone's mind."

The cruelty of this was beyond imagining. When Zammit found his voice,
it was clotted with rage.

"You're evil."

Jamal laughed in genuine amusement. He walked over to Frankie, the
gleaming needle held aloft.

God, thought Zammit, if you exist, help me now. His eyes searched the
room. Find a weapon. What would Costopoulos do? Desperately he
thought. Think like the Greek.

He had it.

Fergus Cronin and Roy Dool. Cronin's ruddy face was pale, staring at
the carpet, his Skorpion machine pistol sagging. Dool stared at the
floor too, looking ill.

Realizing Zammit was watching him, his eyes flicked up.

A weapon doesn't have to be a piece of equipment. Choose your weapon.

Choose it now.

"Hey Roy," croaked Zammit.

"Roy Dool." The Irishman looked at him, eyes burning.

"When the idealistic young man you once were first joined the IRA to
free your country, did you ever think you'd be part of something like
this?"

"Shut him up," Jamal said to Wurban Ice.

The squat Hungarian plodded toward him, rolling his shoulders, ready to
throw a barrage of punches. Zammit wasn't sure he would survive the
assault.

"Did you, Roy?"

Dool stepped forward and loosed a burst from his pistol.

"Step away from her, you piece of filth."

"What're you doing, Dool?" said Cronin.

Without taking his eyes from Jamal and Ice, Dool said, "C'mon, Fergus.

He's right. When did we turn into a couple of monsters ourselves?"

Cronin stared at Dool. He hefted his weapon, then swung his gun
around. At Jamal.

"You and me, Roy Dool. As always."

Jamal's eyes glowed red from under his brows, like those of an insane
animal in a cave. He stopped in front of Frankie.

"You can't even imagine what I am going to do with the two of you."

Frankie's long right leg pistoned as she kicked Jamal in the groin. He
doubled over, gagging. Her leg shot out again and cracked him on the
side of the head, the spike of her shoe hitting him in the temple. He
dropped to the floor.

Everything was happening too fast. Zammit was almost free. Wurban Ice
fired at Dool as Dool fired at him. The Irishman fell. Cronin was
shouting.

Zammit twisted free and hit the floor. His legs wouldn't hold him. He
lifted his head and saw Ice grab Jamal and start hauling him from the
room, firing over his shoulder to keep Cronin at bay. Cronin crouched
behind a sofa. Zammit couldn't see Dool, but Frankie was still bound.

Cronin couldn't get a good shot at the fleeing men because she was in
the way. Then they were gone.

Zammit tried to rise and fell, forehead pressed to the floor. Voices
shouted in his ear, people tugged at his arms. He was upright. It was
Morgan and Costopoulos, both armed.

"Tried to get here sooner," panted Morgan.

"What is this chamber of horrors? Why does it smell like a
farmyard?"

Zammit's head ached. Someone in the doorway, firing. One of the
Irishmen. Ahead of him Frankie, still bound.

Step by step. Scientific method.

"Help the Irishmen," he croaked.

He staggered across the room toward Frankie and gazed blearily
around.

Scientists use instruments. Desk. Scissors. An instrument. He
fumbled for them and started cutting. Soon she was free. She took him
by the shoulders as he began to fall. She couldn't hold her head
steady, and her eyes were too bright.

"Mike, are you all right?"

"Yeah," he lied.

"You?"

She nodded. It was a lie. He could see it in her soundlessly
screaming eyes.

Black rage rose in his heart, choking him. Jamal was going to pay for
this.

Gunfire. Fergus Cronin, crouched in the doorway, firing down the hall.

Where was Dool?

Tears began streaming down Frankie's face. He was about to put his
arms around her when Cronin shouted, "Where's Roy?"

Dool was slumped against a wall. One bullet had creased his eyeball
and others had stitched gaping holes across his torso. Blood poured
from the wounds. There was nothing to be done.

Zammit took the dying terrorist in his arms.

"Thanks, Roy."

The man's lips moved but he couldn't hear. Zammit leaned forward.

"What?"

"Redemption," whispered Roy Dool.

"Did I get them all?"

"Who?"

"Jamal, Ice. Does that make up for the rest of my life?"

Dool was dying in some faraway place, beyond even pain. Comforting the
dying was more precious than telling the truth. He looked in the
Irishman's remaining eye and lied.

"Yes, you did."

"Good." Dool was fading away.

"Bless me. Father, for I have sinned."

He thinks I'm a priest. Desperately he tried to remember the prayer,
the giving of absolution. He hadn't been to Mass or a funeral in
years. I absolve you of your sins. What was the Latin? Remembering,
he made the sign of the cross on his own, then the Irishman's chest.

"Ego te absolve a peccat is tuis, in no mine Patris, et Filii, et
Spiritus Sancte. Amen."

The terrorist whispered something sibilant. Zammit leaned forward,
weariness filling his soul, not wanting to be false. No choice.

"Say again, my son."

"Desperate," whispered Dool.

"Life is a desperate business." His head fell to one side, and Zammit
knew he was dead. His remaining eye stared from his face like a
searchlight someone had forgotten to turn off.

"Thanks, Roy."

He realized there were people standing over him. Richards, Cronin,
Morgan, and Costopoulos.

"Ah, Jesus," said Cronin as he looked at Dool's body. Frankie Richards
held the videocassette in her hand.

"Where are Jamal and Ice?" asked Zammit.

"Probably escaped by now. I heard he always had a jet fueled and ready
at the airport in case he had to flee. It looks as if staff and
soldiers are looting the palace now that Jamal has escaped, the Popovs
are dead, and no one is in control. They'll stay away from this area
for a while because they know we're armed."

Zammit couldn't move. Cronin bent down and grabbed him by the arm.

"Come on.

Knight of Malta. It's not over yet."

Frankie Richards helped Zammit to the bathroom, where he splashed cold
water on his face, then rinsed the blood from his mouth. A loose tooth
moved back and forth as he swished. He cleaned the blood off his arms
'and hands with a towel.

As far as he could tell, he had at least one cracked rib and a broken
left hand, which was swelling like a balloon. His clothing stuck to
him, wet and clammy with Dool's blood.

"Frankie. Adam. That videotape. He may still be alive."

Her eyes were desolate.

"I can't go down that road right now, OK? I'll start screaming and not
be able to stop."

He was wobbly. Frankie helped him back to the main room. The
Circassian girl was sobbing, huddled on the floor. Costopoulos knelt,
several feet away, talking to her quietly in her own language. The
sound was hypnotic, as Zammit knew Stavros intended it to be.

"Hey, Stay." He looked up.

Zammit knew it was a stupid question, but he had to say something.

"She OK?"

The Greek's eyes swept over him, then Frankie.

"Physically, yes, as far as I can tell without touching her. Having a
male touch her right now would be a bad idea. But she's only been
prisoner for a few days, so I think she'll be all right. Circassians
are very tough people. Her name is Yasmin." At the sound of her name
the girl looked up. Behind the tears her eyes were now clear.

"Mike, can you stand on your own?" Frankie's eyes were flicking in and
out, in and out, like a light switch someone was toying with. Jamal's
cruelty.

"I want to help Yasmin get into something other than that bikini
thing." Zammit nodded, and she walked over to one of the closets.

Cronin was in the doorway, his eyes searching the corridor.

"Anything?" asked Zammit.

"All quiet," replied the Irishman.

"But not for long."

Zammit looked around the suite, the empty harness, the chairs, the
bullet holes in the walls.

"Jack, search this place. He lived here. People store valuables where
they live." Jamal's tuxedo jacket, draped over a chair.

"Clothes first. Wallet, phone numbers, anything."

Morgan searched the jacket.

"Bingo." He held up a black square.

"Computer disk."

He searched another pocket.

"Booklet with numbers in it. Looks like code."

"Take them," said Zammit.

"See if there are more disks or papers. Search everything." A wave of
weariness engulfed him.

"I have to lie down."

Lying on the silk Bokhara carpet, trying to both think and quell the
pain in his body, he could do neither. He passed out.

He was roused by a voice.

"Hey," said Morgan.

"What's this box? Found it in one of the other rooms. It's got some
sort of symbol on the side." He placed it on the floor.

Zammit tried to focus his eyes. The container was yellow with the
symbol of a black circle with three interlocking horned crescents.

"It's a biohazard box," he croaked.

"Well, the lid was popped when I found it," said Morgan.

"Open a couple of inches. I haven't opened it any more."

Swell, thought Zammit. An open biohazard box.

"Open the lid all the way. Don't put your face directly over the
interior, and try not to breathe."

Leaning away, Morgan flipped the lid open, then waved his hand over the
top of the box.

"The interior is cold. Some sort of refrigeration unit." Cautiously
he peered inside. He started violently and scrabbled away from the
box.

"Jesus Christ, that spider thing is in there!"

Zammit crawled over and looked inside. Catula was curled up, its plug
inserted into a socket inside the box.

"A portable refrigeration unit has an internal power source. Probably
batteries."

"Who put it in the box?"

"No one. The spider has three programming commands. The first two are
to eat and hide. By getting into the box, it's doing both. When
attacked by the cat, it was following the third command--defend
yourself."

Something was wrong about this. It struck him. Spargo's insectoids
were programmed to hide but not if finding a refuge meant something as
complex as opening a container.

If his face hadn't hurt so much, he would have smiled. Catula was
evolving.

Evolving fast. Most people think you're a nasty bit of business,
thought Zammit. But you're a smart little insectoid, and even if
you're ugly, I think you're sweet.

He said to Morgan, "Let's see if I can find the off switch before
Catula figures out what I'm doing." He reached inside as fast as he
could. The robot sprang to life, its tentacles scrabbling. His
fumbling fingers found and flipped the tiny toggle switch. Catula's
little red eyes slowly turned black. It was now asleep.

As a precaution he pulled the robot's plug out of the socket.

A wave of nausea rolled him onto his back. Dimly he thought, Biohazard
box.

"There's other stuff in here besides the spider," said Morgan.

Eyes closed, Zammit said, "Remove the robot and find out what's
underneath. It sounded like the tentacles were scraping on glass."

"Is it going to attack me? I've got a thing about spiders."

"It's not going to attack you. Take it out."

Moments later he heard, "Lab stuff. Tubes. A dozen of them."

Zammit opened his eyes. Morgan was holding up a glass tube the size of
the cardboard inner tube of a paper towel roll.

"Jack, I can't see very well. Describe it to me."

"There's another smaller tube inside and a bunch of seals and valves on
top.

Label's in Russian."

"What does it say?"

"Doesn't make sense to me." Laboriously he spelled out the word.

"V-A-R-I-O-L-A.

Variola. What the hell's variola?"

Zammit felt his face turn to ice. He rolled over and propped himself
up on one elbow.

"Jack, I don't want to alarm you, but please don't drop that tube.

Variola is the scientific name for it. You are holding in your hand
one of the world's last remaining vials of smallpox."

Morgan paled.

"This must be what was stolen a few days ago from Vector, the Russian
virology institute in Novosibirsk, in Siberia. Bled must have brought
it in that big black box. Why, I don't know. But given the chaos in
this palace, we can't leave it here. Put the tube carefully back
inside. Make sure it's firmly in its padded rack. Then put Catula on
top, close the lid, and lock it."

Then he remembered how Catula had been able to get out of his suitcase
in the first place and battle Anastasia's white Persian. Dikka's
battery pack, to jump-start the robot so it could drag itself to a
power source. The last thing he wanted was for Catula to be
jump-started in the biohazard box and start thrashing around to the
sound of breaking glass.

Then he remembered--he'd flipped the toggle switch. The insectoid was
asleep until manually turned on again.

"Find anything else in these rooms?"

"More disks. There's a laptop too, but it caught a bullet so I have no
way of finding out what's on them."

With an effort, Zammit sat up.

"Take the disks."

Cronin came over. He was carrying Roy Dool's weapon as well as his
own, and his pockets were stuffed with spare clips of ammunition.

"Seems reasonably quiet. We should get out of here. Do we have a
plan?"

"Yes," said Zammit.

"We get to the communications center. Make some quick calls.

On our tour of the palace I noticed they have PCs there as well as
phones. We can check those disks." With an effort, he got to his
feet.

They staggered down endless hallways trying to find the communications
center.

Zammit had to be half-carried. Yasmin was still barefoot but dressed
in one of Jamal's shirts. Cronin was point, Morgan guarded the rear.

The palace was in chaos, being looted by palace staff and soldiers.

They were stripping paintings off the walls and lugging ornaments. The
sight of Cronin with his machine pistol and Morgan with Dool's weapon
was enough to send them scurrying.

"Where are we going?" panted Morgan.

"We're getting close," said Zammit.

"Next corner, take a right at the Ming vase." The vase was gone, but
he recognized the massive porphyry marble table it had sat on.

Finally they reached the communications center. Soldiers milled
around. Cronin fired a burst and they fled.

Zammit said to the Irishman, "Guard the corridor and fend off anybody
who tries to get in here." Cronin moved to the door.

Morgan surveyed the banks of glowing PC monitors.

"Quite a setup." He pointed at the video cameras near the ceiling.

"Never did want to be a TV star." He picked up a chair and swung,
smashing them to pieces.

"Spies do not permit others to watch them, unless of course it's a
trick. CIA 101. What now?"

"We have to let people know what we've learned and ask for a pickup,"
said Zammit.

"Let's start with Colonel Yildiz and Colonel Graves."

Gunfire from the corridor. As Costopoulos grabbed a phone, Fergus
Cronin pulled out an empty clip and rammed a full one home.

"If you're going to reach out and touch someone, do it now, some
unpleasant people want this room."

Costopoulos called Yildiz and told him to send an escort of fighter
planes to the Tuvanian airport five miles west of the capital. He then
briefed Graves and told him what Zammit had observed--that although the
cult reached into the Kremlin, national security advisor Vyacheslav
Radchuk was not part of it.

Zammit interrupted.

"Arrange a meeting with Radchuk. Tell Graves I want to be there. Once
we get out of here."

"You're quite an optimist," said Morgan.

Costopoulos spoke into the phone, then listened intently.

"Graves says Radchuk is paranoid. Doesn't want to meet with Western
intelligence people because it'll give ammunition to his enemies in the
Kremlin. Also, he'll want to know where Graves got his information."

Zammit's brain raced.

"Tell Graves to call Yury Bogov. Bogov and Radchuk were both senior
officers in the KGB. See if Yury will vouch for us. Contact Irina
Markova as well. She can confirm what Boris Kazov found out about
Smegyev's cult."

Costopoulos transmitted this to Graves.

"Colonel says good idea. But they are careful about verification of
sources. Bogov doesn't know Graves. How can he confirm the request
comes from you?"

It seemed so long ago.

"Neanderthal man," he said.

"What?" asked Stavros.

"Yury will remember. Tell Graves to quote to Bogov what I told him
about the mafia thugs at Dzerzhinsk. He'll remember."

Costopoulos told Graves what to say to Bogov and hung up.

"Why do you want to meet with Radchuk?"

"I'll explain later," said Zammit, feeling for the wall. He leaned his
forehead against it and closed his eyes.

"Apparently the Turkish army is standing fast, and it's still a secret
that Amurkhan is alive. Yildiz thinks they've arrested all the
fundamentalist sympathizers in the army and government who were Jamal's
pupils. The Iraqis and Syrians are being ground to pieces, but it's
slow going. The Turks have had to transfer military units from the
north. If Bled invades, he'll have an easy time of it."

Face pressed against the wall, Zammit was aware that Frankie Richards
was on the phone. It sounded as if she was speaking with someone in
Seattle. Her voice was quavering. He tried to hear what she was
saying. Irrationally he thought. It's just the friction of my face
against the wall that's holding me upright.

"Doc, are you all right?" It was Morgan.

He didn't answer or open his eyes, concentrating on keeping his legs
from buckling.

Morgan again.

"He seems to be out of it."

Costopoulos.

"Nothing is ever as it seems, young man. Michael, speak to me."

Zammit's voice was a whisper.

"When I was in high school, I was on the track team."

"See?" said Morgan.

"He's out of it."

"A sprinter. Fastest guy in school. We had a weak 400by-400meter
relay team. The coach always had me run anchor, the last leg. By the
time I got the baton we were almost always behind. At the
championships, by the time I got the baton I was last in a field of
eight. The leader was thirty yards ahead of me. I ran in an outside
lane and still passed everyone. I don't know how I did it. I pulled
every muscle in my body and threw up for an hour afterward, but we won.

After, I asked the coach why he always made me anchor."

Zammit pushed himself away from the wall and swayed. A great weariness
filled him.

"He said it was because he knew I was the kind of guy who never gives
up.

And I'm not going to give up now. What does Frankie have to say?"

"She's still on the phone," said Morgan.

"I'm not a scientist, but it sounds as if the team in Seattle has
discovered something horrible about the cyanobacteria. They've
analyzed the underwater pictures taken by the Alliant.

Something about the stuff growing downward. There's also news about
those fleshy bulbs growing on the surface. Dr. Richards got this
strange look on her face, then she started talking technical and I
couldn't follow."

"Just hung up," said Costopoulos.

"Let me talk to her."

Richards appeared. He could tell from her gaze that he must look
dreadful, that his face was swelling even more. She moved to put her
arms around him. Zammit held up his hand.

"Don't!" She stepped back a pace, a look of uncomprehending hurt on
her face.

Zammit knew he was on the verge of losing it altogether. Frankie's
touch might be the little thing that could shove him over the edge into
total collapse. He couldn't afford to think about anything except the
problem at hand.

Her look told him he had cut her to the quick. She's trying to comfort
me, but she's badly hurt too. That videotape. Her ordinarily pale
skin was paper white, and he could see a vein throbbing in her neck.

The pupils of her eyes were huge.

It's just sinking in, the horror of what might have happened to her
husband, the horror of what Jamal would have made her do under the
influence of the drug.

He was about to say something when there was more gunfire from the
hallway.

Cronin was crouched against the door frame. Yasmin was crouched there
too. She had Dool's gun.

"We can't make any more bullets!" shouted the Irishman.

Painfully Zammit touched his face.

"That guy could punch the wet out of water," he said to Frankie,
wanting her to understand why he had just done what he'd done, that he
couldn't allow her to touch him.

As if in a trance, she ignored the remark.

"The situation at the reservoir is critical. The cyanobacteria is
changing."

