The Alpha Choice (62 page)

Δ
 

Liz Corcoran stirred and opening her eyes, saw the man who was holding her. ‘Hugo, is it over?’

‘It is, for us,’ he replied.

She sat up with some difficulty and looked around, taking in the still form of the technician. ‘Is he dead?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘What happened?’

‘That can wait until you're feeling stronger.’

She shook her head. ‘Now, Hugo!’

He recounted everything from the moment she had been placed within the field. When he was finished, she looked at him angrily. ‘It isn't over! Jon and Emily are alone, out there against Tala and her goons, and we’re sitting here as though everything is going to be fine. It isn’t, they need our help!’

Hugo knew she was right, but she was unable to walk never mind run, and he did not want to leave her in that room, alone. With a strength that belied her condition, she gripped his arm. ‘We’re all in danger if Jon fails, you need to leave me here.’

‘We gave Jon and Emily our rings, I can't get to the signing room in time, unless,’ he looked at the prone technician, then shook his head. ‘Te’ans don’t need rings, they have implants.’

The voice of Gorn/Avatar spoke up. ‘Please do not be afraid. I wish to help you, I am a friend.’

‘Who are you?’ asked Hugo, looking around the room for the source of the voice.
 

‘As I have said, I am a friend who can help you get to Jon and Emily.’

‘How do we know we can trust you?’ asked Liz.
 

‘I have already had this conversation with your friends. You have to trust me, because you have no one else, and if you wait they will fail. If it helps, I deactivated the field.’

Hugo and Liz looked at each other, but exchanged no words. Hugo knew what he had to do. ‘How can you get me to the signing room in time?’ he asked.
 

‘The nearest teleport station has been unlocked and programmed to take you to the station closest to the signing room,’ Gorn/Avatar replied.

‘How are they?’ Liz asked.

‘Jon is running from Beron. I have prevented the other agents from reaching him. Emily is on course to intercept them. That is all I know.’

Liz nodded to Hugo. ‘Hurry!’

He ran from the room, the door closing behind him.

Ω

Once Hugo Black left the room, Gorn ensured that the Avatar locked the door, and gave it a standing instruction to reactivate the teleports only as Jon, Emily or Hugo needed them.
 

He was then called to the bridge, but before leaving his console he set the routine that would require only a single failsafe instruction, transmitted from his bridge station to the Avatar.

Δ

From his vantage point, Jon watched in mute fascination as the trapped man began, slowly at first, to reverse the movement of the door. The fascination turned to horror, as it dawned on him that the pursuit was far from over. He began to run again, he had to put as much distance between them as he could, before the chase continued.

Δ
 

Emily’s route would take her to where she anticipated Jon would be. He was unable to take a direct route to the President, the Te would expect that, but on the plus side, the teleport lockdown put his pursuers at a disadvantage. There was little she could do to help him, but at the very least, she could prove a distraction and give him enough time to complete the task
Jane
had set him.

Δ

Three floors above the atrium, Jon burst through the double doors from the stairwell. The sound of Beron pounding up the stairs only a floor below, thudded through his brain; he had to come up with something to slow the faster, stronger man.

The doors now closed, he removed his belt and looped it through the handles just as his pursuer crashed against the makeshift barrier. Convinced the doors would hold, he tied off the belt as Beron’s second assault caused the entire frame to shudder. He was stepping back when a third crash broke the doors off their hinges. Part of the tethered projectile smashed against his shoulder, as the force of the collision propelled him across the floor, onto his back.
 

Gingerly, he managed to stand as pain seared through his upper right arm, screaming of a dislocated shoulder.
 

Advancing slowly towards him, was the menacing figure of the Te’an agent, his face immobile, showing neither pleasure nor anger, simply an unswerving intent to ensnare his quarry. Without taking his eyes off Beron, he backed away, his shoulder on fire, not knowing how long he could remain conscious. Already, his head was beginning to swim. Endorphins flooded his body, shutting down the flight mechanism. Oblivious to the danger behind him, he edged towards the rail, beyond which there was nothing but air until the floor of the atrium, three levels below.

