by Flynn Vince
“You’re getting a little ahead of yourself, aren’t you?” Rapp said. “We haven’t talked money.”
The man bristled, unaccustomed to being challenged. But none of his men seemed to speak English, so he was the only one who registered Rapp’s attitude.
“How much do you think you’re worth?”
“Two hundred and fifty grand seems about right.”
The cartel leader laughed. “A quarter million a year? I don’t even pay Vicente that much.”
“A month, Carlos. Two fifty a month.”
The cartel leader’s bemused expression spoke volumes. He was going to agree. But probably not because he was willing to pay that amount. More likely, he’d created a test that he was certain Rapp wouldn’t survive.
“Done,” he said, pointing to a primitive road leading into the jungle. “All you have to do is make it to a small village twelve miles to the north. Actually, village might not be the right word. It’s just three houses. But one of them has a covered porch and operates as an informal restaurant for the local farmers. Meet me there and you’ll get your first month’s payment.”
Rapp was fairly sure he knew the place—a crossroads where the crappy dirt road met a slightly less crappy dirt road that ran from east to west. The bulky GPS watch on his wrist contained a color screen and was full of topographical maps that he’d downloaded during his layover in Mexico City. And while the tiny screen didn’t have the resolution to depict buildings, the distance and direction was right, and businesses tended to set up at crossroads.
“What if I don’t make it?” Rapp said.
“Then you’ll be dead.”
Rapp scanned the men around him again. Some were overweight, others looked like the run-of-the-mill psycho cartel enforcers, and a few looked like solid former Mexican soldiers. All the gear was well maintained and top-of-the-line. They had weapons, vehicles, dogs, and the home field advantage. In his column, the heat wasn’t too bad this time of the morning and the sky suggested rain was coming. Likely a lot of it.
“Do I get a head start or does everyone just start shooting now?” Rapp asked.
“Ten minutes.”
“That seems light.”
“This isn’t a negotiation,” Esparza responded, retrieving an old-fashioned stopwatch from his pocket and making a show of clicking the button on top. “Your precious minutes are already running out.”
Rapp toggled the timer on his own watch and started to run. The roadbed was soft and a little slick, limiting him to a seven-minute-mile pace. The goal was a stream just over a mile from there. Based on what he’d been able to make out on the topo, it was steep and narrow enough to neutralize even the dirt bikes, and the reliable water supply gave him a decent chance of running into a human settlement where he could scrounge supplies.
The critical component at this point was to stay ahead of his pursuers until the rains came and reduced the effectiveness of the dogs. Probably doable as long as the handlers kept hold of them. If they got close enough to release them, though, things were going to get exciting.
He notched his pace upward to the very edge of what the surface would safely allow. The idea that Esparza would live up to his word on the ten minutes seemed a little far-fetched.
After six minutes of running, he activated the screen on his watch to check his position with regard to the stream. In the end, it turned out to be unnecessary. The water from recent rains had swollen it to the point that it had washed out part of the road. Rapp slid down an embankment into the muddy creek, alternating between it and the banks, depending on which maximized his speed. After about a hundred yards he heard the distant whine of the dirt bikes starting up. The timer on his watch read eight minutes and four seconds. Frankly, a minute longer than Rapp had figured. Apparently, that was what passed for honor among thieves.
If they weren’t complete morons, it would take only about three minutes before they found the place where he’d ducked into the jungle. At the pace he’d set, his footprints were clearly visible, though it would be impossible to determine whether he’d headed upstream or downstream. Best bet, the dirt bikers would radio it in and split up to chase. The dogs would be put in vehicles and driven to the place where Rapp had abandoned the road. So call it another five before he had an organized chase coming up behind him.
Not surprisingly, the microscopic topographical map hadn’t provided a very accurate picture of the terrain. Instead of narrowing into a tiny scar cut through the jungle, the stream kept getting wider, deeper, and more powerful. Cascades that were half waterfall and half mudslide fed it from the canyon walls, making it increasingly hard for Rapp to keep his footing.
Overhead, the clouds were building, but at a pace that was slower than he’d hoped. The rain he was counting on to save his ass from the dogs seemed a long way off.
When the pack become audible again, they were going nuts. The question now was, would their handlers try to keep them under control or would they let them run?
The answer came about a minute later when the sound of their barking suddenly diminished. They were no longer straining against their handlers. They were loose.
The jungle at the edges of the now thirty-foot-wide river was too dense for a human to move through, but the dogs would manage it pretty well. Rapp abandoned the shallow water on the right bank and went for the deeper center. He selected a thick, leafy tree from the floating debris and tangled himself it in. A branch behind his head kept his nose and mouth out of the water while the rest of him floated along beneath the surface.
Because he’d traveled mostly in the water, the dogs wouldn’t have much to work with. They’d have to move along both banks, trying to pick up a scent. As long as the river kept moving and he stayed submerged, he’d probably be all right.
Probably.
After an hour of floating along at a less than thrilling three or four knots, the situation started to deteriorate. On the positive side, his femur wasn’t yet a dog toy. On the negative side, it was potentially a few seconds from becoming one.
