Clive Cussler - The Tombs

“It’s an encouraging sign,” said Sam. “This place is too well guarded to be an honest drug company. Let’s hope one of the things they’re hiding is Albrecht Fischer.”

Suddenly the big dog surged ahead. His leash tightened and jerked Remi’s arm, then pulled her relentlessly forward. “We’ve got a scent,” she said. Zoltán tugged Remi along the roadway between the windowless buildings, and the others followed closely. Sam and János spread out on both sides of her and watched for obstacles ahead and either way, with their hands resting on their pistols.

They reached a building near the farthest corner of the complex, some kind of utility or storage building. There was one door made of steel, and around it was a steel cage with its own door and an electronic card reader on the latch. Zoltán went to the cage, nosed around it, trying to find a way in, getting more and more excited, sniffing under the grating and then jumping up to put his forepaws on it.

“ Ül , Zoltán,” Remi said. “Jo fiu.” She patted Zoltán as he sat. To the others she said, “This is it.”

Sam said, “We can knock or we can wait for somebody with a card key.”

“I’ll knock,” said Remi. “Take Zoltán out of sight with you.”

The three men and the dog stepped to either side into the shadows while Remi went up to the cage and pressed a button next to the card reader. A loud buzzer went off inside.

A small window in the steel door slid open at eye level, then closed. The door opened. A man in the usual gray uniform appeared and asked her a question in Hungarian. She laughed as though he’d said something charming. He was clearly intrigued by the sudden arrival of an attractive woman. She smiled brightly at him and he pressed a button on the inner wall of the building that buzzed and unlocked the cage door.

As Remi stepped inside, the man saw Zoltán materialize out of the darkness beside her. He began reflexively to shut the steel door, but Zoltán was much faster and pushed in ahead of Remi.

There was a low growl as the dog’s jaws closed on the man’s forearm, and the man let out an involuntary yelp. As the door was swinging shut, Sam hit it with his shoulder, and he, Tibor, and János were inside, guns drawn. János shut the door.

“Ül!” Remi said to the dog: “Sit!”

The man in Zoltán’s grip sat. When he did, Zoltán released him and sat too. “Jo fiu,” Remi said. “Good boy.” The man remained seated on the concrete floor while János relieved him of his gun and kept it pointed in his general direction.

“Sam!”

They all spun and saw, across the empty floor of the building, an enclosure that looked like a tool cage, with a steel grating that went from the floor to the ceiling and a padlocked door. Behind it stood Albrecht Fischer.

“Albrecht!” called Sam. “Is he the only guard?”

“There are two others on duty now. They both have rifles. They left a few minutes ago to bring back some coffee.”

As they hurried to the cage, Sam said to Tibor, “They’re probably your friends with the flashlight and the badly shined shoes.”

In the enclosure, Albrecht had a bed with a steel frame and a thin mattress over wire mesh like a military bunk and he had a portable toilet. He was wearing the same clothes he’d worn in Berlin, which looked worse for wear and had dried bloodstains on the front of the shirt.

Sam called, “Bring the guard over.”

János spoke to the man and the man got up to walk over to the cage. Zoltán followed at the guard’s heels, occasionally issuing a low growl.

Sam said, “Get the key.”

Tibor gave the man the order in Hungarian, but the man shrugged and said something. János patted him down. “He doesn’t have it.” He ran to the desk near the door and rifled the drawers. He found a second padlock with a key in it, ran back with it, and Sam tried the key in the first padlock. It didn’t fit.

Sam said, “Tell him to take his uniform and boots off.” He added, “You strip down too, Albrecht.”

The two men obeyed, and Sam said, “Albrecht, step back and get behind something solid. Everybody else, do the same. When I shoot the padlock, the clock starts running. We have to move quickly. We dress Albrecht like us and lock this guy up in his place. Then we move fast to the van and get out of here. If anybody we meet aims a weapon, shoot first.”

The others got behind some wooden crates. Remi took the dog with her and covered his ears with her hands.

There was a loud bang as Sam shot the lock off the cage. Everyone began to move quickly. János pushed the guard into the cage and sat him on the bed. Albrecht came out and put on the uniform. As Albrecht was tying his shoes, Tibor put the guard’s gun belt around him and clicked the buckle. Sam used the second lock to secure the cage.

Everyone trotted to the door. As Remi was about to open it, the buzzer sounded loudly and made her jump. Zoltán began to growl, but she whispered to him and he went quiet.

“Our two friends must be back,” said Sam. “We’ve got to let them in.”

Tibor stepped to the side of the door where the guard had pressed a button to open the cage before. He read the label, then nodded. The others all moved to the sides, backs to the wall, with guns drawn. Tibor pressed the button to buzz the guards in while Remi swung the door open.

The two men stepped inside, each carrying two paper cups of coffee, their rifles slung across their backs. As soon as they were in, Sam and János were beside them, holding pistols to their heads.

Tibor snapped some orders, and the men set down their coffee cups, set their rifles on the floor, stepped away, and lay down on their stomachs. János removed the handcuffs from the leather cases on their belts and handcuffed them to two steel girders that served to support the roof.

Remi and the dog went out, with Sam right behind. Albrecht followed, and then Tibor and János, carrying the two AK-47 rifles. When Sam looked at them questioningly, Tibor whispered, “Would you rather we had them or they did?”

They moved quickly, in loose formation, along the drive between the rows of buildings toward the spot where they had left their van.

There was the sound of a truck moving along the roadway on the far side of the buildings to their left and then a second truck coming along the paved surface outside the tall chain-link fence. They stopped in front of a building for a moment, using its bulk to hide from the truck moving along the fence. Sam and Remi moved to the corner of the building to see that it passed. The vehicle was a stake truck with about fifteen men inside, on two benches along either side, all in gray guard uniforms and holding AK-47 rifles, muzzle upward, between their knees.

When the truck had moved away along the outer perimeter, Sam moved close to the others. “So much for going over the fence.”

Suddenly there was the sound of running feet somewhere to their left beyond the next row of buildings. Sam, Remi, and Zoltán began to run ahead toward the gate, and the others moved up with them. “We’ve got to keep from being boxed in,” Sam said. “Stay ahead of them.”

The group ran harder until they reached the double-fenced building with the warnings about Contagious Disease Research. Sam said to Tibor, “Go over one row and see if you can keep those guys from flanking us. I’ll give them something else to think about.”

He waited until the others were around the next row of buildings and out of sight. Then he ran up to the Contagious Disease building and threw his body against the gate in the fence. There was a loud ringing alarm and a louder electronic siren. The red lights above the gate flashed, and a set of floodlights came on, illuminating the outside of the building. Sam ran along the drive on their original route.