by Fritz Galt
Alec didn’t look back, but heard Mick’s soothing voice. Gradually, Natalie’s sobbing ceased.
Alec trained his night scope on the glowing green spot, and called out slight variations in direction.
His radio crackled. A voice was repeating. “Team Three, this is Team Two. Come in.”
He pressed his transmit button. “Team Two, this is Team Three. We’re in hot pursuit. What’s the situation there?”
“We’re all present and accounted for, except for one man.”
Alec felt his knees weaken. “Who?”
“Captain Savage.”
Alec looked at the broad shoulders of the man at their helm. Blood soaked through one pants leg. One singed hand hung limp by his side. The captain, seasoned by years of special operations, leaned into the wind with a fierce smile on his lips. He was a man in his element.
Alec pressed the button. “Don’t worry. The good captain is right here, piloting our boat.”
“What a relief, sir.”
“Tell ’em to evacuate back to the hotel,” Savage called over his shoulder.
“Okay. Brush yourselves off and return to the hotel at once. We were never here.”
“Of course, sir.”
As he watched, the green spot grew weaker on his infrared scope.
“They’re gaining distance on us,” he reported. “I don’t think we can keep up.”
“What’s that on your back, soldier?” Savage shouted.
“Weapons.”
“What kind of weapons?”
“A Stinger, sir.”
Alec heard Mick stand abruptly behind him.
“You can’t blow up that boat,” Mick said.
“Why not?”
“They have the vaccine.”
Savage reduced the throttle. “Then they’re gone. We’ve lost them.”
Captain Savage turned the boat and began to glide back toward the scene of the battle.
Mick sat back and cradled Natalie in his lap, one hand carefully brushing the hair back from her face. Her body was limp from exhaustion and fright.
Fragments of words drifted from her lips. “So sorry. I almost saved you, baby.”
She convulsed in anguish and shed another round of tears.
If he hadn’t guessed it earlier, now he knew with all certainty that Mariah was foremost on Natalie’s mind.
What an incredible job she had done to infiltrate Abu’s organization, to be trusted to take the ransom money, to gain access to Abu’s residence. Risking exposure at every turn, Natalie had become the perfect insider. He hadn’t needed to send the sleazy Camille into Casa do Rio when Natalie had everything well in hand.
In his lap, he held a woman who had been through it all, yet emerged empty-handed.
Holding her tenderly, he felt her remaining energy ebb away.
They passed several silent white structures. Huge churches, monuments from the past.
All was dead and lost now.
The few remaining buildings of Old Goa were reclaimed by nature.
Once the largest city in Asia, Goa had been deserted a hundred years earlier to escape the deadly mosquito. Malaria had frightened the Portuguese colonists out of the jungle and forced them to retreat to the sea.
What, if anything, would remain of the world once the mosquitoes completed their lethal task?
Chapter 43
President Charles Damon opened the National Security Council meeting the next afternoon with his characteristic hunger for information.
First he turned to his secretary of defense. “I know that Operation Fatal Sting continued without our permission. Did they accomplish their goal?”
“My people are still filing their report,” Park said.
Not likely. He turned to Hugh Gutman. “You had several officers at the scene. What intelligence do they have?”
“Sorry, Mr. President. They haven’t reported back yet.”
They were both stonewalling him. He looked at Adam Trimble. “Okay, it’s up to you. You had a diplomat present during the operation. What did she report?”
“I also have to say I’m sorry.”
Bronson Nichols cleared his throat. “I do have news, sir,” he said, measuring his words.
He swiveled toward the counter-terrorism chief. “At last someone is brave enough to give me the bad news.”
“Hardly brave, sir,” Bronson said. “But the group should inform you that the entire operation has come up with zilch. No Abu Khan. No vaccine. The terrorist is assumed to have fled Goa, and we don’t know his whereabouts or the whereabouts of the informant who joined his cause. All we have managed to do is to bow in to extortion and exchange Congressman Butler’s daughter for two million dollars.”
“What happened with the informant?”
Bronson looked him directly in the eye. “She seems to have switched allegiances once again, stolen the vaccine and disappeared with Abu Khan.”
Unblinking, he turned back to his secretary of defense. “What happened to our men on the ground?”
“One soldier is dead,” Park said. “The rest are sitting tight, awaiting word on when we’ll extract them.”
“How did the damn terrorists escape again?” he said, feeling his blood pressure rising.
Park shook his head. “No information on how they escaped or where they went.”
“If you will excuse me,” Bronson said, “the story goes something like this. Our men were detected while they were trying to infiltrate the terrorist compound. So they initiated an attack, and were surprised by the speedy escape. It appears that they could have used motorized launches and a backup team, which I’m told our Government explicitly prohibited.”
“My God,” Charles said, running a hand through his thick gray hair. “I knew this would happen.”