"Changing how?"

"It has three life stages. Growth, generation of toxin, then
reproduction.

Unfortunately, the terminal phase is going to be a little different
from what I expected."

Grimly Stavros said, "I don't like the way you emphasize the word
terminal."

"I'm listening" said Zammit.

"The underwater shots taken by the Alliant show that the cells you
identified have now developed into filamentous hollow tubes."

"Go on."

"The tubes consist primarily of cytoplasm, interspersed with
fluid-filled spaces. Imagine grabbing a handful of cooked spaghetti
and immersing it in water. The spaghetti hangs down in the water. Only
it isn't spaghetti, and it's growing."

"I understand," said Zammit.

"Downward, toward the reservoir floor. There are billions of
filaments. They are growing downward for a purpose."

"Why?" asked Morgan.

"Survival."

Talking about this allowed Richards to detach herself emotionally from
the horrors she had witnessed and barely escaped.

"Keep going," Zammit encouraged.

"Bacteria are among the oldest and most abundant organisms on earth.

But they are structurally simple. Just rigid vessels filled with DNA
and cytoplasm. They lack the elaborate features of most other
organisms' cells. But this structural simplicity belies an
extraordinary sophistication in manipulating their environment. This
involves communicating with each other."

Morgan was incredulous.

"Bacteria talk to each other?"

"Yes. These biochemical discussions can result in amazing behavioral
and even structural changes. They talk to survive. And it works. Why
do you think cyanobacteria are almost 4 billion years old? They are
one of evolution's great winners."

"I'm listening," said Zammit.

"They live in colonies. We used to think these colonies were groups of
rugged individuals that had little to do with each other or with cells
in another colony. Not true."

She now looked almost calm.

"As I said, these chemical discussions can result in astonishing
changes. In this case, when nutrients are in short supply, millions of
cells assemble into complex multicellular structures called fruiting
bodies."

"I never did understand this part. Why would they do that?" asked
Costopoulos.

"We've stopped feeding the cyanobacteria, right?"

"Right."

"So it's begun to starve."

"Right."

"Allowing yourself to be starved to death is not sound evolutionary
strategy. An organism must find some way of continuing to exist. So
now it is entering the terminal stage of its life cycle, one that will
allow it to survive even though it is starving and trapped in the
reservoir."

Jack Morgan suddenly looked ill.

"You mean it has a way of escaping?"

"Yes. Starvation provokes a survival response--maturation of the
fruiting bodies, leading to reproduction. Not through cell division
this time. Through sporing."

"I am getting a bad feeling about this," said Stavros.

"What exactly are spores?" asked Morgan.

"Thick-coated cells, resistant to heat, dessication, and long-term
starvation.

Ordinarily, fruiting bodies are just big enough to be seen by the naked
eye, but with the GMO, it's different. And those thousands of
basketballs contain trillions of tiny spores."

Zammit saw Yasmin place Dool's empty gun on the floor and start firing
a pistol instead. It wouldn't be long before they were both out of
ammunition.

"Approximately four hours after starvation sets in, the cyanobacterial
cells send an SOS to other cells, using a chemical signal called Factor
A--a homoserine lactone."

"Dr. Richards, what's it mean in English?" asked Morgan.

"Factor A is a distress signal telling other cells they are in danger
of starving. Once the other cells say, hey, you're right, they all
release Factor C, a small protein that starts the process of spore
maturation."

"How long does that take?" asked Zammit.

"Even with the distance the chemical signals have to travel, I'd say
anywhere from forty-eight to seventy-two hours."

"Christ," said Morgan.

Richards continued.

"From what I can tell, the spore maturation and release process is not
complete until the filaments touch bottom and anchor themselves.

At present, they are quite delicate. As far as we can tell, all that
changes once they touch bottom. Then a further chemical reaction takes
place, and the filaments suddenly turn into stalks of fibrous material,
like bamboo. Imagine an impenetrable underwater jungle of tough
stalks."

"So once it's anchored, it spores?"

"No, the spores are forming, but they're still immature. Once
anchored, the chemical signal is given to induce spore maturity,
followed by another signal for release. The fruiting bodies burst
open, and the spores are released into the wind."

"Trillions of spores," said Costopoulos tonelessly.

"I wish I'd taken biology in college," said Morgan.

"What are we looking at here, and what can we do about it?"

"The green stuff is starving, which is the signal to breed by maturing
spores in the basketballs. Once the spores mature, the balls burst.

The spores, which have giant wings for such tiny bodies--did I mention
that?--get lifted into the air by the slightest breath of wind. This
carries them into the atmosphere. Far away, to another body of water,
which may or may not contain the nutrients they need to resume a new
life cycle."

"How far?" asked Zammit.

"Hundreds, perhaps thousands of miles."

"More cyanobacteria in another location?" asked Morgan.

"Yes."

"Another body of water fills with green slime and poison?"

"Correct."

"And we have no antibiotic that will kill the cyanobacteria," stated
Costopoulos.

"No."

"Or the spores."

"No."

"And no antidote to the endotoxin itself."

"No."

Morgan spoke.

"So we're up shit creek without a paddle."

"You are one smart fella," said Frankie Richards.

"Wait a minute," said Costopoulos.

"Once it's in a new location, it has to eat.

And not just anything, it has to eat organophosphates. Without someone
like Ruslan Glinka to supply nutrients, it'll die."

"You're forgetting something," interrupted Zammit.

"They had to be fed in the reservoir because the Euphrates is
nutrient-poor and there's no agriculture in the area. No use of
organophosphate pesticides on fields, no runoff from the soil into
nearby water bodies. But that changes within a few hundred miles of
the Ataturk Dam. Some of the most intensively farmed lands in the
world, with the highest use of pesticides. The Ukraine, Russia,
Hungary, Italy, Egypt.

Ponds, lakes, rivers, and reservoirs with high levels of
organophosphates."

"The bacterial equivalent of Christmas dinner, all year round," said
Frankie.

"This stuff will spread its spores all over the world?" asked
Morgan.

"Within weeks."

"But not the oceans? Please say not the oceans."

Richards frowned.

"Good point. This is a GMO. Perhaps, like AIDS, it can mutate very
fast to adapt to different environments. Many of the world's oceans
are badly polluted. Unless we can think of something, it is probable
the entire planet will revert to what it was 4 billion years
ago--water and poisonous green slime."

"Well, I think something should be done about this," said Morgan.

"I am open to suggestions," said Richards.

Zammit waggled his loose tooth. Think. The meeting at the Dolmabahce
Palace. The Turkish general saying that war was about strategy and
tactics, minimizing your own losses while maximizing the enemy's. What
had he said?

"This way, everyone loses."

Once again, he felt the pieces of a complex puzzle whirling around in
his brain.

Some pieces of that puzzle were now in place. Where did the other
pieces fit? As he stared at one of the computer monitors, a jigsaw
piece suddenly slipped into place.

"Jamal's disks," said Zammit. They stared at him, surprised at the
sudden energy in his voice.

"The one he had in his tuxedo pocket. If he carried it on his person,
it must be important."

Morgan sat in front of a PC, inserted the disk, and started typing.

After a few moments he said, "Encryption codes. Complicated ones." He
pulled Jamal's booklet from his jacket and flipped the pages.

"Same stuff."

"He was concerned about computer crashes and not being able to access
the disk, so he put the information on paper as well," said Zammit.

Morgan flipped more pages.

"Each code has a date and a time beside it. Most of them are crossed
off." He smiled.

"He changes his encryption codes at least once a day. The old ones, he
crosses off the list." He peered at a page.

"Here are the only codes that aren't crossed off. They have today's
date."

"That means they're still usable," said Zammit.

"Hang on," said Morgan.

"One of them contains letters from the Cyrillic alphabet."

Zammit leaned over and stared.

"Is it the only one with Russian letters in it?"

"Yes."

"That must be the code he uses to communicate with General Bled. What
about the other disks?"

Morgan pulled them from his pockets and quickly checked them, one by
one.

"Messages he's sent. All of them are signed ghazi."

"I'm starting to get the picture," said Frankie.

Zammit nodded.

"We're going to send a message to General Bled, using Jamal's current
encryption code. This communications center must have its own
automatic ID signature, so Bled will know it came from here. The
message will be waiting for him when he gets back to Sevastopol. The
message will appear to be from Jamal. Stay, read some of these
messages. Can you imitate Jamal's style?"

"Yes. I'll keep it simple to minimize the possibility of errors that
will make Bled suspicious."

"What's the point of sending a message in the first place?" objected
Morgan.

"Bled is on his way back to Sevastopol," explained Zammit.

"He has no idea what just happened here. As far as he knows,
everything is fine. It was obvious to me that he has a healthy respect
for Jamal's intelligence. If he knows a message came from the palace
communications center, and if he believes it's from Jamal, he'll follow
whatever advice it contains. And don't forget, when he was here, he
was drunk. He's obviously a highly functional drunk, but he'll do
whatever Jamal advises."

"What advice are you going to give?" asked Morgan.

"Hold off on launching his invasion of Turkey for precisely forty-eight
hours.

Keep it terse, say some new development has come up. A minor problem,
but it has to be dealt with. Just delay the invasion."

"How is that going to work?" demanded Morgan.

"He won't fall for it. What if he calls back to the palace to get an
explanation? Everyone's fled or dead."

Zammit's mind was racing.

"We'll also tell him there's been a revolt and the Popovs are dead. He
knows damn well what the political situation is in this country, so a
revolt won't surprise him. Because of the revolt, Jamal's had to flee.

But everything is under control. Just delay the launch."

Richards interrupted.

"What if Jamal, wherever he is, contacts Bled on his own and Bled finds
out our message is fake?"

Zammit pointed at the encryption codes on the glowing screen.

"Those codes are complex. He carried them on his person because he
couldn't memorize them. Now he doesn't have the disk anymore, or his
notes. Any message he sends to Bled that isn't properly encoded and
doesn't come from here. Bled isn't going to believe.

Jamal and Bled are now incommunicado."

Quickly they composed a terse message telling Bled to delay launching
the invasion for forty-eight hours, signed it ghazi, and fired it off
into cyberspace.

"I still don't understand," said Jack Morgan.

"A delay isn't going to do anything. The war is still raging, and the
Iraqis and Syrians are losing. The political situation in Turkey is
stable. Maybe Bled will get this fake message and call the whole thing
off."

"He can't," said Zammit.

"By disobeying explicit orders from both the Kremlin and Kiev to stop
maneuvers, he's gone too far. Once Radchuk finds out about this plot.

Bled is a dead man. He has to invade. The cult members are cranked
up, Smegyev is urging him on, and he has all those nukes. He still has
reason to feel confident of success, delay or not."

"But we still don't know what to do about the crap in the dam,"
protested Morgan.

"Dr. Richards said the planet is going to revert to water and green
slime, invasion or not. The whole world is going to die, and there's
nothing we can do about it."

Zammit fiddled with the loose tooth, wincing.

"Jack, remember in our initial briefing about Biopreparat, you said
something about how their bio weapons are designed to be immune?"

"Yes," said Morgan.

"They're designed to be immune to antibiotics."

"That's not what you said. You said they were designed to be immune to
Western antibiotics."

He turned to the rest of them.

"We agreed it would be insane to use a naturally occurring bio weapon
much less a genetically altered one. Jamal is morally insane, but he's
brilliant and leaves nothing to chance. He would never rely on
something as inherently unpredictable as a GMO. And Bled isn't an
idiot either."

The others were perfectly still.

"There is a single condition under which it would not be insane to use
this bio weapon

They stared at him. The tooth came loose. He pulled it from his
mouth, gazed at it wearily, and tossed it across the room.

"It wouldn't be insane if you had the antidote."

moscow, September 8

Mike Zammit looked at the walls and wondered if somehow they contained
echoes of the anguished screams of every tortured soul who had died in
this place.

He was in the notorious Lubyanka Prison, headquarters of the secret
police ever since the building was taken over by the Bolsheviks in
1918. It had been used for decades as an administrative headquarters,
prison, and interrogation and execution center. Formerly occupied by
the KGB, the Lubyanka was now home to its successor, the Russian
Federal Security Service. He glanced at Graves, Morgan, and
Costopoulos, all staring at the floor. Yury Bogov was bumming a
cigarette from Irina Markova. She was chain-smoking. It was only
thanks to Bogov that they'd been able to get in on such short notice.

They had escaped from the communications center in the Blavatsk palace
and found the palace garage. It was being looted by the Popovs'
mechanics and drivers, but gun to his head, one of the limousine
drivers sped them to the airport. At the hangar they learned that
Jamal and Ice had escaped in a jet, destination unknown. Four F-15s
arrived and escorted them back to Istanbul without incident.

Their various wounds were treated. Then they flew to Moscow. Frankie
Richards was now back at the Ataturk Dam with Cairo Jackson, making
preparations in case national security advisor Vyacheslav Radchuk
agreed to cooperate. In case.

Zammit glanced at the white plastic cast on his left hand. Still the
tornado whirled in his brain. How did it all fit together? There was
one thing he had realized on their escape from Tuvanistan, and it
worried him almost as much as the contamination in the reservoir.

Abdul Jamal had known they were coming. How? There's something I'm
missing, thought Zammit. Something vital.

The door opened and Vyacheslav Radchuk marched in. He was of Ukrainian
descent, stocky, about five foot eight, with salt-and pepper hair and
bandy legs. In the puffy, sallow face, his small eyes looked like
raisins in pools of buckwheat dough. He wore an expensive Italian
suit that didn't fit properly and held a cigarette. His index finger
was bright yellow all the way to the knuckle.

Bogov stood as Radchuk stopped in front of him. The national security
advisor had the look of a man who expected at any moment to find a shiv
in his back.

Bogov introduced them all. Eyes bright and wary, the two former KGB
spies contemplated each other.

"Hello, Yury," said Radchuk, in good English.

"Long time no see."

"Hello, Vaya," replied Bogov.

"Still on the old career treadmill, huh?"

"Yeah. You're freelance now. You like it?"

"I like it."

"I envy you. This place is hell."

"It always was," said Bogov.

"Are we through with the pleasantries?"

"Yes." Radchuk crushed out his cigarette.

"When you told me your information I almost had a heart attack." He
gestured at Zammit.

"Apart from looking like he's been run over by a truck, is he OK? You
trust him?"

"Yes," said Bogov.

"He's worked for our government before. He's smart, tough, and
honest."

"Good," said Radchuk, contemplating Zammit.

"Haven't met anyone like that in ... well, never, actually."

Radchuk appraised Colonel Graves.

"I am sure word has already gotten out that I am having an unexpected
meeting with an assistant to the president of the United States and
that I have not invited any politician or civil servant to attend.

That's bad enough. I am also meeting, in private, with a CIA agent.

This will get me into a great deal of trouble." He looked at Irina
Markova.

"And meeting with a journalist like her, in private, is a death
sentence. This better be good."

"I assure you--," began Graves.

Radchuk held up a yellow index finger.

"One moment." He walked over to a filing cabinet by his desk. He
opened the bottom drawer and removed four small antennas. He carefully
placed one in each of the four corners of the room. Then he sat in his
desk chair, opened one of the drawers, and fiddled with something.

"Mr ... Radchuk, what are you doing?"

Radchuk gestured at the antennas.

"If there were any more bugs in these walls I'd have to hire an
exterminator. Ninety years' worth of listening devices. I suppose we
could tear the walls down, which would take forever. Once they were
back up again, they'd start filling with more bugs. I have no idea how
many of the bugs now in the walls are operational or who might be using
them."

He reached into the drawer and flipped a switch.

"Good. Now we can talk. I have reason to believe my secretary is a
spy. For General Bled, in fact."

He pointed again at the antennas.

"Broad spectrum noise generator. An electronic cone of silence. The
device that generates the field is in this drawer. Any electronic
equipment other than a watch won't work in this room as long as it's
on. That includes telephones and listening devices in the walls.

Markova, try your cell phone."

She did.

"Dead."

"Got the idea on a tour of FBI headquarters in Washington. The entire
building is a huge cone of silence. Good thing there are no windows in
this room. Then I'd have to worry about long-distance laser listeners
who could overhear my conversations by picking up voice vibrations from
the glass." He lit another cigarette.

"Now, what is this about, and why should I care?"

They filled him in as Radchuk's ashtray quickly filled with cigarette
butts. By the time they were finished, the national security advisor
had his head in his hands.

"So," concluded Graves.

"If you help us, you will accomplish a number of things.

First, you may help save the world from death by poison. Second, you
will help stop the war that is currently raging. Third, you will
prevent the formation of a hostile new nuclear power right next door to
you. Fourth, you will help destroy an international fugitive and
criminal. Finally, you will annihilate General Vladimir Bled."

"Razborka," said Bogov.

"What?" asked Zammit.

"Settling of scores. Getting even." The former KGB man was watching
Radchuk carefully.

"Vaya? What do you think?"

Radchuk stood and walked over to a filing cabinet. He opened it and
removed a glass and a bottle of vodka. He poured himself a stiff shot,
tossed it back, wiped his mouth, and sat down again.

He turned to Irina.

"I want copies of your files on Smegyev and Bled."

"OK."

Radchuk lit another cigarette.

"Four times I have started files on those two.

Four times the files disappeared. Everyone thinks I'm powerful. In
some ways I am. But I can't even trust my own staff."

He stared moodily at the walls.

"OK. Here's how it is. I don't care about Abdul Jamal. He's not my
problem. I don't care about this American evangelist either.

Once I have proof from Markova's files about Smegyev, I will take
action. The day I can't at least handle some crazy monk is the day I
blow my brains out."

He scratched his cheek.

"A rod of plutonium and cobalt-60 used to kill Boris Kazov. Well, at
least we found one of them. I wonder where the other twenty-six are. A
problem for another day."

He turned to Graves.

"The problem for now is Bled, the army, and those nuclear weapons. His
mafia allies might pose a difficulty too." His puffy face lifted in a
humorless smile.

"You heard the joke? In Russia, the law is like a lamp post--you can
always get around it." The smile disappeared.

"The Russian mafia has more money than God, and they are just as
powerful."

"I don't believe the mafia will be a problem here," said Graves.

"Maybe not," said Radchuk, rubbing his face.

"Maybe yes. It is tiring, always trying to think of every
possibility."

Morgan spoke.

"Why can't you just order other army units to take Bled out? They have
nukes too."

