Mikey O’Sullivan walked them to the rear of the workshop and through a sliding door. In a small yard now, the big Dubliner pulled a key fob from his pocket and padded over to a car parked up beside a dark blue four-yard bin. The bin was covered in rust and so full of junk the lid couldn’t shut, but the car was something special. It was a classic Audi, white with yellow stripes and a faded number ‘5’ on the door panel.
“Meet my baby,” Mikey said with pride. “A 1984 Quattro, redesigned instrument panel and new steering wheel design. This little baby right here won the Monte Carlo rally back in the early eighties.” He stroked the hood as if it were a faithful pet, but snapped out of his daydream when Devlin coughed.
He turned to face them. “Of course, since then I’ve done a lot of work on her. I call her Ciara. If any one o’ youse so much as scratches her, I’ll blow your head off, okey dokey?”
He gave them a warm smile and opened the driver’s door.
“Sure thing, Mikey,” Devlin said.
Mikey cranked the seat forward to allow Devlin to climb into the back of the two-door rally car. Kyle strode out of the workshop with a shotgun over one shoulder and the gun-stuffed red leather sports bag in his hand. “Just some extra treats in case we get hungry on the way.”
“Good job, Kyle, now hop in the back like a good lad so Miss Donovan can sit up front with me.” Mikey winked at Lea as they all climbed in the car.
“All ready for a nice quiet drive to the coast?” Mikey said, turning the key in the ignition. The two liter engine roared to life with a retro rasping sound and the old instrument panel lit up. “There’s my good girl,” Mikey said, gently tapping the top of the vinyl steering wheel.
They drove through Dublin Port toward East Wall, turning left and driving down to the River Liffey before swinging right at a roundabout and moving west again. Ahead of them the outline of the Convention Center Dublin rose against the black Irish sky.
Mikey switched the radio off and sighed. “Terrible, this America business. I have a cousin in Boston — I hope she’s all right.”
Lea leaned forward in the passenger seat to check the mirror.
Devlin saw the look of concern on her face. “What do you see?”
“I think we have company,” she said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Klaus Kiefel looked into the camera and scowled at the world. Alan Pauling had made the final adjustments to the webcams a few moments ago and was now busy typing commands into a laptop.
“Are we ready to roll?” Kiefel said, straightening his roll-neck and adjusting his hair in the polished metal of the distillation unit.
“We’re sure are, Klaus,” Pauling said. “Just make sure you’re ready to transfer my ten million dollars.”
The German raised an eyebrow. “You’ll get your money, Alan. Just make sure this works. I don’t want it traced — understand?”
“There’ll be no tracing this signal to anywhere,” he said, and gave the boss the sign that the signal was live and broadcasting.
Kiefel stepped into the limelight. His fifteen minutes had arrived at last, and he held America in the palm of his hand.
“People of the United States… people of the world — you are about to witness the birth of a new nation right here in America… a new kind of revolution. You are about to witness a new kind of civilization run by a newer, different kind of law — a higher law!”
After a tense opening, Kiefel relaxed slightly and began to wander back and forth in front of the camera as if he were delivering a simple lecture on ancient Greek mythology.
“Your government has been lying to you all. You need to know this. What is casually dismissed as the insane ramblings of the conspiracy nut is in fact the truth. Area 51 is real, and so are all the things the conspiracy theorists say are inside it.”
He paused for effect. “And so is the notorious Archive 7… This too is a real storage facility used by the United States Government to hide some of the most ancient secrets of this world from you, the common man and woman.”
Kiefel paused a beat to let the words sink in, then he started to talk about his mother’s execution. This was the moment he had been waiting for. This was his chance to get the ultimate revenge on a world he hated.
In Washington, Brooke looked at Kimble and his Chief-of-Staff Scott Anderson who were both in his office by way of a conference call, their faces lit large on a plasma screen to the left of the one where Kiefel’s horror show was now unfolding.
“You getting this, Mr President?” Brooke asked, his raspy drawl dominating the room.
Kimble nodded grimly but said nothing. Anderson looked like he wanted to crawl into a hole.
Revelling in his new-found fame, Kiefel continued to strut up and down before the camera. “Your leaders have deceived you. They know ancient truths about your world that would shock you to your core, but they have kept them from you. Now, you will see a small part of the fabric of their lies and deceit come undone before your very eyes! You will see the light of reality and truth as it shines through from the ancient past and brightens the darkness you have been kept in.”
Kiefel clicked his fingers and a tall, muscular man dragged a smaller, older man in a suit in front of the screen.
“My God!” Anderson said. “That’s Dirk Partridge, one of the President’s closest Secret Service agents!”
“Who’s the ape hauling him across the room?” Kim asked.
“According to our facial recognition software, his name’s Jakob Müller, a burned out gymnast from another age, now a small-time thug from Leipzig.”
“I have a bad feeling about this,” Hawke said.
“Me too,” Alex whispered, moving closer to Hawke and putting a hand on his arm.
On the plasma screen, Kiefel smiled and continued. “This is United States Secret Service Agent Dirk Partridge. Shortly he will have the honor of dying for his country in the most ancient and wonderful of ways, and I would be honored if you join us for that.”
Kiefel directed an insane grin at the camera and then the screen flicked to static.
“God damn it!” Brooke boomed. “Can’t anyone shut this madman down?”
“We’re working on it, sir,” said one of his staffers. “But right now we can’t even find his location.”
“So shut down the internet!”
The staffer looked at him. “We can’t do that, sir, not since the Cybersecurity Act of 2009.”
Brooke said nothing for a moment, looking up at Kimble’s face on the plasma screen across the room. Since Hawke had told him about the new President’s reaction when he’d learned about Watkins’s death back at the Smithsonian, Brooke had begun to harbor certain suspicions about his new Commander-in-Chief, but now wasn’t the time to indulge in conspiracy theories or let his mind wander off-track.
Brooke looked from the President to the staffer. “That’s just not true, son…”
Kimble looked at Anderson, equally shocked. Brooke considered that being in the Top Job for less than a few hours meant that Teddy Kimble probably knew a lot less about these things than your average conspiracy theorist.
“What are you talking about, Mr Secretary?” President Kimble said.
Anderson spoke up. “He’s talking about the Kill Switch, sir.”
“The what?”
“It’s a cybercrime countermeasure, sir,” Anderson said, his voice dropping to a whisper.
“Would someone tell me just what the hell we’re talking about?” Kimble said.
Brooke sighed. “Everyone below codeword clearance please leave the room… except you three.” He pointed at Alex, Hawke and Kim Taylor. “You ain’t going anywhere. I need you.”
When the room was clear, Brooke cleared his throat and walked out from behind his desk. “We’re talking about the Kill Switch, Mr President. You won’t have been briefed on it yet, of course. Its existence has been rumored a lot, I know… and there is even some kind of an accommodation for it in the Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act of 2010, but…”