Page 49 of Hawk on the Hunt

Several boxes were stacked in one corner of the room. “Let’s check what’s in there. Could be files, data, stuff about the quantum computer.”

Tiger nodded. “I’ll take care of that. You should go back to the machine; figure out how to switch it off if we need to.”

Dylan knew instantly why Tiger was concerned. During his first day at the mansion, Tiger and the others had recounted the incident when they’d tried to get Tiger out of the machine. It had taken them way too long to figure out how to switch off the machine, and as a result, Tiger had endured massive headaches for several weeks, though luckily there was no lasting damage to his brain.

“All right,” Dylan agreed. “I’ll check the machine.”

He hurried downstairs. By now, he’d gotten used to the humming sound of the machine. It was merely white noise, and he was able to hear other sounds as well: a passing car, a dog barking outside. He looked at the computer screen to make himself familiar with the app that seemed to be running the MRI machine. He tapped on the mouse pad, but was unable to move the cursor, so he looked for an external mouse, but there was none. At the machine itself, a gurney stuck out of the circular part of the machine, ready to receive its next victim. But even there, he couldn’t figure out how the gurney was operated. He tried to move it manually without success.

Dylan went around the machine, looking for a power cable, but to his surprise, there was none. Where was this machine getting its electricity from? He bent down to look underneath the MRI and used his cell phone light to illuminate the area. He saw it then: the power cable was beneath the machine, apparently plugged into a custom outlet on the ground—a truly unusual place to plug in such a device. Clearly, Polo had thought of everything. He didn’t want anybody to disable his machine.

At a sound, Dylan turned, rising in the same instant. He froze when he saw who was entering the room through the door from the hallway: Zara. She wasn’t alone, and she wasn’t moving of her own will. Polo was holding a gun to her neck, his other hand clamped over her shoulder so she couldn’t escape. Sheer fright was painted on her face, and he could only imagine what she was going through.

“Polo.”

Polo grinned icily. The coldness in his eyes was the same as Dylan had seen in him over a decade earlier.

“I see no introductions are necessary. And what a surprise that you managed to turn one of my employees against me.” He dipped his head to Zara’s cheek then stared directly at him. “I must say, you almost got me. But I saw this in my premonition. I saw you and Zara come here.”

That news wasn’t entirely unexpected. After all, Polo had always been a step ahead of them. “So that’s how you did it.”

Polo chuckled. “My precognitive skills are so much more developed than yours. I’m superior to all of you. And you made it so easy for me. You left dear Zara here outside. Alone. Unprotected. That’s on you, Hawk.”

“Leave her out of this,” Dylan said loudly, hoping that Tiger would eventually hear him over the din of the machine, because he’d just realized something: Polo hadn’t mentioned Tiger. Had his vision not shown him that Tiger was here too? “She has nothing to do with this. It’s me you want.”

“You know as well as I do that I have no bargaining chip if I let her go now.” He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t play me for a fool. We both know I’m not.”

“You sure about that?” He gestured to the machine. “Or do I have to remind you that my friends blew up your first machine not too long ago? And managed to save one of our own in the process?”

Polo scoffed. “And I’m actually grateful for that. It’s given me the opportunity to upgrade the machine.” He tipped his chin toward it. “Once a person is on the gurney, the sensors set everything in motion. Untearable belts lock the patient in place, and the gurney moves into the machine without anybody, not even myself, being able to pull it out until the program is finished. The sequence can’t be overridden. Sorry.”

His last word dripped with sarcasm. Polo didn’t know the meaning of sorry. No psychopath did. It was a mere taunt, but Dylan didn’t let it distract him. Instead, he made calculations in his head of how long it would take to push Zara away from her captor, before he could shoot her. The answer was: too long. There was no way to get to her in time. All he could do was stall. The situation made him feel more helpless than he’d ever felt. He didn’t care what happened to him, whether Polo managed to hurt or kill him, but he couldn’t allow anything to happen to Zara. She was an innocent.

“So this is your second machine, I see,” Dylan said, raising his voice. “How many of us have you scanned already? Can’t be enough, or you wouldn’t still need the machine to feed your quantum computer. Must be tough to not live up to your own expectations.”

The taunting words seemed to work, because Polo narrowed his eyes, glaring at him. “Don’t you worry about me. Everything is running perfectly. In fact, once I have the data in your head, I won’t need any more of your sort. Turns out that with each data set I feed into the computer the algorithm learns exponentially, much faster than I expected. So, I’m actually ahead of schedule.”

It was obvious that Polo enjoyed talking about his own achievements.

“Congratulations,” Dylan said, before finding another tidbit to keep him talking. “Tell me, your father didn’t die a natural death, did he? You couldn’t wait until heart disease or a stroke would have killed him in a few years. You needed to speed things up, didn’t you?”

“Good old Dad never really understood me. But people who think they love you are so easy to manipulate. They trust you, and that makes them vulnerable.” Polo shrugged. “It was his time anyway. He was turning into an old tattering fool. I did him a favor really.”

“He was a good man,” Zara suddenly choked out. “How could you?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” Polo snapped. “But enough of this. Let’s get down to business.” He jerked his chin toward the machine. “Hawk, if you will… I warmed the machine up for you. It’s ready. And I’m getting impatient.”

Dylan perceived a movement in the dark hallway behind Polo, though he couldn’t be sure. “One last thing… a word of goodbye for Zara…”

Polo grunted.

He looked deep into Zara’s eyes, wishing in that moment that his skill was that of telepathy, but he hoped she would understand anyway. “Zara… duck.”

From behind Polo, Tiger emerged with a tennis racket that he swung toward Polo’s left side, the impact making Polo sway to the right. The hand holding the gun made an uncoordinated movement, while Zara dove as low as she could. Dylan charged toward her. At the same time, Tiger landed another hit with the tennis racket that now broke into two, while Polo tumbled to the right and lost the grip on his gun. It clattered to the floor.

Dylan reached Zara and pulled her up, pushing her behind him in the next instant. “Get behind the machine.”

It was the safest place in case Polo reached his gun and began shooting. Without looking behind him to see if Zara was following his command, he rushed toward Polo, who had already regained his balance and now kicked Tiger in the stomach to force him back toward the wall.