Radchuk smiled again.

"Ah, to be so young and naive. First, I am sure you understand why we
don't want a nuclear war on our own soil. There's also the fact that,
despite our propaganda during the Cold War, our missiles never were
accurate, and now they're old. We've always suspected that if one day
we had to launch them against Washington, we'd end up raining death on
a town in Kansas.

Second, I know Bled, and he would start such a war here in Russia if he
felt trapped. He is also a brilliant strategist and a stubborn
fighter. Third, there are many other military men and politicians who
are members of Smegyev's cult.

Even in the Kremlin."

He gestured around the room.

"Why do you think I have this setup? At least I can have a
confidential conversation in my office. But because of the cone of
silence, the phones don't work, so I can't make any calls. Once I walk
out that door and start giving orders to do something about Bled,
someone in this building will quietly pick up a phone. Informed of our
plans, he may decide to launch his invasion ahead of your
forty-eight-hour deadline, regardless of any message he thinks he
received from Jamal."

Zammit interrupted.

"Bled must have a headquarters. Where is it? It must be a place where
he has complete control, including secure storage for his arsenal and
the bio weapon Wherever the cyanobacteria came from, the antidote must
be there too. What do you call the bio weapon

"Cyanostrom."

"Have you ever tried it before? Experimentally, on a large scale?"

The Ukrainian's eyes flickered.

"Unfortunately, no."

"So there was no one in Biopreparat with any idea how its life cycle
might play out, whether it might be unpredictable."

"No."

Costopoulos spoke.

"Do you know the name of the antidote?"

"Anticyanostrom."

"Well," said Zammit, "that's simple enough. How do you spell them in
Russian?"

Radchuk spelled them as Morgan wrote down the names.

"Do you know what the antidote is?" asked Zammit.

"Its chemical composition, optimum delivery system, anything?"

"No."

He tried again, as discouragement rose in his heart.

"Do you know how much of it there is?"

"No. However, there are stocks in storage in other secret cities."

Zammit thought hard.

"If I had designed this GMO, I'd use the same engineering on the
antidote. Superconcentrated, dessicated with sugar, instantly
dissolvable in water. But I won't know that until I can test it. I
must take some of it back to the Ataturk Dam where my micro lab is.

Once again, where is this material stored?"

Radchuk looked hunted. As a professional spy, he was used to
collecting and hoarding information, not giving it away.

"Come on," said Zammit.

"We're running out of time."

He could tell the Ukrainian had reached some momentous decision.

Radchuk took a deep breath and stared him straight in the eye.

"Secret city Talitsa-4. It's in the Crimea. It's a small one and the
only one located in a populous area, apart from a facility near St ...

Petersburg."

"St ... Petersburg?" asked Bogov incredulously.

Radchuk looked hunted.

"You didn't hear it from me. Bled controls Talitsa completely. His
warehouse and research facilities are there. My information is
sketchy, but that's where he stores everything."

Costopoulos interrupted.

"Can't you at least give the order to attack the warehouse with
paratroopers or something? Capture it and hold it at all costs?"

Radchuk's voice was cold.

"For the reasons I have just explained, no, I cannot.

I am helpless."

"Bullshit," said Yury Bogov.

"I know you, Vaya. You would never find yourself in a situation where
you were completely helpless. You're too smart for that. You have
something, even if it's little stuff. Give."

The two old spies stared at each other. Zammit expected an explosion
of anger from Radchuk, but there was none.

"Vaya," whispered Bogov.

"You might get to save the world. It's not often an old spy like you
is a hero. At least you may be able to destroy Bled. Razborka."

" can't do it myself," said Radchuk.

"I can't give an order to restock toilet paper without everyone knowing
about it. But nobody knows about the conversation in this room except
us."

He turned to Zammit, eyes appraising.

"I've heard stories about you. If you want the antidote, you're going
to have to get it yourself."

Zammit almost laughed, until he realized Radchuk was serious.

"And how do you suggest I do that?"

The national security advisor rose and walked over to a giant wall
safe.

"Since the files on Bled and Smegyev vanished, I've kept all my good
stuff in here. It has four combinations, as well as six encryption
codes I change four times a day. Getting it open is going to take a
few minutes. By the way, it is also wired with enough plastic
explosive to level this building. When I installed it, I made sure
every employee here knew about it. So far, no one has touched it."

Five minutes later Radchuk laid a box on his desk and shut the safe. He
beckoned them all over as he removed the contents. There was a large
roll of paper, an odd-looking pen, several blank forms about the size
of credit cards, a stencil, and a set of contact lenses in a plastic
case.

"I'm supposed to break into secret city Talitsa-4 and steal the
antidote using this junk?" said Zammit.

"I'm not McGyver."

Radchuk smiled.

"I love that show. And yes, that's the plan."

He picked up the roll of paper and spread it out.

"Here are detailed blueprints and a layout map of the warehouse at
Talitsa-4. Bled may have moved things around a bit, I don't know. But
here are the research labs, loading docks, and transportation bay, and
he can't move those. Forklifts, cranes, the usual. There is a small
airport at the back."

"I don't even know where this place is," protested Zammit.

"These plans won't do me any good unless I can actually get there and
get inside. And I can't fly a plane."

"I can," said Jack Morgan.

"All types. A hobby of mine." He sighed and colored.

"OK, I learned to fly most of them through flight simulators and
computer games.

But doing the real thing won't be much different. Doc, you can't do
this yourself, especially not with a broken hand. I'll fly the
plane."

Zammit stared at the young agent for a moment. Morgan's eyes were very
bright.

"OK."

He turned to Radchuk.

"What else is in this pitiful collection?"

Radchuk held up the forms, the stencil, and the pen.

"These blank forms are security passes. Standard issue, for entry into
all the secret cities." He pointed to an iridescent strip.

"The latest magnetic code. Also, I have all the necessary stamps and
seals." He pointed to an old typewriter in the corner.

"I'll fill them out properly. The passes will get you through the
first set of security gates. But not without Bled's signature on the
bottom."

He held up the pen.

"Bled uses a special pen, with ink that is luminescent under
ultraviolet light. His signature is verified by running it under a
fluoroscope.

Obtaining the pen was hard enough. For the ink, we had to scrape some
off an old signature, do a spectroscopy, and recreate the formula from
scratch. The stencil is for forging Bled's signature. I have been
practicing."

Zammit pointed at the contact lenses.

"What use are those?"

"The security passes are for the first checkpoint. The second one,
leading to the research labs and loading docks, is more difficult. You
must press one of your eyes against a scanner, which reads the pattern
in your iris. Anyone whose iris pattern is not in the data bank
doesn't get in. It's more accurate than fingerprints."

Radchuk held up the box.

"And fingerprints can be faked-stick-on pads and such. Iris patterns
can't be faked. At least not until now. I'm proud of this--I don't
believe it's been done before."

He opened the box and gingerly removed a lens.

"Because he drinks so much, Bled's eyes are going. He needed surgery
and had contact lenses made. The surgeon photographed his eyes. I
arranged for an office break-in by an agent with a camera, so that's
how we know the patterns of both his irises. I was also able to get a
duplicate pair of lenses, only nonprescription. I had his iris
patterns and color imprinted on them. Believe me, neither of these
tasks were easy. When you and Morgan approach the door, you will each
wear one lens. Keep in mind that when the lens is in your eye, you
can't see through it. You'll be completely blind in one eye for as
long as the lens is in."

Zammit grinned.

"This is clever. Why didn't I think of it?"

Radchuk put the lens back in the case.

"Because you're not a spy. Count your blessings."

Zammit thought for a moment.

"But we have three problems. First, how do we get to Talitsa-4 in the
first place? Second, I don't speak or read Russian. Somebody asks me
a question, I'm dead. Third, we'll need uniforms."

"Uniforms are not a problem. As far as getting there, I will tell you
how. In downtown Sevastopol, there is what appears to be a vegetable
warehouse. But in the basement, through the secret entrance on which
these security passes will work, there is an underground train, a
subway. It will take you to the secret city in about an hour."

"Don't worry about language. I'm fluent," said Morgan.

"Besides," said Markova, turning to Zammit, "based on what we've
learned from the files. Bled and his research staff do ugly
experiments on soldiers. You look awful. You're just the victim of an
experiment that didn't work, and as a result you cannot talk. Jack can
explain that to anyone who gets suspicious."

"I hardly think the two of you will be able to do it alone," said
Costopoulos.

"I too am fluent in the language. And I've always harbored an illicit
desire to be an actor."

"Two more things," said Zammit.

"If this does work, and we do somehow manage to get the antidote onto a
plane and take off, we will be pursued. Can you give us cover?"

"I'll work on it."

"Also, I doubt if the amount of antidote we can load onto a single
plane will be enough. We'll need more, from other secret cities. Air
freight it to the Ataturk Dam. Call Colonel Yildiz and tell him you
will be violating his airspace but that you are not Bled's invasion
force. Work out some sort of signal."

Radchuk's face was a mask of furious concentration.

"I don't know if that is possible."

"You're a smart guy, Vaya," said Bogov.

"Figure it out."

It was a challenge. Zammit could tell from the anger in Radchuk's
eyes.

"All right, I will. Let's get working on the documents and uniforms.

And Dr. Zammit?"

"Yes?"

"If you fail, I cannot help you. I will deny that we ever discussed
this."

"Understood."

Radchuk reached for Zammit's hand and shook it firmly.

"Good luck."

Tallitsa, September 10

Zammit stared at the gray concrete wall flashing by. There was a
whooshing sound from the constant rush of air and a whackitywhack from
the wheels. The rocking motion was soothing.

As he leaned against the side of the car, he glanced down at his
uniform, that of a Russian army private. He looked at the two people
seated across from him--Morgan in a sergeant's uniform and Costopoulos
in a white lab coat with a pocket protector, some pens, and a
clipboard.

They were on the subway that led from the vegetable warehouse to
Talitsa-4. With Radchuk's assistance, they had no trouble accessing
the secret entrance that led to the underground platform. The security
passes had been verified, and so far their journey had been uneventful.

The car was filled with people who looked just like them--technicians,
scientists, and soldiers. Most of the soldiers had the emaciated faces
and shaved heads of abused recruits, but there were some who looked
like Morgan. Most of the soldiers looked alert and normal, but some
did not. Zammit knew these were the ones who had been used as guinea
pigs by Smegyev, Bled, and Bled's Director of Clinical Research and
Development, Dr ...

Bratko Cabrinovic. Their eyes were vacant, they had difficulty sitting
upright, and some were drooling. Without being obvious, Zammit studied
them so he could imitate their behavior to some extent. He gazed at
his reflection in the glass.

With the battering he had taken, he certainly looked like an experiment
gone wrong.

Having Costopoulos play a scientist instead of a soldier had been a
last-minute change in plan. They realized they would have easier
access to the lab area if one of them looked as if he had unquestioned
authority to be there. Stavros hadn't liked this change: "So we get
into the lab area. A technician asks me a question. I speak Russian,
but I don't speak science. What am I supposed to say so I don't arouse
suspicion?"

"I'll feed you the answer somehow," Zammit had replied.

"What, in English?

You're supposed to be a brain-damaged mute."

On the one-hour journey, Zammit ran through everything he had endured
in the past several days. Pieces of the jigsaw puzzle still whirled
in his brain and refused to fit into place. Step by step, he thought.

First, get the antidote.

The train clattered to a stop and the passengers departed. There were
wheelchairs for those too damaged to walk. The security checkpoint was
manned by soldiers in combat gear with machine guns. Costopoulos took
Zammit's card out of his uniform pocket as Zammit stared vacantly into
space, hoping he looked convincingly brain damaged. First the guard
verified the iridescent magnetic strip on their three passes. Zammit
was aware that the man was appraising him and wondered why. I can't be
that bad an actor, he thought. Finally, as the guard ran the cards
under a fluoroscope to verify Bled's signature, he said something to
Costopoulos. The Greek gave a brusque reply that seemed to be
satisfactory. But the guard did not return their security passes.

Costopoulos asked a question, the guard replied, and they were waved
through.

Without their passes.

The three had memorized the layout of the secret city's warehouse by
studying the plans Radchuk gave them. If they ran into problems,
Costopoulos carried the blueprints and layout diagram concealed under
scientific papers on his clipboard. Zammit wanted to ask what was
going on, but there were too many people around them as they proceeded
down the long concrete hallway that led into the bowels of the
warehouse. The hallway ended in a cavernous space that was one of the
main sections of the building--all steel girders and concrete, typical
warehouse construction, although the girders seemed unusually sturdy.

In the open area, the crowd dispersed and Zammit could finally talk. He
tried to speak without moving his lips.

"Talk to me."

"The guard asked, "Since when did they start beating people up?" I
replied it was necessary to establish a certain drug's effects on the
ability to endure pain."

"What about our security cards?"

Morgan replied.

"He said they expired in an hour anyway and wouldn't be of any use. He
said we'd have to go to the main permitting office, submit proof of
identity, then get new cards issued. Standard procedure. In short, if
we want to leave this place by the main door, as it were, and take the
train again, we're out of luck. We're trapped in here."

They kept walking. Other hallways fanned out from the main room like
spokes.

"This way," said Costopoulos. From the bustle of activity, it was
obvious that preparations were being made for the invasion.

As they walked through the cavernous room, warehouse shelving units
rose forty feet high until they were lost in the dim vastness near the
ceiling. The shelves were stacked with crates and drums, some clear
white plastic, others black metal. Every one had on its side a sign or
symbol indicating its contents. Some held weapons, from antitank guns
and machine pistols to surface-to-air missiles.

Others had the international symbol for radiation or the yellow emblem
of a black circle intersected by three horned crescents that indicated
a biohazard.

Morgan gestured at the shelving and its lethal contents.

"War in a box."

Their footsteps echoed hollowly on the concrete floor. In the
distance, knots of people in white lab coats. There was a distant
rumbling sound, as if large pieces of machinery were working overtime.

They could see the gleaming rectangle of the foot-thick stainless steel
door that led to the most secret part of the warehouse.

"We are approaching the research labs, chemical manufacturing area, and
transport bays," said Costopoulos, checking the diagram.

"Where are those lenses?"

Morgan pulled the plastic case from his pocket.

"Tell me again how we do this?"

Zammit replied.

"We have two lenses and three eyes. I will create some kind of
diversion so I can get the lens out of my eye and palm it to you so you
can fit it into your eye and get through the scanner too. You're not
going to have any saline solution to lubricate the insertion, so you'll
have to get it right the first time."

Morgan handed the plastic case to Costopoulos. The two lenses floated
in a saline solution. They paused momentarily as the Greek took a lens
on his fingertip, popped it into his left eye and blinked.

"Work OK?" asked Zammit.

"Yes," said Stavros.

"Odd feeling, to be suddenly blind in one eye. Loss of stereoscopic
vision."

"Remember," said Zammit.

"Bled's irises are a peculiar color. Do not look at anyone directly
while wearing the lens. You'll have one eye that's your own color and
another that isn't. It wouldn't take an Einstein to notice the
difference."

He took a lens on his fingertip, popped it into his right eye, and
blinked furiously.

"Stay, I see what you mean. Once we're through that security
checkpoint, I suggest we get these out fast." They continued
walking.

"Start drooling. Doc," said Morgan to Zammit.

Zammit put his hand on the young agent's shoulder and leaned.

"Should've gone to drool school. Excess saliva is hard to produce in
situations like this."

A technician looked up. His eyes narrowed at the approach of three
strangers. He started to say something, then Costopoulos let loose
with a burst of nasty-sounding Russian. The man flinched and stepped
aside. Costopoulos marched up to the iris scanner and pressed his left
eye against it. There were three loud beeps, and a green light glowed
above the big steel door. Morgan seized Zammit's head and assisted him
in pressing his right eye against the scanner.

Beeps and a green light.

Zammit's legs suddenly buckled and he sagged to the floor, clutching
his face.

He was aware of the technician moving in to assist. Once again, some
barks of Russian from Costopoulos made the man back off. Jack Morgan
leaned down to stare him in the face and ask if he was all right.

Zammit popped off the lens and held it, shining, on one fingertip. As
he pretended to struggle to his feet, Morgan took the fragile disk and
put it into his eye, wincing and blinking. Zammit wondered if the
scanner would sound an alarm upon seeing the same iris pattern twice in
a row within less than a minute. Morgan pressed his eye to the
scanner.

Three beeps and a green light. No.

They were in.

Once through the huge steel door, the rumbling sound was louder.

"Out," said Zammit. Costopoulos removed the contact lens from his eye.

So did Morgan. I The CIA agent took both lenses, placed them carefully
back into the plastic case, and handed it to Zammit, who slipped it
into his pocket.

Stavros lifted the papers on his clipboard and studied the layout plans
for Talitsa-4. "This way." They walked down a wide hallway. At the
end were three branches. One branch, to the left, led to a series of
glass-walled lab facilities. Zammit recognized the usual paraphernalia
of a research laboratory.

But there was something else as well several large clear plastic
isolation tanks. They contained the limp and motionless forms of naked
young men, obviously the subjects of experiments. Zammit's eyes
narrowed. He'd like to have five minutes alone with Dr. Cabrinovic.

The hallway straight ahead led to a series of conveyor belts. They
rumbled loudly at full speed. There was daylight at the end of the
hallway to the right.

Through an open bay, Zammit could see loading docks, forklifts, and
cranes, as well as the tail of an enormous aircraft.

And ranks of pallets filled with 200-gallon black drums. All had
different colored labels.

Zammit moved toward the conveyor belts.

"Hey, Doc," said Morgan.

"You're looking way too alert for someone whose brain has been
fried."

"We have to move fast. You see anyone around?"

"Technicians and soldiers in the distance. Otherwise, no."

Zammit approached the conveyor belts and stared. There were four
systems. Only two were operating. On both, thousands of tiny white
pills bounced along the line, but each system was heading toward a
different packing destination. He moved around to study the
destinations of the two conveyor belts and quickly returned.

"System is completely automated. That's why no one's here." He
plucked a white pill from one line and examined it closely. Another
white pill from the second line. He turned them over, looking at both
sides of each pill, thinking furiously.

"What is it. Doc?" asked Morgan.

Zammit held up the tablets.

"The one in my left hand goes into drums with a blue label. The one in
my right goes into drums with a red label. Obviously two different
drugs." He smiled.

