With a curse, Abhay slammed the door to the locker room. The violent action shook the walls and echoed in the stillness of the empty building. Abhay cursed again and pivoted slowly, relaxing against the blue matted wall in what had to have been a training room and slid his phone from his pocket. Since searching the compound was a bust, he had to reevaluate his next steps. Of course, getting to Istanbul to follow up on Simon’s search for his USB drive would be at the top of that list—He needed those documents!—but to do so, he’d have to clear his business calendar of all outstanding sales.

“Status?” he barked into the phone when his contact answered.

“You received a new bid for the device schematics. A different buyer this time.”

“Oh?” New was unexpected, but not surprising. There were plenty of “bad guys” in the world.

“The bid is double the amount of your first,” his contact supplied.

Abhay swallowed back his hum of excitement. The promise of what the frequency generator could do was proving to be a much better investment than even Abhay had expected, and usually, he was a good judge of value. “And for the officer’s name?” Abhay inquired.

“Still firm on the original offer.”

Well, that wouldn’t do. Abhay smiled. He suspected that his new buyer for the schematics was the same one who wanted the name.

Time to up the ante. “Deny all bids.”

“Sir?”

“Deny all bids,” Abhay repeated. If his hunch was correct, the buyer would take his bait. They almost had to. “Quote both buyers triple the current starting bid.” If they reacted as expected, he would get a counteroffer slightly less than his new price. Anything less than a cool three million pounds, and he’d tell his winning bidder, no deal. Clearly, the FGRT-334 was worth the escalating amount and he’d try again with a different market.

“Consider it done, sir.”

“I’ll reach out to you in four days,” Abhay acknowledged.

“Understood,” his middleman replied, disconnecting.

Abhay immediately disassembled his phone to retrieve the SIM from it, destroying the link between his contact and himself. Finished, he straightened with a grimace and headed for the door. He had one more stop to make before he could initiate the next stage of his plan.

He was not looking forward to it.

***

Out front of the apartment where Abhay had stashed Mark, stood Abhay and Liz. Her hand was fisted tightly around Abhay’s.

It was sticky and damp.

He wished she’d let go.

“My daddy’s in there?!”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

Abhay sighed. This had to have been her ten-thousandth “why” since he picked her up from her private school. “Because your daddy is staying with me for a while.”

Liz glanced at him and then the run-down building. Her nose scrunched in distaste. “I don’t believe you,” she announced with a haughty air, and Abhay rolled his eyes.

Spoiled brat.

Gently urging her forward, he said, “Why don’t you go inside and check?”

Liz dropped his hand, crossed her arms, and said with a pout, “No.”

“For Fu— really?” Abhay began, correcting himself mid-expletive. Children were not his forte. Give him an unfindable object, and he’d succeed each time. Put him in a room with a kid and they’d both be reduced to tears within minutes. “Your dad is staying with me while he recovers,” Abhay said with as much calm as he could muster.

Liz’s frown turned contemplative. “But… If he’s sick, why isn’t he at home?”

“Because,” Abhay said, drawing out the word while he scrambled to find an answer which wouldn’t destroy her innocent worldview—he didn’t know if Mark made a habit of shielding her from the more risqué aspects of the Organization’s day to day business or not. “He was hurt and can’t stay at home by himself.”

Liz studied Abhay for a moment but eventually broke eye contact to stare at the apartment’s door. “Why didn’t he hire a nurse?”

“He did, but she was too expensive, so he let her go and asked me to help instead.”

Shaking her head, Liz negated his statement. “You’re lying. He wouldn’t do that. Daddy has all the money in the world. And,” Liz stressed the word. “If he needed more, he’d just ask grandma!”

Abhay refrained—with difficulty—from covering his eyes with his hand in an epic facepalm. Even if the Org wasn’t orchestrating his death, the last person on Earth Mark Prescott would ask for help from would be his mother-in-law. Abhay shuddered. Truth be told, he’d rather go without food and shelter than ask that woman for anything.

“Just…” He sighed. “Just go inside, please?!”

Liz held still for a few more moments and Abhay feared he’d have to carry her, but then she finally relented and entered the dwelling. As she stepped inside the small one-bedroom apartment, she let out a mighty squeal, “Daddy!” And in a blur of motion, she was across the room, bounding into Mark’s lap heedless of his injury.

A small part of Abhay wished he felt joy at their reunion, it had been weeks since they’d seen each other, but all he could think about was his relief. Abhay was off the hook. Mark had to field all her questions now!

Leaving them to their own devices for a bit, Abhay went to the small kitchen to prepare a light evening meal. Liz’s high-pitched voice a constant backdrop to his activity. Occasionally, Abhay found himself startled when Mark would reply. His deep timbre providing a dissociative response each time.

Finally finished, Abhay brought plates and food to the duo. After setting it down, Abhay indicated they should eat, and said, “I’ve upheld my end. Your turn. Tell me about the FGRT-334.”

Mark turned a light shade of green and glanced at Liz. “Later.” Liz smiled up at him before taking another bite of her sandwich, unconcerned.

“No, now,” Abhay demanded.

Mark shook his head. “I will tell you, but not now. Later.”

“When later? And you better not mean ‘never’.”

Again, Mark shook his head. “Nine?” he volunteered, though with the inflection at the end, Abhay didn’t know if Mark meant it as a statement or a question.

“Nine,” Abhay confirmed, standing. “Enjoy your meal,” he added. He’d come back later. There was no way on earth he’d be able to sit in that little apartment with a chattering Liz for another hour, let alone the four which remained before the appointed time.

