74.

LAS VEGAS.

'Stop snooping around,' a gruff voice whispered over Brooke's shoulder.

Caught red-handed, Brooke flinched. Her fingers lost their grip and the jar's lid clattered back in place, fortunately not with enough force to cause any damage. Spinning around, she was face to face with Flaherty. He'd silently entered the room and was standing directly behind her.

'Caught ya,' he said, pointing a finger like a gun. 'Hands up.' He winked and flashed a mischievous smile.

'Jesus, Tommy,' she said, clutching her chest and letting out an anxious breath. She eyed his swollen nose, the bloodstains on his shirt collar. 'You nearly scared me to death!'

'You're alone in a vault with a demon's severed head, and I I scare you?' scare you?'

She bared her teeth and curled her fingers like talons. 'Oh, you are such a-'

'Whoa, slow down.' He held up his hands in surrender, saying, 'Just thought I'd tell you that we can't leave here until the infectious-disease folks come and scrub us down, prep Stokes for transport. We'll all need to be quarantined. Then the FBI drones will swing by and have their way with us. So best get comfy.'

'Great.' Rolling her eyes, she huffed and turned her attention back to the jar.

'What are you looking at?' he said, stepping up beside her.

'This. It's the jar Lilith was carrying just before she was executed. It's supposed to have some kind of magical power.'

'Spooky.'

'I just thought I'd take a look ... see what's inside it,' she confessed.

'And?'

'I haven't gotten that far yet, thanks to you.'

'So what are you waiting for? Let's see if there's a rabbit in the hat.'

She shook her head. 'This isn't tampering with evidence, right?'

'I'd say it's gone through plenty of tampering already. I'm sure it'll be okay if we take a peek.'

'All right.' She rubbed her fingertips together, then reached into the case for a second attempt at unveiling the jar's interior.

With utmost finesse, Brooke curled her fingertips around the lid's thick rim. She lifted away the plate-like clay disc and gave it to Flaherty. 'Hold this.'

Hesitant, he said, 'What if it's cursed or something?'

She shot him a chastising look. 'For real? You're a Catholic, not an occult freak.'

'Fine.' He begrudgingly took the lid from her and held it at his side like a discus.

Brooke and Flaherty peered down at the uncovered jar.

'Looks like one of those jumbo candles from Pottery Barn ... without the wick,' said Flaherty.

'Kinda does,' she agreed. Brooke tapped a fingernail on the solid glossy layer that levelled off just below the jar's rim, and it made the clink-clink clink-clink sound of gla.s.s. sound of gla.s.s.

'I'm not seeing anything inside it,' Flaherty said. 'You?'

'No.' But her hopes weren't dashed, because if the ancient Mesopotamians had preserved the jar's contents employing the same method used on Lilith's head, then deep inside the jar, something had been trapped inside a viscous substance that over the centuries had hardened like gla.s.s. They just couldn't see it yet.

'Maybe we can shine a light in there, or something,' he suggested.

'I've got a better idea.' Closely studying the cut lines that split the circular rim into two equal arcs, Brooke could see paper-thin slivers of light squeezing through the fine gaps. 'I don't think this is glued.'

'Oh. Well maybe we could ...'

Reaching in with both hands, she pinched the top of the rim at the middle of each half and applied gentle outward pressure on the opposing sides.

'... crack it open, or something.'

It was sticky at first. She bit her lip and put some more push behind her fingers. The pottery yielded with a gritty creak, yawned open along its front side from top to bottom like a giant pistachio. 'Hah ... there we go.'

Flaherty tilted his head sideways for a better look, but refused to get any closer to the relic. With the bulbous core still masked in the jar's shadows, he couldn't yet decipher the contents.

Thrilled, Brooke was grinning ear to ear. 'Oh, this is amazing.'

Flaherty's eyes twinkled with admiration as he watched how she worked the pieces apart with patient dexterity. There was an endearing childlike innocence lurking beneath Brooke Thompson's sophisticated exterior; that wide-eyed wonderment that seemed to exist only on Christmas morning. And in this intimate moment, her pa.s.sion for archaeology and discovery burned like the sun.