"Remember General Bled saying that Cabrinovic was behind in his
refining? That if the material wasn't ready by the time he got back,
he'd have him shot?"

"That's what you told us," said Costopoulos.

"Well," said Zammit, "in his desperate rush to manufacture this stuff.

Dr ...

Cabrinovic has made a terrible mistake." He slipped the pills into the
right and left-hand pockets of his uniform and darted toward the
drums.

"Jack, what do these labels say?"

Morgan stared at the ranks of drums. There were hundreds of them.

"Blue labels say POCS. There are two types of POCS. Pills and a
liquid--an aerosol."

"The aerosol is probably a variant of the stuff Jamal was going to use
on Frankie," said Zammit.

"Spraying from aircraft, I expect. You can't force millions of people
to take pills. An aerosol version of the sedative will be used
initially to stupefy the populations of Istanbul and Ankara. Show me
where the label for the aerosol version is different from the label for
the pills."

Morgan pointed, then moved to another set of drums.

"Green labels say Cyanostrom. The bio weapon

"We've had enough of that already. Keep going."

"Red labels say Aggressor."

"The amphetamine and hormone cocktail Bled will use on his troops."

"Yellow labels say Anticyanostrom."

"Good." Zammit's eyes searched the area. He walked over to a
workbench and stared at its scatter of equipment. He turned and gazed
at the loading dock and an array of forklifts, thinking hard.

"What is it?" asked Costopoulos.

"I have an idea," replied Zammit.

"Jack, approach that group of soldiers and techs in the distance and
tell them they have to load as much of the Anticyanostrom as they can
onto the biggest plane out there."

"What about the rest of these drums?" asked Morgan.

"We can't take them," said Zammit.

"Too many, and we don't have time."

"Then let's torch the place as we leave, destroy this stuff."

"Thought of that already. Look at those girders, all this concrete.

Even if we had something to torch this building with, the fire wouldn't
spread. And we don't have explosives."

Morgan's eyes flickered as he gazed over Zammit's shoulder.

"Houston, we have a problem."

Zammit turned. The group of soldiers and technicians was gathered in a
knot, staring at them and whispering among themselves.

"Get moving," said Zammit.

"Yell, threaten to have them shot. Say the order to load comes
directly from Bled and you'll report them if they don't obey. They
already know the stuff has to leave, so the order won't be a surprise.

Stay, you go too, add an air of authority. Keep shouting at them so
they don't have time to think. Jack, order them to prep the plane
first. Fuel, maintenance, whatever.

Get the forklifts lined up and ready too. But tell them they can't
actually start loading the drums until thirty minutes from now." He
turned to the Greek.

"Stay, you give a direct order that no one is to approach this area for
the same length of time."

"What the hell?" said Morgan.

Zammit saw a soldier and a technician leave the group and start walking
down the corridor toward them.

"Go." The two marched off. Moments later he heard both men shouting
and the sound of running as the soldiers and techs rushed to obey their
orders.

He strode over to the workbench, picked up the piece of equipment he
had noticed before, and started to work.

His broken hand and aching ribs made it harder and slower than it
should have been. Sweat was running down his face by the time he was
almost done. He panted with exertion, the dull ache in his ribs now a
stabbing pain. Hold yourself together for just a little longer. He
tried to breathe shallowly. Finally, it was finished. He laid the
device back on the table, swaying. Don't faint now. He sat down on
the workbench, head between his knees, and fought the black clouds that
threatened to engulf him.

He looked up at the sound of approaching footsteps. Costopoulos said,
"My God, Michael. You look like death."

"Never mind," said Zammit.

"Plane ready?"

"Yes."

"Give the order to start loading."

"OK. They want to know why they have to stay away from here. I can't
stall them any longer."

"Doesn't matter now." Zammit rubbed his face.

"They can enter the area. I'm going to sit in that corner. Give them
some reason why I'm here and why they have to leave me alone. Tell me
when we're ready to leave."

"OK."

Wisps of black cloud writhed across his vision.

"Help me get over there."

Stavros hauled him to his feet and into the corner. He sat down on the
floor, leaned against the wall, and closed his eyes. He heard bustling
movement, pounding footsteps, barked orders, the rumble and thump of
forklifts. He wasn't sure how long he was there, but gradually his
breathing slowed and he didn't feel as nauseated. He remembered what
Aunt Julia had said: You're a knight of the Order. That toughness is
in your blood. You'll need it someday. You're right, Julia, he
thought. I'm going to need every ounce of it.

"We're ready." It was Costopoulos, looking worried. As he helped
Zammit to his feet, he said, "We have to get out of here fast. One of
the techs asked me a question about the behavior of granules in a
centrifuge, and of course I didn't know what he was talking about. Got
a funny look on his face and now he's disappeared. I've also been
asked why an army sergeant will be flying the plane." He reached into
his lab coat pocket and handed Zammit a pistol.

"Jack says, just in case." The scientist stuffed it in his jacket.

"From the looks on the faces of the soldiers and techs, I've given the
last order that will be obeyed."

"Where's Jack?"

"On the plane, studying the controls. We must go now."

Footsteps echoed in the corridor. A tall spindly man in a white lab
coat bounded down the hall toward them from the direction of the lab
facilities. Zammit thought he looked like an ostrich. A soldier was
with him. Zammit leaned against the Greek and stared vacantly at the
soldier. The man stopped in front of Costopoulos and said something
sharply. Even without knowing Russian, Zammit understood and
recognized the name. Dr. Bratko Cabrinovic was identifying himself
and demanding to know who they were. Costopoulos said something sharp
in response. Zammit recognized the name Vladimir Bled. Cabrinovic
flinched. Stay was reminding the research director what Bled had said
about shooting him if the drugs weren't ready. Cabrinovic's emu like
eyes darted about as uncertainty and fear battled suspicion. Suspicion
was winning.

Zammit started to slide to the floor. The soldier moved toward him. He
straightened suddenly and moved behind the man.

Caught by surprise, the soldier was slow to react. Zammit slipped his
arm around the man's neck and placed him in a choke hold.

As the man fought against him, Zammit saw Cabrinovic attack Stavros.

Neither man was a trained fighter, but Costopoulos was winning. Finally
the soldier was unconscious. Zammit dropped him just as the Greek
missed with a haymaker and lost his balance. Cabrinovic seized his arm
and started whirling Costopoulos around. When the tall man let go,
Costopoulos slammed heavily into the engine casing of a forklift and
fell to the ground, clutching his chest. Cabrinovic pounced, fingers
extended like talons. He was going for the eyes. As he clawed at
Costopoulos's face, Zammit lunged, fist raised, and hit him with a
vicious rabbit punch to the back of the head. Bled's research director
fell without a sound.

Zammit knelt over the Greek.

"Stay?"

He had long fingernail slashes on one cheek, but his eyes were
undamaged.

Costopoulos struggled to catch his breath.

"Hurts," he gasped.

"Get out of here."

Zammit looked around. The soldier and Cabrinovic were still out. Going
for the eyes. Dirty fighter. He rolled Cabrinovic onto his back.

Taking the contact lenses from his pocket, he forced open the man's
eyelids and dropped one lens in each eye. Then he seized the rifle and
helped Costopoulos to his feet. Dragging the injured Greek, he headed
through the deserted loading area for the plane.

Jack Morgan, and freedom.

Morgan was standing in the cockpit, a pistol pointed at the head of a
terrified mechanic.

"Where the fuck have you been?"

"Had to fight our way out," gasped Zammit, panting from the exertion of
hauling the Greek up the metal ramp into the cabin.

"Stay's hurt."

He laid Costopoulos and the rifle on the floor and looked around. The
cargo hold was packed with black drums with yellow labels. The stink
of Jet Al turbine fuel, stale motor oil, and hot metal was
overpowering.

"Cargo bay closed?"

"Yes."

"This thing is huge. What kind of aircraft?"

"Military cargo plane. Ilyushin 76. More precisely, an IL-76MD. They
call them Mike Deltas. One hundred and sixty-five-foot wingspan, a
hundred and fifty feet long."

"Name Ilyushin mean anything?"

"I think it's Russian for 'crate." Must be one of the original ones,
built in 1974. A sort of sky truck. They've sealed the emergency
exits with duct tape, for Christ's sake."

"Can you fly it?"

"Guess I'll have to."

"Will it get to the Ataturk Dam?"

"I remember the specs from the flight simulators. Has a maximum
takeoff weight of about 171,000 kilos. It was already half loaded with
crates of weapons and Semtex plastic explosive. We didn't have time to
take them off. This guy says that with the drums it's close to being
overloaded but it should get airborne."

"Answer the question. Jack."

"With maximum payload, it'll go over 1800 miles at 480 miles an hour.

I've already checked the maps. It's about 500 miles from here to the
dam. Piece of cake, if I can get it off the ground."

"So we can be there in an hour?"

"Yes."

Costopoulos moaned. Zammit went to him and bent over. His chest was
heaving, lips turning blue.

"Stay. You OK?"

"No."

He tore open the Greek's lab coat and shirt. There was a deep purple
abrasion on the left side of his chest.

"What is it?" asked Morgan.

"Broken rib, collapsed lung. Ask if this plane is pressurized."

Morgan asked the question. The mechanic's eyes flickered uneasily as
he answered.

"He says sometimes. The airframe has cracks in it, and they haven't
finished with maintenance yet."

Zammit thought furiously.

"If we have to fly high, and if this isn't pressurized, Stay will die
of hypoxia."

"With this huge payload and a cracked airframe, we might also shake to
pieces in midair," said Morgan grimly.

The scientist hooked a thumb at the mechanic.

"Do we need him anymore?"

"Probably. Crew is supposed to be two pilots, a flight engineer, a
navigator, a radio operator, and two load masters But I can't fly this
thing and hold a gun to his head at the same time."

"I have to look after Stay. After I've fixed him up, I can be
navigator if necessary." Zammit appraised the mechanic. He was
stocky, with a round face, slanted Tartar eyes, and hands like shovels.

His overalls were greasy, and his face shone with sweat and fear, eyes
pleading.

"He can be our flight engineer. Ask his name and if he's a member of
Smegyev's cult." Morgan barked the questions. A look of confusion
crossed the man's face.

He talked until the agent interrupted him.

"Fedor Slavutych. Unless this guy's a great actor, he doesn't know
anything about Smegyev. Says he's never been here before. Was ordered
to come two days ago, been working nonstop on the planes. Mechanic for
twenty years in the Soviet air force. Says he can take apart and put
together one of these things blindfolded. Says he's a working stiff
from Kazan, has a wife and kids, please don't kill me."

"Tell him we are agents of the Moscow government. If he helps us, he
won't get killed, he'll get a medal and lots of money." Morgan talked.

The man's eyes blinked. He smiled an honest peasant smile and
replied.

Morgan looked relieved.

"He says OK. Says he'll show me what I need to know and that he's
test-flown these things unofficially."

"Let's go," said Zammit.

Morgan stuffed the gun in the belt of his uniform. He sat in the
pilot's seat and contemplated the controls as Slavutych took the
copilot's seat.

"Damn, those video game people are good," he said.

"Just like the real thing." The four Soloviev D-30KP turbofans
screamed to life. He taxied away from the loading docks and started to
swing the huge plane around.

Slavutych pointed through the windshield and spoke. Morgan said,
"Fedor says this plane is close to overload. We're going to need every
inch of runway to get aloft."

"We can't do anything about it," said Zammit.

"Just get out of here." He ran back and looked through the still-open
cabin door. At one of the loading docks he saw a tall man in a white
lab coat leaning against the metal door frame, sobbing convulsively. He
straightened and held his arms out in front of him as he lurched
forward, like Boris Karloff in The Mummy. He took a few steps and
pitched off the end of the loading dock, falling six feet onto the
pavement. It looked as if he had broken at least one leg and an arm.

"Well, Dr. Cabrinovic," said Zammit softly.

"How do you like being the victim of an experiment?"

As the man rolled on the cement in agony, several soldiers appeared on
the metal platform. Zammit seized the rifle and fired. They ducked
back into the opening.

"Come on. Jack!" he shouted over the rising shriek of the engines.

"It's Chuck Yeager time!"

He saw Morgan ease the throttle. The big cargo jet started to roll
down the runway. As it gathered speed, the old plane shuddered and
clanked.

"Shake, rattle, and roll!" yelled Morgan. Zammit and Slavutych seized
the cabin door and heaved it shut. The scientist darted back into the
cockpit and peered through the windshield at the runway flashing
underneath.

"This is going to be mighty close," said Morgan grimly.

Shuddering and straining, engines screaming like banshees, the Ilyushin
slowly lifted into the air just as the last bit of runway disappeared
under the wheels.

Airborne.

Zammit bent over Costopoulos.

"Stay, I'm going to have to do something. It isn't going to be
pleasant." Eyes half-closed, the Greek nodded.

(Zammit headed for the cockpit. The plane was shuddering so badly he
could hardly keep his feet. Fedor Slavutych's eyes searched the
control panels. He pointed at dials and talked rapidly as Morgan used
both hands to struggle with the throttle, fighting for lift.

"It's like flying the Queen Mary!" he shouted above the shrieking
engines.

"Christ, this thing is heavy." He gritted his teeth as he strained at
the throttle.

"I feel like I'm physically lifting it myself!"

Zammit shouted in his ear.

"Remember, this isn't a video game. It's a real plane, carrying too
much weight. It's old, has a cracked airframe, and a maintenance
history I suspect has not been impeccable. Be prepared for
anything."

"How's Costopoulos?"

"Not good. Ask Fedor if there's an emergency medical kit on this
crate."

The mechanic listened to Morgan and nodded. He disappeared into the
back of the plane and returned with a white box with a red cross on the
side. Zammit opened it.

"Syringes, sutures, needles, tubes, bandages, local anesthetic, foil
packets of disinfectant swabs, rubber gloves, the works."

He tore open one of the foil packets. Completely dried out.

"How old is this stuff anyway?" He handed the box of anesthetic to
Slavutych.

"Jack, ask him the expiration date."

Morgan asked.

"September 15, 1998. Been expired almost five years."

"Damn," said Zammit.

"I have no choice. Fedor, is there anything in this plane that has
tubing, medical disinfectant, anything?" Morgan spoke. The mechanic
again disappeared into the bowels of the aircraft. Zammit headed down
into the glass cage at the bottom of the nose cone, where the navigator
would be stationed. He established their bearing and bounded back into
the cockpit to give the information to Morgan.

"Keep heading due southeast, in a straight line." He stared through
the cockpit windshield. They were now over water. The Black Sea.

"Jack, our ETA is about an hour?"

"If we don't get shot down by the Russian, Ukrainian, or Turkish air
force?

Yeah."

"Send the signal. You remember the frequency?"

"Seared into my brain. But is there anyone to respond to it at the
other end?"

"I hope so." Hearing a rattling sound, Zammit turned. Slavutych was
pushing a cart. Zammit grinned.

"What the hell is a beverage cart from a commercial airline doing on a
military cargo plane?"

Morgan listened for a moment.

"Fedor says the pilot of this craft got it from an Aeroflot flight
attendant in exchange for a couple of machine guns."

Zammit knelt and examined the cart. It was filthy. Metal canisters of
soft drinks, connected with stiff plastic tubing. He tore off a length
of tubing. A coil of thin wire was attached to one of the cart's legs,
presumably to fasten it to something so it wouldn't roll in turbulence.

He unspooled a couple of feet of wire, straightened it, and bent it
back and forth until it snapped. He examined the bottles and selected
the one with the highest alcohol content.

Overproof Armenian brandy. He rummaged around in a drawer, found
knives, forks, and spoons. No scalpel. He searched his pockets, found
what he wanted. An OLFA Touch-Knife.

Morgan and Slavutych were talking in the cockpit. They were gaining
altitude. If they got high enough, the Greek was going to die.

He bent over Costopoulos. Eyes closed, lips bluer than before. He
returned to the cockpit.

"How's it going?"

"Good," said Morgan. He glanced at the material Zammit held in his
hands.

"What now?"

"I have to operate, get that lung fixed. I just hope the anesthetic is
still good."

The agent hooked a thumb at the kitchen utensils.

"You going to operate on him or eat him?"

"I may need these," replied Zammit.

"I realize it's not the Mayo Clinic way, but I have no choice."

"What's the wire and tubing for?"

"I'll insert the wire into the tubing to stiffen it. Tell Fedor he's
entering the surgical profession." The mechanic paled.

Zammit and Slavutych returned to Costopoulos. The scientist fetched
an empty basin from the beverage cart, tore open a sealed plastic
container of napkins, and laid several on the metal floor of the
aircraft. With the brandy, he sterilized the tubing, both inside and
out. He rubbed alcohol along the length of the wire, then selected one
of the rubber gloves. Using more wire, he secured the glove around the
end of the tube with an air-tight seal, then cut two fingers off the
glove.

He rolled Costopoulos onto his side, having decided to make the
incision on the side, the part of the chest that moves least.

He laid everything carefully on the napkins and mimed what to do next.

The mechanic held his hands over the basin as Zammit poured brandy over
them. Zammit did the same to his own hands, scrubbing vigorously,
making sure to clean the cast too. He mimed making the incision and
inserting the tube. Fedor nodded.

Zammit opened the box of anesthetic. The clear bottle had a blue
rubber seal on top. He tore the plastic off a syringe, thrust the
needle through the rubber, and withdrew four cc's of liquid. He tapped
the syringe to get rid of any bubbles, then leaned over Costopoulos.

"Hey, Stay." The eyes slowly opened.

"I

have local anesthetic, and I'm not sure if it's going to work. I'm
injecting the area where I'm going to make the incision and insert the
tube. Let me know if and when it feels numb. I'm not going to lie to
you. This might hurt like hell."

He injected the incision site.

Costopoulos's voice was faint.

"I laugh at danger, I flirt with death. What's with the glove?"

"I've improvised a flap-valve. When you exhale through the chest tube,
positive pressure is generated within the thoracic cavity, pushing air
through the tube and the cutoff fingers of the glove. When you inhale,
the walls of the glove fingers are sucked together by the negative
pressure, preventing air from accumulating in the cavity. If air and
pressure are allowed to accumulate in the cavity, they kink the large
veins around your heart. You go into shock and die."

"Sorry I asked. I'm numb."

"Jack!" shouted Zammit.

