Perfect Weapon. Amy J. Fetzer

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      Cisco approached the escape route, stopping to study the footprints.

      There was enough moisture and dead leaves to give them a hand full of casts, but he saw three sets, one was very small. Female.

      The escape entrance in the underbrush was intact. Gravel crunched beneath his shoes as Cisco moved behind the partition and walked the corridor. Power had been routed to a generator and lit the stone interior. The sensors were already registering the area free of toxins. At the end was a single steel elevator, bullet and impact proof to ten thousand PSI. It was unmarred but for the bloody handprints smeared all over. He leaned near.

      “Small. Frantic. Female. Look how many times they touched. Get a sample.”

      “There’s another blood trail here,” Wickum said and Cisco turned.

      His assistant squatted near the entrance and gestured with a pen at the bloody stones.

      “Type match it to the blood on the doors. Let’s see if we have more than one runner.”

      “You think this was one of the attackers?”

      “I hope so. There were two females working the graveyard shift.” And alive, he hoped. Neither were the killer type.

      Cisco’s pager went off. He leaned toward the light to read it. The bosses, he thought bitterly. They could wait. He had to collect something other than theory before he could give an initial report. He who makes the gold makes the rules, he thought as he moved out of the stone corridor and into the morning light.

      He slipped his cell free and punched numbers, securing the line, then moving to his car.

      “We have Dr. Sydney Hale,” the agent said on the other end of the line.

      Instead of being relieved, Cisco was instantly suspicious. “Anyone else?”

      “No, sir.”

      Cisco cursed. “No discussions, Combs, and double check your security. Remove all outside traces. Dr. Hale is a witness and a suspect.”

      “Sir?”

      “So far, she’s the only one alive.”

      Cisco cut the line, then dialed again. His boss went off on him the minute Cisco spoke. “No, sir, I don’t know exactly what happened.”

      “Your best scenario, Agent Cisco?”

      “I’d rather not speculate just yet.”

      His boss growled into the phone. “Give it a shot.” It was an order.

      “The attack occurred at zero seven hundred hours. Mother was down seconds before that. We’re locked out of the system, still. The escape lift is covered with blood, three, possibly four sets of footprints on the mountains. For unknown reasons, Dr. Sydney Hale escaped and is now secured.” There was a small stretch of silence while Cisco waited for that to sink in. “We have reports of ground tremors and considering nothing is opening the doors, my first analysis is the Cradle suffered an explosion. We have to assume they took the gas and anything else of value, killed the inhabitants and escaped out the emergency lift.”

      “Good God. How?

      “That I can’t speculate, sir. Until I have something, I’d ask that you not inform the council yet.”

      “And just why should I do that?”

      “This assault team got into one of the most secure facilities in this country, sir.”

      There was a grunt, and then the line went dead.

      Cisco cut the line and tucked the satellite phone inside his coat. He scrubbed a hand over his face, then walked down the mountainside.

      Wickum was right behind him.

      Cisco stopped, gauging footprints. He touched something, rubbing his fingers together. “Someone definitely got hit.” He showed the other man the blood on his fingertips. Cisco snapped out a handkerchief, bright white against the dark clothes. As an agent took pictures and a sample, he stared toward the cavern’s tourist side. He’d bet a hundred that the carefully disguised door at Tatiana’s Veil hadn’t been destroyed. Inside the cavern formation Tatiana’s Veil hid the interior doorway into the facility. The only other route in or out was the escape lift. Likewise disguised from the untrained eye, the escape hatch was locked from inside the Cradle and a Marine guard had the only codes and turnkey. The inhabitants of the lab didn’t know it existed. Except, apparently, Dr. Hale. Wickum met up with him, pressing on the earpiece that wasn’t hidden all that well. Cisco wondered if that made him feel important. He hated the things. Communication aside, it was like someone in your head just to annoy you.

      Wickum spoke softly while Cisco lit a slender Cuban cigar. He dragged on the smoke, his gaze narrow and moving over the mountain, the caverns. He tried to visualize how it went down.

      “We’ve found a body.”

      He glanced at Wick. “Excellent. Now we have something.”

      “Victim’s wearing black ops gear and has a semiautomatic machine pistol.”

      Cisco clenched the cigar between his teeth. “Crap.”