Джеймс Паттерсон - The Games

Two o’clock had come and gone before he reached an even fainter trail inside the tree line below the cliff. He had found the path in his scouting trips and used a machete to trim out the rough spots.

The doctor studied the damp earth there and saw no tracks. He’d learned that most people wanting to follow the contour of the mountain took a heavily used trail some two hundred vertical feet below. In his experience only the odd rock climber or two came this far up, and even they rarely used this trail.

He’d met a few over the past two months. One of them had used a Cinder 55 backpack as a cargo bag for ropes and such. An American. Billy White from Fort Collins, Colorado. He’d recommended the pack.

Good guy, Dr. Castro thought. Nice guy.

The faint path ahead continued through the jungle, and he had to be sure of his footing, keeping his weight and balance shifted toward the steep slope to his left. One false step and he’d go down hard. Very hard. And tumble and then hit hard again.

The north breeze ebbed. The rain forest turned even more oppressively hot. Insects were buzzing, birds were calling, and somewhere a monkey chattered. But no human voices. Not even a distant car horn.

It suited Castro. He did not want to run into anyone today. He wished to be like a virus: Alone. Mutating. Incubating. Not existing in people’s minds until their friends started dying all around them.

Dr. Castro pushed on into one of the mountain’s deep and densely forested side canyons. For all intents and purposes, he was invisible.

Alone. Moving. Mutating. Incubating.

Castro imagined he was becoming like Hydra-9. In the shimmering heat he was hyperaware of everything. He felt part of nature now, the buzzing and sawing, the building and destruction, all of it unfolding in an imperfect but inevitable process.

One species becomes dominant, and then, with something as insignificant as a twist in the strand of a virus, the same species is laid low, making way for some better, stronger, and smarter creature.

Great good will come of this, he thought. The population is out of control. The rich are out of control. This will be a check. This will create some balance.

“Hey there, Doc.”

Dr. Castro startled at the soft voice, almost tripped off the wrong side of the trail, but he managed to grab onto a vine. He looked up and saw Billy White sitting on a rock about fifteen feet above him, tanned, bare-chested, ripped, Petzl helmet and a pack next to him, chewing on an energy bar.

“Billy,” Castro said. He coughed. “I didn’t see you there.”

White wiped off sweat below his short blond dreadlocks and flashed the doctor an aw-shucks smile. “Just taking a rest. I’m playing mule, hauling out a bunch of gear from the last time we were in here climbing.”

The American stood and ambled like a goat down over the loose rocks between them. “Frickin’ hot, isn’t it? Hey, that’s the pack!”

“Yes.”

“Didn’t know it came in that color.”

“I dyed it like that,” Castro said.

“Nice,” the climber said. “I’d bow-hunt with something like that back home in Colorado. At least that’s what I was thinking. Where’d you get it?”

“Moosejaw.com,” the doctor said.

“I’ve got the two smaller ones, but I’ve never seen the big boy. Want to take a rest, let me look inside?”

“I’d rather not,” Castro said. “I’m trying to make the top of the mountain before dark. I’ll have a ride waiting up there.”

“Yeah?” Billy said. “You know the way?”

“I’ve done it before.”

“Lead on, then,” he said. “I’m always up for a virgin climb.”

The doctor didn’t know what to do. He did not want Billy White with him. He wanted Billy White to go downhill and out of sight.

“I was sort of hoping to do this alone,” Castro said. “Kind of a solo thing.”

“I get it and no worries,” White said. “I hunt for the same kind of solitude.”

The doctor smiled. “I appreciate it. Well, be seeing you, Billy.”

Before Castro had fully turned to set off down the trail again, he felt the weight come off his shoulders.

“Jesus, Doc, you got that sucker packed to the gills,” White said. “What the hell’s in here?”

He’d grabbed the bottom of the pack and hoisted it.

“Sand,” Castro said, upset. “I’m training. Thinking of climbing Everest someday.”

“Yeah?” White said, letting go of the bag. It dropped and there were clanking noises as the weight returned to the doctor’s shoulders and hips.

“Don’t sound like sand to me,” White said. “Really, Doc, what’s in there?”

The American said all this good-naturedly, but Dr. Castro felt like he had no choice in the matter now. With his body still turned three-quarters away from the American, he released the chest strap and then the hip belt.

“Since you’re so interested, I’ll show you,” Castro said. “Help me?”

White grinned and grabbed the pack with two hands.

“Careful,” the doctor said. “I have sensitive scientific equipment in there.”

“I didn’t think it was sand,” White said, crouching down, unsnapping the flaps, and admiring the hardware. “You doing an experiment?”

“Something like that,” Castro said.

“What’s your hypothesis?” White asked, lifting the flap to look into the main compartment.

“You a scientist as well as a climber?” Castro asked, feeling increasingly nervous about White rummaging around in his pack.

“This is a nice feature, the top compartment on the flap,” White said thoughtfully. “Awful bottom-heavy, though. Doc, hasn’t anybody taught you to put the heaviest stuff highest?”

The American started to unzip the top pocket, and Castro knew he’d see the pistol and extra ammunition. He reached over, picked up a chunk of jagged granite, and swung it like a hammer at the American’s skull.

White must have sensed something because he jerked to his left just before the sharp rock struck and took a hard but glancing blow high on the side of his dreadlocked head. The American lurched to his right and fell on his side, clutching at his bleeding head and groaning. “What the fuck! What the fuck!”

Finish it, Castro thought, and he took two steps and then stood over White with one boot on each side of him so the American climber’s upper body and head were in range.

The doctor started to raise the rock to smash it down on White’s head and be done with it. The American swung a fist and hit him in the balls.

The doctor hunched up, dropped the rock, and almost puked. White lurched up and punched him in the face. Castro fell backward, almost slipping off the flat and into the rock piles below.

He was stunned but aware of White getting to his feet. Blood gushed down the side of the American’s face, which had turned primal.

“What the fuck’s in that pack, Doc?” White asked, taking a step toward Castro and kicking him hard in the ham of his left leg. “Tell me what’s in that pack you want to kill me to keep me from seeing!”

The American cocked his boot as if to kick him again. Before he could, Castro stuck a three-inch dagger through the side of the calf of his opposite leg.

White howled in agony and danced back before going down on the rocks. He lay there, screaming and panting, then tried to reach the figure-eight handle of the dagger.

The American saw Castro get to his feet and come for him. White’s face turned purple with fury, and he made insane little grunting noises before he grabbed the handle and wrenched the bloody dagger from his calf.

“C’mon, Doc,” White said, swinging it at Castro. “I’ll fucking kill you now. What you got in that pack?”