Brooke spread the pottery halves so that their crescent-shaped bottom surfaces slid out from under the solidified inner ma.s.s. The liberated core clunked down against the bottom of the display case. 'My G.o.d, Tommy ... look at this!' she gasped Setting aside his irrational superst.i.tions, he stepped up to the case and peered in at what she'd found. He cringed at the frightful sight. 'Mother Mary.'

'It's beautiful,' she said.

'Beautiful?' Flaherty said. What had been inside the jar resembled a solid, honey-coloured crystal ball, much the same as the one containing Lilith's ghastly head. And coiled up inside the opaque ma.s.s was a considerably large snake whose jaws were hinged open and frozen in place, as if it had been drowned. Like its beheaded charmer, the snake's malevolent eyes were wide open in a threatening glare. Its hooked fangs were easily five centimetres long. The black, ropey body - thick as a beer can - was covered in scales the size of his thumbnail. He guessed that if he could stretch the thing out, it would be nearly two metres. 'That's a bizarre choice for a pet.'

'Sure is,' she said.

'Think it was poisonous?' he asked, fixated on the fangs.

'Sure looks like it,' Brooke said, slowly circling the case to see the snake from all angles.

'Why the h.e.l.l would she be carrying this thing around?'

'I don't know. But think about it, Tommy ... a snake is one of the central figures in Creation mythology, just like in the story of Adam, Eve and Lilith.' Then halfway around the case, she froze. 'Wow, look here,' she said, waving him over.

Tommy stepped around to have a look. She was tapping on the gla.s.s to indicate a huge bulge in the snake's wide midsection; something caught inside and ballooning the body outward.

'Looks like the snake's last meal wasn't fully digested,' Brooke said.

'Not to change the subject of this fascinating discussion, but speaking of meal ... I'm starving,' Flaherty said. He checked his watch. 'Seeing as we're going to be here awhile, I'm thinking we should raid that vending machine out in the hall. You like chips? Pretzels? Candy bars? The sky's the limit.'

'I could eat.'

'You, uh, like the Celtics?' Flaherty said with a polite cough.

'Huh? What? Yeah, I love the Celtics,' she said.

You're the woman of my dreams, he thought.

'Why do you want to know?' she asked.

'Stokes has a big-screen TV in his office, rigged for satellite. Supposed to be a great game tonight - playing the Lakers. Starts in about ten minutes. You, ah, interested?'

'Are you asking me out on a date, Agent Flaherty? I thought you were abstaining from gambling in Vegas.'

He blushed. 'Not sure if taking you into a room contaminated by anthrax, with a shot preacher lying on the floor, would qualify as romance. But I'm looking for a safe bet. So yeah, let's call it a date.'

75.

IRAQ.

Ramirez blazed like a thunderbolt through the cave, determined to return to the outside world in record time. Doing his best to keep the light directed towards the dodgy ground, he pumped his arms and legs like pistons, remembering how it felt to sprint the fifty at high school track meets. Normally he'd be looking over his shoulder for anyone sneaking up in his wake. For this race, however, he wasn't looking back.

He could barely stomach the idea of his niece's caged gerbil, Felix. The h.e.l.l with Felix. Felix was nothing but a pimped-out mouse.

But rats? A cave full of huge, filthy rats? Repulsive. Made his nuts pull up into his stomach. And these rats seemed to be out for blood. The way they came at him like that? Pursued him? That couldn't be normal. Rats didn't eat live meat, did they? he wondered. But they sure liked the taste of Holt. The poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d was covered in the things. And there was nothing Ramirez could've done about it. It's not like he could've swatted them away or shot them off Holt's chest. There were so many many of them. of them.

There was only one option: run ... hard hard.

Back in the cave, when he'd discarded his M-16, he'd barely glimpsed Hazo marooned on top of one those s.a.d.i.s.tic breeding kennels where some twisted psycho nurtured those flesh-eating-rodents-from-h.e.l.l. He'd be sure to send some guys with flamethrowers and grenades back inside to fry the critters and pull Hazo out - a.s.suming he didn't die from demon pestilence first.