"What?"

"Any sign of pursuit?"

"Not yet."

"Let me know if there is. We might have to do evasive maneuvers. Give
me ten minutes steady flying, and Stay lives."

"Roger."

With the OLFA Touch-Knife he made a small, deep nick in the skin, then
punched in the tube with the flap valve on the end. Minutes later
Zammit sewed up the wound with brandy-sterilized sutures as Slavutych
tossed the instruments into the basin. Zammit poured more brandy over
the mechanic's hands, then did the same with his own.

"At least he's not going to have one hell of a scar." He took a swig
from the bottle. Not a lot left. He handed it to Slavutych. Fedor
drained the rest. The mechanic's eyes were darting. He looked down at
Costopoulos, held up a forefinger, and headed to the cockpit.

Wearily Zammit rose and followed. The two were talking.

"Fedor looks like he's had an idea. What's up?"

Morgan grinned.

"He says if we fly real low and slow, forty or fifty feet off the sea,
their radar won't be able to track us. And in case the operation
didn't work, Costopoulos won't die of hypoxia, because we're not flying
high."

"OK," said Zammit.

"An aerial version of the low-speed 0. J. Simpson chase. Just make
sure this crate doesn't stall. He headed down into the glass
navigator's cage, then returned.

"Entering Turkish airspace in about ten minutes."

"Yeah," said Morgan grimly.

"In an Ilyushin. If the Turks send F-15s after us, we're finished."

"We'll have to wait and see if the signal got through. As for whether
Radchuk worked something out with Yildiz ... " He shrugged.

Zammit returned to Costopoulos. The Greek whispered, "I heard heaven
is filled with angels. I always visualized them as female. Because
I'm looking at your ugly mug, I assume I'm not dead."

"That's right," said Zammit.

"Lie back and relax."

"Two o'clock!" shouted Morgan.

"Fighters. Can't tell who they are."

Slavutych handed Zammit a pair of binoculars. He watched for a few
moments.

Three fighter planes, moving in fast.

"I'm not an expert on aircraft," he said.

"I presume they're MiGs."

"Can't be," said Morgan.

"MiG-29s are small short-range fighters. They're not capable of flying
a distance like this without being refueled in midair. Let me see."

He peered through the binoculars.

"Shit. Sukhoi-30 Flankers.

Fighter-interceptor, range of 2500 miles. Can go over Mach 2.3.

Incredible engines. Only mass-manufactured plane in history capable of
breaking the sound barrier while climbing vertically. Only fighter
capable of the Cobra maneuver. Scary as hell. Like an F-15 on steroids.
They must be within range.

Why aren't they shooting us down? We're a sitting duck."

"Because," said Zammit, "we're carrying the antidote. They shoot us
down, the antidote drowns in the sea. They're going to try and herd us,
force us back to Talitsa-4."

"More planes," said Morgan.

"Ten o'clock. We're screwed."

Zammit stared through the binoculars.

"More Sukhoi-30s. Five of them."

"Shit creek, no paddle," said Morgan.

"At least we tried."

The fighters were closing fast. There were two spurts of flame and white
propellant from one of the jets approaching at ten o'clock.

Missiles. Zammit looked at the planes in the two o'clock position. A
direct hit. The sky filled with flame. The remaining Su30s soared
through the sky, in a swirling dogfight.

Five against two. He watched as the two Sukhois were destroyed.

Slavutych said something to Morgan.

"What?" asked Zammit.

"Wants to know what's going on. Wouldn't mind knowing myself."

"Radchuk found a way to meet Yury Bogov's challenge. He responded to the
prearranged signal we sent on a special frequency, the signal telling
him we were on our way and needed help. The original plan was for
Radchuk to arrange with Yildiz to have Turkish jets show up and fight
Bled's pursuit force, so Radchuk could preserve deniability. But that
would've meant Turks fighting Russians. An act of war. It would have
given Bled and his people in the Kremlin the perfect justification for
their invasion of Turkey. This way it's Russian fighters against Russian
fighters. No possibility of an international incident, no excuse for
Bled."

Zammit pointed.

"It appears we now have an escort to the Ataturk Dam."

Morgan glanced at his instruments and grinned.

"We are now in Turkish airspace.

Not an F-15 in sight. Radchuk and Yildiz obviously worked something out.
Hot diggity dog." He waved at the Su-30s flying on either side of them.
The pilots waved back.

"Vaya, next time we meet, the first bottle of vodka is on me." He
explained to Slavutych.

The radio crackled to life, and Morgan started talking. Zammit examined
Costopoulos. His lips were no longer blue, and although he was in pain,
he was out of danger.

"Hey, Doc!" yelled Morgan.

"The Su-30 pilots want us to fly higher. Can we do that without killing
Costopoulos?"

Zammit returned to the cockpit.

"Yes. Just don't try setting any altitude records."

Shuddering and groaning, the big cargo plane ascended. They were now
over land.

In the glass nose cage Zammit examined a map and checked their
coordinates, then scrambled to the cockpit. He pointed to a cluster of
buildings in the distance.

"That must be the town of Niksar."

Slavutych was staring intently at the control panel. He looked worried.

He pointed and said something to Morgan. Zammit leaned over to take a
look. Needles were quivering at the far end of their dials, creeping
toward red lines.

"What is it?"

Jack looked grim.

"These engines are hotter than a two-dollar pistol."

"Will we have to land before we get to the dam?"

"Maybe."

Zammit eyes searched the horizon.

"That must be the town of Hekimhan. It's not far now."

Minutes later they spotted something shining like a mirror on the
horizon.

Water.

"We're approaching the reservoir," said Zammit.

"This northern end is the only part that the cyanobacteria hasn't
contaminated yet."

Soon they were flying over a green mat.

"Jack," said Zammit, "radio our Sukhoi escort and tell them you want to
move west so you're flying over land. If we have to ditch, I don't want
to do it in this crap."

"Christ, no," said Morgan, reaching for the receiver.

Minutes later they were circling the Ataturk Dam. Morgan spoke urgently
into the receiver with staff on the ground.

"They want to know how heavy we are. I told them my best estimate and
they freaked out. The runway isn't made to take a weight like this.

They think we're going to break through the pavement at 200 miles an
hour and tear off the undercarriage. The plane will be ripped to pieces
and explode. We still have almost a full tank of Jet Al fuel."

"The stuff is not particularly volatile," said Zammit.

"But you mentioned earlier that some of the crates in the back contain
Semtex. If we crash, that fuel, mixed with the plastic explosive, will
create a bang so big it'll wake up Hong Kong."

He pointed at the gauges.

"And we can't fly around forever, or make it to another destination.

Those dials just red-lined. The engines are about to burn out." He
looked at the mechanic.

"He knows this plane. Ask him."

Morgan talked. Slavutych shrugged, grinned, and replied. Morgan grinned
back.

"I'm waiting," said Zammit.

"Fedor says this plane is beautifully designed. Has over a dozen huge
wheels under the nose cone and fusil age Great weight distribution, so
it can operate on very poor runways. The runway and tarmac only have to
be able to withstand a pressure of six kilograms per square centimeter."

Morgan spoke into the receiver, listened, and smiled.

"No problemo."

He flipped a series of switches. Fedor pointed at a lever, and Jack
pulled it.

They heard the whine and thump of landing gear being lowered. Their
escort of five Su-30s peeled away and headed for home. Morgan headed in
for a landing.

With the slightest thump and bounce, they were taxiing to the
maintenance warehouse and loading docks.

Morgan smiled blissfully.

"Man, those video game people are good." He slapped Fedor's back
affectionately.

ATATURK Dam, September 10

Once off the plane, Zammit asked for the infirmary's physician and a
stretcher.

When they arrived, he told the man how he had reinflated the lung and
ordered him to complete the procedure with an underwater seal. The
doctor did a quick examination of Costopoulos and said he was going to
be all right.

Then he looked at Zammit.

"You have been badly beaten and are very pale. Come with me."

"Can't," he said.

"Then I will get you a painkiller."

"No thanks. I'm so tired it'll make me stupid. I can't get stupid."

"I insist on examining you."

Zammit rubbed his face and winced as he felt his broken rib scrape.

"OK. Give me a few minutes and I'll be in your office. Look after
Costopoulos."

As they took the Greek to the infirmary, Zammit ordered maintenance
staff to unload the antidote and bring the first drum into the
warehouse. He fetched the micro lab and laptop from storage, opened the
drum, and started to work. Morgan and Slavutych stood by anxiously.

Zammit examined a slide under the microscope.

"Where is everyone?"

Morgan replied, "I'm told Dr. Richards is here, along with Dikka
Spargo, Kitson Kang, and Cairo Jackson. Never met them, but I must say
your colleagues have weird names. Colonel Yildiz is in Istanbul, making
sure Prime Minister Amurkhan is protected. The election is four days
from now. Your colleague Connie Palaeov is in Istanbul too."

Zammit started keying information into his laptop, wincing as he used
only the index finger of his broken left hand. Without taking his eyes
from the screen, he said, "I have to talk to Frankie."

When Richards arrived, she gestured at Slavutych.

"Who's he?"

"A helpful fellow and a damn fine mechanic," said Zammit.

"I won't be much longer." As he matched his new information with the
computer's database, Morgan filled Frankie in on what had happened.

"Are you sure Stay is going to be OK?" she asked.

"Pretty sure," replied Zammit.

"It's hard to operate with a broken hand. I'm glad I took that training
in emergency medivac surgical techniques a couple of years ago." He
stared at the screen, then turned to Richards. Her face was impassive.

He remembered how hurt she had looked when he hadn't let her touch him.

"The video. Was there ... ?"

"Nothing more about Adam's fate. I'm sure he's dead." She was all
business, but he could tell she didn't want to believe what she was
saying. No time to get into it now, and it was obvious she didn't want
to talk about it.

"As soon as you landed, I talked to Connie in Istanbul," she said.

"Colonel Yildiz wasn't available-he's in conference with Amurkhan and
the National Security Council.

I filled Connie in and told him to explain to Yildiz what's happening
with the arrival of the treatment. Then Yury Bogov phoned, wanting to
know if you'd arrived safely. Apparently Radchuk pulled in every favor
he was ever owed and twisted arms. He's in big trouble with the Kremlin
for doing this solo. Barely holding things together. Approximately forty
tons of the antidote are being air freighted from a couple of other
secret cities, Sverdlovsk-17 in the far north and Vozrozhdemya-2 on an
island in the middle of the Aral Sea. There's more antidote in other
secret cities, but they're controlled by allies of Bled's, and Radchuk
can't get into them. The cargo planes will have military escorts in case
Bled tries to intercept them. It'll be hours before they get here."

"Tell me more."

"No one knows Amurkhan is still alive. The water situation is
desperate--crops are dying, and soon people will be too. The Turkish
army is grinding the Syrians and Iraqis to pieces, but they're fighting
hard. It looks as if Bled fell for the fake message we sent. Even with
the theft of the antidote, it seems he's still going to launch the
invasion."

"He has to. He's reached the point of no return," said Zammit.

"There's more of the antidote elsewhere, and besides. Bled must have the
formula. Can't be that hard to manufacture more, if his allies control
some of the secret cities.

Anything else?"

"According to Bogov, given what Bled will throw at them, the remaining
Turkish forces in the north will be overrun."

Zammit was silent.

"Mike, I know that look. There's something you're not telling me."

Wearily he rubbed his face.

"God, I feel awful. A Russian private's uniform is itchy in this heat."

He gestured at the computer screen.

"I've done some analysis on the antidote. I figured out part of it but
not all. You're the expert in microbiology, and I'm not. I don't
understand some of it. Have a look.

I'm going to get this rib checked."

As Zammit headed for the infirmary with Morgan and Slavutych, Frankie
sat down in front of the laptop.

The physician's examination showed that Zammit indeed had a broken rib
and that the cast on his hand didn't need replacing. He taped Zammit's
chest to stabilize the rib and gave him a handful of vitamins.

When Zammit returned, Frankie said, "Good news."

"What?"

"Every member of the anonymous Biopreparat research team who invented
this should win the Nobel Prize for Chemistry."

"Talk to me."

Richards gazed up into the hot blue sky.

"These drums contain at least one super concentrated antidote. It binds
with chlorophyll."

Zammit frowned.

"The substance that makes all green plants green.

Photosynthesis. Chlorophyll absorbs energy from sunlight and transforms
light energy into chemical energy."

"Correct. In all plants, chlorophyll is located in chloroplasts. Except
for cyanobacteria, the only organism on earth where the chlorophyll is
located in photosynthetic membranes at the cell periphery."

Light dawned in Zammit's eyes.

"So that's it. Located on the outside of the cell, it's vulnerable."

"You've got it. The antidote binds to the chlorophyll on the cell
periphery.

Once the two are bound together, sunlight is suddenly not a source of
life but a source of death."

Zammit grinned.

"The antidote makes sunlight poisonous to cyanobacteria?"

"Yes."

"Wow," he said.

"Take an organism's basic survival mechanism and turn it into its worst
enemy. That is fiendishly clever."

"What did you find?" asked Richards.

"There is a second treatment as well. As I suspected, they used the same
technique as they did to engineer the bio weapon Miniscule sugar beads
that dissolve instantly in water. The toxin molecules produced by the
cyanobacteria become bound to the synthetic sugar, an oligosaccharide.
It, in turn, is attached to particles of diatomaceous earth."

"Chalk," interrupted Richards.

"A harmless natural substance that cannot be absorbed by the human
body."

"Precisely. The combination of sugar and chalk is a sort of toxin sponge
that binds up the poisonous molecules. The human intestine will not
absorb chalk. The endotoxin is bound to the chalk, so the body won't
absorb it, either. If it doesn't get into the bloodstream, you can't
die. It simply gets expelled."

"You mean, I could take a glass of poisonous water from the reservoir,
mix it with the antidote, drink it, and nothing would happen?"

"That's right."

Richards threw back her head and laughed.

"In other words, once this is in the reservoir, water can be released?"

"Theoretically, yes." Zammit glanced at the computer.

"One moment." He keyed an equation. The hard-drive light blinked
furiously as the machine flashed through its calculations.

"The question is, how much do we need? We'll know in a couple of
minutes. And how fast does the organic material dissolve once it's
exposed?

We can't release water if the dam's intakes and machinery are incapable
of filtering out organics."

"How do we deliver the treatments?"

"Spray them over the reservoir. We'll need planes. As far as I can tell,
biplane crop dusters could do it. Also, put it into smaller canisters
and drop them through the muck into the water underneath."

"That leaves us with one insurmountable problem. Sporing."

Zammit closed his eyes. His hand hurt, and so did his chest. He had
never felt so tired.

"Because it's never been field-tested, the bio weapon behavior is
unpredictable. The Biopreparat team probably didn't know it could
reproduce through sporing as well as cell division, so they never came
up with a way of dealing with the spores."

"We can't allow it to spore. Once it gets into the oceans, all the
pharmaceutical factories on earth working full time couldn't make enough
antidote to get rid of it. The world will die."

"I know," said Zammit wearily.

"We'll have to think of something."

The hard drive stopped clicking. Zammit checked the screen.

"We don't have enough. We'll have to wait for Radchuk's cargo planes."

Richards interrupted.

"The filaments are close to reaching the reservoir floor.

I am a botanist and microbiologist. I cannot even imagine how we can
stop the sporing."

"There has to be a way," said Zammit.

"I refuse to be beaten by green slime."

He heard pounding footsteps and turned. It was Cairo Jackson.

"Mike, Colonel Yildiz just phoned. He sounds totally creeped out. He
wouldn't explain anything, just said you have to fly to Istanbul
immediately. Some sort of crisis. He's sending a helicopter."

Zammit turned to Frankie Richards.

"All the info is in the laptop. Wait for the arrival of Radchuk's cargo
planes. I'll meet with Yildiz and get back here as fast as I can."

Jackson and Zammit walked through the warehouse toward the elevators.

Zammit concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other.

"Frankie filled me in," said Jackson.

"Given what happened in Tuvanistan, I'm amazed you're here at all. You
look terrible. Are you sure you're all right?"

"Yes," he lied.

They took the elevator up to the locker area.

"Cairo, go talk to the helicopter pilot when he gets here. Find out what
Yildiz is so worried about."

"OK."

Zammit walked toward the lockers. Dikka Spargo was seated at a table.

The metal in her face gleamed under the lights. She had inserted a small
flashlight through one of her eyebrow hoops, and she read a book and
fiddled with something at the same time.

"Hey, boss. You're looking kind of inert."

Zammit couldn't summon a smile.

"What are you doing?"

"Waiting for some results about that crap in the reservoir. Reading
Clive Cussler's Inca Gold. This guy is really good. How come we never do
something as exciting as hunting for treasure? Meanwhile, I'm following
your orders."

"What orders?"

Dikka snapped a couple of pieces together and held up an object.

"You said you wanted the robots to make noises so people don't get
startled. I made a couple of dozen little prototypes. They make
different sounds. When we're done here, you tell me which sounds you
like."

Zammit stared at the insectoid in her hand.

"Dikka, do they have to be so ugly?"

She looked hurt.

"I think they're cute." She rose and walked over to a set of duffel bags
in the corner.

"I borrowed one of your travel bags. Hope you don't mind. I didn't have
one large enough to carry my tools plus the robots." Zammit shook his
head. The teen flipped aside the tag with the scientist's name on it,
opened the bag, placed the insectoid into the bag and zipped it shut.

"They're all in here."

The scientist remembered what had happened with Catula.

"Did you install a battery pack to jump-start them awake after a while?"

"No. They're too little. I'll have to invent a battery pack small enough
to fit them. Won't be easy. I've installed a little broadcast generator
in the bag.

Fits on the bottom, on the inside, small and snug. To activate the
insectoids, just flip the outside switch near the base. Wakes them all
up instantly--it's a pain to do it manually, one at a time. They run
around like crazy. As you requested, when they get within a few feet of
someone, they make noises. I had fun with the noises. I took--" Zammit
knew what Spargo was like when she got started on the subject.

"Dikka, I understand. Do me a favor. I'm going to get cleaned up. Tell
Frankie I want a printout of the information about the two antidotes to
take to Yildiz."

"OK." She darted out of the room.