There were two pit bulls on the east bank, staying roughly even with him. They seemed to sense that their prey was close but hadn’t yet focused on the tree he was hidden beneath. A Doberman was on the opposite bank, hanging a bit farther back with its handler alongside. Two soldiers were visible in the shallow water to the west, scanning the dense jungle around them with assault rifles gripped tight.
One got a call on his radio and he spoke into it for a few seconds. His words were unintelligible, but his tone and gestures weren’t hard to decipher. They figured Rapp was in the river because the dogs couldn’t pick up his scent, but they had no idea where. The response was also audible, a static-ridden jumble of anger and frustration from Carlos Esparza. He wouldn’t be too worried yet, but he’d be looking up at the same darkening clouds as Rapp was.
• • •
When the clouds finally opened up, they did so with no warning at all. One minute Rapp was floating along with an overheated Rottweiler swimming about ten yards in front of him and the next he was fighting to breathe as water came at him from every direction.
The shouts of the soldiers were swallowed by the downpour, as were their outlines. Shots rang out but it was impossible to know if they thought they’d spotted a target or were just using the sound to locate each other. The Rottweiler, again proving its intelligence, made a beeline for the nearest land bank as the river began to swell.
Rapp stayed put, struggling against a current that kept pushing him under. He was finally forced to unhook his feet from the trunk and let them dangle in the deepening water. His head was still among the tree’s leafy branches, but now high enough to get a few breaths between waves crashing over him.
From the impact of the stationary objects he was colliding with, he could tell that the speed of the water had picked up significantly. He held on, knowing that he was leaving his pursuers well behind. Soon, though, it became too dangerous. The water was filling with larger, more j
agged debris, and the current was becoming impossible to fight. Ahead, the channel narrowed enough to give him a shot at reaching the east bank.
Despite his having a gift for swimming that had helped him win the Iron Man in his youth, the fifteen-foot trip turned out to be harder than it looked. He took a few good hits from deadfall, one particularly large tree sending him to the bottom and dragging him across the rocks for almost a minute.
When he finally came up, he found himself only a few yards from the edge of the jungle. A few hard strokes put him in range of a partially submerged tree and he managed to use it to pull himself to safety. After crawling onto the muddy bank, he lay there vomiting what felt like a tanker truck full of muddy water. Finally, he pulled himself beneath a bush, using the leaves to protect himself from the pounding rain while he got his breathing under control.
Images of carving Carlos Esparza’s heart out with a dull stick flashed across his mind, but he reminded himself again that wasn’t the mission. No, that’d be too easy.
• • •
Rapp had been out of the water for just over two hours when the dogs became audible again. Someone on Esparza’s team was a pretty functional tracker and was using his canine teammates to maximum effect.
A temporary hole in the cloud cover had tipped the advantage back to the chasers, leaving Rapp with very little time. The handlers would soon get close enough to release the dogs again and then he’d have five hundred pounds of muscle, teeth, and claws bearing down on him like scent-seeking missiles.
He was currently lying in a large field of surprisingly healthy-looking coca plants. Typically, the Mexicans imported their coke from farther south, but Esparza seemed to be trying to integrate his supply chain. The plants were harder to spot from the air than marijuana, but it was doubtful that anyone was even trying. With the relationship between the United States and Mexico being what it was, the government would probably be happy to overlook this fledgling cash crop.
The compound in front of him contained four modest buildings—most notably a two-story structure that seemed to be the Mexican answer to a barn. It would have come off as a typical subsistence farm if it weren’t for a few details to the contrary. The coca plants were a pretty clear tip-off, obviously. As were the well-camouflaged fifty-five-gallon drums that likely contained the chemicals necessary to refine Esparza’s experimental crop. Most interesting to Rapp, though, were the two guards.
Both were armed with AKs, but older and more poorly maintained than the ones carried by the men pursuing him. Neither had sidearms, opting instead for knives sheathed on their hips. One was sitting on a log with his back to Rapp at a distance of about fifteen feet. The other was twenty feet farther, leaning against the barn and facing his companion. Every once in a while they spoke to each other, but neither seemed particularly interested in the conversation. Other than that, there was no sign of personnel or activity.
The sound of the dogs was getting closer. When they were released, it would be a matter of minutes before they were on top of him. And this time, he didn’t have a whole lot to work with to escape them. While he’d made significant progress toward the village that was his objective, he was currently stuck in relatively flat terrain with no rivers nearby. The patch of blue sky above him was shrinking fast, though, suggesting the weather might be turning back in his favor.
No more time for fancy strategies or precision. It was time to pull out the hammer.
He dug the toes of his shoes into the soft earth, putting himself in a position similar to that of a sprinter in a starting block. He wanted to wait until the man against the barn wasn’t looking in his direction, but the strained barking of the dogs suddenly became less frustrated. They’d been turned loose again.
He shot forward, snatching the knife from the first man’s belt and dragging the blade across his throat. The guard near the barn grabbed his weapon and leapt to his feet just as Rapp threw the knife. While it was still in the air, the man caught his foot on something and pitched forward. It changed the range between them just enough that instead of penetrating his chest, the blade hit hilt-first.
