J.J. was interested — but dubious. But before he could speak again there was the harsh ringing of a telephone, a loud and demanding sound.

“It’s the red phone!” McCrory said, startled.

“I’ll take it.” Beckworth picked up the phone and an unfamiliar voice rasped in his ear.

“Mr. Beckworth, there is an emergency. You must come at once.”

“What is it?”

“This line is not secure.”

J.J. put down the phone, frowned with annoyance. “There is an emergency of some kind, I don’t know what. You both wait here. I’ll attend to it as fast as I can. I’ll phone you if it looks like there will be any lengthy delays.”

His footsteps retreated and Brian stood in angry silence glaring at the machine before him.

“He doesn’t understand,” McCrory said. “He hasn’t the background to understand the importance of what you have accomplished.”

He stopped when he heard the three coughing sounds followed by a loud gasp, a crash of equipment falling to the floor. “What is it?” he called out, turned and started back into the other lab. The coughing sounded again and McCrory spun around, his face a bloody mask, collapsed and fell.

Brian turned and ran. Not with logic or intelligence, but spurred on by simple survival — painfully learned from a boyhood of bullying and assaults by older children. He went through the door just before the frame exploded next to his head.

Straight in front of him was the vault for the streamed backup tapes. Lodged there every night, empty now. Fireproof and assault proof. A closet for a boy to hide, a dark place to flee to. As he threw the door open bright pain tore into his back, slammed him forward, spun him about. He gasped at what he saw. Raised his arm in impotent defense.

Brian pulled on the handle, fell backward. But the bullet was faster. At the close range through his arm and into his head. The door closed.

“Get him out!” a hoarse voice shouted.

“The door’s locked itself — but he’s dead. I saw the bullet smash into his head.”

Rohart had just parked his car and was getting out and closing the door when his car phone buzzed. He picked it up and switched it on. He heard a voice but could not understand the words because of the overwhelming roar of a copter’s rotor blades. He looked up in astonishment, blinking in the glare of its spotlight as the chopper settled out of the sky onto his front lawn. When the pilot slacked off the power he could make out some of what was being shouted into his ear.

“… at once… incredible… emergency!”

“I can’t hear you — there’s a damn chopper just landed and digging up my lawn!”

“Take it! Get in…come at once.”

The spotlight switched off and he saw the black and white markings of a police helicopter. The door opened and someone waved him over. Rohart had not become Managing Director of Megalobe by being dim or slow on the uptake. He threw the telephone back into his car, bent over and ran toward the waiting machine. He stumbled on the step and hard hands dragged him in. They were airborne even before the door was closed.

“What in blazes is happening here?”

“Don’t know,” the policeman said as he helped him to belt in. “All I know is that all hell broke loose over at your place. There is a three-state alarm out, the Feds have been called in. Every available unit and chopper we have is on the way there now.”

“Explosion, fire — what?”

“No details. The pilot and I were monitoring traffic on Freeway 8 over by Pine Valley when I got the call to pick you up and take you to Megalobe.”

“Can you call in and find out what is happening?”

“Negative — every circuit is tied up. But we’re almost there, you can see the lights now. We’ll have you on the ground inside sixty seconds.”

As they dropped down toward the helipad Rohart looked for damage, could see none. But the normally empty grounds were now a seething ant’s nest of activity. Police cars everywhere, helicopters on the ground and circling outside with their spotlights searching the area. A fire engine was pulled up before the main laboratory building but he could see no flames. A group of men were waiting by the helipad; as soon as they touched down he threw the door open and jumped to the ground, bent and ran toward them, the downdraft of the rotors flapping his clothing. There were uniformed police officers here, other men not in uniform but wearing badges. The only one he knew was Jesus Cordoba, the night supervisor.

“It’s incredible, impossible!” Cordoba shouted over me receding roar of the chopper.

“What are you talking about?”

“I’ll show you. Nobody knows how or what really happened yet. I’ll show you.”

Rohart had his next shock when they ran up the steps of the laboratory building. The lights were out, the security cameras dark, the always sealed doors gaping open. A policeman with a battery lamp waved them forward, led the way down the hall. “This is the way I found it when we got here,” Cordoba said. “Nothing has been touched yet. I — I just don’t know how it happened. Everything was quiet, nothing unusual that I could tell from where I was in Security Control Central. Guard reports were coming in on time. I was keeping my attention on the lab buildings because a late party was in there with Mr. Beckworth. That was all — just like normal. Then it changed.” Cordoba’s face was running with sweat and he brushed at it with his sleeve, scarcely aware of it. “It all blew at once. It seemed every alarm went off, the guards were gone, even the dogs. Not every alarm, not on the other buildings. Just the perimeter alarms and the lab building. One second it was quiet — the next it looked like that. I don’t know.”

“Have you talked to Benicoff?”

“He called me when the alarm went through to him. He’s on the plane now from D.C.”

Rohart went quickly down the hall, through the doors that should have been shut. “This was the way it was when we got here,” one of the police officers said. “Lights out, all the doors open, no one here. It looks like some of this stuff has been broken. And more, in here, it looks like, and equipment, computers too, I imagine — there are a lot of disconnected cables. It looks like a lot of heavy stuff was dragged out of here in a big hurry.”

The Managing Director looked around at the emptiness, remembered the last time he had been here, at this spot.

“Brian Delaney! This is the lab, where he works. His equipment, experiments — they’re all gone! Get on your radio at once! Get some officers to his home. Make sure that they are heavily armed, or whatever you do, because the people who did this will be going there too.”

“Sergeant! Over here!” one of the policemen shouted. “I’ve found something!”

“There,” he said, pointing. “That’s fresh blood on the tiles, right in front of the door.”

“And on the jamb of the door as well,” the Sergeant said. He turned to Rohart. “What is this thing? A safe of some kind?”

“Sort of. Backup records are stored in it.” He pulled out his wallet. “I have the combination here.”

His fingers shook as he worked the combination, turned and pulled the handles, threw open the door. Brian’s body, soaked with blood, slumped forward at his feet.

“Get the medics!” the Sergeant roared, pushing his fingers into the sticky blood of the man’s throat, feeling for a pulse, trying not to look at the ruined skull.

“I don’t know, can’t tell — yes!, he’s still alive! Where’s those paramedics?”

Rohart stepped aside to let them by, could only blink at the shouting organized confusion of the medical teams. He recognized the intravenous drips, the emergency aid, little else. He waited in silence until Brian had been hurried out to the waiting ambulance and the remaining medic was repacking his bag.

“Is he going to be — can you tell me anything?”