***
Just before the impact, Massai grabbed the stick from Devan’s limp hand and pulled it back. It was the only thing he could think to do. The craft tilted upward and slowed, and for a moment he thought it would be like flying a small plane, but then the stick jerked to the right and the whole craft pitched sideways. The stick bucked and jerked like a living thing, and soon ripped itself free of his grip. The Bell spun and rolled its way to the desert floor while he tried to get into his seat. Just before he could buckle himself in, they hit the ground with an ear splitting metallic screech. Then the whole world turned into a bright white light.
The next thing he knew, he was lying on his back. He looked up to see the cockpit of the Bell above him. Devan hung upside down from his seat, his broken body still strapped into the pilot’s seat. Blood dripped from the wound in his shoulder to patter onto the vinyl of the seat next to Massai. By the angle of Devan’s head, there was no way the pilot could still be alive. Massai checked for a pulse anyway, just be sure, and found none.
He glanced at the radio. It looked fine. At least there was that.
“Ahmad,” he called. “Are you there?”
“I am here,” Ahmad said from somewhere outside the wreckage. “Are you hurt?”
“Not badly,” Massai replied. His head ached, and he felt a warm trickle from his right temple to his jaw that could only be blood. His left wrist stung, leading him to believe he’d sprained it, and two of his ribs felt like they might be broken. But it could have been much worse. Both his legs worked, and that was the main thing. It meant he could walk. “How about you?”
“I am fine. A few scratches, nothing more.” Massai couldn’t believe it. He pulled himself out of the wreckage to find Ahmad kneeling in the sand about five feet away and praying. He didn’t have his mat with him, but he didn’t seem to mind putting his knees in the dirt and prostrating himself on the desert floor. After a few minutes of prayer, he stood up, brushed the sand off his knees, and smiled.
“The radio looks all right,” Massai offered.
Ahmad’s smile grew. “I told you Allah would protect us,” he said cheerfully.
Massai would have preferred Allah be a bit more proactive in his protection, but he kept that thought to himself. “Devan is dead.”
Ahmad didn’t flinch. Death was nothing new to either of them.
Massai noted several tracks around the helicopter, including a set that went away from the crash and then returned. “How long was I unconscious?”
“Twenty minutes. I used that time to look around.”
“Do you know where we are?”
“A few kilometers west of the research facility.”
“You saw it?”
Ahmad produced a pair of binoculars from the ground at his feet and handed them to Massai. “If you climb over that small ridge, you can see for yourself.”
Massai took the binoculars but didn’t bother to look. “Are they still there?”
“No, they have long gone, but they left one of the motorcycles behind.”
“Do you think Joker disabled it?”
“It looks good from here,” Ahmad answered. “In any case, it is a better alternative to the radio.”
Massai couldn’t argue. He could probably raise Shahid on the radio, but there was never any telling who might be listening. It would be better to take the bike and ride it back to Hassi. Once there he could contact Shahid on an encrypted line, as long as his cell phone still worked.
He pulled it out of his pocket and turned it on. As he suspected, he had no signal at all, but at least it was still working. He turned it off to save the battery and started walking.
An hour later, he and Ahmad, sweating and cursing, reached the concrete cylinder that marked the entrance to manifold’s facility. By then, both men were parched and thirsty, but there was no water to be had anywhere. Joker and Somers had taken the four-wheeler he’d seen earlier, and thus the cooler and gas it carried. He’d expected as much, of course.
Ahmad examined the Yamaha, checking the fuel level of the tank, and nodded. “Nearly full,” he said. The front end looked bent, but the engine seemed intact.
Good. The ride might not be comfortable, but it should get them back to Hassi. From there they would call in the Sikorsky.
“They will still beat us there,” Ahmad said. “They have too great a head start.”
Massai nodded. “But we know where they are going.”
“Shiraz,” Ahmad said.
Massai nodded. “We will confront them there, in the Abbasi…what is that?”
