Rogue Strike (A Troy Stark Thriller—Book #6), page 24
Troy reached to his calf, found the pant leg, and pulled it up.
His vision was starting to dim and go dark.
Troy stripped the knife away from his leg.
Everything was turning gray. There was no color anywhere.
Troy put the handle in his fist, and brought the knife blade up, and back towards himself. He plunged it into the man’s back.
The man straightened up, his mouth wide open in agony.
But he did not release Troy’s throat. Troy ripped the knife out, and plunged it in again. The man screamed this time, a howl of rage and pain.
Troy pulled the knife out and stabbed the man again. And again. He stabbed him high in the lungs. He stabbed him low in the kidneys. He brought the knife around and stabbed the man in the side. Again he stabbed him. Again.
The man's hands were weaker now. His eyes were growing dull. His face was a permanent grimace of pain. His shoulders went slack. His hands went limp and hung on either side of Troy's neck. Troy drove the knife into the man's back one more time.
Then he pushed him onto the floor, leaving the knife in.
Troy gasped for air. His breaths were rapid and shallow. His throat felt constricted, as if the man’s strong hands were still gripping it. Troy forced air all the way out, and then let it flow slowly back in, filling his lungs to the bottom. The guy had nearly killed him.
Troy made a sound like: "Aaaaaaahhhhhh."
He lay on his back, looking up. He noticed now that his heart was thumping in his chest, but beginning to slow. He was breathing. He was okay. He arm still hurt, a lot now, but it seemed like a very minor thing.
The woman and the blonde-haired guy were still standing over him. They looked at him as if he were an interesting bug that they had caught and placed in a jar. These must be the scientists who had created the deadly disease.
Troy gestured with his head. “Who was that guy?” It hurt his throat to talk.
The guy was sputtering, still alive, but he’d be dead in another minute or two.
Good.
“He was an assassin,” the woman said.
Troy nodded. “Yeah. That sounds right.”
Troy reached up and straightened his helmet. Now he could see the woman clearly, and with both eyes. He was in no mood for any more games. He swallowed. His throat worked. The saliva went down hard.
“If you try to pick up that gun again, I swear to God I’ll kill you.”
She shook her head. “I won’t pick it up.”
Troy pushed himself into a seated position. He wasn’t sure if he would be able to stand for a little while. The assassin was dead on the floor with him now, his body bleeding out. The tall man, gut shot, remained slumped over. He was starting to turn ashen in color.
“Stark?” Alex said over the helmet speaker.
Troy nodded. “Yeah.”
“I’m in the river. The chopper is dead.”
Troy nearly laughed. “Call the cops,” he said.
“I did. They’re already here.”
Troy sat still for a long moment. He could hear the sirens now, some far away, but some very close. Some sounded like normal police vehicles. Some sounded like fire engines. One or two were shrieking clarions, like air raid sirens.
They were beautiful sounds.
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO
February 6
1:05 am Eastern European Time
A Hospital
Timisoara, Romania
“Nice place,” Troy said under his breath.
He sat in a threadbare waiting room in an uncomfortable, metal framed chair. A dozen other similar chairs were taken, all facing forward toward a desk with two nurses sitting behind it. The light in here was bad, given off by sputtering yellow fluorescents in the drop ceiling overhead.
As protocols demanded, everyone in the place was wearing at least a paper medical mask on their face and rubber gloves. A few people - the ones who could acquire them - wore full face shields. The crisis wasn't over.
Even so, this dismal hospital was quiet. The outbreak had never reached here, and so the hospital had not been overrun.
Troy was waiting for them to give him permission to see Dubois, who was imprisoned in here somewhere. In the meantime, he pulled out Jan’s tablet computer. Jan was still sending him information, and if nothing else it was informative, and maybe a little entertaining. A stack of short videos had just come through.
One was playing on Troy’s screen at the moment. It showed a somewhat young looking, blonde-haired man, sitting in another threadbare room. He was at a desk, both hands fastened behind his back, answering questions from someone off-screen.