Slipping out the door, he left to do other errands. When the hour of nine approached, Abhay returned to his small decoy-flat at Elephant and Castle. Quieting his steps, he first confirmed the apartment was as he left it. In other words, Abhay thought wryly, no Hashashin hiding in the shadows ready to jump out at the slightest provocation. Though he supposed, with Adam Black in Istanbul, he could rest a little easier.

Entering quietly, he closed the door and found a seat near Mark who sat on Abhay’s ratty couch with his elbows on his knees and his hands buried in his hair.

“It’s nine,” Abhay announced as if Mark needed the reminder.

Mark swallowed hard. In halting starts, he said, “No one should have possession of a weapon that devastating.”

So, it was a weapon as Abhay had thought. Jorge had been a bit ambiguous with his details. “I’m not planning on possessing it.” ...Yet. But since Mark all but confirmed a prototype existed, Abhay would be remiss in his mission if he wasn’t already scheming about how to acquire it for future sale.

“Don’t be coy, Abhay. I know you—”

“I’m not,” Abhay interrupted Mark to offer his reassurances. “All I want to know”—Right now—“is what you have found out about the device. What does it do?”

Mark shook his head in clear disbelief. “You don’t know?”

“Of course not,” Abhay scoffed. He had an active imagination though and had formulated several assumptions.

“It amplifies sound to a frequency humans cannot hear”—didn’t I read about something like that...—“Like a singer hitting the right note to break wine glasses,”—Wait, is he talking about that bombing...—“The generator will shake and shatter anything in its path until full destruction is reached.”

Abhay sat up straighter.

Mark was talking about it!

“Are you referring to that village in Russia?” According to a glossed over report Abhay had found buried under a mile of bureaucratic bullshite and disguised as a traditional, military debriefing, the first testing of the device had leveled an entire town—along with everyone in it—shaking molecular structures apart until all that remained was a mess of dirt and human tissues.

Abhay hadn’t realized the FGRT-334 and the report was one in the same.

“Yes,” Mark replied, defeated.

“I read that there was a second test and that someone from the Organization died. What happened?” Abhay asked eagerly.

Mark glared at him but complied with his retelling without Abhay having to prompt him further. “It wasn’t a second test. It was the same one.”

“Oh?”

“A guard handling the generator prior to the initial test accidentally popped open the back of the weapon. His thumb slipped inside as he caught it. We learned—later—that when we turned the generator on for the village—” Mark stopped, shuddered, and grimaced. “Well, the weapon used the DNA signature from of the guard’s skin cells to identify him as a target. His body made a muffled popping sound seconds before his body leaked blood from all his orifices.”

“Messy,” Abhay quipped.

Mark glared at Abhay as he continued, “Further testing allowed us to determine what happened. It turns out the weapon can handle multiple cellular signatures at one time: plant, animal or mineral, and target each individually regardless of sample quantity.”

Astounding! No wonder the device was so sought after! Imagine, being able to kill your opponent in a crowded room with only a cellular sample and no risk of collateral damage. Now that he knew about the device, he needed to get his hands on it. It was the perfect way for him to follow through with his promise to Fitzgerald should the Hashashin ever deliver on his half of the bargain. “Where is it?”

Mark shook his head vigorously. “No. It’s too unstable; too dangerous. You can’t have it,” Mark vehemently denied. “I won’t let you sell it to the highest bidder. Don’t you care that it might be used by criminals?”

Abhay’s eyebrow rose.

Sure, he cared, but even a ballpoint pen could be used as a weapon if one were determined enough, and Abhay didn’t see anyone lining up to stem societies blatant pen usage. Besides, by all intents and purposes, Mark was a criminal, for that matter, so was Abhay. Abhay shrugged, unwilling to be swept up in the minutiae of that thought. “No, I don’t. If the money’s good, I don’t ask too many questions. It’s better that way.”

“You’re a terrorist.”

“I’m a businessman.”

“You disgust me,” Mark spat.

“And you disgust me,” Abhay countered.

They were silent for several beats. Finally, after a quick calculation of the risk, Abhay forged on, “Where did you hide the FGRT?” Mark turned his head away to gaze through the window, not answering. The message was clear; he wasn’t ready to talk. “That’s okay,” Abhay replied, grinning. Like most people, Mark was unimaginative when it came time to conceal his precious belongings. Abhay could take a few solid guesses as to where Mark may have hidden something of the FGRT-334’s nature. “I’ll check your safe in the basement of Luminations Corp. downtown. You know, the one hidden behind some storage boxes, over by the elevator shaft.”

“Leave it alone,” Mark sputtered, confirming Abhay’s guess.

Too easy! Where was the challenge? Abhay hadn’t even had to mention the hidden cabinet in Mark’s office bookshelf, or the false drawer in his laboratory desk, or even the loose stair riser at his country estate. “Is the combo still 7-9-1-8-3?”

“Drop it.”

“Not a chance.” Abhay leaned forward, rubbing his hands together. “Do you have any idea how much money I can get for it? Hell, I’m getting three million pounds for the mechanical drawings—”

Mark’s cheeks drained of all their remaining color. “You didn’t—”

“Of course, I did,” Abhay said with a smile.

“But you said you needed my help in recreating the research.”

“I did,” Abhay agreed with a curt nod. “But I’ve found them”—or near enough, once Fitzgerald made good on his end—“And the best part of it is, the Order’s helping me retrieve them.”