In the dirt by the cylinder, Massai spotted a crumpled green shape. He walked over to it and recognized it as a backpack. Olive green, not quite military issue, but clearly modeled after those given out by the Iranian Army. On the flap was a sewn-on patch featuring The Joker from the American comic books.
“It’s his,” Ahmad said.
Massai picked it up and looked inside. He couldn’t believe his luck. In addition to four bottles of water, the pack had ammunition for a .380 pistol, several packs of American MREs, a knife, a flashlight and ten or twelve DVDs. He picked up one of the DVDs and read the writing on the disk.
Manifold, Ergot Facility, Camera 12 - April 14, 2010. 1600 to 0000.
Security tapes from inside the facility!
“What are these doing out here?” he wondered aloud.
“The Joker must have been taking them and dropped his pack during the fight.”
“Why would he want them?”
“I do not know,” Ahmad said. “Perhaps it was Somers who grabbed them.”
That made more sense. Massai could see why Somers would want to view the DVDs, but there was nothing on them that CJ did not already know.
Ahmad grabbed one of the bottled waters and took a long drink. “Still cool,” he said. “I told you, Massai.”
“I know,” Massai said. “Allah is watching over us.” He took one of the bottles and brought it to his lips. The cool, clean water rolled down his throat, cooling his entire body.
“Praise Allah,” Ahmad said.
This time, Massai joined him.
10.
Bishop watched the land below as it rolled out underneath them. They had left Hassi in CJ’s Cessna several hours ago and were well on their way to Shiraz. Both men had eaten a light supper in the small village prior to boarding the Cessna, but Bishop found he didn’t have much appetite. Not only was he about to meet his biological father for the first time, he was going to have to arrest him.
Maybe kill him.
“I still can’t believe we lost the security DVDs,” he said. “We could have used them to confirm Abbasi’s involvement.”
“We don’t need them,” CJ replied. “I saw the pilot. I know the guy. He was your father’s—”
“Abbasi’s,” Bishop corrected.
“Abbasi’s man,” CJ finished.
Bishop nodded. Blood or no blood, his father was Darren Somers from eastern Illinois. This Dawoud Abbasi guy was just another terrorist, as far as he was concerned. He checked the pistol in his waistband for the tenth time since he’d gotten in the plane.
CJ laughed. “Is it still loaded since the last time you checked?”
Bishop didn’t respond. He hadn’t used any of his meditative techniques to stem the growing coal of anger in his belly, and the longer he waited—and the more he thought about the old man’s death—the greater the pressure building inside him. He sat in silence, willing the Cessna to go faster. He knew a Cessna 172 was capable of speeds up to 180 miles per hour, but it was dangerous to fly them that fast. They simply weren’t built to handle that much stress. The cruising speed of a typical 172 was somewhere around 140 mph. By Bishop’s estimation, they were traveling a little over 140, so he couldn’t push CJ to add throttle. He would just have to be patient for a while longer. They would get there when they got there.
And when we do, I’m going to have a long talk with Abbasi, he thought.
***
Dawoud Abbasi stepped out of his Rolls Royce and examined the ruins of Naqsh e-Rustam. Also known as the Persian Crosses or the Necropolis, Naqsh e-Rustam was the final resting place of four ancient kings. Their tombs were carved into the rock in four identical cross shapes, which is where the local term Persian Crosses came from. In addition to the four tombs, the outer rock faces held seven relief carvings depicting seven of the Sassanid kings, the oldest of which dated back to 1000 BC.
Every time he looked upon the magnificent site, Dawoud felt an immense swelling of national pride. The Americans, in all their arrogance, believed they had a great history, but Dawoud knew the truth. History in the United States only went back to 1776—not even three hundred years. Even if you allowed for Columbus’s voyage, America’s Anglo-Saxon history still only stretched as far back as 1492, just over five hundred years.
Iran had been around for thousands and thousands of years. True, for much of that time it was known by other names, most notably Persia, but the rich heritage of his people could be traced back farther even than that of the ancient Greeks, to cities from 7000 to 8000 BC like Chogha Bonut and Susa, the latter of which still existed today. Despite the rest of the world’s seeming refusal to acknowledge the facts, civilization began right here. In his beloved Iran.