The man’s blue eyes were wild, wide open and frightened. He was wearing a mask, so there was no telling what his mouth was doing.
Troy had the sound down, but it didn’t matter. He wouldn’t be able to understand what was being said, and anyway, there were captions appearing that translated the dialogue into English.
At the bottom left of the screen, in small letters, it said:
Name: Robert Osgard.
AKA: None.
Place of Birth: Frankfurt, Germany.
Words were scrolling about halfway up the screen:
RO: “It’s too late now. The bacteria have gone around the world. There will be outbreaks that you cannot contain. I will not tell you where.”
Q: “What is the purpose of these attacks?”
RO: “To save the Earth, while there is still time.”
Q: “You will save the Earth by killing everyone on it, yes?”
On the screen, the blonde-haired man nodded. He seemed agitated. Being bound seemed to disagree with him.
RO: “Yes. Of course. Not everyone. Nearly everyone.”
Q: “You understand you are wanted for mass murder in the state of Moldova?”
What looked like tears were beginning to form at the corners of the man’s eyes.
RO: “Yes. I would assume that’s correct. But to be clear, I never…”
Q: “The Moldovan government has just voted to reinstate the death penalty.”
Troy nearly laughed. He switched to another video. In that one, a dark-haired woman sat at a wooden desk in yet another similar, threadbare, nondescript room. Eastern and Central Europe, the old communist world, were the kings of dated-looking offices.
The woman’s wrists were cuffed to a steel ring screwed into the heavy wood of the table. She wasn’t wearing a mask. She sat in a somewhat awkward position, pulled forward, but her dark eyes seemed relaxed. She was pretty. A wisp of dark hair hung down into her face. She looked tired, but not afraid.
Troy mused that it would take a lot to make this woman afraid. It was possible that nothing could do it. There were people in this world who were born without the ability to feel fear. Usually, they were missing a lot of other emotions as well.
At the bottom of the screen, it said:
Name: “Irina Decker” (there is no official record of this person).
AKA: Unknown.
Place of Birth: Unknown.
Q: “Who are you?”
The woman smiled.
ID: “Who are you?”
Q: “Will there be more attacks?”
ID: “No.”
Q: “Your accomplice says there will. He says this is an attempt to cull the human race. He said this was an effort to return the population to that of the year 1700, before the industrial revolution. He says you are one of the leaders of this project.”
The woman was shaking her head now. It wasn’t emphatic, the head shaking. It was a simple side-to-side, side-to-side, almost a robotic movement.
ID: “They’re silly, the enviro whackos. They’re naïve, like children. That was never the plan.”
Q: “Who are they, these enviro whackos?”
The woman shrugged.
ID: “People like the man you captured. Robert. They’re scientists. So-called activists. Well-meaning, I suppose. But very child-like.”
Q: “Where are they now?”
ID: “Other than the ones you captured? They’re dead. Laskov used them. When he was done with them, he killed them, or had them killed. They were no longer useful, so he got rid of them. Dead men tell no tales, as the saying goes.”
Q: “It’s cold-blooded, isn’t it?”
She smiled.
ID: “Yes. Laskov is cold-blooded. Like a lizard. He was covering his trail so he could escape when this was over. He has escaped from many things before now. He’s a spy. You must know that. He works for Serbia and for Russia. This was all his idea, or maybe the idea of his bosses. I know a little bit about their plans, but I was really just here to be next to Laskov. He held me in his thrall, like a modern Rasputin. I shouldn’t be blamed. I didn’t hurt anyone, not until he tried to have me killed. It was Laskov all along. He’s manipulative. He harbored the grand design, which he kept secret from almost everyone, but not from me.”
Q: “Are you in love with him?
ID: “Do you want to hear this or not?”
Q: “Please continue.”
