by Greig Beck
They would walk long into the night’s darkness, and rest for a few hours before sunup. Then hopefully, they’d only have another twenty-five or so miles until the border, maybe arriving by mid morning. Matt wasn’t sure what this meant, when they got there – friendly faces, an outpost? He was too fatigued to ask.
A few hours later, the light had gone and Berry came back in. Matt overheard his words as he spoke softly with Abrams.
“Got a dry creek bed – only a slight depression, but gives us some shelter. Flat land outside, low opportunity for concealment on the perimeter – good as we’re going to get.”
Abrams nodded. “Okay; we’ll rest here.” He suddenly felt for his comms and looked at the small screen. He grunted in satisfaction.
“Good news, we got a return ping. There’s a Mossad agent in the vicinity: Bluestar. Looks like we might have a friendly face out there about to join us.” He turned to the group and pointed to the dry creek bed. “Let’s get some rest. I’ll take first watch for an hour, then Berry, and then Hartogg. No fires, no lights, no wandering off, limited conversation – sound will carry for miles over a flat surface.” He looked hard at Matt and Andy.
“Got it,” Matt said.
Later, he and Andy sat together, eating dried beef and sipping warm water. Matt felt bone tired, and Andy’s eyes had dark circles showing under a layer of dust.
“Been in the desert before?” Matt whispered.
Andy nodded slowly. “Yep, Chihuahuan, Sonoran, Mojave, lots of them. But never in the Middle East – first time.” He took another bite of his beef, chewing slowly. “You?”
Matt nodded. “Yeah. The Middle East is the real genesis of civilization, and the birthplace of formal language. Most of my work is done on campus, but I’ve been known to get my hands dirty.”
Andy grinned. “Thought so. You never struck me as the sort to wrestle with other academics over that stale donut.”
Matt smiled. “No, but as Captain Kovitz is extending me her personal protection…”
“Forget it; she has eyes for only me.” Andy laughed. He nodded to Tania. “She’s quite a looker…for a soldier, I mean.”
Matt looked over his shoulder to where Tania was checking her kit. “Only you, huh? Good luck with that.” She looked up and gave them a thumbs-up. Matt retuned the gesture and then turned back to Andy. “Sure, she’s attractive, but I wouldn’t tell her that; army chicks are usually pretty tough.”
Andy’s mouth turned down. “Still not sure I like them on the front line.”
Matt snorted. “You haven’t met some of the military women I have.” He remembered the fearsome Special Forces soldier, Casey Franks, all tattoos, scars and bunched muscle. And there were others he knew even more formidable.
“Yeah, well, maybe there’s one in a thousand,” Andy scoffed. “But Tania’s a nice girl – too nice to be doing this.” He laid himself back down.
“Archeology or army? Ah, forget it.” Matt also lay down, resting his head on his pack.
Andy said, “Do you really think there is a book that’s going to tell us what’s going on with these earth-drop occurrences?”
Matt shrugged. “A week ago I would have called bullshit. But with the holes, the birds, roaches, and seeing the pages that Albadi had, predicting the events we are experiencing, well, then, yeah, I think there’s a good chance we’ll find something.”
“Good.” Andy cleared his throat. “Because when I was at the bottom of the Iowa sinkhole, I saw something. Freaked me out. First time I ever felt like that in my life.”
Matt stared up at the sky. There were a billion stars sprayed across the velvet darkness – pinpricks of light showing through a black blanket. Directly overhead, lighter and bigger than the rest, was a line of six dots. Matt knew there’d be two more behind the Earth – it was the solar system’s convergence, and would complete within a few days.
“Yep, we’ll find something,” he hoped aloud, and closed his eyes and prayed for sleep.
*
Abrams, first on watch, had draped a camouflage net over his head to break up his profile. He had a long, bulky set of field glasses to his eyes and moved them over the landscape – nothing showed. He flicked them over to light enhancement and then up to thermal – a few rocks still glowed pink, as the day’s heat slowly left them, but for the most part, there was nothing – not a bat, rodent, lizard, or even bug he could detect. Unnatural, he thought, as a desert night was a hive of activity for nocturnal hunters. The heat of the day forced most creatures below ground, but at night, it was showtime…Unnatural, he thought again.
