Sub-Sahara

by Ethan Arkwright

  ‘Ah,’ Evron said. ‘So the gamble is they weren’t all killed.’

  ‘Correct. There was enough plastic explosive in that pack and the incoming drone to put a big dent in the ground. If the car following was doing so at a normal distance, it would have been thrown off the road but not destroyed.’

  ‘Here’s hoping,’ Evron said. ‘We’re in no shape to take on the Americans.’ He looked behind him at his colleagues in the back. ‘How’s everyone doing back there?’ he asked.

  ‘Bit battered but still in the game,’ Lampack said, looking around.

  ‘Good,’ Cavill said. ‘Check your weapons. We might be meeting Titan again shortly.’

  They all started checking rifles and clipping in fresh magazines.

  Kate Edwards shook her head.

  ‘How about you, Kate? Still with us?’ Cavill said.

  ‘I just want this madness to end,’ she said.

  ‘That’s the plan,’ Cavill replied, putting his foot down on the accelerator as the landscape smoothed out slightly.

  ***

  They soon came upon the smouldering wreck of the Titan vehicle. Cavill slowed up, and his men leapt out, advancing in a spread-out line with rifles raised. Cornell signalled that he’d spotted the second vehicle in front of the burnt-out wreck. He made a sign indicating there was no movement. They still advanced slowly and carefully.

  Cavill rolled the Land Rover next to the blackened wreck of the vehicle that took the drone hit. The force had been so large that he couldn’t even identify any bodies in the mangled metal.

  The car in front had clearly been thrown a great distance and flipped many times by the force of the explosion behind it. The front of the roof was crushed inwards, and it had landed upside down.

  Cavill’s men slowly surrounded the wreck and started advancing on it.

  There was still no sign of movement.

  Using hand signals, they each took a window to investigate. It was easy to see inside because the glass had been shattered all around.

  At the front of the vehicle, Harcourt and Evron made signs that the driver and front passenger were clearly dead—crushed under the metal.

  Cornell and Sansom looked into the backseat. Two men hung upside down, suspended by their seat belts. The man in front of Cornell had his head at an unnatural angle. Cornell slowly took his left hand off his gun and reached in to feel for a pulse on the man’s neck. He signalled that the man was dead.

  Sansom was also feeling for a pulse on the last person in the car. ‘Got one,’ he said. ‘Pulse is weak.’ The others rushed around, and they made room for Harcourt, the team medic.

  Harcourt checked the man’s vitals and his body for injuries. ‘Arm and ankle look broken. He’s badly banged up, probably concussed, but he’ll survive,’ he said.

  ‘Can we get him out?’ Cornell asked.

  ‘There’re no puncture wounds. He’s not bleeding out. So, yes.’

  They reached in to support his weight as Harcourt unclipped the seat belt. The weight dropped, and Cornell and Harcourt slowly pulled him out.

  ‘I’ll get the smelling salts from the larger medical kit. Bring him around,’ Harcourt said, setting off for the Land Rover.

  He was soon back with the kit. Cavill was with him.

  ‘Rebecca Grainger in there?’ Cavill asked.

  ‘No,’ Cornell replied.

  ‘Must have stayed clutching the pack she had,’ Cavill said, looking back at the burnt-out vehicle.

  Harcourt unscrewed a small vial of liquid and held it under the Titan man’s nose. His head jerked slightly as the ammonia gas triggered his inhalation reflex. His eyes flew open, and he moaned as the pain from his damaged body hit him.

  Cavill knelt down next to him. ‘Hey, you hear me okay?’

  The man moaned again. ‘Yeah,’ he muttered.

  ‘American?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Good. Who we are doesn’t matter. What does matter is that you are now our prisoner. Now, I’m going to give you a choice.’

  ‘Go fuck yourself,’ the man said through clenched teeth.

  ‘Before you’ve even heard the choice? All right, tough guy, we don’t have a lot of time, so here it is: we can torture you to get the information we want and then leave you here for the US Marines to find you. I’m sure the US government and the CIA will want to interrogate you further—probably in their facility in Morocco. This will also heap further shame on you and whatever army unit you were dishonourably discharged from.’

  Confusion and fear replaced the burning pain and anger in the man’s eyes.

  ‘Option two,’ Cavill continued. ‘We fix you up and take you with us. Then we cut you loose when we get back to Europe—no strings attached.’

  The man’s eyes darted left and right. ‘Option two,’ he said.

  ‘Good choice. Get him up and in the truck, boys,’ Cavill said.

  Harcourt plunged an ampule of morphine into the man, and they lifted him up and headed back towards the Land Rover.

  ‘How did you get overland so fast? What’s your way out?’ Cavill asked, walking next to the man.

  He was grunting in pain as the movement jarred his broken bones.

  ‘We…ugh…we paid the nearest village where the ground is semi-hard to smooth out a runway so we could land a rented Antonov. It’s…one hundred and sixty clicks south. Coordinates are in the detachable satnav in the car.’

  ‘Sansom, do the honours. Get one of their radios as well,’ Cavill said, replacing him in taking the man’s weight. Sansom set off at a run back to the Titan vehicle.

  ‘How many people guarding it?’ Cavill asked.

  ‘Two pilots…one guard.’

  ‘That’s it?’

  ‘Yeah,’ he grunted through the pain. ‘It’s just guys pushing goats around the desert with a stick around there.’

  They lifted him into the back of the Land Rover. Kate Edwards looked shocked as he landed next to her.

  ‘That’s our ticket out of here,’ Cornell said to her, smiling.

  The men piled in, and Sansom arrived with the satnav and radio. They were soon on their way.

  ‘Check again for dust plumes or drones,’ Cavill said.

  Evron and Cornell scanned the sky and ground behind them while Cavill set up the satnav and checked the destination before driving off.

