The Curse of Medusa

Devlin eyed him up suspiciously. “I knew it! And what would that be?”

“We’re taking Ciara,” Mikey said. “I’m not making a journey like this without my Ciara.”

Kyle rolled his eyes.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Hawke and Kim Taylor approached the heavily-armed PFPA men guarding the external doors at the entrance to the Pentagon. The Pentagon Force Protection Agency was a civilian law enforcement organization within the command structure of the Department of Defense. It was assigned to protect not only the world-famous Pentagon but also the Mark Center Building and other smaller DoD facilities in the city.

Kim showed her pass and Hawke followed her as she navigated her way deftly through the labyrinthine defense headquarters until they finally reached Brooke’s sprawling suite of offices. They passed more yet guards at the door to the outer office of Brooke’s private secretary and after a brief word with his personal assistant they entered a bustling, noisy room full of men and women talking into cell-phones and vying for their boss’s attention.

Hawke took a look around the hectic office. “There are more guns around here than at your average firing range.”

“He’s the US Secretary of Defense and next in the presidential line of succession, plus we’re in the middle of our worst terror attack, Hawke,” Kim said, keeping her voice to a whisper. “What did you expect?”

Point taken, he thought. “We still need to speak to him.”

He looked over at Brooke. Alex was beside him as an assistant was now directing the boss’s attention to one of the many plasma screens neatly fitted into the far wall of the Secretary’s office. Everyone in the room watched in silence as a second helicopter drone appeared on the capital’s horizon and fired another Hellfire missile.

This time the target was the Lincoln Memorial, and a collective gasp of horror went around the room as the north side of the impressive monument exploded in a massive fireball. A few seconds later a grisly, black column of smoke billowed and plumed into the night sky, lit yellow by the memorial’s powerful floodlights.

“It’s another drone, sir!”

Brooke slammed his fist on his desk. “I can see that, damn it! Just blow the god-damn thing out of the sky like the last one.”

Another flurry of phone calls was made, and Hawke watched as two F-15s flew over the city, one of them firing an AIM-9 Sidewinder missile at the drone. The enemy aircraft tried to take evasive action and dodged the missile, but the USAF fighter jets were too fast for it and after firing another heat-seeking Sidewinder they hit the target. Everyone in the room cheered as the drone exploded above the Potomac and crashed into the water in an orange fireball.

“Now’s our chance,” Kim said.

They stepped over to Brooke’s desk.

“Mr Secretary,” Kim said.

Brooke looked at them distractedly. “What is it? Oh…” His face warmed for a moment when he saw Hawke. “Joe, hi.”

“We need to talk, Jack.”

“Shoot — but make it fast. As you can see, those sons-of-bitches somehow just got another goddamned drone up.”

“It’s about the Smithsonian.”

“What about it?”

“It’s Frank Watkins, Jack.”

Brooke smiled for a second and nodded his head. “How is the old bastard?”

“Dead, sir,” Kim said.

Brooke’s face dropped. “Dead?”

Hawke nodded. “Professional hit, and more than that — we found the President’s order on his desk — the one sanctioning the release of an object from Archive 7.”

“I can’t believe Frank’s dead… You think he was murdered by Kimble’s men?”

“We can’t be sure at this stage.”

Brooke paused as he took the news on board. “So what did Kimble order from the archive?”

“We don’t know what was released, or to whom, but whatever the hell it was, something very bad went on in that Archive, Jack. We found two men turned to stone.”

Brooke’s eyes widened with shock. “Turned to stone?”

Hawke nodded again. “But here’s the thing — when we mentioned it to the President he just shut us down — told us point blank to leave it and get back to the White House.” Hawke lowered his voice. “I think President Kimble is covering something up.”

Brooke looked at the two of them, glancing over his shoulder as an admiral brushed past him with a cell-phone in each hand.

“What is it, Dad?” Alex asked, suddenly concerned.

Brooke didn’t reply.

Alex tried again. “Whatever the hell you know about this, Dad it’s time to bring us in.”

Brooke was silent for a long time before replying, his face tormented by indecision, his mind torn in two directions — his duty to protect national security interests on the one hand but his responsibility to help Hawke, Kim and Alex as much as possible to stop the threat on the other.

“Come with me.”

He led them out of the main office into a smaller ante-room and closed the door.

“This is my private office. We can talk in here undisturbed.”

“Sounds serious,” Alex said.

Brooke ignored the comment. “What I’m about to tell you is highly classified. In fact, it’s the second highest classification we have.”