Medusa

CHAPTER 45

CHANG WAS A CLASSIC PSYCHOPATH. HE DIDN’T HAVE A drop of human empathy or remorse in his squat, ugly body, and for him killing was as easy as crossing the street. The other Triad triplets had channeled his murderous impulses to their own ends. He displayed a real talent for organization, so they gave him responsibility for the network of gangs that operated in the world’s big cities. The job slaked his blood thirst by allowing him to participate in assassinations for commercial advantage, retribution, or just plain punishment.

The job also had restrained Chang from tumbling into the abyss of sheer madness, as long as the other two triplets provided balance. But now he was on his own, far from the familial reins that had kept his barely restrained violence in check. The voices that sometimes whispered in his head were now shouting for his attention.

After leaving the lab, Chang had delivered the vaccine cultures to the freighter lying in wait near the atoll and then waited for a report from the submarine. The failure of the explosives to detonate, to destroy the lab and staff, had finally pushed him over the edge.

When the appointed time had passed, Chang got back in the shuttle with his most cold-blooded killers, and ordered the pilot to head back into the crater. As the shuttle emerged from the tunnel, the undimmed lights at the bottom seemed to mock Chang. A vein pulsed in his forehead.

Dr. Wu, sitting at Chang’s side, had sensed his employer’s growing fury, and he tried to will himself into invisibility. Even more disconcerting was Chang’s sudden lightness of mood when he turned and said in an almost cheerful tone more frightening than his anger:

“Tell me, my friend, what would happen if someone were to fall, quite by accident, into the tank with the mutant jellyfish?”

“That person would be stung immediately.”

“Death would be instant?”

“No. The nature of the toxin is to paralyze.”

“Would it be agonizing?”

Dr. Wu shifted his weight uncomfortably.

“Yes,” he said. “If the person didn’t drown, he would be aware of every sensation in his body. In time, the jellyfish would begin to absorb him.”

“Splendid!” Chang clapped Dr. Wu on the back. “Why didn’t I think of this earlier?”

He announced that, since the lab hadn’t blown up, they were going back for some “sport.” Once they were aboard, they were to round up the scientists and kill them any way they wanted. The men he brought in the shuttle were his most cold-blooded killers. They were to spare Zavala, who would be thrown into the medusa tank. Dr. Wu would record his death on video so his final moments could be transmitted to Austin.

Carrying its cargo of murderers, the shuttle descended to the transit hub. The pilot activated the shuttle’s airlock. Minutes later, Chang and his followers burst out of the airlock and almost stumbled over a box of C-4. A length of colored wires had been tied in a bow and placed on top of the carton. And resting against the bow was a white envelope with CHANG on it in big block letters.

The man who had set up the explosives picked up the cluster of wires.

“Nothing to worry about,” he said. “These wires aren’t connected to anything.”

He handed the envelope to Chang, who ripped it open. Inside was a piece of stationery with a Davy Jones’s Locker logo on it. The paper had been folded in three. Printed on the first panel was

BANG!

Chang quickly unfolded the paper. There was a smiley face on the next panel and

JUST KIDDING!

The last panel read

I’M IN THE CONTROL ROOM.

Chang crumpled the paper and ordered his men to search the complex. They came back a few minutes later and reported that the complex appeared deserted and that wires had been torn from all the C-4.

Chang stormed off to the control room, only to pause at the door. Suspecting that the room had been booby-trapped, he sent his men in first.

They scoured the room and reported back to Chang that it too was deserted and that nothing was amiss. He stepped in to see for himself. He glanced around, his scowl deepening. He wanted somebody to take his fury out on. He saw Dr. Wu filming the room.

“Not now, you fool!” Chang shouted. “Can’t you see there’s nobody here?”

A metallic voice issued from the wall speakers.

“You’re right, Chang. You and your pals are the only ones on the lab.”

Chang wheeled around, the stock of the machine pistol tight against his chest.

“Who’s that?”

“SpongeBob SquarePants,” the voice said.

“Austin!”

“Okay, I confess, Chang. You got me. It’s Kurt Austin.”

Chang’s eyes narrowed to slits.

“What happened to the scientists?” he asked.

“They are no longer on the lab, Chang. They left in the minisubs.”

“Don’t toy with me, Austin. I destroyed the subs’ power circuits.”