He was about to move back to light enhance when a lump grew in the sand a few hundred feet out. He frowned and focused in on it – the thing was big, and moved slowly, only raising the sand by a few inches. Where it lumped the dry surface there was a red glow, as if there was intense heat being generated. He blinked to clear his vision. The small sand wave travelled for hundreds of feet. He wished the geologist was with him to ask, as he doubted it was anything artificial. As Abrams followed it with his eyes, it began to sink lower and lower, until it vanished.
“What the fuck was that?” he whispered. Must be related to the sinkholes, he guessed. He made a mental note to ask Andy Bennet when he woke. He exhaled, feeling unsettled. He’d feel better after they got to their destination, and at least had some cover at their backs. He put the glasses to his eyes again, and scanned the now cold and motionless desert.
*
Matt felt the toe in his ribs and looked up to see Captain Tania Kovitz standing over him. “Rise and shine, Sleeping Ugly.”
He blinked; it was still dark. He felt grittiness in his eyes, and a mouth that was sticky dry. “Christ, I feel like shit. Sorry.” He sat forward, his head thumping.
Tania kneeled. “How’s the head?”
“Not worse.” He rubbed his face. “Just dehydrated. I’ll be fine when we’re under way.”
She punched his arm. “Good man.”
Matt grinned back. “Yes I am. You should see me at my best.”
“Careful, I might take you up on that.” She raised an eyebrow.
Matt toasted her with his canteen and then sipped. He would have liked to swill and spit, but the water was too precious, so he swallowed it down, grit, stickiness and all. He got to his feet and saw that Andy was already up, talking to Abrams. Berry and Hartogg were nowhere to be seen.
Tania had a small pair of field glasses to her eyes and spoke out of the side of her mouth. “Get some food into you, as we’re heading out soon. We’re going to try and put in another ten miles before the sun comes up.” She lowered the glasses. “We don’t have enough water for a full daylight trek; this’ll save us a few pints.”
Matt nodded. “I’ll be ready.”
Andy joined them and Matt snorted. “Hey, you look as bad as I feel.” He motioned to Abrams. “Everything okay with the major?”
“Yeah sure,” Andy said. “He said he might have seen something strange out in the desert last night; like a lump or something moving under the sand. Wanted my advice.”
“That sounds weird; what did you tell him?” Matt tucked his canteen away.
Andy shrugged. “Could be a lot of things. The earth can create a wave effect through seismic activity, stress vibrations, liquefaction – plenty of causes.” He looked around and then grunted softly. “But I doubt any of those are in effect around here. The Middle East is geologically very old and stable. But then again, so were Iowa, Kansas, Montana, Utah, and a hundred other places where the land dropped.” He grunted softly. “Nothing is making sense any more. Don’t think I was much help to him.”
Abrams turned to them and held up a hand.
Tania nodded in return. “Let’s go, boys.” She waved them on.
*
Charles Drummond walked around the man nailed to the top of the wooden table. He hummed softly as he removed objects from his pockets to lay them gently next to the prone figure. At one side of the large room, the
man’s servants were perched on wooden stools, hands tied behind their backs, and a noose around each of their necks – there were six of them, but three already dangled, their faces blue, eyes popping and tongues bulging like fat slugs between their lips.
Kroen stood with several men almost as huge as he was, with automatic weapons held loosely at their sides. More men were spread throughout the house – Drummond’s small army had been assembled.
“So, so, so, Doctor Hussein ben Albadi, formerly of Damascus University, well-respected academic, and a man who is moderately wealthy…and now a traitor, and a thief to boot!” Drummond motioned to all the books stacked around the room. “And a very good one, by the look of this treasure trove.”
Albadi mumbled through his gag.
