Read #2 Shades of Gray: From Moscow, With Love Page 68
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Zax turned his van down an alley beside Dad's Donuts, activated an automated garage door, and pulled into the Maydag Auto Garage. He turned off the engine, plunging the area into silence; the place was empty. Zax opened the van's squeaky door, shut it, and glanced around the grease monkey pit. "I hate this place at night." He went to the second storage room, unlocked the door with a key, and went in. "It's kinda creepy when you're the only one here." The storage room smelled of dust and gas. Zax went to the back wall and looked up at a light. "Better hurry. R.G. wants to see me right away." He half unscrewed the bulb from the socket and pulled the chain and the back wall flipped around and on the other side, Zax walked along a gray stone passage to a knobless door.
"Identify yourself," a man's voice commanded through an intercom. "Are you man or Un-Man?"
"Funny, real funny." Zax looked up into the lens of the camera. "I'm the Delivery Man. Hurry up and open." He waited a few seconds and added, "R.G. wants to see me."
"Hurry? Hurry you say?" the man replied.
The door slid open, and Zax proceeded in. He quickened his pace, trying to make up for lost time and halfway down a white tiled hall, he came across the glass enclosed security desk. The usual four guard team manned it. There were three men and a woman. One of the men looked up and grinned at him. All four guards were armed with handguns. The man waved Zax up to a bio-detector, and he went and stood in the device as the man scanned him for life signs.
"You ready for this again?" the guard asked. "Today, could be the day."
"Come on, Tom," Zax said. "We go through this every time I come in. Scan me and get it over with. I need to see R.G."
"Testy today. You need to cut down on the coffee," Tom said as he scanned him.
"Funny, real funny."
"All clear, you may proceed." Tom flipped a switch, and the next door clicked open.
Zax entered and hurried down the hall, and the passage ended at a door. He opened it and entered a dark room with a lighted spot in the center and then he went and stood in it. Zax waited a few minutes in silence.
"Thank you for coming, Delivery Man," the mechanically altered voice of R.G. spoke over an intercom. "I wanted to personally talk with you. I need for you to know what I have planned for Kimberly and Katharine."
"I'm listening."
"I mentioned in the past, they would need to be tested. I have tested one of them."
"Which one would that be?" he asked.
"I have tested Kimberly, the Phoenix. I had Voice place a Closing on her at the same time she was to perform a Closing on Ms. Melissa Odin."
Surprised, Zax uttered, "You did what?"
"I needed to test her resolve. Would Kimberly carry out her job even though she was being hunted?" R.G. paused and added, "The test in the end was a failure. The Closing for Ms. Odin was canceled by Valhalla."
"What about Kimberly?" Zax asked. "What about the Closing placed on her?"
"I have canceled it for now," R.G. replied. "It's a shame. I had worked on that particular test since the Phoenix went to Moscow. It was not easy bringing a dead assassin back from the grave to work again, but I did convince Maestro."
"I don't understand. Why would you..."
"Because I must," R.G. interrupted. "We all have a part to play, and mine isn't the least hard. Now... Earlier you reported spotting Cerberus at their apartment."
"Yes."
"Could you tell what she was up to?"
"No," Zax answered.
"I need to know; they aren't ready for this sort of test, but I guess I can't be in charge of every trial. Fate has stepped in or should I say the Fates?" R.G. paused. "Delivery Man, continue the surveillance of the two and remember, do not interfere unless I instruct you to. Is that understood?"
"Yes."
"Well done."
The single light turned off, plunging the room into darkness till the door opened automatically. Zax headed out.