Ω

Watching his prey approach the rail, Beron slowed, and for the first time uncertainty crept into his face. His orders were clear, no harm was to come to the Tellurian, he was to be captured intact and held until the signing, any sudden movement and…
 

Δ

Moments earlier, Emily’s form had coalesced at a teleport station. Stepping off the platform, she heard a loud crash and turned to the source of the sound. Across the open space that was the atrium, she saw Jon struggling to hold back someone, or something on the other side of the stairwell doors. Whoever, or whatever was trying to get through was immensely strong. Without the belt he was using to secure the handles, it was clear Jon would be unable to resist the brute strength that was slamming into the wooden barrier.
 

There was another crash, only this time much louder as the doors themselves fell inwards. The belt remained firm, being stronger than the hinges supporting the doors. She could only watch as her friend was hurled across the floor, the huge wooden projectile smashing against his side. She heard him let out a cry of pain as he landed on his back.

Emily watched Jon, as he slowly and painfully hauled himself to his feet. It was then she saw the cause of her friend’s dilemma, a muscular, dangerous looking man, showing no ill effects from bursting through the doors, as he walked slowly and deliberately towards Jon. The absence of haste contradicted the urgency with which he had attacked the doors, making each step more ominous.

The reason the pursuer could take his time was obvious to her. Jon, holding his right arm against his body, was backing away from the advancing agent, seemingly unaware of his approach to the perimeter rail, he had nowhere to go. He was inching further away from the teleport station, and escape. The Te’an, on the other hand, knew that Jon had run out of options, as he also moved closer to the rail in the hope, no doubt, of intercepting the injured man.
 

She knew what she had to do, and timing would be critical. Within moments she was at the teleport station, her form dematerialising.

Δ

Each man, unaware of the presence of Emily, carefully eyed the other. Beron was closing on him when Jon saw, dashing across the floor from his right, the figure of his young friend. Beron followed the direction of Jon’s gaze and, in turning transferred, for just an instant, all his weight onto his right side. It was at this precise moment the tiny form of Emily collided with him. The combination of surprise and the young woman’s velocity sent the Te’an spinning, and as the small of his back struck the rail, the momentum of his body carried him over. As he began to fall the agent continued to turn, catching Emily’s side with an arm that may as well have been a club, The unintended blow sent the girl over the rail.

While all of this took only split seconds, it passed in slow motion to Jon. The pain in his arm forgotten, his attempts to reach his young friend were gripped in the same slow motion frame, so that as he moved forward, she moved away at the same speed.
 

As Emily was flung over the rail she shouted only one word. ‘Go!’ Her eyes showed no trace of fear, as the illusion of slow motion was replaced with real time, and she hurtled after Beron.

Jon reached the rail as the pair struck the floor. There was no noise and no blood, in fact they both looked uninjured, albeit absolutely still. The faint shoots of hope sprang up inside him, after all, he had heard of falls higher than this, where people got up and walked away. Feeding his hopes, Beron stirred and sat up, looking across to the still form of Emily. He stood, and walking over to her, crouched down taking one of her tiny wrists in his hand. After a few seconds his cold, emotionless eyes swept upwards until they locked on to the tragic eyes of Jon.
 

All hopes fled before the stark realisation that Emily was dead.
 

His face set as before, Beron swiftly made for the doors to the stairwell.

Δ

Without Emily, Jon was lost. He was running to the teleport, but part of him just wanted to give up and let the pain of losing his friend consume him.
Where are you?
How could you let it happen?

He approached the platform; any moment now his pursuer would repeat his earlier entrance and, this time, there would be no Emily to protect him. The sight of his young friend’s face replayed in his mind, silently mouthing that single word. If he remained, she would have died in vain - she would not have forgiven him for waiting as long as he had. The teleport, if their invisible helper was still in play, would get him to the second level, perhaps with enough time to reach the President.
Well, what are you waiting for?
she asked impatiently, except there was no Emily, only a remonstrating memory. As he moved towards the teleport, the pain in his shoulder and upper arm resurfaced, and was now moving downwards.