The greatest nation on earth, he thought.
More than his sense of patriotism, Dawoud felt pride on a personal level every time he approached the tombs. The instrument of his greatest ambition was stored in a secret room that only he and a few others knew existed. Soon he would let loose a plague upon his enemies, just like the Jews’ Jehovah. Ironically, a western industrialist had made it possible for Dawoud to conceive and execute his grand plan.
He could not believe his good fortune when his men stumbled upon an abandoned outpost in the Kavir Desert. The structure was clearly American in design, and all the signs and manuals had been printed in English. The two men inside, one of whom was already dead, were residents of the village of Hassi, just north of the site. Dawoud knew the village; he’d sent a group of soldiers there to recruit more men.
At first, he couldn’t believe the Americans would be so brazen, but then when he realized what his men had uncovered, he knew it must be a sign from above. Many thousands of years ago, Persia was a great power, and the entire known world revolved around it. Now, the time had come to restore Iran to its former glory and strike a blow at the West at the same time. Using this fantastic monument to his people’s heritage as a base of operations, Dawoud would begin his plan to bring the rest of the world to its knees.
His phone beeped twice, which was his assigned ring for text messages. He took out the phone and checked the screen, immediately pleased to see who it was from.
SUBJECT IS EN ROUTE. ETA: 2 HOURS.
Dawoud smiled and put the phone back in his pocket, not bothering to respond.
His son, lost to him for decades and presumed dead, was coming home.
He turned back to the Rolls Royce and poked his head into the door. Faiza sat in the cool air of the car’s interior, reading a book about the Parthian Empire, which ruled over Iran from 238 BC–226 AD. Faiza seemed as fascinated by Iran’s history as Dawoud, and the two would often have great discussions on the subject that lasted for hours. For that reason, he had not forbidden her to read, nor had he disciplined her too harshly for speaking her mind. He valued her input, and knew that if he was not careful he would lose that important aspect of their relationship. His other wives made up for her brashness, and were more than willing to pleasure him at his whim.
“Our son is on his way,” he said. “He will be here in two hours.”
“Here?” Faiza asked, waving her hand to indicate the area around the ruins.
“Where better?” Dawoud asked.
“The house in Tehran would have been suitable, I should think. It is certainly large enough to impress him.”
“No, wife. You are missing the point. I will bring him here, to bask in the sight of this great monument to Iran’s history, and impress upon him the glorious nature of our nation. He should begin to learn about his heritage as soon as possible.”
“He was raised in America and joined the American military. Do you think he will abandon his previous life because of these ruins?” she asked.
“He is my son,” Dawoud said. “Love of Iran is in his blood.”
Faiza said nothing, merely nodding her head and returning to her book. Dawoud closed the door and pounded his hand on the roof of the car, which pulled away immediately. The driver was instructed to return Faiza to their home in Shiraz. Dawoud would join her later, if time permitted it. His wife did not know about his plan—she did not approve of his association with jihadists, and had been so bold as to tell him so on numerous occasions—but he would tell his son about them. The boy, now a man, would fall in love with the country, Dawoud felt it in his bones. And together they would usher in a new era of Iranian supremacy.
His smile grew larger as he turned and started walking toward the tomb of Xerxes I, which served as the entrance to a small network of rooms and chambers, accessible only from the rear of the tomb. The secrets contained in those dark corridors, both ancient and modern, were known only to a chosen few. His son would soon be one of those few. That feeling of pride returned. Not for his country this time, but for his blood.
His son was coming. He couldn’t wait to meet him.
***
As soon as the door closed, Faiza put down her book. She hadn’t been paying attention to it, anyway. It was merely a convenient method of keeping Dawoud from bothering her. She used her husband’s interest in the history of Iran against him. Because of it, she had learned to read and write, and had much more freedom than the average Iranian woman. But it was all for show. She preferred reading material that wasn’t so swamped with the “glorious history” of Iran. Not that she didn’t love her country, but Dawoud’s fascination with Iran’s former greatness bordered on fanaticism, and she would rather read about things that affected the international community.
