Amirah's face instantly changed and she whipped her hands away from her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and slapped them against the wall on either side of the slot. It was like an entirely different personality had shoved itself into place behind her dark eyes. "G.o.d? How dare you even mention Him! Your G.o.d is money, you worthless piece of s.h.i.t."

Gault recoiled and raised the pistol.

"You don't even understand what it means to worship G.o.d. You couldn't know, Sebastian, what it feels like to feel Him in every thought, every breath, to hear His words flowing over the desert sands. You pretended to read the writings of the Prophet to fool El Mujahid, but you lacked even the depth of understanding to let those words enter your soul! You think you made me into your wh.o.r.e? Do you think that I would truly betray my husband, my people, my faith, for you?" She spat at him and he dodged away, terrified of what might be in that sputum. He swung the pistol up and put the dot of the laser sight on her forehead where it glowed like an Indian bindhi.

"I loved you," he said weakly. And then his mind replayed those words and he realized that he had said "loved," not "love." It nearly broke him. In his mind's eye he saw himself turning away from her and bringing the barrel of his pistol up to his own temple. Better to snuff out that loss than endure its absence.

But although his hands trembled the gun did not move.

Amirah ignored it. "Have you figured it out yet? You must have or why else would you be here, Sebastian?" She was using his name like a whip and each time it stung him. "You think you found us, but we had been looking for you for years. Not specifically you-you're just not that important-no, we were looking for any faithless greedy dog who had the resources you have. It was so easy!" She laughed and shook her head, delighting in the pain she caused him. "It was so easy to lure you with covert hints through your network of spies, to draw you to us step by step, to stage things so that you always felt that you were in control when all the time this was a plan my husband and I had made. Yes my husband. El Mujahid, the greatest of G.o.d's warriors on Earth. A true soldier of the Faith, a man who lives the words of the Prophet every minute of every day."

"But you we "

She spat again, but this time on the floor. "What? We made love? Is that what you were going to say?" Her voice made the words intensely ugly. "I'm not a man, Sebastian. I can't go into battle with guns and knives like my husband and his soldiers. I'm a woman and I am forced to use other weapons no matter how utterly disgusting and humiliating it has been to open my body to you."

"No," Gault snapped back, anger flaring. "I know you loved me. I know."

He saw the mad look in her eyes flicker and for a second that other personality, the dreamy one, seemed to drift back. And Gault knew-knew for sure-that he saw the fires of love still there. Or maybe it was only the embers, for in the next moment the hard and murderous personality reemerged.

"Each day I get down on my knees to beg forgiveness from Allah for what I have done, even though it is His will and serves His ends. You made me a wh.o.r.e in the eyes of G.o.d, Sebastian. How many deaths does that earn you?"

Behind Amirah there was a strange sound. The gathered scientists and technicians were all jabbering loudly, some in shocked protest, others in fury. Amirah stepped back to allow Gault to see what was happening.

"They think we have an antidote," she said softly as below more than two thirds of the crowd were sinking down to their knees or collapsing onto tables. "They think we are all safe from Seif al Din."

"What have you done?"

She turned to him. "I gave my best people-a few fighters, a few scientists-Generation Twelve. Like me." She raised her arm and pulled back her sleeve to show the needle mark on her arm. From the dark pinp.r.i.c.k black lines of infection radiated out like a dark spider-web.

"You've killed your own people."

"Oh no not all. The rest of them were given Generation Ten, and soon I'll open the Bunker doors and they'll spread out across Arabia like the plague they are. The Great Satan does not have enough bullets to stop the waves of them that will come."

"You're insane! You've doomed us all."

But Amirah shook her head. "No Generation Twelve is different. We don't die like they do. We ascend. I've already ascended. I died without dying, Sebastian, but I suffered no brain death, no loss of brain or motor function, no loss of intellect. I am me, Amirah, scientist, wife of El Mujahid, loyal handmaiden to Allah, a servant of the word of the Prophet but now I cannot ever die. I've been reborn, you see. Seif al Din has cut through me like a purifying scythe. My sins, my earthly attachments have been carved away by the Sword of the Faithful. What remains is pure. What remains is the instrument of G.o.d on Earth."