Drummond leaned over him. “What’s that, too tight?” He laughed. “That’s the least of your troubles, my dear.” He walked to a shelf and drew out a book. He flipped it open. “Wow, this looks old…and expensive.” He looked up. “Is it rare?”
Albadi’s face was red and he mumbled more frantically.
Drummond opened the book, and ripped out a page. He snorted. “Oh what the hell.” He ripped out page after page, getting faster and faster. Many of the ancient leaves crumbled in his hand. At last the spine split and the book fell to pieces. “Oops, bet I get a late fee for that.”
He dropped the remains and wiped his hands together. “So, dear Doctor, let’s get down to business. We know that you have assisted six Americans – four of them military, and two specialist civilians. We also know you sent them out into the desert, after showing them fragments of the first existing copy of the Al Azif. A very valuable copy, given it has clues regarding the whereabouts of the original. But you already knew of its value and its secrets, didn’t you? That’s why you burned it up.”
Drummond sighed. “What makes a man who has given his entire career over to books consciously destroy something of such rarity and value?” He grinned down at the doctor. “Oh, I can’t tell you how irritating I found that. Irritating, but of no matter.” He reached out to stroke Albadi’s head. “Because we now have you, and all the wonderful secrets locked away in your brain.”
Drummond patted Albadi’s balding head, grinned and then reached under the plastic apron he wore to take another item from his pocket, which he placed with the others. He looked along the neat arrangement of scalpels, calipers, pincers, and bone saws and nodded approvingly. They were all gleamingly new and terrifyingly sharp. All would saw, open and slice though flesh like butter.
Drummond ran his hand along the line of reflective steel. Albadi whimpered and stared up at the ceiling, tear streaks marking his cheeks and temples. He was stripped to his underwear, with large nails pounded into the palms of his hands, his elbows and ankles, pinning him to the wood.
Drummond lifted a single instrument, a scalpel, and held it delicately like a conductor would a baton. “Beautiful.” He spoke softly, catching sight of his own reflection in the polished steel. “Where did you send them?”
Albadi whimpered, and then mumbled. Drummond snickered and reached across to pull down his gag. “I’m sorry, you were saying?”
“You fool. You have no idea what you’re doing. I know you don’t want the Book; you want to find the gates. Do you know what will happen if the Old One rises? Do you?”
Drummond turned. “Why yes.” He held his arms wide. “I’ll be king…and you and your kind will be nothing more than grist to the mill, so to speak.” He looked at his wristwatch and his lips compressed. “This is taking too long.” He turned to look over his shoulder at Kroen, and nodded once.
The huge bodyguard kicked another of the stools away, and Albadi crushed his eyes shut, as if that would also drown out the strangulated gurgling as another life was extinguished.
Drummond smirked. “Two left. Soon we will run out of servants, then it will be your turn.”
Albadi kept his eyes closed and Drummond leaned over him. “It’s not very pleasant, watching a man die like that, and knowing that it’s all because of you. But, Doctor, you really are missing something that is truly beautiful.” He tapped the man’s face with the scalpel. “I could make you watch, you know. A little incision here, and here, and then peel away the upper lids on both your eyes – no hiding then, hmm?”
Drummond sighed. “Doctor, or at least doctor of literature, I know the human body so well. I know how to caress it to heavenly pleasure, or take it to Hell when I expose nerve clusters and then play them like a harp.” His smirk deepened. “But the music yours plays will not be to your liking: of that, I can assure you.”
“Kroen.” Drummond held up two fingers, and the last two stools were kicked away. He waited until the sounds died away to only the creaks of stretching rope fibers. He sighed. “I have done this dozens of times, to stronger men and women than you. They all talk, they always talk.” He grinned. “Just to be clear: you are already dead. Your future is known and it is me who will have the pleasure of taking you forward on that journey. But the way I take you is up to you – swift and painless, like you are just getting tired and so cross over into a gentle sleep from which you never wake.” His eyebrows went up slightly. “Or screaming for hours on end as I reduce you to a thousand slices of bloody flesh and shrieking nerve ends.”
Drummond waited a moment longer, and then held up both hands, surgeon-like, with one holding the scalpel.
