Page 59 of Jacob

There was no rushing the theater, no rappelling in from helicopters, no sniping at the terrorists. The terrorists made sure they were embedded among the theater-goers. No one wanted a massacre and every idea put forward involved a probable massacre.

Gas them, the head of the FSB said, and it was the smartest possible move. The only possible move. Using a new drug called fentanyl, a hundred times more potent than morphine.

He excluded the use of carfentanil on Dr. Hethering, one thousand times more potent than morphine. It could tranquillize an elephant and with the wrong dosage would fry the doctor’s brains.

No, fentanyl it was.

And it was the only possible move here because he needed Dr. Alexandra Hethering alive and unwounded. Going in with guns drawn would be dangerous. Not to mention loud, guaranteed to draw attention.

At Dubrovka they hadn’t known what a lethal dose was, but now they knew better. Topolev knew exactly what the dosages should be. He had a lab full of pharmacologists and scientists able to get the doses carefully calculated and a lot of Narcan available should something go wrong.

He had three canisters made. High, but not lethal, dosages for the two guards outside the hotel suite and a lower dosage for the good doctor. It would put the two guards out for at least four hours and Dr. Hethering out for an hour, tops. She would be functional again by the time they got to Zalny.

First, they had to grab her. In and out in five minutes, nobody the wiser.

The helo hovered over the hotel rooftop, not even settling on the surface. His men—five of them—leaped out with air-purifying respirators, protective goggles and nitrile gloves. Their combat suits covered their skin, though the exposure to fentanyl was going to be brief.

The door to the stairwell wasn’t locked. Their contact at the Stella Hotel had unlocked it that morning. There were no security cameras. The contact had taken care of that, too. It had only cost Topolev one thousand dollars. Vostokova was a poor country.

The men entered the stairwell and quietly descended to the top floor, given over to power panels and supply storage. They got into the elevator and pushed the 12thfloor, one floor down.

They deployed on either side of the elevator doors. The two guards would hear the elevator coming and would be waiting as the doors opened. And yes, sure enough, there they were, guns in a two-handed stance, knees slightly bent, weight on the balls of their feet.

Textbook.

They were well-trained, but they were biological entities, as susceptible to poison as anyone. The instant the doors started opening, his men tossed two canisters into the lobby. Fentanyl was released in a stream so strong he could hear it through the webcam on his soldier’s chests.

The two guards fell immediately, dropping where they stood, in a boneless heap. His men stepped out of the elevator and over to the door to the suite. One man bent to feel for a pulse in the neck of both men through the nitrile gloves. He nodded to the webcam on his teammates’ chest.

The men were alive.

Good.

They would have no idea who or what had attacked them. The elevator doors started opening and they lost consciousness. Even if they had seen his men, they wouldn’t be able to remember.

Topolev didn’t really care if they lived or died, but finding two unconscious men would definitely create fewer problems than finding two corpses. Corpses gummed up the works, even in a state as weak as Vostokova. He didn’t care about these men, what was important was bagging the woman.

As per instructions, they moved fast. They didn’t even try to pick the lock or ring the bell. They shot out the lock, tossed in a canister and rushed the room. Topolev saw the woman look up from her computer, startled, then fall to the floor. The woman was tossed over the shoulder of Andrei, still feebly kicking but by the time they got to the elevator, she was completely still.

A minute later, they were on the roof, ducking to avoid the grit raised by the rotors. They tossed in the woman, then followed her into the cabin. The helo lifted off as soon as they were in the cabin. They wouldn’t bother tying the woman up, restraining her. She would be out for at least an hour.

More than enough time for the helo to make it back to base.

Topolev sat back. That went well. He now had an ace card in his hand. He thought with distaste of Elias Field, how difficult he was proving to be. He’d wasted his time and money cultivating him.

This Hethering woman was just what he needed.

* * *

Nick drove.He’d been to Zelenograd before and anyway understood the street signs. Jacob had no problem relinquishing the wheel, though he usually liked to be the one driving. The one in control.

Well, one of many things that seemed to be changing. Alex was changing him with every passing moment.

The thing was, he was… happy. It was hard to admit, even to himself. Hard even to recognize, but a human understood happiness when it appeared. This mission was hard, potentially extremely dangerous, which usually put him on red alert, a state he’d been in for most of his life. Muscles tense, ready for trouble. Laser focused on getting the job done, whatever the job was. More or less closed off to anything else.

Not now. Now, all his senses were blasted wide open. It was foggy and sleety, but the fog came in snaking tendrils, creating a pearly light and covering up the pocks and bullet holes left over from the last war. Made the buildings look almost… beautiful. The vehicle was really comfortable, a Mercedes Benz SUV with soft leather seats and with that new-car smell.

He was hungry. Jacob basically shut down most bodily functions when on mission. He was rarely hungry, thirsty or sleepy when working and certainly not horny. But here he was, wondering whether it would be unprofessional to slip in a quick little nooner with Alex after lunch.

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