As Ramirez tore through the tunnel, the squealing din faded and he became confident he'd make it out from the mountain unscathed. In fact, it sounded as if the rats had stayed inside the cave.

Ramirez's relief, however, instantly withered when up ahead in the tunnel's dark throat, a series of bright flashes coincided perfectly with the metallic hammering of automatic gunfire delivered at point-blank range.

The bullets struck him low - one shattering his left kneecap, six more to the groin and thighs. His legs instantly went out and his face slammed into the ground like a pile driver. It was so fast, so shocking, that he didn't even scream. With all the adrenaline pumping through his system, even the pain was slow coming.

But when the gunman emerged into the glowing cone of his fumbled flashlight, the sting of treachery came instantaneously.

'Crawford?' he groaned, blood streaming into his right eye from a ragged gash that split his forehead. 'Wh - why?'

There was no answer. The colonel simply pressed the M-16's muzzle against Ramirez's head and delivered the kill shot.

76.

The huge rodents - bodies as large as eggplants - were teeming over Holt, clawing their way up his legs, chest and back. Hazo watched in horror as the marine flailed his arms violently, flinging rats in every direction. Blood covered dozens of tattered holes in his sleeves where he'd been bitten (though his flak jacket had protected his torso). A sickly-looking thing squirmed up on to his shoulder and sank its teeth into his ear. Holt screamed in rage, tore it free, hurled it into the darkness like a football. By then, another horde of rats was grappling up his pant legs. Trudging through the knee-deep brood, it looked as if Holt were slogging through wet cement.

'Up here!' Hazo screamed again. 'Up-'

The coughing seized his voice again. Spitting up more blood and bile, Hazo watched helplessly as Holt tried to quicken his pace. Then desperation and frustration got the better of Holt and he raised his knees to try to run. It was a costly mistake.

Trampling the spongy rats underfoot caused Holt to lose his footing. He faltered, caught himself, faltered again. The rats piled on to him. He got back up again and shook some of them free, before slipping and going down a final time.

Hazo shined his light on the spot, praying that Holt would get up.

He didn't.

The rats swarmed over their prey.

Holt's arms thrashed a few more times, as if he were drowning. Then he disappeared beneath the roiling current.

'Hazo!' a voice called out over the maddening squeals.

Hazo turned and saw Shuster pulling himself up over the edge of the neighbouring container. He'd lost his helmet and his pant legs were torn up and b.l.o.o.d.y. Otherwise, he seemed unharmed. 'Are you all right?' Hazo called back.

Breathless, Shuster rolled on to his back. 'I'm okay,' he said, panting.

Hazo looked towards the entry tunnel and saw that the glow of Ramirez's light seemed to be growing stronger again - coming back towards the cave.

77.

Years had pa.s.sed since Bryce Crawford last walked these tunnels, yet he still recognized every oddity and anomaly inside the mountain as if they were the birthmarks of a former lover. Even the familiar loamy smell invoked fond memories of the extensive time he'd been stationed here - like grandma's turkey roasting in the oven on Thanksgiving Day.

Once Frank Roselli had declared the installation 'complete' the previous spring, the single entrance to Operation Genesis's self-sustaining breeding facility had been sealed. Every mechanical part of the gnotobiotic isolator cells that housed the rats had been designed for remote operation, thanks to technology borrowed heavily from NASA's unmanned s.p.a.ce stations. Similarly, the facility generated its own power from a state-of-the-art compact nuclear reactor capable of continuously churning out electricity for ten years before needing refuelling.

Even replenishment of the feeding tanks was handled by a cleverly concealed pipeline to a dairy farm situated a kilometre to the west. The milky nutrient solution manufactured there was a potent brew infused with plague virions and gonadotropin hormone that stimulated the brood's pituitary development (to promote aggressive behaviour).

What they'd built inside this mountain was the most sophisticated installation of its kind. Such a pity that not long from now, not a trace of it would remain, Crawford thought.

As he neared the cave, his apprehension intensified with the sounds of squealing.

These are no ordinary rats, he thought.