“Why the water, Commander?” one of his men asked.
“Because they hate water. In there, they cannot exert any influence, and they detest it, making it a perfect prison for them to be contained in without any concerns,” he explained. With that, he got in the car, and the two vehicles pulled away slowly to leave Chernobyl even more barren than she had already been before.
Sam was still drugged by the powder that had left a white residue at the bottom of his empty whiskey glass. Kemper paid him no mind. In his new exciting position as owner of not only a former Wonder of the World but also on the threshold of ruling the new world to come, he hardly noticed the journalist anymore. Nina's screams still echoed in his thoughts as sweet music for his rotten heart.
It seemed that using Purdue as bait had paid off after all. For a while, Kemper had not been sure if the brainwashing techniques had succeeded, but when Purdue had successfully utilized the communications devices Kemper had left for him to find, he knew that Cleave and Gould would soon be netted. The betrayal of not releasing Cleave to Nina after all her drudgery was positively delectable to Kemper. Now he had tied up loose ends no other Black Sun commander had ever been able to.
Dave Purdue, the traitorous Renatus, was now left to rot under the godforsaken soil of cursed Chernobyl, soon killing the annoying little bitch that had always inspired Purdue to wreck the Order. And Sam Cleave…
Kemper looked at Cleave. He was bound for a bit of water himself. And as soon as Kemper had conditioned him he would play a valuable role as the ideal media representative for the Order's public relations. After all, how could the world fault anything presented by a Pulitzer Award winning investigative journalist that single-handedly exposed arms rings and toppled crime syndicates? With Sam as his media puppet, Kemper could announce whatever he wished to the world while nurturing his own Kalihasa to wield mass control over entire continents. And when that little god's power ran out, he would have several others safely shelved to replace it.
Things were looking up for Kemper and his Order. Finally, the obstacles from the Scotland were eradicated and his path cleared to make the necessary changes that Himmler failed at. In all this Kemper could not help but wonder how things were going for the sexy little historian and her former lover.
Nina could hear her heart beating, and it was not a difficult feat by the way it was thundering in her body while her sense of hearing was in overdrive for even the slightest noise. Purdue was quiet, and she had no idea where he could be, but she moved as quickly as she could in the opposite direction, keeping her light off so he couldn't see her. He was doing the same thing.
‘Oh sweet Jesus, where is he?’ she thought, crouching near where the Amber Room had been. Her mouth was parched, and she ached for relief, but now was not the time to pursue comfort or sustenance. A few feet away she heard a few small rocks scrunch, and it made her gasp loudly. ‘Shit!’ Nina considered talking him down, but by the look of his glazed-over eyes, she doubted that anything she said would get through. ‘He is coming my way. I can hear the sounds are closer every time!’
They had been underground in the vicinity of Reaktor-4 for over three hours already, and she was beginning to feel the effects. She was starting to feel nauseous, while a migraine practically crippled her ability to concentrate. But danger was coming in many shapes and forms for the historian lately. Now she had become a target for a brainwashed mind, programmed by an even sicker mind to kill her. To be murdered by her own friend would be so much worse than running from a deranged stranger or a mercenary on a mission. It was Dave! Dave Purdue, her long-time friend and ex-lover.
Without warning her body convulsed and she fell to her knees on the cold hard ground, throwing up. It grew more violent with every convulsion until she started to cry. There was no way for Nina to do it quietly and she was convinced Purdue would easily track her by the din she caused. She was sweating profusely, and the flash light strap around her head turned into an annoying itch, so she jerked it from her hair. In a spell of panic, she pointed the light downward a few inches from the ground and switched it on. The beam spread over the small radius on the ground, and she took stock of her surroundings.
Purdue was nowhere to be found. Suddenly a large steel rod came hurling towards her face from the darkness ahead. It struck her on the shoulder, evoking a yelp of agony from her. “Purdue! Stop! Jesus Christ! Are you going to kill me because of that Nazi prick? Wake the fuck up!”
Nina killed her light, panting like an exhausted hunting hound. Crouched forward on her knees she tried to ignore the throbbing migraine that was splitting her skull while she held down another pressing bout of regurgitation. Purdue's footsteps moved towards her in the dark, indifferent to her quiet sobbing. Nina's numb fingers fiddled with her strapped two-way radio.
‘Leave it here. Switch it on for noise and then run in another direction,’ she suggested to herself, but her other inner voice was not for it. ‘Idiot, you cannot abandon your last chance for outside communication. Get something you can use as a weapon, over where the debris was.'
The latter was a more feasible idea. She grabbed a handful of stones and waited for a sign of his location. The dark was a solid robe wrapped around her, but what made her frantic was the dust that burned her nose when she breathed. Deep in the darkness, she heard something stir. Nina launched the handful of stones out ahead of her to throw him off before she darted to her left, running straight into a protruding rock that hit her like a truck. With a suppressed gasp, she fell limply to the floor.
As her state of consciousness jeopardized her life, she felt a boost of energy and crawled along the floor on her knees and elbows. Like a bad flu, the radiation started to plague her body. Her skin was crawling, her head was as heavy as lead. Her forehead hurt from the collision while she was struggling to regain her equilibrium.
“Hey Nina,” he whispered a few inches from her shivering frame, shocking her heart into a leap of terror. Purdue’s bright light momentarily blinded her as he flicked it on in her face. “I found you.”
Sam was livid, but he dared not stir up trouble before his escape plan was secure. When he had awoken to find himself still in the clutches of Kemper and the Order, the transport vehicle ahead of them had been creeping steadily along a miserable, desolate stretch of road. By then, they had already progressed past Saratov and had crossed the border into Kazakhstan. It was too late for him to get out. They had traveled almost a day from where Nina and Purdue were, making it impossible for him to simply jump out and run back to Chernobyl or Pripyat.
“Breakfast, Mr. Cleave,” Kemper offered. “We have to keep your strength up.”
“No thanks,” Sam snapped. “I have had my quota of drugs this week.”
“Oh, come on now!” Kemper replied evenly. “You are like a whining teenager throwing a tantrum. And I thought PMS was a women's issue. I had to drug you or else you would have run off with your friends and gotten killed. You should be grateful that you are alive.” He held out a wrapped sandwich bought at a shop in one of the towns they had passed.
“Did you kill them?” Sam asked.
“Sir, we have to fill up the truck at Shalkar soon,” the chauffer announced.
“That’s fine, Dirk. How long?” he asked the driver.
“Ten minutes until we get there,” he informed Kemper.
“Alright.” He looked at Sam, and a mean smile jumped onto his face. “You should have been there!” Kemper laughed in glee. “Oh, I know you were there, but I mean you should have seen it!”