John Lyman - House of Acerbi

Acerbi coughed again, releasing a torrent of blood that flew from his mouth and splattered against the mirror. He let out a piercing scream and threw open the bathroom door before stumbling back into his room and out into the hall.

A security man standing on the stairs at the end of the hall heard his screams and ran to help, but he stopped and drew back in fear when he saw the dark splotches covering Acerbi’s face. Rene continued down the hallway, his vision becoming dimmer as he felt his way, leaving a trail of bloody handprints along the wall. By now, several of the household staff had been alerted to his plight, and lights began to come on in rooms all over the chateau.

Awakened by the frightened security man, Emilio flew from his room, his bathrobe flowing out behind him as he ran through the chateau. He had almost reached the second floor when he looked up and froze. Standing above him, leaning against a blood-spattered railing, was Rene Acerbi. Emilio recoiled when he saw the blood-red eyes staring back at him. A yellowish froth was oozing from the corner of Acerbi’s mouth, and his breathing now came in sporadic, rasping gasps that trailed off in a horrible bubbling noise that wracked him once again with a wave of coughing that spewed blood-tinged mucus into the air.

With visions of the invisible pathogen floating all around him, Emilio began to back away. He fully expected Acerbi to scream at him to stop, but instead, the grotesque thing hovering over him only gasped and bubbled and stared out into space with unseeing eyes before falling straight ahead onto the hard marble stairs with a sickening thud before rolling all the way down to the first floor with all the grace of a leaky plastic bag filled with the bloody day-old remains of a butchered carcass.

Emilio turned and ran past a screaming female servant, tearing across the grand foyer until he reached the chateau’s thick wooden front doors. He pulled with all his strength, flinging one of the doors inward, then stopped, frozen in place by yet another frightening sight. A blue monster was staring straight at him. Was this a dream … a nightmare? Yes, of course, he was still asleep. He had to wake up. The blue monster reached out and jerked him outside into the arms of another blue monster.

Emilio began to feel weak, his vision growing dim with fear as he felt the monsters leading him away into the night, where there were lights-lots and lots of flashing blue lights. Looking around, the defrocked priest slowly began to realize that he wasn’t dreaming after all. He could feel himself being pressed against a van. He was being handcuffed. The blue monsters were men wearing blue biohazard suits, like the one he had worn the day Acerbi had shown him the pathogen. He could hear the hiss of air from their self-contained breathing apparatus as they shoved him inside the van and closed the door.

Unbeknownst to those inside the chateau, they were now surrounded by a multi-national military force, including a biohazard team from the World Health Organization, the one organization that, surprisingly, Acerbi had failed to infiltrate.

Standing on the road outside the main gate leading to the chateau, Danny Zamir looked on as his men assisted in rounding up the core members of Acerbi’s inner circle. News trucks bristling with satellite dishes were already arriving, and soon the world would know the real truth about Rene Acerbi and his plan for world domination led by a cadre of the privileged elite.

Naturally, there would be the predicted shock among people the world over when they first heard the news of the death of Rene Acerbi, a man who had ironically just died from the same virus his company had supposedly developed a vaccine for. Acerbi had been looked upon by the people of the world as a hero, but as soon as those same people learned the truth about him, their grief would turn to rage.

In the next twenty-four hours, Acerbi’s people would begin to turn on each other in a dog-eat-dog race to claim ignorance and blame others. Soon, government officials, followed by reporters, would be swarming outside his labs after sources inside began to reveal the true facts behind the horror that had been unleashed on the world by Rene Acerbi and his power hungry associates.

In a matter of weeks, the extent of Acerbi’s influence inside governments around the world would begin to surface. Countless high-ranking government officials would be exposed, and their embedded accomplices would be quickly arrested.

Other insiders would try desperately to make a deal with authorities by naming names, and as soon as the names of those involved were leaked to the press, mobs would surround their homes and deliver their own brand of justice before the police or military could arrive to arrest them.

The era of Rene Acerbi was over, and a plan seven hundred years in the making would now be nothing more than fodder for countless books and movies about one of the most diabolical schemes to ever cross the threshold of human imagination.

One Month Later

Cardinal Leopold Amodeo was awakened early in the morning by the sound of voices outside the cabin. Shuffling from his warm bed, he opened the thick wooden door to find the head of the Mossad looking him straight in the face.

Leo rubbed his eyes. “Good morning, Danny.”

Danny Zamir smiled back. “Good morning yourself, Cardinal.”

“Haven’t you heard? I’m no longer a cardinal.” Leo peered over Zamir’s shoulder at several Israeli commandos standing among the trees. “Is this a social visit?”

“We’ve come to take you all home … and by the way, the pope has reinstated you to your former position.”

A sleepy voice called out from inside the cabin. “Who is it, Leo?”

“It’s the Mossad. It appears we’re surrounded.”

Zamir looked through the doorway and saw Evita Vargas curled up in a large chair under a blanket.

“Ask them if they want some coffee.”

“We don’t have time,” Zamir said. “There’s a chopper down on the highway and a plane waiting for us on the runway at the base of the mountain. Where’s Lev?”

“Right behind you.”

Danny swung around to see his old friend, Lev Wasserman, standing behind him holding the stub of a cigar in his hand. “We just heard about Acerbi on the shortwave radio. So it’s all over, eh Danny?”

“Yes. Eduardo finally agreed to take matters into his own hands after we followed two of Rene’s most fanatical supporters to a conference center on the grounds of a resort he owned in the Netherlands. We discovered a hidden stockpile of the virus in a secret vault beneath the building, along with hundreds of pounds of the genetically altered wheat. Once we had the powdered virus in our hands, it was a simple matter of having our scientists bake some croissants with the genetically altered wheat-apparently there was a special procedure involved to prevent the destruction of the delicate DNA. In the end, I believe Eduardo realized that he was the only one who could get close enough to Rene to get the job done, but I could tell it really broke the old guy’s heart.”

“Is there any way we could stop by to speak with him before we leave?” Leo asked. “I’d like to thank him. I’m sure he could use some support right about now. He appeared to be ill the last time we saw him.”

“I’m afraid that’s impossible, Leo. He disappeared three weeks ago.”

The weather had turned frigid by the time Leo arrived outside the Apostolic Palace. Hurrying past the Swiss Guards, he noticed the frenetic activity inside as aides rushed back and forth, squeezing past him without bothering to acknowledge his presence. Something was going on. Making his way up to the papal apartments, he tossed his coat on a chair inside the reception area and strode down the long marble hallway to the pope’s library.