He washed up and shaved, then dressed in the clothes he'd brought from
Malta, so long ago--chinos, a dark green cotton shirt, and a black
bomber jacket. What was Yildiz so panicked about? He transferred
everything from the Russian private's uniform into his pockets and after
a moment's reflection tucked the pistol into his jacket. He sat down on
a bench, his head between his knees.

Spargo returned with a sheaf of paper.

"Stick them in my bag," said Zammit wearily.

"I'm going to lie down until the chopper gets here."

Dikka's eyes were appraising.

"I'm worried about you, boss."

"I'm OK." Zammit lay down and was out in an instant.

He heard a voice and struggled from the deep black well of sleep. It was
Kitson Kang.

"Chopper's here."

Painfully he rolled off the bench, grabbed his duffel bag, and took the
elevator down to ground level. As he boarded the Huey helicopter, he
turned to Jackson.

"Cairo, does this pilot know anything about why Yildiz wants to see me
so urgently?"

"Guy doesn't know bugger-all," replied the big man.

Zammit nodded.

"I'll be back as soon as I can." The big Huey shot into the air and
zoomed away.

During the flight, Zammit fought the urge to sleep and tried to make
sense of the tornado whirling in his brain. They had two treatments but
no way of stopping the sporing process. As he meditated on the events of
the past few days, he was again filled with a sense of foreboding.

Abdul Jamal had known they were coming to Tuvanistan. How had he known?

Where was he now?

A car and driver waited for Zammit at Yeltsikoy airport. He gazed at the
glittering waters of the Sea of Marmara as they drove east along Kennedy
Cadessi. Huge tankers, merchant ships and ferries plied the waters in
the fading sunlight of early evening. He looked at the modern office
buildings, the red tiled roofs of the older houses, the forest of
slender minarets stabbing toward the sky. This time they were driving
through Askaray district instead of around Sultanahmet. As usual, the
streets were jammed with vehicles, the sidewalks swarming with
pedestrians, as people headed home from work. Six million people.

It was now just hours before General Bled would launch his invasion.

Grimly Zammit wondered which of these buildings would be rubble, how
many bodies would lie on the pavement, the number of vacant-eyed zombies
that would be wandering aimlessly, if he couldn't stop it.

The car pulled into the underground garage of the Istanbul headquarters
of Turkish Intelligence. It seemed so long ago that he had been in this
building.

As they took the elevator up from the garage, he wondered what new
crisis had occurred, one so urgent Colonel Yildiz had to see him
personally.

The elevator stopped. Zammit stepped out. There was an unusually large
number of men in the hallway, including soldiers. They turned to look at
him, gazes openly hostile. Suddenly Colonel Yildiz burst through the
crowd. His face was furious.

He pointed a pistol at the scientist's head.

"Dr. Michael Zammit, you are under arrest."

Istanbul, September 10

The room was small and windowless. Zammit sat in a chair in the middle
of the floor. Four soldiers stood along the walls.

"Colonel, what the hell are you talking about?"

Yildiz stopped pacing.

"I can't believe I have been so stupid." He pointed his cigarette
accusingly.

"The assassination attempt on Thamar Amurkhan. Only three people on
earth knew she was going to be at the Hilton--her, myself, and you. It
was you who tipped off the RAA fundamentalists about where she would be
and when."

"This is insane," said Zammit.

"Why would I--?"

"And why did you go to Tuvanistan? I now know. To confer with your
fellow conspirators. You are of Maltese descent. Historically, Turks and
Maltese have hated each other. Tell me. Dr. Zammit, what do you get
out of this plot?"

Zammit's head spun. What was going on? Suddenly another piece of the
jigsaw puzzle removed itself from the whirling tornado in his brain and
slipped into perfect place. He contemplated it for a moment, surprised
at how cold and detached he felt.

"Well?" demanded Yildiz.

Zammit glanced at the duffel bag at his feet. He still had the Russian
pistol in his jacket, and they hadn't frisked him. But there were too
many of them. He'd be shot down in an instant if he drew the gun. His
eyes narrowed as he looked at the bag. It had a tag on it, with his
name. But there was a small switch near the base. Suddenly it came to
him.

In his confused exhaustion, he'd taken the wrong bag.

"Colonel, I can explain everything. The information about the treatments
is in this bag. May I?"

The Turk nodded curtly. Zammit leaned over and picked it up. He flipped
the switch, felt the bag suddenly seethe with movement. He pulled it
open, turned it upside down, and emptied its contents on the floor.

Tiny multicolored robots instantly scattered across the room, scuttling
everywhere. The Turks stared in horror. The stunned silence was broken
when an insectoid got too close to an astonished Yildiz.

"Meep meep!" it said in a surprisingly loud voice. Another stopped in
front of a soldier. His eyes bulged from his head.

"AAAOOOOGGGAAAHHHH!" There was an eruption of sound- whistles, sirens,
meep-meeps, and

"Dive! Dive!" from one of the larger robots as the insectoids spun
across the floor. The noise was deafening.

Pandemonium. Soldiers leapt onto chairs and scrambled onto tables. One
opened the door and fled. Another tried stamping on a particularly
nasty-looking robot.

The third programming command--defend yourself. Little hooks popped from
the ends of the tentacles, and the insectoid swarmed up the soldier's
leg. He screamed and tried to bat it away.

Zammit grabbed the pistol from his jacket and hit Yildiz as hard as he
could across the back of the head, then seized him by the collar and
dragged him down the hall to the elevators. One was open. Soldiers
rounded the corner. Zammit snapped off two shots and punched the button
for the underground garage. The doors swished shut. He searched the
colonel's uniform. Car keys, fastened to a plastic tag with a stall
number. He fished in the left pocket of his chinos and found what he
wanted. He held up the little white tablet.

Population Control Sedative. POCS.

What would be the optimal delivery system for such a drug in pill form?

Ingested drugs had to be absorbed through the intestinal wall. Too long.
You'd want it to work instantly. Also, pills could be spat out.

Not the stomach and intestine.

The thin membranes of the mouth. As Yildiz moaned, he decided. He forced
open the Turk's jaws and tucked the pill between his cheek and gum. It
started dissolving instantly. The doors swished open. Zammit heaved the
man to his feet and dragged him to the car. He threw him into the
passenger seat and got behind the wheel. The engine roared to life.
Tires squealing, he shot toward the exit ramp. People were running after
the car and converging near the exit. There was a burst of gunfire
behind him. He flinched as bullets stitched holes in the trunk. The car
smashed through the barricade and onto the street.

It was evening, and rush-hour traffic was over. Zammit thought about
what he had to do. He glanced at Yildiz. The Turk was upright but
motionless. He had an odd look on his face, eyes vacant and alert at the
same time. Zammit remembered Yasmin, and what Jamal had said. Were the
pills as strong as the liquid?

"Colonel. Lift your right arm and place your index finger on the
windshield."

Slowly, Yildiz obeyed.

"Nod twice if you think you are capable of following a complex
explanation." Two slow nods.

"Say yes if you can speak."

"Yes." The Turk's voice was toneless. Zammit's lips tightened. This
demonstration of POCS's power provided a sickening illustration of what
could have happened to Frankie. He drove through the Beyoglu district,
heading out of Asia toward the European part of Istanbul. Traffic was
light. He crossed the Ataturk Bridge and turned onto Ordu Cadessi. To
his left he could see the Beyazit Tower. Straight ahead were the Topkapi
Palace, the Blue Mosque, and the rose-red church called Hagia Sophia,
the Church of Holy Wisdom, now a museum. As he drove, he talked nonstop
to Yildiz, eyes searching. Finally he saw it and pulled over.

"Stay here."

It was a bus station with a big yellow sign and the black letters PTT,
which meant a bank of public telephones. For a few Turkish lira he
bought a plastic and metal telephone debit card known as a tele kart
Walking to one of the yellow phones, he inserted the card and dialed the
only member of the INERT team still in Istanbul.

"Connie? Zammit. We got trouble. You're going to have to help me." He
explained how he had escaped from Turkish Intelligence headquarters.

"No, I can't tell you where I am and you can't come and get me. Every
police officer and soldier in this city is after me. I have a better
idea. You know Hagia Sophia? About 400 yards from the Blue Mosque.

It's rose-red and has four minarets around it, like spacecraft about to
launch? Good. There's a park with flower gardens and a big pool with a
fountain. Meet me at the fountain in half an hour." He hung up.

Wearily he climbed back into the car. Yildiz was still motionless. He
wondered how long the effects of the drug lasted. Zammit leaned back,
fighting a fatigue so deep he thought it might stop his heart. He rubbed
his face. With clinical detachment he noticed that his right hand was
trembling, as if with palsy. He tried to remember the last time he had
eaten anything and couldn't. He looked at his face in the mirror, the
bruises and cuts, the deep lines, the utter exhaustion. If he could just
hold himself together for a little longer. Miles to go before I sleep.
He turned the key in the ignition.

"Showtime," he whispered.

Zammit parked the car along the avenue of small shops in front of Hagia
Sophia.

He talked rapidly to Colonel Yildiz, hoping he understood everything
he'd been told.

As he got out of the car, his right leg buckled and he fell to the
pavement.

With an effort he stood. He leaned into the vehicle before shutting the
door.

"Stay here."

He walked down the street, concentrating on putting one foot in front of
the other. He crossed Alemdar Cadessi, the broad boulevard in front of
Hagia Sophia, and headed for the park. At this time of night there
weren't many people around.

A slight breeze rustled the trees. The sweet smell of roses was
overpowering.

Dew sparkled on the grass, a fairy spill of tiny silver sequins. A fall
moon hung in the sky like a giant pearl snuggled on blue velvet. Shadows
and moonlight played with each other. Chiaroscuro. The contest of
darkness and light. Where one ruled, the other could not. He had a
sickening flashback to what might have happened to Frankie, the video of
Adam, the horror that was Abdul Jamal. He found the big pool with the
fountain and stepped into the vegetation nearby. Hidden, he leaned
against a tree trunk, waiting for Connie Palaeov. He knew he was
standing on some of the most blood-stained ground in history. Blood
pounded in his ears. In his exhaustion, he thought he could hear 2,000
years' worth of spectral screams. So many deaths, so much senseless
ugliness in the world.

He remembered what Grand Master Fortucci had said evil exists, and we
have always fought it. Aunt Julia had said. You're a knight of the
Order. That toughness is in your blood, and you will need it someday.

He needed it now. He checked himself out, piece by piece. His legs were
rubbery, his right hand still shaking. He felt faint. Methodically he
visited his physical and spiritual wells and noted, for the first time
in his life, that they were dry. He had nothing left.

He closed his eyes. You're a scientist. Figure it out. Slowly his eyes
opened as he remembered. The only option. He reached into the right-hand
pocket of his chinos and took out the little white tablet.

Aggressor.

He used his broken left hand to steady his right as he opened his mouth
and slipped the pill between gum and cheek. He closed his eyes.

Nothing. Noth ... A neutron star exploded in his body. A burst of energy
filled him, and a strange neon-lit curtain rose in his brain. He opened
his eyes. Everything was sharper, clearer, more definite than it had
ever been. He could see in the dark. He could hear sounds he'd never
heard before. He flexed his right hand. No more trembling. He flexed his
broken left hand, inside the cast. No pain.

His sea-blue eyes glowed, and his head shot up like a panther's at the
rustling sound of approaching footsteps.

Zammit stepped from the shadows. Startled, Constantine Palaeov whirled
around.

"Hello, Connie. Betrayed anyone lately?"

The young Russian faced him warily.

"What are you talking about?"

"Cut the crap. I know it was you."

Palaeov looked him up and down.

"So you figured it out. Jamal said you were smart." The light in
Palaeov's eyes was not quite sane.

"It took me far too long to realize I was harboring the viper in my
bosom."

"I was careful. What gave it away?"

"Little things. Jamal always being several steps ahead of me, knowing my
every move. When technicians went to fetch Ruslan Glinka at the dam, he
was on the phone. The instant he saw them he tried to run. He was on the
phone with you, wasn't he? You were warning him that we'd figured out
his involvement and to get the hell out of there."

"Yes."

"All the samples coming from the reservoir being contaminated. You were
supervising the collection of samples. You also destroyed the original
samples at Urfa."

"Yes."

"It wasn't just you. Jamal made mistakes. In Tuvanistan. People freak
out the first time they see Catula. Jamal didn't. When he saw the robot
and Anastasia's white Persian going after each other, he shouted, "Get
that cat out of here!"

How did he know the robots even existed, and how did he know Catula
hates cats?

Somebody told him."

"That wasn't very smart of Abdul," said Palaeov.

"Other things. When I told him about the blocks of coins in the
underground temple, he knew I was unconscious when I was brought there
and that I escaped at night. How did he know that? Him saying, "We
wondered where you went." Who's 'we'?"

"My opinion of the man is dropping like a stone," said Palaeov,
surveying the area. He flexed an arm and his biceps bulged.

Connie was bored with talking. Zammit waited, arms loose at his sides,
trying to quiet the raging tide of adrenaline in his system.

"Where's Jamal?"

"He wanted to be here, but he's not feeling well. Dr. Richards popped
one of his testicles."

"Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy," said Zammit.

"The final piece fell into place when Yildiz arrested me. Frankie told
you to brief him about the antidote.

I can only imagine what concoction of lies you told him. He asked how
the RAA assassination team knew Amurkhan was going to be meeting him at
the Hilton. She knew, he knew, and I knew. You knew because I told you.
I've had a feeling for a long time that pieces of a puzzle weren't
fitting together, but now most of them are. The only reason we were able
to break into Talitsa-4 and steal the antidote is because it all
happened so fast and in such secrecy that you didn't know.

What was the purpose of having Edward G. Pompo and me together on the
Molly Katz show?"

Connie grinned.

"That was an accident. Earl Stone booked you on at the last minute, when
he learned you were coming back from Dzerzhinsk. Synchronicity is a
strange thing. Man, Pompo was angry at the way you humiliated him."

"Why did you do this, Connie?"

"It was Jamal's idea. He even wrote the letter I sent you, begging to be
hired.

He said you'd hire me because you're a do-gooder, and do-gooders are
trusting and easy to manipulate. He knew they'd bring you in to solve
the cyanobacteria.

We needed some way of keeping an eye on you."

"I'll repeat the question. Why did you do this?"

"For the reasons I just mentioned. Besides, according to the prophecy, I
must prove myself against a worthy opponent."

"What are you talking about?"

"I am the Holy Chosen One. The direct descendant of the last Byzantine
Emperor, Constantine XI Palaeologus Dragases. He supposedly died on May
29, 1453, but his body was never found. That's because he escaped.

First to the Despotate of Morea, badly wounded and raving. When Mehmet
II captured Morea, he was taken to the monastery of St ... Sava, near
Kemerovo, way on the other side of the Urals. He was off his head for a
long time, couldn't speak. Eventually had a son with a local girl named
Natalka, so the dynastic line was continued."

"That is the biggest load of crap I have ever heard in my life," said
Zammit.

"It's true." Palaeov's gaze was appraising. He flexed his other arm.

"The monastery's had the last emperor's personal possessions stored
there ever since.

It's all in The Secret Chronicle, by Nestor. See this?" The heavy gold
signet ring gleamed in the moonlight.

"The last emperor's personal seal."

"You shouldn't read fiction, Connie, if you're going to mistake it for
real life."

"It's not fiction. It is destiny. It is foretold."

"Why now? Why you? It's been over 500 years since the fall of
Constantinople."

"The timing was never right." Palaeov was moving, toward an open area.

"Monks aren't much good at organization, and they don't have armies.

It's happening now because of the chaos in Russia. It allowed Lazar
Smegyev to get established. His ability to raise the dead appeals to
people. It was Bled who bribed members of the Duma to ban proselytizing
by foreign missionaries, which is how Smegyev was able to flourish.

Lazar is from the St ... Sava monastery, so he knows about all this
history. When Bled joined the cult, Smegyev let him in on the secret.

Bled was doing business with Jamal, which is how Jamal found out. As I
said, monks aren't much good at large-scale organization. Jamal brokered
the whole deal."

"So what happens now?" asked Zammit.

Palaeov glanced at his watch.

"Midnight attack. Bled invades in less than two hours. He will win. I
will be crowned emperor of the new Byzantium." He pointed at the vast
bulk of rose-red Hagia Sophia, looming in the darkness.

"In there.

Nothing can stop us."

"I wouldn't be too sure," said Zammit.

The big Russian stopped his slow circling.

"The prophecy says I must prove myself against a worthy opponent. Jamal
said you are worthy, and I agree with him. But the only way to truly
prove myself is in battle."

Zammit waited. The muscles in his legs were twitching spastically. He
was clenching and unclenching his right hand.

The Russian grinned.

"They told me to wait for Wurban Ice, just in case. But I'm bigger,
stronger, and younger than you. You're tired, you're hurt, and you're
old. I'm going to beat you to death."

"Connie, I wouldn't bet the farm on that."

Palaeov lunged. Zammit stepped to his right and threw his first punch.

They fought for a long time. Zammit found he could move faster than he
had ever moved in his life. Palaeov wasn't a trained fighter, but even
though he was muscle-bound and slow, the Russian outweighed him by at
least fifty pounds and had a chin like concrete. And the Aggressor in
Zammit's system couldn't restore the structural integrity of his left
hand. He could feel broken bones grinding against each other. The hand
was now not just broken but shattered. Throwing lefts was as effective
as throwing porridge. Palaeov tried grappling, wrestling, using his size
to get Zammit on the ground. The scientist refused to go down. He seized
the Russian's right arm, braced the elbow against his knee, and pulled
backward. Palaeov screamed as his elbow broke. Zammit got behind him.
Choke hold. The huge muscles of the Russian's left arm strained as he
tugged in vain at Zammit's arm. He rammed his elbow into Zammit's
ribcage. No pain. He started clawing frantically. Zammit could feel the
writhing body against him, smell the Russian's sweat. He squeezed
harder. Just as Palaeov was about to go limp, Zammit heard a sound.

He turned. A squat figure was plodding toward him. Whiteblond hair, a
man built like a 350-pound fireplug. Wurban Ice. Zammit let go of
Palaeov. A spike of incandescent rage shot through him. He threw an
overhand right at Ice, so hard it stopped him in his tracks. Zammit
lifted the Hungarian off the ground and hurled him. He landed near a
stone bench. The moaning Russian was getting to his feet. Suddenly
Zammit saw a figure lurching toward them. Yildiz. His motions were
jerky, his balance uncertain. But he was moving toward Palaeov, and he
had a pistol in his hand. As the Turk threw himself at the Russian,
Zammit lunged at Ice. Jamal's bodyguard slipped on the grass and fell.