A different voice came on the speaker: Phelps.

“Those were backup circuits you stomped on,” he said. “The subs were fully operable, boss.”

“Phelps?” Chang exclaimed. “I thought you were dead.”

“Sorry to disappoint you, Chang. Austin ain’t jerking you around. Dr. Mitchell and all the other scientists are long gone.”

“I’ll find them,” Chang shouted. “I’ll find you and Austin and kill you!”

“That’s not very likely,” Austin said. “By the way, the vaccine cultures they gave you are useless. The real ones are with the staff.”

THE VOICES IN CHANG’S HEAD began to rise in volume and number, reaching an evil cacophony. A white hate flowed through his bull-like body like a power surge. He ordered his men back to the shuttle. As it rose from the lab, he radioed the freighter, giving orders to start scouring the depths with sonar. A minute later, he got a reply. Sonar had picked up four shapes moving away from the atoll. Chang ordered the freighter to be on hand when the minisubs surfaced.

The shuttle went full speed toward the tunnel. Chang allowed a smile to cross his face, anticipating the looks on the scientists’ faces when they saw the freighter bearing down on them. He was savoring the scene, imagining how they would react when he rose from the deep like Neptune, when he heard the pilot call out. Chang leaned forward in his seat and stared out the cockpit window.

A huge black shadow was bearing down on the shuttle.

The pilot recognized the massive blunt bow of the Typhoon hurtling right at them and he yelped like a frightened puppy. Chang yelled at him to turn, but the pilot’s hands were frozen on the controls. Uttering a feral snarl, Chang grabbed the pilot by the shoulders, pulled him out of his chair, and took his place. He yanked the wheel hard to starboard.

The shuttle’s turbines continued to drive it forward, but after a few seconds the front came around to the right, narrowly edging the shuttle out of the way of a head-on collision with the six-hundred-foot torpedo hurtling its way. But the Typhoon was moving at twenty-five knots, and it clipped the tail end of the shuttle, demolishing its rudder and sending the shuttle into a wild spin. The violent impact caused the cargo door to fly open, and water began flowing in.

The weight of the inrushing sea dragged the shuttle’s tail down, and the front of the shuttle angled upward like a dying fish. Chang’s men grabbed onto the seats and pulled themselves up the slanting deck toward the cockpit.

Dr. Wu struggled to join the pack, but the stronger guards pushed him under the water and his flailing arms soon grew still. Chang was not about to share the pocket of air with anyone. He turned around, leaned his pistol over the back of the seat, and shot any man who tried to encroach on his space. Within seconds, he had killed all his guards and was alone in the cabin.

By then the weight of the water in the shuttle had shifted forward. Its nose leveled out, and the shuttle began to sink to the bottom of the crater. The cabin was plunged into complete darkness. Chang fought to keep his head up in the diminishing pocket of air, but the bodies swashing around in the blood-stained water made it difficult. As soon as he pushed one body out of the way, another body came along to take its place. At one point, he was eye-to-eye with dead Dr. Wu.

More water came in, diminishing the pocket of life-giving air even more. Chang pressed against the ceiling of the shuttle with only a few inches left. As water filled his mouth and nostrils, he looked up, saw the monstrous shadow of the Typhoon gliding overhead, and, with his last, soggy gasp uttered:

“Austin!”

THE OWNER OF THAT NAME sat next to the Russian helmsman in the Typhoon’s control room. Zavala was on the other side of the man, a young Ukrainian who had a natural talent for his job. The captain stood by Austin’s side, relaying orders in Russian to the helmsman.

Minutes earlier, the helmsman had backed the sub into the tunnel, facing into the crater. The sonar operator watched for the shuttle and alerted Austin when he picked up its moving blip. A monitor connected to a camera in the sub’s sail picked out the shuttle’s twin searchlights approaching. Austin gave the order for a full-speed ram. The helmsman gripped the wheel as the submarine began to move forward. The ambush was under way.

After glancing off the shuttle, the Typhoon had continued into the crater and made a wide turn. As the sub headed back toward the tunnel to finish the job, the camera picked up the shuttle once again. Austin watched with pitiless eyes as it plunged to the bottom. He felt no sense of triumph. Not yet. He was all too well aware that the Triad was a three-headed monster.