Albadi whimpered, and then nodded. Drummond leaned over him. “I have a secret to tell you.” He snickered. “I don’t really care about the Book’s copy, and I know exactly where your visitors are going…I only want to make sure you tell no one else about it.” He kissed the blade and smirked. “Doctor, I think we both know that I was always going to torture you.” He placed the blade on Albadi’s thigh, just over the femoral nerve, and then drew it down.
*
On the Lebanese-Syrian border, an Israeli agent of the elite Metsada Division stopped her roadside interrogation as she received the coded security squirt from the Americans. Her lips compressed in a tight line: she knew well the territory the Americans were in – there were Al Qaida, ISIS, the United Islamist Front, Party of a Thousand Martyrs, and a dozen other armed brigades crawling all over the area. With luck they might make it – but there was precious little of that left in Syria any more.
The man underneath the agent’s boot wriggled and spat words up from split and bloody lips. The agent ignored him, and looked out to the east – the sun would soon rise, and the Americans would be exposed – not much time.
Concentration lapsed for only a moment, but it was enough – the man jerked upward, a combat knife appearing in his hand, the blade coming fast at the Metsada agent’s groin. In a swift motion her foot on his neck was withdrawn, and then swung around to stamp down on the wrist holding the knife. Her slim black dagger flashed down once, deep into the man’s orbital socket – he shuddered, and then lay still.
The agent wiped blood from the knife and hand, exposing a small blue star in the meat between thumb and forefinger. The blade was then expertly tucked back into a sleeve, and then she stepped away from the body and rolled it into a ditch.
The agent climbed aboard a long skeletal-looking motorbike. The LEPERD was an Israeli design for fast solo incursions – electric motor with plenty of torque delivered via a lightweight but muscular power plant. Its heavy-duty spring suspension system, adjustable rear shocks, and knobbed tire tread meant it was built for overland desert terrain.
The agent kicked up the guard, pulled goggles down over her eyes, wrapped a keffiyeh headdress around her nose and mouth, and throttled forward, accelerating quickly to seventy miles per hour over the dry flat landscape. It immediately became clear why the motorbike was Metsada’s solo vehicle of choice in the Middle East – it was near silent, the electric motor giving off only a faint whine as it blistered over the predawn desert landscape.
Fifty miles – be there in an hour, thought Adira Senesh, whose name meant mighty in Hebrew. She
concentrated on the still dark desert as she drove without lights. Her eyes were as black as pools of oil and they were narrowed in her concentration. She knew she owed the Americans nothing, but there was one man she would never forget, one who had stolen her heart, and who perhaps again one day…She shook her head and gritted her teeth. But not this day, she thought. This day she would do her job, and, as a top Metsada agent, sometimes that job was dealing death.
*
The sun was up and Abrams and the small group had long since left the creek bed. The land was flat save for dry scrub and ochre boulders in an ochre landscape, for miles upon miles upon miles. He thanked his lucky stars that the GPS unit had survived the crash – without electronics he bet even his SEALs would be hard pressed to navigate by just the huge sun.
Berry was out at point, a hundred feet ahead, hunched, and occasionally lifting field glasses to his eyes. Thermal and night-vision were of course now useless. Abrams looked briefly over his shoulder – the geologist and language professor were strolling along as if looking for a picnic spot in Central Park. Behind them was Captain Tania Kovitz with only a sidearm, but she was as vigilant as ever. Deeper back at rear point was Hartogg, adopting the same crouching movement as Berry – Abrams was glad to have both of them, but now wished for another dozen. There was something about the land here that made him feel uneasy…and he hated to admit it, but he was still a little rattled by that weird lumping in the desert he had seen the night before.
Out front, Berry raised a hand, and then lowered it slowly, palm down. Abrams felt a tingle run through his system – the SEAL had spotted something. Those guys could pick up things regular soldiers like him could never hope to. Abrams half turned; Tania and Hartogg were already lowering themselves to the ground, but Matt and Andy were just squinting back at him.