"Oh Amirah my princess," Gault murmured, tears cascading down his cheeks. "What have you done? What have you done "

"Beginning today thousands of doses of Generation Twelve will be sent from here to those fighters who have proven their faith. Once they have ascended they will share the gift with their families and their most trusted friends, and then we will sit back and watch the rest of the G.o.dless world devour itself!"

"I won't let you!"

Amirah reached out to grasp the lip of the observation slit. She pulled herself close and whispered like a child conveying a great secret. "I know everything about the Bunker, Sebastian. Everything. I know all your secrets."

Gault stared at her, puzzled, and then he heard the slow scuff of shambling feet in the darkness of the corridor behind him.

Chapter One Hundred Nine.

The Liberty Bell Center / Sat.u.r.day, July 4; 12:04 P.M.

AS SOON AS I was inside the sound of chaos diminished and I crept into a long, darkened corridor that led, I knew, into a maze of offices and workrooms. The center wasn't that big but there were still a hundred places someone could hide. I moved forward through several rooms, encountering one locked door after another. It would be suicide to kick each door, but these were interior locks and I could trip most of them with a stiff piece of plastic. I used my Barnes n.o.ble member card. It was slow going, searching and clearing every room without backup. I wondered what was taking Skip so d.a.m.n long to send someone after me.

I was hoping that O'Brien and Ollie had tried to make a run at the First Lady and had been cut down by Colby and his team. Agents on the Presidential Detail are incredibly tough and resourceful. But with every step my hopes diminished. I didn't know who or what O'Brien was, but if Brierly was right and Ollie was a top CIA killer, then this was exactly his sort of operation: a hunt-and-kill.

What confused me was the fact that Brierly did not seem to be our man. Having spoken with him and seen him in action I could not believe that he was any part of the chaos back in the hall; and yet Ollie had been with O'Brien. And someone had fired those shots that saved O'Brien. Very accurate shooting in a hysterical situation, which showed professional calm.

I stopped when I saw a splash of blood on the floor. Very fresh. Creeping forward I found more, and then a place where feet had scuffed in the blood. Two sets of shoes. A scuffle? Had someone else come in following O'Brien and Ollie and been ambushed by them, or had the two traitors had a falling-out?

Then it occurred to me that one of them might have become infected. What if the walker plague had turned one of them into a monster? Was I chasing two armed men or one man and a zombie? Or two zombies? The thought chilled me.

"Joe?"

Grace's voice in my earjack made me jump and I faded to one side and crouched down behind the open door of a mop closet, pistol aimed into the darkness.

"Joe where are you?"

"I'm inside the center," I whispered. "O'Brien came in here with Ollie Brown. I'm following a blood trail but no sign of them yet. I could use some backup."

"Top Sims is on his way in with Skip. I have two other agents on the door."

"Good. What's the situation outside?"

"It's bad. We're getting the crowd quieted down, but I think some of them are already infected. Several people are showing signs of sickness. I have our people going through the crowd and separating out anyone who was. .h.i.t by those darts."

"Grace if they start to turn "

"I know, Joe," she said in a voice that was hard but scared. We were both thinking about St. Michael's, but this was much worse. Members of Congress were here, and the VP's wife; and on both sides of the gla.s.s were TV cameras. "I called Church and he had the President order an immediate media blackout. Church said that the President has declared a state of emergency for the Philadelphia metropolitan area. Oh G.o.d!"

Through the mike I could hear a fresh wave of screams.

And then gunfire.

Then nothing as Grace's link went dead.

"Grace " I said into the silent link. I wanted to run back. I needed to go forward. I was totally torn.

I heard a m.u.f.fled sound behind me and whirled, but it was one of the Secret Service agents standing in the shadow of an open doorway. I recognized him. Agent Colby, Brierly's second in command. I could see a couple of other agents behind him.

"G.o.d, am I glad to see you. Is that the safe room? Is the First Lady okay?"

Colby took a step into the hallway and smiled.

But it wasn't a smile.