Zammit tipped over the heavy stone bench as easily as if it were
plywood, pinning the Hungarian's legs.

He straddled Ice and started hitting him with his right fist. The karate
expert was hammering him with his hands, but Zammit didn't feel any
pain. It was as though his entire system were screaming with rage.

He rode the Hungarian like a cowboy on a bull. Was it possible to punch
your way to China? It seemed like a good idea. He closed his eyes and
tried.

He wasn't sure how long he was at it, but slowly he became aware that
someone was calling his name. He stopped and looked over. It was Yildiz.
He was leaning against a tree, his pistol pointed at Palaeov.

The Russian was whimpering on the ground and clutching his elbow.

"Dr. Zammit, I believe he has been dead for some time."

He looked down. Where Ice's head should have been, there was a pile of
raw meat with some splinters of white bone poking through. He wiped his
bloody hands on the Hungarian's clothes and stood. He wasn't even
breathing hard. He walked over to Yildiz. The Turk's eyes were still
strange. Zammit realized the colossal effort of will it must have taken
him to fight through the effects of the drug and come to his aid.

"Thanks, Yildiz."

"The name's Hakim. Call my people. We'll take him to headquarters and--"

"No, we won't," said Zammit. He seized the pistol from the Turk's hand
and faced Palaeov.

"My friends were hurt. Frankie almost spent the rest of her life as a
sex slave. Twenty thousand people are dead and thousands more sick. The
world may die. Somebody has to pay for all that. Razborka." He raised
the gun.

"Show muscles, Connie. I told you they were no good." He shot the Holy
Chosen One between the eyes.

Ataturk Dam, September 11

Zammit gazed at the carpet of cyanobacteria. It glistened under the hot
sun as if coated with oil. In the heat, the stink was overpowering.

Cairo Jackson was standing beside him, holding a padded laptop bag.

Superaware because of the Aggressor still in his system, Zammit could
tell the big man was spending more time casting sideways glances at him
than looking at the fetid contamination in the reservoir. Getting
cleaned up before leaving Istanbul, Zammit had looked in a mirror. It
had taken him a few moments to realize he was looking at himself.

"So that's the situation," said Jackson.

"The cargo planes arrived from the secret cities with another forty tons
of antidote. Radchuk's people found every member of Bled's invasion
force sitting at the controls of their weapons, staring vacantly into
space. Bled's committed suicide, Smegyev and Pompo have been arrested,
and the Syrians and Iraqis have given up. Tell me again how you did it."

"The warehouse in Talitsa-4. The drums of bio weapon antidote, POCS, and
Aggressor. I examined the pills bouncing down the conveyor belts.

In his rush to manufacture the stuff, Cabrinovic failed to add any
coloring to the pills or stamp marks on them so they could be
distinguished from each other. To the naked eye, the sedative and
amphetamine tablets were identical. I noticed a heat gun on a workbench.
As Morgan and Costopoulos kept everyone away from the loading area, I
melted the labels off the drums and switched them around. Bled's troops
took the sedative. How's Yildiz?"

"Looks stunned, says he has a crashing headache. How do you feel?"

"I could sip hot lead and spit out rivets."

"Obviously they made Aggressor more potent than the sedative."

"Obviously."

Jackson gestured at the oily green mat that stretched to the horizon.

"With the defeat of the Iraqis and Syrians, the Turkish air force is
able to supply planes that can spray the two antidotes and drop
canisters under the water. But we can't stop the sporing. Frankie has
been running scenario after scenario. The stuff is going to anchor
itself in about four hours. Then it spores. Nothing can stop it. The
world will die."

"I refuse to be beaten by green slime," said Zammit.

Jackson held up the laptop.

"Mike, you want this? Run some scenarios yourself?"

He gazed at the huge white cast on his left hand. The physician in
Istanbul had looked at it and shaken his head, slopped iodine all over
it, muttered something about gangrene, given him a bottle of penicillin,
and offered morphine. Zammit had refused the morphine.

"If Frankie can't figure it out using a computer, neither can I. It's
going to tell me we've lost."

His mind raced. A muscle convulsed in his cheek. Jackson was watching
it. Zammit tried to stop the spastic twitch and couldn't.

"Planes fly. Birds fly."

Jackson's eyes searched his battered face.

"Mike, you are scaring the hell out of me. What are you talking about?"

"You know how much Stay hates computers. He once said, "Planes and birds
fly, but the way they fly couldn't be more different. A plane is a
machine. It flies through the power of its engines and clever
engineering of the wings. Birds fly because they're born that way. A
bird can go places aircraft never could. A computer is just a machine
that operates through sheer calculating power." My brain is like a bird.
It can do things that laptop can't. For example, lateral thinking. I'm
going to let my imagination fly."

Jackson's eyes searched his.

"What do you want?"

"A pad of paper, some pencils, and thirty minutes of solitude."

They took the elevator up to Yildiz's office. Zammit told Jackson to
gather everyone in the boardroom down the hall and wait. He sat and
stared at the walls, then started drawing aimlessly on the paper. After
a few moments, he realized he'd broken the nib and was tearing through
several sheets at once, so he stopped. He closed his eyes. His mind
strobed, images flashing crazily.

His parents, dead at sea in a winter storm, drowned in their yacht.

Drowned in water. Birds. Planes. Flying. Wings. Spores developing wings.
The spores were the result of fruiting bodies. Bodies. Palaeov and Ice.
Cutting bodies. Cutting open Costopoulos to reinflate the lung, on the
IL-76. How did planes fail in the air? Cracks in the airframe. Weak.
Metal fatigue, leading to shearing. The cyanobacteria floated on the
water like a carpet. Carpets. Some were made by shearing the wool. He
gazed at the cast on his hand. Weak. Shearing.

Pulverized.

He had it.

Zammit burst through the boardroom door with such force he threw it off
its hinges. He was aware of it leaning crazily. Everyone in the room was
looking at him as if he were crazy. Aggressor. He knew he was talking
too loudly.

"How do you deal with a carpet of contamination? Carpet bombing!"

He seized a piece of chalk and started hacking at the blackboard.

"Frankie said that until the filaments anchor themselves, they're
delicate. Weak. If they can't anchor themselves, the cyanobacteria can't
spore. The war is over.

Colonel, how close are the nearest bomber forces?"

Yildiz was pale but seemed alert.

"Twenty minutes' flight time away, near the Syrian border."

"Give the order for every bomber within 500 miles to arrive here, with
depth charges, bombs of any sort."

The chalk kept breaking. He hurled it across the room.

"The cyanobacteria is already dying because we've stopped feeding it.

The explosions from the bombing will shear the filaments, pulverize
them, turn them into slurry. They won't be able to anchor, so it can't
spore. We have the antidotes. All we have to do is spray them."

Jackson protested.

"Bombing will destroy the filaments, but it will also break open the
fruiting bodies. That will release the spores anyway."

Zammit turned to Frankie Richards.

"You said the wings are the last things to develop on the spores."

She looked at him warily.

"Yes."

"Have the wings developed yet?"

"No. It'll be another three hours, as far as I can tell."

"Good. We carpet bomb the reservoir. The fruiting bodies may break open,
but the spores don't yet have wings, so they can't fly. They fall into
the water and drown. The antidotes destroy them, neutralize any
remaining cyanobacteria and toxin, and make the water drinkable."

Dead silence.

"Move!" roared Zammit.

Everyone scrambled.

"Yildiz. A word."

As the others left the room, the Turk said, "It's Hakim. You look like a
madman.

What do you want?"

"Patrols. Within a thirty-minute flight radius of here, due west and
southwest. Any unusual movement, any unusual presence, you report it to
me.

I also want a chopper on standby for my personal use."

"What for?"

"Just do it."

From the dam's crest, Zammit watched the motley collection of heavy
bombers, crop dusters, and fighter planes make endless passes over the
reservoir. He held his hands (over his ears. Aggressor made everything
brighter and louder than it would ordinarily be, and the sound of
screaming engines and explosions was painfully loud. The cyanobacterial
carpet floating on the water seethed like green scum in a boiling pot.

He had supervised the loading of the antidote onto the planes. Depth
charges, missiles, spray canisters, all had their guts modified to carry
a load of miniscule sugar beads. It was a patchwork job, as each weapon
was fitted with timed explosive charges. Dangerous, improvised work, but
nothing had blown up in anyone's face, run after screaming run, bomb
after bomb, as the green carpet heaved and geysers of oily green muck
shot twenty feet into the air, then collapsed with a wet splat. In his
super aware state, he thought he could actually see the color shift as
the cyanobacteria was destroyed.

Cairo Jackson bounded up.

"How's it working?" asked Zammit.

"Couldn't be better. Yildiz sends a message."

"I'm listening."

"Couple of cargo planes and helicopters spotted by a patrol about thirty
minutes from here, due west. Desolate area. Nonmilitary aircraft. He
said you'd want to know."

Zammit nodded.

"Everything here is under control. Only one more thing to do."

"Am I reading this right?"

"About why those planes and helicopters are at the underground temple?

Yes. In his insane greediness, he couldn't resist."

"You've taken that amphetamine. God knows how long the effect will last,
but it can't be much longer. It's taken you way up, and when it wears
off, you're going to crash and burn. Way down. Someone has to be there
to catch you when you fall."

"I know," said Zammit.

"I don't care. Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord."

"We're going to find him sooner or later. Doesn't matter if we get him
now. You're on the verge of complete collapse. I refuse to let you kill
yourself."

"I don't care. Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord."

The big man looked deep in his eyes.

"Ask yourself the question General Custer should have asked himself
before the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Is this the hill you want to
die on?"

Zammit's face was a carved mask of aggression, exhaustion, and misery.

"Yes."

Cairo shrugged.

"OK. Let's go."

"I'm not asking you to die with me."

"You're not asking. I'm volunteering. We've known each other since we
were kids.

This is personal for me too."

Five minutes later they were in a Huey, thundering west. Zammit had paid
a visit to the storage area as Jackson collected weapons and
flashlights. Yildiz wanted to send soldiers with them, but Zammit
explained that the underground temple was a labyrinth designed to kill
intruders: "The last thing we need is a stomping herd of soldiers
falling through holes in the floor. Stealth is the best way to deal with
this."

"It isn't working!" shouted Jackson.

"There's no signal from the metal detector you jammed into the crevice
by the entrance!"

"Jamal's probably removed it or turned it off. Doesn't matter. Grab
those binoculars."

"What am I looking for?"

"I paid close attention to our flight path when you rescued me after I
escaped.

The landscape is all brown. Look for a formation of stones and boulders
about ten feet high and a depression in the ground 200 yards to the east
of it. In the depression, there will be two white plastic distilled
water containers."

Twenty minutes later, Jackson shouted, "I see them!"

The Huey landed, dust swirling in choking clouds. Zammit's sea-blue eyes
glowed through the murk as he leapt to the ground. They headed for the
entrance to the underground temple.

"How did you get out of here without a flashlight?" panted Jackson.

They darted down the corridor, beams of light swinging crazily. They
tried to move fast awhile avoiding the holes in the floor. Rough 'yellow
stone, shadows, dust, and stifling air seemed to squeeze against them
like a physical presence.

"We're heading to the temple's central shrine," gasped Zammit.

"That's where the treasures are stored. Jamal will have people with him.
It's going to be hard for him to move all that stuff in this trap.

He's a meticulous planner, so be prepared for anything."

"Where are his choppers and cargo planes? There were no aircraft by the
temple entrance."

"Probably did a quick mapping tour of the temple complex and found an
entry more suitable for moving the loot."

"Why do you keep looking up at the roof?" asked Jackson.

Zammit pointed to his left.

"Near the ceiling. The red fluorescent arrows. I used a felt-tipped
marker when I escaped the first time." He grasped Cairo's arm.

"We're getting close."

They extinguished their flashlights and pressed against the wall. Lights
and movement. Dim figures, half-hidden by swirls of dust, wrestled with
dollies and carts laden with statues and blocks of fused coins. The
sound of voices, as they crept down the corridor. There were portable
lights in the central shrine.

Zammit waited until a group of men left with a burden of treasure and
silence fell. He stepped into the stone room. A yawning space of
roughhewn yellow stone, a vault rising into the gloom like a primeval
cathedral. Crude oblong niches hacked in the rock. The statues they had
contained were gone. Only two blocks of coins were left among the debris
littering the floor.

Dressed in a black aviator's suit, Abdul Jamal had his back to them, a
gun in one hand, a cane in the other. He was contemplating the bronze
statue of a Greek goddess, her weight resting gracefully on her left hip
as she gazed sightlessly at him. The whites of her eyes were alabaster,
the irises made of emerald or jade.

"Hello, Abdul," said Zammit.

"Having a little trouble getting it up lately? At least you can't hurt a
woman made of bronze."

The Omani slowly turned. His face was gaunt and had a greenish tinge in
the flaring lights. With a visible effort he composed himself. His voice
was thin.

"Why am I surprised? How did you find this place again, once I removed
the metal detector?"

"White plastic and distilled water. You figure it out. I'm not in an
explaining mood."

"I understand you managed to kill both Ice and Palaeov. I am impressed.

How?"

"Aggressor."

"I see. Well, you must at least allow me credit for inventing good
drugs." He peered more closely.

"I notice you are twitching a little. Dr. Zammit. I've never tried it
myself, but I understand the aftereffects of Aggressor are singularly
unpleasant. Including flashbacks that can last for years. That didn't
bother us at the testing stage, since the drug was to be administered to
soldiers in continuous doses until their hearts burst or their brains
failed.

They're just soldiers--it's their job to die."

Zammit gestured at the remaining treasure in the room.

"Where?"

"I have another refuge. It's not Paris, or even Blavatsk, but it will do
for the time being. I always have a fallback position."

"So I've noticed," said Zammit.

"It's taken me a while to figure that out. When dealing with someone
like you, I need one too."

He heard the sound of stealthy footsteps creeping down the corridor. He
glanced at Cairo Jackson, staring at Jamal with loathing. But without
the super awareness of Aggressor, the big man couldn't hear the
approaching enemy. Zammit fanned through his options as if they were
cards in a poker hand, and made a decision.

He waited, trying to quell the convulsing muscle in his cheek. Suddenly
five of Jamal's men darted into the room, machine guns at the ready. Too
many. Jamal said, "Unless you feel like the Earp brothers at the OK
Corral, I suggest you surrender your weapons." Wordlessly he and Cairo
handed over their guns.

Jamal's eyes narrowed.

"You have a fallback position in a situation like this?"

He raised his pistol and aimed.

"I can't even imagine what it is. I should have killed you immediately.

Should I ever run across anyone like you again, I will not make the same
mistake."

What Costopoulos had said. Use the man's ego against him.

"You're like Napoleon," said Zammit.

The Omani gave a wary smile and lowered the gun.

"Goodness, a compliment."

"It isn't intended as one. Napoleon's career rested on the bodies of two
million Frenchmen, whom he murdered in his insane quest for personal
glory. Even when exiled to Elba, he managed to escape and return to
France. I forget how many soldiers died at Waterloo. As long as he was
alive, he was a danger. Same with you."

Jamal shrugged.

"History doesn't care whether you're a nice guy. We make our own
destiny. The purpose of life is existence, and the price is violence.

Nature, red in tooth and claw. To act is to exist."

Zammit looked around the room. Five heavily armed men, plus Jamal.

Jackson and himself, defenseless. You're a scientist. Figure it out.

He gestured.

"May I? As one connoisseur to another?"

The Omani's eyes were wary.

"Yes. But very, very slowly."

He watched Zammit examine the glittering block of fused coins near the
oracle niche.

"Beautiful, isn't it?"

"Yes." Zammit stepped into the oracle niche, as if examining the walls.

Slowly he lowered himself onto the stone throne where the priest would
have sat. The niche was virtually identical to the one in the Hypogeum
on Malta, the one excavated by his great grandfather Sir Themistocles.

He looked above his head and saw a hole. The male oracle would have sat
on this throne and spoken during religious ceremonies, in a normal tone
of voice. The bizarre acoustical properties of the place would have
served to echo his words throughout the vast circular temple. He thought
of Radchuk and his cone of silence. This was the reverse. He'd always
wondered if the acoustical effect was as spectacular as rumored.

He was about to find out.

"So, you won't tell me where you are taking all the treasure you're
stealing from the central shrine of this temple? Where your next refuge
is?" In his super aware state, he thought he heard a faraway resonance,
like the ringing of a deep, sonorous bell.

"No. But it doesn't matter. As with everyplace else, my refuge will be
filled with useful idiots. Such people make up most of the human race.

I'll come up with another plan. It's like Bled, the drunken fool. He was
worried he would be seen as a traitor to his country. Can you believe
anything so stupid? What's that saying?"

Zammit remembered."

"Treason doth never prosper, for if it does, none dare call it treason."

"I've always enjoyed associating with well-read people. We are alike,
you and I, despite your resistance to the idea. Perhaps we could have
been friends. Talked about books, had some laughs, planned how to
conquer the world."

"Not a chance," said Zammit.

"We are not alike.

"What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, if he loses his own
soul?"

" Jamal sighed.

"Sir Thomas More. To be beheaded because you disapprove of Henry VIII's
divorce. Religion--it's not good to take it so seriously. You're a
Knight of Malta. You believe things I do not. People are animals. The
concept of the soul was an invention of the ancient Greeks, an
intellectual artifact, an attempt to give meaning to an existence that
is meaningless."

"We've been down this road before. I'm tired of this conversation."

"You cannot refute me, so you avoid the issue. You're a scientist, yet
you live like a monk. Celibate and alone. You've never had sex with D.r
... Richards?"

"No. I prefer to make love."

Jamal shook his head.

"Making love. Never grasped the concept."

"That video of Adam Richards. What happened to him? Is he alive?"

"My little secret. Tell Frances I said so. I like the idea of her waking
and screaming at four in the morning."

From his seat on the stone throne, Zammit saw a lithe figure slip into
the room.

It had worked.

He rose and stepped from the oracle niche. He could hear other
approaching steps, footsteps the others couldn't hear. There was a
sudden spasm in his abdomen. The spastic twitch in his face was getting
worse. His right hand was starting to shake. Aggressor was wearing off.
Just a little longer. Miles to go before I sleep.

