‘So, you studied it then,’ Ethan said as he looked at the bone.
‘I’ve spent every spare moment of the past few years studying it,’ Lucy confirmed. ‘I couldn’t do it through the University or the museum without raising suspicions and I’ve always believed that somebody has been watching me ever since what happened in Israel.’
‘It’s not impossible,’ Ethan replied. ‘The US government’s black budget runs into tens of billions of dollars: small change for them to assign an agent or two to keep an eye on what you’re doing.’
Lucy nodded as she stared down at the bone in the cylinder.
‘I ensured that I did my research out of hours at home, or in my lunch break or my days off, times when it would not raise suspicion and I could work without interruption.’
‘And what have you found out?’
The discovery of a seven thousand year old tomb with alien remains inside had raised all kinds of questions in Ethan’s mind, as it had done so many others. Solid, irrefutable evidence of the presence of an extra-terrestrial species not just on Earth but at the very dawn of human civilization raised all sorts of doubts and questions over the origin of human beliefs and religions worldwide.
‘I started out by confirming the age of the specimen,’ Lucy explained. ‘Finding the remains in a seven millennia old tomb did not necessarily mean that the bones themselves were of the same age. They could have been interred later, perhaps even recently, so it was essential to match the remains to the tomb itself. I extracted material from within the interior of the bone that could not have been contaminated either by handling or other external influences, and radiocarbon dating confirmed that age of seven thousand years.’
Ethan rubbed his jaw as he looked at the specimen, his coffee forgotten as he considered the magnitude of what Lucy was revealing.
‘You know why the DIA kept this find under wraps, don’t you?’
‘They think a public announcement of the find would cause chaos,’ Lucy sighed. ‘They think that the inevitable collapse of religion, especially in the Western world where it’s already in rapid decline, would create a crisis of identity for the human race.’
‘And you think differently,’ Ethan guessed.
‘I think that the revealing of this evidence of its implications would be the beginning of a new enlightenment. Those who simply believe in religions, regardless of evidence to the contrary, would be forced to face up to the fact that we are not special, not the product of a god. We are in fact likely inferior to many other species out there, especially those that have mastered the art of spacefaring. It could herald the beginning of a new age of reason and logic that has suffered so much in the face of rising religious extremism over the past few decades.’
Ethan shrugged uncertainly. ‘That’s a hell of a gamble to make with seven billion lives. Nobody really knows quite what would happen if this became public. Is that why you’re here? Are you intending to do something about it?’
‘No,’ Lucy admitted. ‘I’m here because I think other people are intending to either obtain these remains from me or from the US government.’
‘What other people?’
‘The Russians,’ Lucy replied. ‘I was approached in Chicago a few days ago by a representative, somebody claiming to be working for a collector in Russia. They wanted to know about the remains that were found in Israel and whether I had any access to them. I played dumb, naturally, but I don’t think they bought it. I’m pretty sure I’ve been followed ever since.’
Ethan’s eyes flicked to the cottage front door but Lucy waved him down.
‘Not here,’ Lucy assured him. ‘Nicola helped me vanish from Illinois, she was really very clever. She employed a double, booked flights on my behalf so they could not be tracked to me and then booked two further decoy flights under my name before sending me off. She told me what to do when I landed at Gatwick Airport near London, to take different trains, stay in hotels and halfway houses, pay cash only. I’m confident that nobody but Lopez knows I’m here.’
Ethan nodded. Lopez was every bit as much of an expert at vanishing as Ethan was. Once, after a lengthy investigation in the forests of Idaho, they had been forced to go underground for more than six months, moving from city to city, wearing disguises and essentially vanishing from the system in order to evade rogue CIA agents intent on hunting them down.
‘Fine,’ he said eventually. ‘Why would they have suddenly taken such an interest in things that happened years ago?’
‘I can’t be sure, but it may have something to do with what Pastor Kelvin Patterson was doing with the DNA that he managed to extract from the finds that I made in Israel.’
Kelvin Patterson, a Baptist minister on an apocalyptic mission for the supposed benefit of mankind in Washington DC, had been convinced that the remains Lucy had found in Israel were not the remains of alien beings but in fact those of angels. Intent on converting human beings into angels by injecting them with genetic material from the remains, specifically US Senators who could lobby on his behalf, he had murdered many innocent individuals.
‘Have you managed to extract DNA from that bone?’
‘I got a full profile, everything that Patterson was looking for. But unlike him I spent the last three years analysing the strands, and it’s what I found that I believe the Russians are hunting for and I’m pretty sure they’re not alone.’
‘Tell me.’
‘I think you’d find it hard to comprehend, or even to believe.’
‘You can let me be the judge of that,’ Ethan insisted. ‘You’ve come here for help, I’m assuming, and like your mother before you I can’t help you unless you tell me everything.’
Lucy sighed, and as the fire crackled behind her she replied.
‘The DNA contains…’
The fire spat a particularly loud crack just as the window to the cottage shattered and a spray of glass flew through the air. Ethan turned his head away at the same time as Lucy as a sudden deafening chatter of automatic gunfire hammered the wall of the cottage.
IX
‘Get down!’
Ethan hurled himself across the lounge and grabbed Lucy’s collar as he pulled her onto the ground between the couches and shielded her body.
The gunfire sprayed around the room as it shattered the windows and spat choking clouds of plaster, wood and dust through the air. Ethan pulled himself along the floor in a belly crawl as he reached behind him and pulled the pistol from out of his jeans, then rolled along to the window and watched the bullets hammering the ceilings and walls.
The deafening gunfire ceased abruptly and Ethan could hear the wind rumbling outside the window. He glanced at the damage to the interior of the cottage and noted that all of the bullets had gone high, spraying mostly across the ceiling and the beams rather than down towards where people would be walking or sitting.
In an instant he knew what was coming next. He scrambled to his feet and ran in a low crouch as he grabbed Lucy.
‘Move, now!’ he whispered.
They ran out of the lounge and into the tiny kitchen just as Ethan heard two metallic thumps come from behind him followed by a loud hissing sound. He turned to see a pair of smoke grenades roll across the lounge, one of them landing on the sofa. Ethan pushed the kitchen door closed and then pointed at the corner of the room.
‘Stay there and stay down,’ he said as he turned to the back door.
Lucy crouched into a tiny ball in the corner of the kitchen as Ethan opened the back door of the cottage and crept outside, careful to close the door behind him and turn the key in the lock. He pocketed the key and then hurried around to one side of the cottage.