His lips peeled back from his teeth and b.l.o.o.d.y drool dripped from his mouth. With a feral growl like a hunting cat Colby and the other agents rushed me.

Chapter One Hundred Ten.

The Bunker ABDUL STEPPED INTO the hall, his automatic rifle ready. He was happy to be away from the hall where all sense and reason seemed to have fled. Though he understood the plan El Mujahid and Amirah had devised he still thought it was insane. It did not fit with his understanding of the Koran; but there was nothing he could do about it. He knew enough about the Seif al Din to realize that Amirah was distributing two different versions of it, one to the general staff and another to the more valuable team members. Anah, Amirah's a.s.sistant, had tried to give him a shot but he'd fended her off, not wanting any part of this.

He was almost happy when the alarms rang, warning of an intrusion at the rear hatch.

The monitors were offline but Abdul had a good idea what was happening. Gault was not fool enough to have come here alone. So Abdul sent a team of soldiers to the hatch to intercept whatever backup the infidel had brought with him. Now he was hurrying that way himself to take charge of the situation.

He switched off the safety and took a more comfortable grip on his weapon as he stepped through a portal from the side corridor to the one that led to the hatch.

Toys stepped out from behind a stack of crates and put the barrel of his pistol against the back of Abdul's head.

"Shhhhh," Toys said with a smile.

Chapter One Hundred Eleven.

The Liberty Bell Center / Sat.u.r.day, July 4; 12:05 P.M.

COLBY CAME AT me with incredible speed, reaching with hooked fingers, teeth snapping at me while he was still two yards away. Even with everything that had happened-everything that was still happening-it took me totally off guard. I brought my gun up but not in time as he leaped in and drove me back against the wall. The other agents were three steps behind him.

My back slammed into the wall and for a fragment of a second the thought I'm dead flashed through my mind; but even as I was thinking that my body was moving. Years of conditioning make the limbs move at the reflexive level, and it was all of those years of drills, of repet.i.tive movements, that saved me. But it was so close.

As I hit the wall my hips turned to the left and I slammed the b.u.t.t of my pistol into Colby's temple. It made his ma.s.s turn with mine and we rolled down the wall together, turn after vertical turn, putting distance between us and the other walkers. When we hit the doorway we jolted to a stop and I rammed the barrel of the.45 into Colby's mouth, and even as he bit down on it I pulled the trigger. The big hollow-point blew out the back of his head and punched a hole the size of a nickel through the forehead of the agent right behind him. Both of them were instantly dead, but the sudden drop of Colby's body coupled with the locked teeth around the pistol jerked the weapon out of my hand.

I pushed myself away and dodged instantly to my left as a third walker lunged over the corpses of his fellows. His arms closed around empty s.p.a.ce.

There were three more of them-four in all. The one who had jumped at me had fallen forward. He made a grab for my ankle but I rushed forward to meet the attack of the next closest walker.

Even as I closed the short six-foot distance I whipped the folding RRF knife from its pocket holster and with a flick snapped the blade into place. The motion took a fraction of a second and as the lead walker hit me I spun away like a ballet dancer but at the end of the pirouette I ducked low and slashed him across the back of the knee. The RRF was wickedly sharp and the creature's tendons parted like old string. As he staggered and went down I shoved him toward the second walker and lunged past their colliding bodies and slammed into the third, using a hard palm at the end of a stiffened arm to drive him back; then I ducked under his outstretched arms, avoiding his snapping teeth, and came up behind him. I grabbed his hair with my left hand and slammed the point of the knife up into the sweet spot-the arched opening at the base of the skull. The blade pierced the spinal cord and the walker shuddered to a stop and instantly fell forward.

The walker who'd tried to grab me after I'd killed Colby was scuttling forward now, running at me low and fast. I used my knife arm to parry his reaching arms and sidestepped like a bullfighter, then brought the RRF up and over and down and buried the entire blade in the wind-gate, the soft spot at the top of the skull. I gave the blade a brutal half turn and yanked it up, sidestepping to avoid the arching spray of blood and brain tissue.

That left two.