ID: "They want to rebuild Yugoslavia, or at least Greater Serbia. That was the plan. Not this other thing about killing the whole human race. There was a lot of talk like that, but it was never going to happen. It was a return to the great Yugoslavia of the past. You do that by collapsing Bosnia and Croatia and weakening them with a terrible disease. Then you walk in there with troops, and maybe some medical aid, and food, and tents, and you take over. Later, maybe you can grab the others, like Kosovo and Montenegro."
Q: “Then why attack Romania and Moldova?”
The woman stared. Her eyes were blank for a long moment. She seemed to be looking deep inside herself for the answer. The interviewer must have repeated the question.
Q: “Why attack Romania and Moldova?”
Now, she shrugged.
ID: “I don’t know. For fun, I guess. For target practice. For revenge. They betrayed Russia. The Soviet Union was the modern Russian empire. Who ever really cared about communism, anyway? The regular people went hungry. For the rulers, it was about world power. That’s all it’s ever about. Those two countries are trying to escape to the West, but you can’t escape Mother Russia.”
Q: "Do you know that Moldova has the death penalty now? They've asked us to send you there. We have agreed once we're done with you."
ID: “I didn’t know any of that, but it makes me glad.”
Q: “Why?”
ID: “I’m tired. I don’t want to play these games anymore. I hope they kill me, an innocent woman, in front of everyone. Something barbaric, to show the world their true colors, and their hypocrisy. Slow and horrible, like the gas chamber. I hope they broadcast it on the TV.”
Troy clicked on another video.
A man was lying in a bed, medical equipment around him. He had an IV drip. They were monitoring his vital signs. He looked weak and sick. His wrists were handcuffed to the metal railings of the bed. His head was drooping. His hair was dark, with some gray streaked through it. He had a sharp face, almost like a wolf. It was hard to guess at his age.
A thick glass sat on a table next to him - it looked like a small beer stein or a glass that might hold hot coffee. There was a clear liquid in it.
A hand appeared from off-screen, picked up the glass, and threw the liquid in the man's face. The man jolted back as if he'd been stung or electrocuted. His left eye opened wide. His right eye was swollen nearly shut. His face was bruised and beaten. Someone had gone to town on this guy in the past several hours.
The clear liquid might be anything - vinegar, or alcohol, or something worse. It seemed like it startled him, but it didn’t do any lasting damage. It wasn’t bleach, say, or some sort of cooking gas. Troy was thankful for that. He shouldn’t be witnessing torture, and neither should Jan.
It was clear, whatever was going on, that the Croatians were in breach of any number of European Union laws and treaties. People tended to take it hard when a suspected mass murderer attempts another mass murder in their own land.
The man’s one open eye narrowed into a squint. He was staring at whoever was in the room with him, unbowed by them, apparently unafraid.
The words at the bottom left read:
Name: Viktor Laskov..
AKA: Viktor Kovich; Viktor Trask; Viktor Chekhov; Emil Jokic; Anton Jovanovich; Antony Jovan, Josip Novacek, Josip Novak, Mikael Saucek, many others; Code Name: Sundown (CIA); Code Name: Barksdale (MI6); others.
Place of Birth: St. Petersburg, former USSR.
Q: “Laskov.”
There was a long pause. Laskov said nothing.
Q: “Are you enjoying your time here?”
VL: “I’m a prisoner of war. You are breaking every rule you claim to believe in.”
Q: “You’re a terrorist. No country will claim you. Both the Russians and the Serbs disavow your actions.”
For a long moment, the man said nothing.
VL: “Of course they do. Given the circumstances, what else would they do? Claim these actions for themselves?”
Q: “Were you trying to kill off the human race?”
Laskov smiled, revealing a gap where a couple of teeth had gone missing.
VL: “Give me a cigarette.”
Q: “Answer the question. Were you trying to kill off the human race?”
VL: “No.”
Q: “What were you trying to do?”
Laskov shook his head and stared at the floor.
VL: “You people are fools. Did you know that?”
Q: “You’re going to die.”
Laskov shrugged, and smirked.
