Mark Alpert - Extinction

She took another step forward, approaching the edge of Wang’s desk. “Did you see it yourself?”

The old man nodded. “I thought I dreamed it at first. But my men saw it, too.”

“That swarm was part of Tài Hé. They’re insects embedded with antennas and computer chips. For spying on dissidents and enemies of the state. And delivering biological weapons.”

Wang put the flash drive back on his desk and pushed it away as if it was unclean. “It’s the work of the Devil,” he muttered. “An abomination.”

Kirsten looked again at the crucifix hanging from the old man’s neck. “You’re right,” she said. “What they’re doing is satanic. So will you help me stop them?”

He didn’t answer right away. He lowered his head and stared at the floor, deep in thought. The old smuggler was clearly a clever man who didn’t do anything without thinking it through. Kirsten and the three thugs stood there in silence, waiting for him to finish calculating.

By the time Wang finally raised his head, he’d regained his composure. “Business is business,” he said. “As soon as we take you across the border, I want my fifty thousand dollars.”

Jim’s troubles started at the timberline, about a mile and a half from the radio tower. For the past five hours he’d ascended the tree-covered ridges of Yulong Xueshan, taking cover behind the thick summer foliage. But the tower loomed above an alpine glacier at the mountain’s summit, and between this ice sheet and the timberline was a long barren slope littered with loose stones. If he tried to climb this slope, he’d be exposed to the dozens of surveillance cameras that were surely monitoring the area around the tower. He’d lose the element of surprise, which was one of the few things he had going for him.

He lingered at the edge of the woods, unsure what to do. Although it was only 5:00 P.M., the sun had already sunk behind the high peaks of the mountain range. He knew that waiting for nightfall wouldn’t help; Supreme Harmony’s surveillance network included infrared cameras, and the thermal image of Jim’s body would shine like a beacon against the cold mountainside. He peered around the trunk of a large pine tree, trying to determine where the cameras were, but he spotted nothing on the bare gray slope above him. Then he saw something move beside another tree at the timberline, a figure in an olive-green uniform, about a hundred yards away. An instant later he heard the rapid-fire bursts from the soldier’s AK-47.

Jim ducked behind the pine trunk as the bullets whistled past. The soldier had to be a Module—his marksmanship was too damn good. The AK rounds slammed into the tree, ripping off slabs of bark and pulp. Jim crouched low and raised his Glock, but he was badly outgunned. When he snaked his prosthesis around the pine to return fire, the barrage from the AK gouged the trunk and showered him with splinters. The Module circled to the right, shooting as he ran, and Jim scuttled around the tree to stay behind cover. Sooner or later, he knew, one of the bullets would hit him. It was just a matter of time.

Thinking fast, he pulled his satellite phone out of his pocket and displayed the image of Medusa on the screen. “All right, I give up!” he yelled. “I’m throwing down my gun.” He tossed aside his Glock, which landed on the pine needles that blanketed the ground. “Now hold your fire! I’m unarmed!”

It was risky. He didn’t know if Supreme Harmony would want to take him alive. But even if it had no interest in incorporating him into its network, he assumed it would want to interrogate him. Out of curiosity, if nothing else. After a few seconds the Module ceased firing, and the woods fell silent.

Jim raised his hands in the air, holding the satellite phone in his prosthesis. Then he stepped out from behind the pine trunk. “Don’t shoot! I have something you want.”

The Module came forward, keeping his AK braced against his shoulder and the muzzle pointed at Jim’s chest. He was thirty feet away, close enough that Jim could see the stitches in the young soldier’s shaved head.

Jim held out his sat phone, making sure the screen was pointed at the Module. “It’s in here,” he said. “The information from Arvin Conway.”

The Module lifted his head from the gun sights and stared directly at the sat phone’s screen. But he kept advancing. The image of Medusa seemed to have no effect on him. He was coming in for the kill.

“No, wait!” Desperate, Jim glanced at his Glock, but it was too far away. The Module would blast him before he could dive for it.

The soldier stepped closer, coming within ten feet. “We’ve confirmed your identity,” he said in perfect English. “You are—”

He stumbled in midsentence. His body went slack, and the momentum of his last step pitched him forward. He dropped the AK and landed face-first in the pine needles.

Jim grabbed his Glock and trained it on the inert Module. The trick had worked, but not as well as he’d hoped. Viewing Medusa from afar hadn’t stopped the Module; apparently, his ocular cameras had to see the image head-on and up close to deliver the correct sequence of data that would shut down the implants. Worse, Jim couldn’t use the trick again. Supreme Harmony would figure out what he’d done and make sure that none of its Modules came too close. The only way to defeat the network was to broadcast the shutdown code from the radio tower, but now he had no hope of surprising Supreme Harmony. The network knew where he was.

Muttering curses, he tucked the Glock in his pants and picked up the Module’s AK-47. Then he started running up the mountainside. Although his plan might be hopeless, he couldn’t turn around. He left the woods behind and climbed the barren slope as fast as he could, leaning forward and pumping his arms.

The cold mountain air seared his lungs. He saw the glacier up ahead, a tattered blanket of dirty ice, ravaged by global warming. Its surface was etched with countless cracks and crevasses, and rivulets of meltwater leaked from its receding edge. Near the mountain’s summit, now less than a mile away, was the radio tower, a steel-lattice antenna rising hundreds of feet above the glacier. The tower’s control station was a simple aluminum-sided trailer resting on the ice sheet next to the antenna’s base. Jim focused all his will on that trailer. It was his goal, his target. He stared so hard at the thing, his eyes watered. Then four figures emerged from behind the trailer, running in lockstep across the ice. Jim could barely see the Modules—they were more than a thousand yards away—but he was willing to bet they carried assault rifles. Although they were beyond the maximum effective range of an AK, they were closing in fast. They’d obviously spotted him.

Jim stopped in his tracks and looked for cover. There was nothing but bare rock to his left and right, and the woods were more than half a mile behind him. But just a hundred yards ahead was the melting edge of the glacier, which rose almost twenty feet above the granite slope. He could take cover behind the wall of ice if he could make it there in time. Summoning all his remaining strength, he dashed toward the glacier’s edge, running headlong toward the Modules. He was dizzy from exhaustion, but he managed to stumble behind the cover of the ice sheet just as the first gunshots echoed against the mountain.

On his hands and knees, he gulped the thin air. The altitude made it excruciating—he was 16,000 feet above sea level and seriously short on oxygen. Once he caught his breath, he surveyed the jagged wall of ice in front of him. A stream of meltwater flowed from a gap in the wall, and the gap led to a crevasse, a trench within the glacier. Jim decided to enter the crevasse and see where it went. It was better than walking on top of the ice sheet, where the Modules could take another shot at him.