The one I'd crippled was crawling along the floor toward me but the other was up and running at me. When he was two paces out I stepped in and to the side so that his ma.s.s missed me by half an inch. Again I changed my step into a pivot and came up behind him and tried for the sweet spot again, but the hair was greasy with gel and he slipped away with my blade stuck into the solid bone of his skull. His twist wrenched the handle out of my hand and it wasn't worth fighting for, so I let it go and wrapped my arm around his throat and gave him a reverse hip throw. When you're facing forward it's a hard fall but not fatal; when the thrower is back to back with the person he's trying to throw then all of the hundreds of pounds of force are trapped in the weakest body point. His neck snapped like a bundle of wet sticks.

The last walker was crawling forward, but I jumped over his arms and came down on the small of his back. The vertebrae cracked audibly. He flopped down, dead from the waist down. I couldn't leave him like that so I recovered the RRF. This time there was no way for the walker to twist away as my blade found its target and shut him off.

Chapter One Hundred Twelve.

Grace / The Bell Chamber / Sat.u.r.day, July 4; 12:05 P.M.

ONE MOMENT GRACE was speaking to Joe via commlink and then next the air around her was whining with bullets. A reporter was blasted backward as a bullet punched through his chest and he knocked Grace back and down. As she fell she saw three men separate themselves from the crowd. Each of them had guns and she recognized the weapons as the high-density plastic handguns that terrorists used to sneak through airport metal detectors. Probably firing ceramic rounds. No metal at all, she thought as she pushed the dead reporter off her and drew her weapon.

The foremost of the three gunmen saw her and raised his weapon but Grace gave him a double tap-chest and head-and flung him back against the wall. She swung her gun to the second killer just as two figures came suddenly in from the killers' blind side. Gus Dietrich took the left-hand gunman out with three quick shots: two to the middle of his back and one to the back of his head. Next to him, Bunny appeared, no weapon in his hand, but he didn't need one for the other killer: he chopped down on the man's wrist with a balled fist, knocking the gun to the floor, then grabbed him by throat and crotch and slammed him into a corner of the Liberty Bell display case. He stepped back to let the broken body drop.

Then a fourth man stepped out of the crowd of tourists and pointed a polymer pistol at the back of Bunny's head. Grace didn't bother to call a warning; she put two rounds in the man and he spun away trailing blood. Bunny threw her a grim nod and scooped up the man's plastic pistol.

Then the rest of the Secret Service agents were there.

"There are still hostiles in the crowd," Grace yelled. "Search everyone."

The agents moved very fast, and they plowed into the crowd, gruffly shoving congressmen and tourists alike. They found one final hostile, a trembling young man dressed like a j.a.panese tourist. He managed to get his pistol into his mouth before the agents could tackle him. The blast took off the top of his head.

Rudy pushed his way through the crowd toward Grace.

"Are you all right-?" she began, but he interrupted.

"Grace some of these people are getting sick. It's happening already faster than before. We have to do something. We have to separate them before this becomes another St. Michael's."

As he spoke one of the reporters staggered forward and dropped to his knees and vomited. He looked up at them with a fevered face and eyes that were already becoming gla.s.sy. The man reached out a desperate claw of a hand toward them. "Help me "

Chapter One Hundred Thirteen.

The Liberty Bell Center / Sat.u.r.day, July 4; 12:07 P.M.

I WIPED MY knife and slid it back into its pocket clip then retrieved my gun and cleaned it quickly on Colby's tie. I had no idea how many agents had gone with the First Lady. Was there a chance she was safe somewhere? Would we get that much of a break?

I tapped my ear mike but there was nothing, not even static. It must have been damaged when I'd hit the wall. I was alone.

I was also furious with myself for not having brought a stronger force here to Philly; or maybe for not pressuring Church into canceling the event. We'd both looked at this as a likely scenario and we'd still allowed it go forward. I realized as I thought these things that this was one of the aftershocks of 9/11. For a while after that everything that could draw a crowd was canceled, but then our culture moved on and there were no more attacks. We became complacent. Maybe we even thought that, against all evidence, we really had Al Qaeda on the run and that we'd taken the fight so effectively to them that we could settle back into normal life here in the States.