So, her son was coming home? She had hoped this day would never come, but once Dawoud heard from a source that his eldest heir wasn’t dead, after all, he’d moved Heaven and Earth to find him. Faiza still recalled his reaction when he learned that his flesh and blood had joined the American Special Forces. It had taken the repairmen a week to patch the hole in the wall, and the imported cherry wood dining room table had to be thrown away. She had never seen him so angry, not even when the infant disappeared from his crib all those years ago.
She shuddered at the memory. He had been angry enough to kill someone that night, and she and the other wives had wisely stayed out of his way. Their son’s identity had been discovered a year ago, and in the time since, her husband had turned his attention to ways to bring his estranged son home and make a patriotic Iranian of him. It was all he talked about now, and his anxiety and happiness grew exponentially the closer he came to achieving his goal. And now, it seemed, the day had come for his dream to be realized.
But how angry would Dawoud be when he learned the truth?
11.
Bishop’s phone buzzed, and he looked at the screen. A text message from Deep Blue.
EXAMINATION OF ADDITIVE COMPLETE. VIRUS FATAL. INCUBATION PERIOD OF LESS THAN A MINUTE.
Bishop texted back:
SYMPTOMS?
After a few minutes, his phone buzzed again.
SIMILAR TO LSD: HALLUCINATIONS, VOMITING, ERRATIC AND VIOLENT BEHAVIOR. DEATH OCCURS IN ABOUT 24 HOURS. NO CURE. SENDING HELP.
Bishop typed his reply.
ALMOST TO TARGET NOW. WILL ADVISE UPON COMPLETION OF OBJECTIVE.
Thirty seconds later, his phone buzzed again.
GOOD. FRIENDLY AGENTS SHOULD BE USEFUL. BE CAREFUL.
Agents? As in more than one? Bishop looked at CJ, who was flying the plane and peering through the windshield. Was he supposed to have a partner? If so, what happened to him?
“
Did you have a partner, CJ?” he asked.
CJ looked over, his customary smile gone. “Not anymore,” he said.
Bishop took the hint and let it drop, but it still seemed strange. If CJ had recently lost a partner, then wouldn’t Deep Blue have known about it? Deep Blue’s text specifically said agents, plural, and he rarely made mistakes. Though it could have been a typo.
“There,” CJ said, pointing out the right side window. “Our landing site.”
Bishop looked, expecting to see an airport, but instead found himself staring at a rock face with four huge cross-shaped carvings cut from the stone. He recognized it from travel brochures as Naqsh e-Rustam, the burial site of four ancient kings. Why were they landing here? He had thought they were flying to Shiraz.
The answer came as a sharp pain in his throat. He whirled around in his seat, grabbing CJ’s arm and yanking the needle out of his neck. He reached for his pistol with his other hand, but his arm seemed slow and heavy, and he only managed to get it around to the back of his waist. He could feel the grip of the pistol, but he couldn’t close his fingers around it. Bishop’s breathing increased as he began to wonder just what CJ had put in his system.
“Relax,” CJ said. “It’s not the Ergot B, if that’s what you’re thinking. If I wanted to kill you, I could have done it a thousand times already.”
Bishop tried to reply, but could only manage a grunt. He focused his will on making words, and managed to croak out a slurred “What did you do to me?”
“It’s just a hefty muscle relaxer,” CJ continued. “Nonfatal, but you won’t be feeling like yourself for a little while.”
“Thought…Abbasi…”
“Oh, I’m taking you to Abbasi.” CJ winked. “I just couldn’t have you pulling your gun out and pointing it at him. I couldn’t take the risk that you might actually shoot the guy. Then I’d never get paid.”
Callsign: Bishop - Book 1 (An Erik Somers - Chess Team Novella) Page 7