Again, Rapp charged, but he was forced to drop and slide when the man got his finger on the trigger. A spray of rounds filled the air over his head as they collided. The guard’s feet went out from under him and they wrestled for control of the weapon. Rapp had nearly gotten into a position to choke him out when he heard something burst from the coca plants behind him. He stopped fighting and let the guard roll on top of him just as the Doberman reached them. The man screamed when it clamped its jaws around his shoulder, and Rapp slid from beneath him as more crashes sounded.
The AK was out of reach and there wasn’t time to go for it. Instead Rapp bolted for the barn with an unknown number of dogs chasing. He sprinted through the door, leapt over some rusting fifty-five-gallon drums, and landed three rungs up a ladder that led to a loft. There was no time to climb, so he just jumped, using his momentum and arm strength to flip himself onto the rickety platform.
At least one dog slammed into the base of the ladder, and Rapp heard the claws of others as they tried desperately to reach him. Rapp immediately got into a position that would allow him to kick any that made it to the top, but, as impressive as they were at moving through the jungle, climbers they were not. Every few seconds, a paw or snout would appear, but then it would disappear again as the dog lost purchase and fell back into the crazed pack.
Once he was reasonably satisfied that none were going to get lucky, Rapp looked around him. No weapons or even respectably sharp farm implements were in evidence. Instead, the space was neatly stacked with duct-tape-wrapped bricks. He ripped one open and tried a small sample of the cocaine he found inside. Apparently Esparza’s botany experiment was succeeding. It was seriously good shit.
Rapp moved back to the edge of the loft and the sight of him got one of the pit bulls excited enough to make the top rung. Rapp kicked it in the side of the head, sending it cartwheeling back into the pack completely unfazed.
He ripped open the kilo brick in his hand and then did the same to a few others. While he was working, two more dogs took a shot at climbing the ladder. Their muzzles, necks, and chests were covered in the blood of the guard they had just torn apart.
All six were now present—enough that they could functionally climb on top of each other to try to get at him. It was an unexpectedly effective strategy and their barking turned deafening as Rapp kicked at them.
There was a brief lull as a falling Rottweiler knocked them back and Rapp took advantage of it to chuck the open kilo bags on top of them. They were momentarily enveloped in an impressive cloud that, when it dissipated, left them all a ghostly white. Predictably, their barking and attempts to get to him increased in intensity. He started to regret the light running shoes he’d chosen as he kicked at them, trying to protect his ankles from fangs coated in foaming saliva.
As the coke went to work on them, though, they lost their focus. Some started fighting. Others just ran around in circles or attacked the walls. One bolted out into the rain that had started up again.
While they were distracted, Rapp went to a window on the eastern edge of the loft. He stood to the side of it, gently pushing the wood shutter open and taking a look outside. The downpour had reduced visibility to less than twenty feet.
He climbed down the front of the building with the water pounding on him from above. About halfway to the ground, the force of it became too much for the slick handholds he was improvising and he lost his grip. Fortunately, the landing was soft—about three-quarters mud and one-quarter what was left of the guard the dogs had taken out. Rapp scrambled for the AK and, when he found it, ran for the cover of the coca plants.
CHAPTER 34
NORTH OF HARGEISA
SOMALIA
“I . . . I couldn’t make as much. You didn’t give me time.”
Sayid Halabi looked over his laptop at Gabriel Bertrand standing in the rock archway. The package in the Fr
enchman’s hands seemed to glow in the dull light. Vacuum packed and covered in duct tape, it was indeed smaller than last time. The anthrax it contained could be augmented with other materials to mimic the kilo packages expected by the Mexican smugglers. And, with luck, it would be deployed in America to some minor effect. But the handful of victims it would produce no longer mattered.
Halabi continued to silently watch the scientist as he shifted his weight uncomfortably from one foot to the other. The goal had been to keep him ignorant of the reality and scope of the upcoming attack, using him only to fill in critical pieces of information not available elsewhere. But this was now impossible. The complexity of accelerating the timetable on a biological attack of this scale made continued efforts at subtle manipulation impractical. Halabi would get only one chance. If he failed and was discovered, the entire world would line up against him. Militaries and intelligence agencies that had spent decades battling each other would join forces, coordinating their massive resources with the goal of exterminating both him and the organization he led. The next week would decide whether ISIS reshaped the planet or disappeared from its surface.
“It will be enough,” Halabi said finally.
The Frenchman approached cautiously, leaving the anthrax on the plywood desk. He was a comically weak man. Ruled by cowardice and arrogance. Devoid of a belief in anything greater than himself. But unquestionably in possession of a magnificent mind.
Bertrand had written extensively on the history of contagions spanning from early Egypt to the outbreak of SARS in the modern era. He’d studied the spread of pathogens, examining how they initially took hold, modeling their paths, and scrutinizing their aftermath. Even more interesting, he’d done a great deal of work detailing how epidemics of the past had been made worse and how those mistakes had the potential to be repeated on a much grander scale in the future.
Halabi rotated his laptop so the man could see the screen. “Do you know what this is?”