  ‘Nothing so far,’ Evron said.

  ‘Keep checking,’ Cavill said, as they got underway. ‘It’s going to take us two hours to get to the site, and it won’t take them that long to realise we aren’t in the pyramid and get eyes in the sky looking for us.’

  ***

  ‘We’re twenty minutes out,’ Cavill said, checking the satnav on the dashboard. ‘Wake up Titan boy, there.’

  Harcourt slowly woke the Titan man from his morphine daze.

  ‘Give him the radio and get him to contact his men up ahead; offer them the same deal—surrender without a fight, and we’ll cut them loose on the other side.’

  The man took the radio. ‘The pilots are mercs. They won’t care as long as they get paid,’ he said, tuning the radio to the arranged frequency. ‘Dark One, this is Dark Four,’ he said.

  A few of Cavill’s men raised their eyebrows or shook their heads at the call sign.

  The radio crackled. ‘This is Dark One. What’s the sit-rep?’

  ‘This is Bannister. I’m the only one left. I’m coming in with another private team. I’ve surrendered. They’re taking the plane but have offered us a lift and a free pass out. You’re totally outgunned, and these guys have toasted everyone they’ve met today. Take the deal.’

  Silence.

  ‘Roger…we’ll prepare the plane.’

  Cavill’s men smiled

  ‘Effin’ A,’ Cornell said. ‘Effin’ A…’

  They soon crested the final hill and saw the runway before them. The ageing Antonov sat at the far end with engines running.

  ‘The rear loading door is down,’ Evron said. ‘Drive ri
ght in.’

  Cavill gunned the car when they hit the completely flat surface and then turned to drive straight up the ramp. He pulled the handbrake once they were inside.

  The last Titan man and the two pilots were waiting near the cockpit.

  ‘Raise the ramp,’ Cavill said, jumping out. ‘Everyone strap into the seats.’ He marched up to the pilots and ushered them into the cockpit.

  They soon took their seats.

  ‘Let’s make this quick, gentlemen. Fly to these coordinates in southern Libya.’

  ‘We haven’t been paid,’ the pilot said with a thick Russian accent.

  ‘Well, give me your bank account and the amount you require, and it’ll be there by the time we land.’

  ‘Okay,’ the pilot said. ‘We go.’

  Cavill marched back down the plane to strap into one of the seats next to Evron.

  ‘Once we’re airborne, get on the phone to Stratton and ready the Lear jets in Libya for a quick switch,’ he said.

  ‘Got it,’ Evron said, smiling.

  Cavill suddenly broke into a smile as well. He looked out across the plane at his men, whom he considered his family. ‘Job done, lads!’ he yelled. ‘We’re going home!’

  They all cheered, stamped their feet, and banged the side of the plane in celebration.

  Chapter 44

  Two days later, a black cab pulled up next to the Devonshire private members club on Pall Mall in London. James Cavill stepped out and bounded up the stairs. It was the doorman’s job to know the name of every member and guest. He didn’t know the name of the man heading towards him, but he had been shown a photograph by Sir Henry Stratton fifteen minutes earlier and knew to let this guest straight through.

  ‘Morning, sir,’ the doorman said as he held the ancient door open for the man, who looked like most members as he strode through in a bespoke suit.

  ‘Thank you,’ Cavill said, nodding to the man. ‘Which way to the small study?’

  ‘Turn right, then third door on your left,’ the doorman replied.

  Cavill nodded again and made his way through the panelled doors. Luminaries through the ages watched his progress from pictures on the walls.

  He entered the required room to find Sir Henry already ensconced in a plush leather chair.

  ‘James, m’boy. Glad to see you!’ Sir Henry said, rising slowly from his chair.

  They shook hands warmly before Sir Henry ushered him to sit down.

  ‘Thanks for coming,’ Sir Henry said.

  Cavill smiled. There wasn’t much choice when Sir Henry requested your presence.

  ‘No problem. It’s ten minutes from my office in Victoria,’ he said.

  ‘I was just about to order a cognac and a cigar. Care to join me?’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Sir Henry waved at a butler in the corner, who scurried off to do the necessaries.

  ‘All your men recovered, then?’ Sir Henry said.

  ‘Yes, some were a bit banged up, but no major injuries. We lost a few, which doesn’t get easier; but we all know the risks—that’s the game we’re in. Given how the whole thing went down, I’m grateful we came out in the shape we did.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Sir Henry said. ‘It was a close-run thing in the end.’

  ‘Any repercussions that you’re aware of?’

  Sir Henry smiled. ‘Well, the Americans are annoyed at missing out. They suspect we had something to do with it. I think the prime minister is secretly pleased. He likes us. So, no. A successful mission.’

  ‘Good,’ Cavill said. ‘So what is this thing we’ve brought out?’

  The butler interrupted by coming back and placing drinks and cigars in front of them. Both men lit cigars and waited till the butler had left the room and closed the door.

  ‘Well,’ Sir Henry said, ‘so far, we know it’s made from something not on the periodic table—’

  ‘That’s impossible,’ Cavill cut in.

  ‘Quite.’ Sir Henry smiled. ‘But how many “impossible” scientific assumptions were later disproven?’

  It was Cavill’s turn to smile.

  ‘We know it’s an element,’ Sir Henry said. ‘An element that glows constantly and releases energy at a consistent rate as it goes through its extremely long half-life…but we don’t know what it does yet. It’s been transferred to Culham. Kate Edwards is one of the people looking at it. It will take five days to know whether it is worthless…or worth everything.’

  ‘So…’ Cavill said.

  ‘So, what are you doing next Tuesday? Fancy a trip to Oxford?’

  Cavill smiled.

  DID YOU ENJOY THIS BOOK?

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