‘Here, sir!’ the excited technician announced, carrying something in a small clear plastic wallet.
‘What is it?’ Eldridge demanded.
‘It’s a tooth,’ the man replied happily. ‘It’s badly burnt,’ he continued, holding it up for Eldridge to see with his own eyes, ‘but it is the tooth of the man who was in the helicopter when it went down.’
‘You’re sure?’ Eldridge asked, only letting his excitement rise a little at this point.
‘One hundred per cent, sir,’ the technician replied.
Eldridge nodded. ‘Good.’ He took the wallet with the tooth inside from the man. ‘I’ll need to get it tested immediately.’
Stephen Jacobs was excited. He had just flown to Switzerland to see the machine with his own eyes, and was delighted with the progress of the CERN team. It was really going to happen.
He was flying home now, thirty-eight thousand feet above the Atlantic in his own private jet, when the phone rang.
‘Jacobs,’ he said, answering the call.
‘Sir,’ he heard the deep rumble on the other end announce, ‘it’s Eldridge. The situation here has been contained.’
‘Are you sure?’ Jacobs asked.
‘Yes, sir. The helicopter was almost totally destroyed, but we managed to find three burnt teeth. DNA testing shows two of them belonged to Matthew Adams, and the other to Evelyn Edwards. There’s no way they could have survived. It’s over.’
Jacobs sat down deeper into his leather club chair. It was over, yes. And yet it was also all about to begin — the deaths of the two fugitives heralded the birth of the new world order.
‘Good,’ Jacobs said finally. ‘You can come home, and take your place among us. It is almost time.’
Jacobs could almost feel the excitement of the man radiating through the satellite phone. ‘Yes, sir,’ the Alpha Brigade commander said, and Jacobs put the phone down, ending the call.
Yes, Jacobs thought to himself as he stretched out in the chair, delighted at the news from Peru, it is almost time.
19
Adams scanned the desert scrub for signs of life as they settled in to their temporary shelter, but found none. Satisfied that they were safe, he pulled the cover over them and put his arm around Lynn to help keep her warm.
After their helicopter had been blown out of the sky the night before, the pair had used the hours of darkness to walk across the desert. The chopper’s navigation system had provided their exact location, and Adams had then worked out the direction of the nearest large town, which was Arequipa. Using the stars for navigation, by the time dawn came they had covered thirty miles and were both nearing exhaustion.
Adams would ordinarily have been able to keep on walking much further, but the recent lack of sleep was hitting hard, making him into a quivering, uncontrolled wreck. They decided that they would rest up for the day — moving at night was better for combating the freezing desert temperatures, as well as for keeping hidden from view — and Adams spent the next half an hour preparing a hide, a small natural crevasse well hidden among a scattering of sun-bleached rocks.
Adams hoped that there would be no search for them but knew they had to be cautions. A trickle of blood ran down his chin from the corner of his mouth, and he wiped it away.
‘How are your gums?’ he asked Lynn, the blood reminding him of what they had done to escape.
‘Not bad, considering,’ she replied with a smile, which showed the gap in the top row of teeth.
The night before, Adams had started to perform evasive manoeuvres, getting whoever was watching them used to the chopper’s erratic movements. Then, when the missiles had been just behind them and the lip of the canyon was right in front of them, he had slowed the helicopter and taken it right down to the ground, and then they had jumped.
They fell ten feet to the hard, dusty desert floor, both of them rolling through the rough sand towards the edge. They saw the missiles hit the helicopter which exploded with a tremendous, cataclysmic roar, its destroyed body falling to the canyon floor below.
They came to a stop just an arm’s length from the huge drop over the canyon, and Adams had cradled Lynn in his arms, holding her tight, protecting her from the intense heat of the explosion. As the heat started to die down, Adams had released her, his shirt smeared with blood from her mouth.
Knowing the pursuit would continue without some proof that they had been in the helicopter when it went down, Adams had used the precious seconds they had before the missiles hit to give their enemy the physical evidence that would be needed.
He had withdrawn his utility knife, snapping it round into the pliers position. He had then quickly wrenched out two of his own teeth, blood spurting from his gums across the cockpit. The pain had made his head dizzy, but he had maintained control of the aircraft, deploying one more round of chaff.
As the countermeasures took out one more missile, he had been amazed as Lynn had pulled the pliers from him and wrenched out one of her own teeth, casting it on to the cockpit floor. Blood trickled from her mouth as she looked at him, and Adams saw the determination in her eyes. He hadn’t wanted Lynn to copy him, but he knew it made sense — if the pursuers just had teeth from one of them, they might well carry on their search. With definite evidence of two bodies, they likely wouldn’t bother.
And then Adams had taken the helicopter down, and they had exchanged one more look of mutual reassurance before they had opened the doors and jumped.
An hour later Lynn found herself with her own arms cradling Adams, their roles now reversed. He was shivering uncontrollably, unable to stop himself, teeth chattering, his entire body convulsing violently.
They had taken extra clothing from the helicopter, as well as some emergency blankets they had found, and Lynn packed the clothing around him, covering him in the blanket; but still he shivered so hard that Lynn was scared he was going to rip himself apart.
She gave him water, and some of the rations they had found on board, forcing him to eat a couple of small chocolate bars. She then took off her clothes, stripped him naked too, and climbed underneath the same blanket as him, arms and legs entwining with his, sharing her body heat.
She held him close, and the feel of his body next to hers brought memories back to her, powerful memories from their joint past together, lying in bed for hours, making love, resting in each other’s arms, and then making love once more.
They had been happy at the time, she knew that now. Why had she not known it then? It had been her work that had stopped her from ever truly living in the moment with him, stopped her ever truly being happy with him; even as they lay together in blissful harmony, she couldn’t help but start thinking about her next research project. Who was she going to recruit for the project, how were they going to raise the money, what results could they expect to find? The list went on, and it eventually began to tear them apart.
Adams was a man who enjoyed life, here, in the moment, and Lynn was obsessed by her work. When her husband had mentioned having children, she had scoffed at the suggestion — had he no idea what her work entailed, how time- and energy-consuming it was? Children were definitely going to have to wait. Adams had wanted to know for how long, and Lynn hadn’t been able to give him an answer. They had stayed together for a short while afterwards, but it was clear that their lives had different priorities, and eventually they had drifted apart so far that divorce had been the only option.
And now? As Lynn held Adams in her arms, the warmth of her skin flowing into his body, she recognized how mistaken she had been. Where had her work brought her? She lived alone, and people were trying to kill her, and the only person she could turn to was the man she had been with originally. She was at the top of her field, certainly, but what did that matter now?