He stepped between the posts just as Beron came through the doorway. The last view Jon had of the agent was his cold, implacable expression, then it was gone and the second floor coalesced before him. If the teleport remained open for the agent, it was all over, but even if Beron was forced to traverse all the levels lying between them, it still left very little time.

Uninjured, it would be a very different story, but he stumbled rather than stepped off the platform. His vision began to blur,
I can't black out!
He set off down the corridor, but the more he tried to hurry, the more disoriented he became, it had to be the arm, it no longer hurt, in fact he had lost all feeling in it. Within seconds, he became so light headed he had to lean against a wall and, try as he might, could not prevent himself from sliding down onto the floor.
 

As his mind began to wander, he recalled in vivid detail the last party before graduation, when he left the building feeling wonderful, only for the night air to stir the cocktail of beer, wine of various undistinguished vineyards and copious amounts of spirit, causing him, not for the first time, to slide ignominiously down the wall nearest to the exit, where he would sit until his friends came looking for him.

He shook his head to clear his mind. The phantoms fled into the past, and he realised where he was: hardly any distance from the teleport, and now unable to move, at all. In no more than a minute or two, Beron would come through the doors. Jon sat, with a useless arm, waiting for the end.
She sacrificed herself for nothing.
It should’ve been her who survived
.
But that was never going to happen, because I’ve got the bloody gene. She deserved better than this…than me
,
he was drowning in self-pity, but the lucid part of his mind hauled him back.
If she was here, she’d have found a way to get to the President…get up!
Gritting his teeth against the pain that had migrated to his side, he managed to climb to his feet. Positioning his body, so that his good side was in contact with the wall, he began to move forward, slowly at first but picking up speed through sheer determination.
 

As the curving corridor straightened out, he saw two Secret Service men standing outside the closed double doors.
They’re the men I saw with Emily this morning, or was it yesterday…are they the same men?
Clenching his teeth, forcing himself to stay focussed
,
he heard the unmistakeable sound of Beron flinging the stairwell doors open. Instantly, his mind cleared. At the speed the Te’an could travel, Jon would be run down long before he could traverse the distance to the Secret Service men. He could see each of the men ahead of him place a hand inside their jackets where, he had no doubt, they would each have a gun. His heart sank,
great
, he thought,
if that monster doesn’t kill me, these two will do it for him
.

Δ

Special Agent Joseph LeClerc was the first of the two Secret Service agents to notice the man approaching their station. Although whether he would make it was moot, as he was partly sliding along the wall, then pushing himself into the corridor to stagger a few steps, before falling back to the support of the wall.

His colleague Vincent Sabatino, ‘Tiny’ to his friends because, towering over his colleagues, no other epithet seemed appropriate, was the first to recognise the man.
 

Both Special Agents, simultaneously, placed their right hands onto the grips of their standard issue SIG Sauer P229s, the guns remaining safely within their holsters.

‘Joe,’ Tiny whispered, ‘I’m sure that’s the same man we stopped earlier, he doesn’t look too good.’

The older man looked hard at Jon, there was no mistaking who he was or what was wrong with him. ‘You're right, and look at his right shoulder, its dislocated, it’ll explain how he's walking like that.’ His ten years of experience told him that even an injured man could be very dangerous. ‘Eyes peeled, Tiny.’ Neither man spoke again, they had assessed the threat, it was now simply a matter of waiting.

As Beron ran down the corridor and past the teleport station, he failed to notice the materialisation of Hugo Black.

The scene that coalesced before Hugo was a corridor, with the unmistakeable form of Beron, hurtling past him. The head of TeCorp stepped off the teleport platform and immediately moved off in the same direction as the Te’an agent, with no real idea what he would do when he caught up with him.