He spoke to the shadowy figure.

"I hope I didn't hurt you when I escaped."

Sultana stepped into the light, muscles tense.

"No." Her pale gray eyes appraised Zammit.

"I was half a mile from here, and I heard your voice as clearly as if
you were standing next to me."

"Fallback position," said Jamal.

"Oh, this is rich."

Sultana's eyes flicked to Cairo Jackson, then to the guards, then to
Jamal. As she got a good look at the Omani, her face settled into a mask
of rage and hatred.

"You!"

"Hello, sweetheart," said Jamal.

"Long time. I always wondered what happened to you. Bulked up a bit, I
see."

He turned to Zammit.

"She was a favorite of mine. When she tried to kill herself, I made the
mistake of sending her to a hospital, where she escaped. The only one
ever to do so. The perils of fondness. I should never let my good nature
get in the way."

Men lunged into the room. Flowing trousers, tight bomber jackets, wide
sashes, and coiled turbans. Wild, romantic countenances, with hooked
noses, great shocks of long black hair, and dark, intense eyes. Sultana
shouted something in Kurdish, and the PKK members aimed their AK-47s at
Jamal's men. The burst of gunfire was deafening.

Zammit grabbed Sultana's hand and ducked as he ran from the room. Cairo
Jackson followed. They headed down a stone corridor, their flashlights
throwing crazy beams of light. Zammit could hear footsteps in pursuit.

Their footfalls thudded as they dashed down the corridor, leaping over
and around floor holes as if in some lethal obstacle course. As they
passed an intersection. Sultana panted, "How do you know where you're
going?"

Zammit pointed at the fluorescent red arrows near the ceiling. He looked
over his shoulder at the lone flashlight beam and pursuing figure thirty
yards behind.

"Jamal can't follow fast. Doesn't know about the arrows, and he's hurt.

He ... "

Zammit stumbled, his legs rubbery. Aggressor was wearing off. His
exhausted body was burning out. Cairo and Sultana hauled him to his feet
and they lurched forward. There was no sound except the scraping of
their feet, labored breathing, the footfalls behind. Zammit's balance
was going. He almost plunged through holes in the floor, saved only by
Cairo and Sultana as they held on to his arms. Cones of light shot
through the darkness as they staggered down the hallway like some
crippled tripartite beast.

Suddenly they inhaled sweet fresh air. The corridor started to slant
steeply upward. Zammit was being half-dragged. Ahead, a dim light
illuminated a set of carved stone stairs. They divided at the top, with
a broad set of steps angling around to the right and out of sight. The
other set was narrow, crudely carved, and twisted away to the left,
appearing to vanish into nothingness.

Sultana and Cairo started up the right-hand set of stairs.

"No," whispered Zammit.

"Other one."

"Mike, that can't be right," said Cairo.

"You can see that " With his remaining strength, Zammit forced them to
stop their ascent.

"Other one." He looked behind him. Jamal was close behind.

"Now." He seized their hands and forced them. He dragged them up the
narrow, uneven steps that angled sharply to the left and disappeared
into darkness. They turned the corner and pressed their bodies to the
rough stone wall.

Thudding footsteps, the sound of panting. The footfalls stopped. They
saw a beam of light flashing from one staircase to the other, heard
labored breathing. Then the scrape of boots on stone.

Jamal had chosen the right-hand staircase.

Silence. Then a grunt, and a crashing sound, as if something heavy had
fallen into something deep.

Zammit staggered to the bottom of the steps. Both hands against the
wall, he slowly mounted the right-hand stairwell.

"Careful," he whispered over his shoulder.

They peered around the corner. There, on the final step, were Jamal's
cane, his gun, and his flashlight. Cairo's beam searched the emptiness,
found the sheer drop into the narrow, smooth-walled rock chamber. He
leaned over and peered.

"It's like the opening of a very deep coffin."

"That's what it is," said Zammit. He leaned over and gazed into the
opening of the crypt. His hand was trembling so much he had trouble
holding the flashlight.

Twenty feet below, Jamal was lying on a carpet of rags and bones. His
legs were twisted beneath him, his face contorted in pain and rage.

"Not even a professional rock climber could get out of that," said
Zammit. He dropped the flashlight into the crypt and called down.

"So you can see what's about to happen to you. Vengeance is mine, sayeth
the Lord."

Back against the wall, legs buckling, he reached into his jacket and
removed the container.

"Jesus, Mike," said Jackson.

Zammit's eyes were desperate.

"Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord." His hand was shaking so badly he
was afraid he would drop it. He looked at Sultana, the muscular body,
the pale gray eyes, the broken nose, the scars.

He handed it to her.

"Razborka. Care to do the honors?"

"What is it?" she asked.

"A vial of smallpox. You have to pop the seals on top You'll hear a
hissing sound as the vacuum of the outer container dissipates. Remove
the inner container, the one with the virus. It's glass. Make sure you
throw it hard enough that it shatters on the stone."

He turned to Jackson.

"Cairo, grab that stone lid." The big man struggled with the heavy
rectangle as Sultana popped the seals. A sound like the hissing of a
deadly snake, then she held up the gleaming glass vial.

Zammit leaned once more over the crypt.

"Abdul. Company's coming. And it hasn't eaten in a long, long time."

He nodded at Sultana. She leaned and threw. The sound of breaking glass.
A rising scream from the crypt, suddenly muffled as Jackson wrestled the
stone lid on top of Jamal's coffin.

They both turned to him. They were saying words, but Zammit couldn't
hear. He tried to speak. His mouth moved but nothing came out. His body
sagged like a marionette whose strings were being cut, one by one.

He pitched forward and slammed face first into the dust.

Malta, December 31, soob

Epilogue

The party was in full swing.

Under a starlit sky, on the roof of the Lascaris fort, people sipped
Maltese wine, devoured Aunt Julia's hors d'oeuvres, and chatted. From
the beach below came shrieks as adventurous guests leapt into the cool
water. It was the annual INERT New Year's Eve party, the one Zammit
always held. Every year he flew his staff and friends to Malta, from
wherever they were in the world, for a big bash.

Frankie Richards stood by the satellite dish and watched the crowd.

Fergus Cronin was by the parapet talking with his girlfriend, Yasmin the
Circassian.

The Irishman was attentive and gentle with her. She had a fiery temper,
but she always seemed relaxed when he was around.

Frankie saw Sultana talking with Colonel Graves. Apart from occasionally
running a hand over her ebony hair, she was motionless, her pale gray
eyes never leaving his face. Her muscular body leaned toward his. Graves
was unusually animated, his face flushed. She couldn't hear what they
were saying, but their body language said it all. Sexual attraction was
an odd thing.

Sitting in the middle of the stone paving, like a group of kids, Jack
Morgan, Rocco Pullicino, Colonel Yildiz, Lloyd Lavender, Earl Stone, and
Grand Master Angelo Fortucci played with Catula. The robot had developed
an inexplicable fondness for chasing and retrieving Ping-Pong balls.
Perhaps that's why you hate cats so much, Frankie thought; your
mentality is essentially canine.

Kitson Kang arm-wrestled with Cairo Jackson, using both hands and all
his weight against the big man's right arm. Biceps bulging, Cairo was
winning.

Dikka Spargo, her facial hoops and studs glinting in the moonlight, was
dissecting a small robot, trying to explain things with her hands,
watched by Fedor Slavutych. The mechanic was fascinated by the
creatures. Tiny insectoids, eyes shining, plastic bodies glowing, roamed
everywhere on the stone floor, softly going "meep meep" whenever they
got too close to anyone. Dikka had been told to get rid of the loud
sound effects.

Yury Bogov, Vyacheslav Radchuk, and Irina Markova were leaning against
the parapet, chain-smoking cigarettes, sharing a bottle of vodka, and
rapidly getting drunk. Radchuk was laughing so hard he was bent double.

Finally he straightened and wiped his eyes, wheezing.

"Oh, that was a good one."

Frankie saw Markova grin at the two old spies, heard her speak in her
croaky, smoky voice as she fired up another cigarette.

"Ever hear about Brezhnev and his mother?"

The two men shook their heads, listening intently.

"Brezhnev lived the good life--big villa in Crimea, a dozen cars,
Cadillacs and Rolls Royces. Caviar and champagne all the time, expensive
suits from London.

One day Brezhnev brought his little old mother to the villa. She was a
peasant.

He showed her everything.

"Well, mama," he said proudly.

"What do you think?"

She said, "Leonid, this is all very nice. But what happens if the
Bolsheviks come to power?"

" The two men roared. Radchuk bent double again, clutching his side,
wiping his eyes.

"Oh, that was a good one," he wheezed.

"Remember about Krushchev, the crate of Georgia peaches, and Mao's
raincoat?" The three collapsed in laughter, snorting and giggling.

Frankie smiled sardonically. KGB humor. They staggered off, the men with
their arms around Markova, to fetch another bottle.

Two days before the election, Thamar Amurkhan had revealed she was still
alive.

She won in a landslide. The Iraqis and Syrians were back within their
own borders, imprisoned by a blockade of UN sanctions and watched by a
huge NATO force in the area. Pure water and hydroelectric power now
flowed from the Ataturk Dam. Russian authorities had raided the St ...

Sava monastery at Kemerovo where the Emperor Constantine's treasures had
been hidden for so long. There was an argument going on between the
Turkish and Russian governments over whom the treasure belonged to. They
had asked Mike Zammit to mediate. He had refused.

Disinfected and sealed, the underground temple was now being explored by
archaeologists.

Abdul Jamal turned out to be unusually susceptible to variola. He died
in an isolation ward, his only monument the fact that he was history's
last victim of smallpox. Unable to help him, physicians closely
monitored his condition.

Frankie had inadvertently seen a photograph on Zammit's desk and wished
she could erase the memory. The pustules covered his entire body, so
close together that each suppurating crater was touching the next. His
face looked as if someone had thrown a shovel full of putrefaction on
it. The virus had eaten into his mouth, creating a crazed grin. One of
his eyes had disappeared in a pool of pus, and the other shone with the
black light of utter madness. It was as if the rottenness of his soul
had somehow ascended to his face and found physical manifestation. The
doctors gave him morphine to deaden the pain, but it hadn't worked well.

At the end they decided to administer heroin. Zammit was informed of the
decision. After a few moment's silence, he agreed. Later, Frankie asked
him why. He had replied, "Because I am not like him," and turned away.

Mike Zammit spent three weeks in intensive care, after being airlifted
from the temple. The doctors had said he was in a state of physical and
emotional collapse, and they couldn't understand how he had been able to
function. Since getting out of the hospital, he hadn't eaten much and
had lost twenty pounds. He spent a lot of time in his office, the door
closed. Not knowing he was there, she had walked in once without
knocking. He was staring out the window, tears running down his face.

The aftereffects of Aggressor included mood swings, angry outbursts, and
emotional coldness. The doctors couldn't predict how long the
aftereffects would last. She was afraid the drug had changed Zammit
forever.

When he wasn't in his office, he was in the machine shop working on an
improved version of the micro lab Since the Ataturk crisis, the world
had been unusually quiet, and they hadn't had to deal with any large
disasters. Zammit's left hand had been reconstructed, the pulverized
metacarpals replaced with titanium rods held in place with pins. He had
started boxing again, now the hand was healed, and the cold fury with
which he attacked the heavy bag resounded through the gym at INERT
headquarters for hours on end, unnerving everyone.

Costopoulos sauntered over. There had been no complications from his
collapsed lung. He raised his glass to Frankie, looking deep into her
eyes.

"Not like you to be a wallflower."

His gaze flicked toward the gaunt figure leaning against the far
parapet, almost hidden in shadow.

"Maybe you could be wallflowers together."

She didn't reply. Since Zammit had gotten out of the hospital, she had
tried many times to talk with him the way they used to, to no avail.

Costopoulos raised his glass.

"Here's to the new year. Hope it's better than the last."

"Stay, what happens when the spirit dies?"

The Greek fell into a prolonged and brooding examination of his
wineglass.

Finally he said, "We are the same as our ancestors 100,000 years ago.

The emotions are the same. Hate. Fear. The need for respect. Love.

Certainly we've seen enough of hate and fear this past year."

She waited.

"The first man or woman to use their fingers to paint an animal with red
ochre deep in the Lascaux caves was expressing the eternal human desire
for meaning.

But all of it comes down to one thing in the end. One thing only."

"What's that?" She knew the answer.

Costopoulos gazed out over the sea glittering under the moon as the
winter waves crashed against the towering cliffs. She could tell he was
trying hard to help her.

"You know Sophocles? The Theban plays?"

"Yes."

"Oedipus at Co/onus. Written in the 5th century b c.

"One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life: that word is
love."

" His cynical brown eyes looked into her soul. He knew. She didn't say a
word.

"Not that I have to tell you about it." He lifted his chin at the
shadowy figure.

"Go to him. Explain. He must understand, or he will destroy himself.

I've tried, and so has Fortucci. He won't listen. The evil prosper, the
good die young. It's the way it is. He cannot wipe all the tears off all
the faces of all the people who are hurting in this world."

He waited for her response. She gave none. The Greek drained his glass.

"See you around." He walked away.

She watched the figure leaning on the parapet. The hard lines around the
eyes and mouth were deeper than before. She remembered what the dying
Roy Dool had said: "Life is a desperate business." And so it was.

She watched him as he watched the storming sea. She wanted to put her
arms around him, but she thought of her husband, his fate still unknown,
of Zammit speaking so sharply when she had tried to comfort him.

Everything between us has changed. He is changed, perhaps forever. She
watched him for a few moments, and decided.

Frankie Richards quietly turned and walked away. Zammit's eyes searched
the horizon, trying to understand the surging rage of the fathomless
ocean, as if it were sending him a message he might somehow be able to
interpret, if he could just listen for eternity.

AFTERWARD

How much of this is true?

The biological warfare agency Biopreparat exists. At its peak, it
employed some 60,000 scientists. It is part of a vast network of secret
cities across the former Soviet Union. The network was first established
in 1942 by Stalin's security chief Lavrenti Beria as part of the USSR's
fight against Hitler. Today, sixteen of the secret cities specialize in
nuclear or biological warfare research and production.

When all the Russian defense ministry's weapon-design facilities are
included, the total number of secret cities rises to eighty-seven.

Huge quantities of nuclear and biological warfare material have vanished
from these places since the demise of the Soviet Union. No one in the
West knows exactly what goes on in these secret cities, what stockpiles
of weapons exist, or who controls them.

Biopreparat's mandate is to take known biological warfare pathogens and
make them resistant to Western drugs. In 1994 work began on developing a
super plague a genetically engineered hybrid of smallpox and Ebola,
called black pox It is not known where this lethal organism is now
stored or who controls it.

There was an explosion at the Biopreparat facility in secret city
Sverdlovsk-17 in 1979 (Sverdlovsk is now called Ekaterinburg). This
resulted in a deadly release of weapons-grade anthrax. This is just one
of many accidents that have occurred in various of the secret cities
over the past half-century. As a result, Boris Yeltsin issued an
executive decree ordering the closure of Biopreparat and the cessation
of all bio war research. According to intelligence sources, this order
has been ignored. Not even the Russian president knows all that goes on
in the dark, corrupt world of his own country's increasingly
out-of-control military establishment.

All the technology described in this story exists now or is in
development.

After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, the body of the last Byzantine
Emperor was never identified with certainty. The last direct male heir
of the Palaeologus dynasty was Theodore, descended from the Emperor
Constantine's brother Thomas. Impoverished and obscure, Theodore died in
1636 in Cornwall, England. A cadet branch of the imperial line can still
be found today, living in southern Italy.

Russian ambitions to conquer Constantinople/Istanbul can be found in any
history book. Even today, right-wing politicians make rabid speeches
about it. As a condition of his empire's participation in World War I,
Nicholas II, the last tsar, demanded the city as a prize once the war
was won. The other Allied powers reluctantly agreed. Only the Bolshevik
Revolution prevented the achievement of this historic quest.

Russian religious cults are very strange. Russian organized crime--armed
with weapons stolen from huge military stockpiles-is the most vicious in
the world.

The Russia I describe is the chaotic Russia of today.

Malta and its history are as described. The modern Knights of Malta
exist. The Hypogeum, with its bizarre acoustic properties and sinister
traps, can be visited by any tourist, as can other megalithic temples
(in Turkey as well). The learned and much-beloved Sir Themistocles
Zammit (1864-1935) was a medical doctor as well as an archaeologist and
historian. He is credited with discovering the source of the deadly
bacteriological infection known as Malta Fever (the microbe Brucella
melitensis, which causes brucellosis).

The Ataturk Dam and reservoir exist, as does the rest of the vast
Southeastern Anatolia Development Project. I would like to see the 200
unexcavated ancient cities in the area examined by archaeologists before
the reservoir fills and they are drowned forever, but this is unlikely
to happen. Turkey has so much history that the government feels it can
afford to lose some if it means striving toward a better future. In
Istanbul, extremist members of the fundamentalist party want to turn
Hagia Sophia, the Church of Holy Wisdom, back into a mosque.

The Kurdish problem is an ongoing saga of violence and brutality, with
no end in sight. And no matter how much we might want to ignore the
fact, there are far more people in the world like Abdul Jamal, Vladimir
Bled, and the Popovs than it is comfortable to think about.

It is ironic that a planet consisting of two-thirds water is called
"Earth."

Seen from space, our planet seems rich in water, but only 2.5 percent is
freshwater, and much of that is inaccessible, locked away in glaciers
and ice caps. Less than one-hundredth of 1 percent of the world's water
is both drinkable and renewed annually through rain or snow. As Earth's
population grows over the next fifty years to 9 or 10 billion people
from the present 6 billion, water may become more precious than gold.

And, as this story describes, the world's worst water problems are in
the Middle East.

There will be a war over water in the Middle East within our lifetime.

It is inevitable. As the Turkish visionary Ishak Alaton says, "I firmly
believe that just as the 20th century was the century of oil, the 21st
century will be the century of water."

Just as inevitable as water wars is the use of biological warfare. I can
only quote Dr. Leonid Rvachev of the Russian Laboratory of
Epidemiological Cybernetics: "Terrorist use of biological weapons is not
a matter of if, but when."