Douglas Preston - The Book of the Dead

“No, it isn’t right!” D’Agosta said, getting in his face and breathing hard with indignation.

The man backed off, unshipped his radio.

“Look, I’m leaving,” D’Agosta said, trying to make himself sound suddenly accommodating. “I’ve got a long drive to get back to the warehouse. This place is in the middle of frigging nowhere and it’s six o’clock at night.”

“You’re not going anywhere, pal.” The supervisor spoke briefly into the radio, then turned to one of the workers. “Take him into staff dining and have him wait there.”

“Come this way, sir.”

“This is bullshit. I’m not going anywhere.”

“Come this way, sir.”

Grudgingly, D’Agosta followed the guard through the loading dock and into a large pantry, empty, dark, and smelling strongly of Clorox. They passed through a door in the far wall into a smaller room where, it seemed, the kitchen staff took their own meals when they were not on shift.

“Have a seat.”

D’Agosta sat down at one of the stainless-steel tables. The man took a seat at the next table, folded his arms, looked away. A few minutes passed and the supervisor returned, an armed guard at his side.

“Stand up,” the super said.

D’Agosta complied.

The super turned toward the guard. “Search him.”

“You can’t do that! I know my rights, and-”

“And this is a federal prison. It’s all spelled out on the signs in front, if you bothered to read them. We have the right to search anyone at will.”

“Don’t you frigging touch me.”

“Sir, at the moment, you’ve got a medium-sized problem. If you don’t cooperate, you’re going to have a big problem.”

“Yeah? What kind of a problem?”

“How does resisting a federal law enforcement officer sound? Now, last time: raise your arms.”

After a moment’s hesitation, D’Agosta did as he was ordered. A pat-down quickly brought to light the pint bottle of Rebel Yell.

The guard pulled out the bottle, shaking his head sadly. He turned to the supervisor. “What now?” he asked.

“Call the local police department. Have them pick him up. A drunk driver is their problem, not ours.”

“But I just took one sip!”

The supervisor turned back. “Sit down and shut up.”

D’Agosta sat down again a little unsteadily, muttering to himself.

“And the truck?” the guard asked.

“Call his company. Have them send someone to pick it up.”

“It’s after six, there won’t be any management there, and-”

“Call them in the morning, then. The truck isn’t going anywhere.”

“Yes, sir.”

The supervisor glanced at the guard. “Stay here with him until the police arrive.”

“Yes, sir.”

The supervisor left. The guard sat down at the farthest table, eyeing D’Agosta balefully.

“I gotta go to the head,” said D’Agosta.

The guard sighed heavily but said nothing.

“Well?”

The guard rose, scowling. “I’ll take you.”

“You gonna hold my hand while I take a dump, or can I do it by myself?”

The scowl deepened. “It’s just down the hall, second door on the right. Hurry it up.”

D’Agosta rose with a flabby sigh and walked slowly to the lunchroom door, opened it, and staggered through, holding on to the doorknob for support. As soon as the door closed, he turned left and ran silently down a long, empty corridor past a series of fortified lunch-rooms, barred doors all standing open. He ducked into the last one and yanked off the white driver’s uniform, revealing a light tan shirt, which, with the dark brown pants he was wearing, gave him an uncanny resemblance to a typical Herkmoor guard. He stuffed the old shirt into a trash can at the door. Continuing down the hall, he passed a lit station. He nodded to the two officers as he walked by.

Beyond the station, he slipped a specially modified pen from his pocket, pulled off the cap, and began walking down the corridor, holding it in his hand, videotaping. He walked easily, nonchalantly, like a guard on his rounds, moving the pen this way and that, giving special attention to the placement of the security cameras and other high-tech sensing devices.

At last he ducked into a men’s room, headed to the second-to-last stall, and closed the door. Digging into the crotch of his pants, he pulled out a small, sealed plastic bag and a small roll of duct tape. He stood on the toilet, lifted a ceiling tile, and used the duct tape to affix the bag to the upper side of the tile. Then he lowered the tile back in place. Score one to Eli Glinn. The man had insisted the pat-down would stop as soon as the bottle of booze was discovered-and he had been right.

Exiting the bathroom, D’Agosta continued down the hall. Moments later, he heard an alarm go off-not a loud one, just a high-pitched beeping. He walked to the end of the empty corridor, where he was confronted by a set of double doors with a magnetic security lock. Here, he removed his wallet, took out a certain credit card, and swiped it through the door.

A light turned green and he heard the whir and click of the lock disengaging.

Score another to Glinn. He quickly ducked through.

He was now in a small exercise yard, empty at this late hour, with high cinder-block walls on three sides and a chain-link fence on the other. He looked around, verifying that there was no security camera watching him: as Glinn had pointed out, even a prison as high-tech as Herkmoor had to limit its cameras to the most vital areas.

D’Agosta strolled around the yard quickly, videotaping all the while. Then, returning the pen to his pocket, he stepped toward one wall, loosened his belt and unzipped his pants, and removed a rolled sheet of Mylar, which had been strapped to the inside of his leg. He glanced over his shoulder, then stuffed the Mylar tube into a drainpipe in the corner of the yard, hooking it in place with a bent bobby pin.

This accomplished, he moved to the chain-link fence, put a hand on it, pulled at it gingerly. This was the part he really, really wasn’t looking forward to.

Pulling a small pair of wire cutters from his socks, he snipped a three-foot vertical row of the chain links, directly behind one of the metal fence posts. He made sure the cut ends rejoined, the fence looking fully intact, and then he lobbed the wire cutters onto the nearest roof, where it would be a long time before they were found. He walked along the fence for half a dozen yards, taking a steadying breath, then another. Looking through the chain link, he could see the vague forms of the guard towers in the darkness beyond. He swallowed, rubbed his hands together. And then he hoisted himself up the chain link and began to climb.

Halfway up, he saw a colored wire strip woven through the chain link. As he passed it, a shrill alarm went off in the yard. Half a dozen sodium vapor lights snapped on around him. There was an immediate response from the guard towers along the perimeter: lights swiveled around, and in a moment they located him on the fence. He continued to climb to the top, and then, steadying himself, and concealing the movement with his arm, he pulled the pen from his pocket, aimed it through the link, and began videotaping the no-man’s-land beyond and below him, now starkly illuminated by the lights focused on him.

“You are under surveillance!” came a bullhorned voice from the nearest tower. “Stop immediately!”

From over his shoulder, D’Agosta saw six guards burst into the yard and run like hell toward him. He replaced the pen in his pocket and glanced along the top edge of the fence. Two wires ran through the chain link here, one white, the other red. He grasped the red one, yanked as hard as he could.

Another alarm went off.

“Halt!”