VL: “So are you. So is everyone. Just probably not today.”
“Mr. Stark?” a female voice said.
Troy looked up from the screen.
A woman in a starched white nurse’s uniform stood there. Her dark hair was pulled tightly to her scalp. Her dark eyes were hard. She was not smiling. She was what a person might call “severe.” Perhaps she had lost someone in the disaster.
She spoke English with the Romanian accent that made Westerners think of vampires.
“We can bring you to the room now,” she said.
***
The light of the tablet computer flickered in the semi-darkness of the hospital room. Troy sat slumped in a metal folding chair, staring at the screen, the sound all the way down. He was inches from Dubois’s bedside, but she was sleeping and he did not want to wake her.
Here, in the gloom, by himself, he noticed how sore his throat was, and was going to be, and how much his arm hurt. His injuries were treated by medics in Zagreb, but even so, the pain was going to be awhile.
On the screen in front of him, a video played, showing a man at a desk giving a news report. An image of a city at night, probably Zagreb, loomed behind the reporter.
Words scrolled along the bottom.
Massive Cholera Attack Thwarted in Croatia. Interpol and American intelligence uncover “Ship of Death” loaded with contaminated water, enough to kill millions. Several unnamed people in custody.
Troy wasn’t ready to deal with that. He didn’t want to think about Interpol, or El Grupo Especial, or Alex, or anything. He didn’t want talking head news reporters massaging his mind and telling him what it all meant.
He switched to another video.
The new video showed daytime footage of a vast tent encampment at the edge of the quarantine zone in eastern Romania. The footage was shot with helicopter or drone, and gave an aerial view of the camp disappearing over rolling hillsides and into the distance.
There was snow on the ground, but what the eye really saw was a riot of colors, blues and greens and oranges and yellows, the colors of the tents and the heavy tarps covering them. It was hard to make sense of it all.
A hastily erected concrete barrier, with tall fencing and razor wire ran the length of a stream or river. There were hundreds of transport trucks, some organized in a sort of giant parking lot, and many just parked in seemingly random places.
There was a heavily-armed checkpoint, with a long line of trucks waiting to pass through it and into the encampment. It certainly looked like they had stopped letting people pass through in the other direction. There was no line of refugees going that way.
At the bottom of the screen, there was a caption in Romanian, helpfully translated into English: Camp New Hope. Estimated population: 1.3 million people.
Troy knew that this was only the largest of three similar camps. There were currently more than two million internal refugees in Romania and possibly another million in Moldova. The death toll hadn't been fully calculated, but was thought to be around thirty thousand. Any way you counted, it was a nightmare of epic proportions.
“Why not just go home?” he whispered.
He had been in the villages these people had escaped from. It seemed almost safer out there, away from these crowds. But then again, the countryside, the towns, the homes, they were all probably full of…
“Bodies,” he said out loud.
No one wanted to go back.
In the bed next to him, Dubois stirred, probably at the sound of his voice. Her eyes opened and she gasped. Her head darted left and right. She seemed ready to spring out of the bed. She saw Troy there, but her eyes showed no recognition.
“Hello, Agent Dubois,” he said.
His heart skipped a beat.
“Stark?”
“Yes.”
“Oh my God. I thought I was…”
“You’re fine,” he said.
“Can you hold me?”
“Of course.”
He powered down the tablet and placed it on the thick wooden table next to him. The room became very dark. He found that he preferred it that way. He didn't want to look at this bleak hospital room. He didn't want to see the bruises on Dubois's pretty face.
It occurred to him that he wasn’t so very different from the woman being questioned in the video. Irina Decker. She showed no fear, and probably felt none. She showed almost no emotion at all.
Troy never felt afraid, not for himself. He couldn’t remember the last time he had. Maybe when he was in high school, early on in his amateur boxing years, he’d felt afraid before a few fights. Maybe that wasn’t even true. Maybe he was just nervous, and wanted to make a good impression on the people who had come out to watch him.