Park looked particularly distressed. “I’m sorry, sir.”
Adam alone appeared unruffled.
Charles shook his head. “We all set up our boys as targets in a shooting gallery.” He fought to regain his composure. “So, Vic, do we extract them or not? Does India know what happened?”
“No official word from New Delhi,” Vic said. “Adam? Any word through your channels?”
“None. I think we can safely assume that word never made it to New Delhi.”
Charles looked over the averted eyes at the table. “So what do we do now?”
Vic had the only response. “The alternatives range from bad to worse. We can alert India and have them conduct house-to-house searches, whereby we incur their wrath for having attempted the operation in the first place and bungled it in the second place. Or we can keep quiet and let India put the pressure on Pakistan to accept the CTBT and let the country die of malaria.”
“As far as our self-interest is concerned,” Charles said, “we want the CTBT signed. They’ll never find the terrorist anyway, or recover the vaccine.”
He surveyed the faces. Only Bronson shook his head.
“Well, gentlemen, we failed,” Charles said. “We’ll stay the course. And that’s final.”
Park seemed pleased, however General Kessler cleared his throat. “How about our men, sir?”
“I don’t want to risk a high profile operation to extract them,” he said. “With our miserable track record, we’ll end up alerting the Indian authorities. This whole mess will blow over eventually. Let our boys keep their heads down for as long as our country needs them there.”
Beyond the windows of the Oval Office, an evening snowfall blanketed the South Lawn of the White House. Charles’ men were in the process of burying a military operation that had gone awry. He tried to imagine a group of commandos subsisting on berries in the Indian jungle.
Just then, his chief of staff, Bernard Jackson entered the office.
“Sir, turn on CNN. You’ll find this interesting.”
The president pressed a button on his desk. Across the room, a large-screen television flashed on.
Then sonorous music filled the room. The title “Nightmare in Kash
mir” signaled a new segment.
An unfamiliar Western-looking correspondent in New Delhi stood before the camera, a microphone shaking visibly in his hand. “CNN has just learned from an unnamed source that terrorists are holding this nation hostage.”
“Who leaked it?” the president growled. “Find out who leaked it.”
Bernard spoke tersely on the phone and hung up.
“It appears that the spread of deadly malaria throughout India has been an intentional act of terrorism,” the correspondent continued.
“It’s that female diplomat,” Bernard said. “I’m sure of it. She told Bronson everything. Now she leaked it to the press.”
“Currently the terrorist is at large in the Kashmir region where, CNN has learned, he holds a vaccine to prevent the deadly form of malaria that is now called the Hanuman type, based on the species of monkey from which the malaria was developed.”
“How the hell could she know that he was in Kashmir?” Bernard demanded.
“We apologize for the poor quality of the pictures and sound of the following home-made videotape. It contains the terrorist’s statement, just released to the media.”
“Damn, they didn’t even share it with us,” Charles muttered. “What’s going on around here? Why isn’t anyone on top of this?”
The picture became a washed-out image of a couple sitting cross-legged on pillows against an anonymous white wall. The woman was young and attractive with thick black hair. The young man, with a stylish beard, did all the speaking. The man’s calmness both surprised and unnerved him.
Rather than ranting, the young man dictated his demands in a rational tone of voice, using precise English expressions. “We demand the dissolution of the Indian Parliament,” the man was saying, “and the resignation of all members of the Indian government. We call for a suspension of the Constitution of India and declare a state of emergency.”
Charles noticed a glass vial in the woman’s hand.
“If New Delhi won’t accede to our demands, I will not release the Hanuman type vaccine. It is as simple as that.”
“He can’t do that,” he said. “It’s against the Geneva Conventions and God knows what else.”
“Try and stop him, Charles,” Bernard said.
He shut his mouth. He had already sent out the U.S. Navy to try and stop him.
“Sir, if you don’t mind my saying so,” Bernard said. “I think you’re obsessing on this issue. It’s only India, for God’s sake.”
Charles waved him off and stayed focused on the transmission.
“Any internal or foreign powers who attempt to undermine my rule,” the young man continued, “will duly suffer the consequences.” He took the vial of translucent liquid and swished it around.
“He’s bluffing,” Bernard said. “He doesn’t have the goddamned vaccine.”
Just then, the hand-held camera panned right, revealing another figure, a slightly battered man. Behind the broken and re-taped frames of his spectacles, the man bore a vague resemblance to Abu Khan.
Abu’s voice continued off-screen. “Dr. Rajiv Khan is my brother. Can you verify that I am Abu Khan?”
Rajiv opened his mouth. The words seemed stuck inside. “That’s right,” he finally squawked. “Your name is Abu Mohammed Ali Khan.”
“Now, as a medical researcher, you are an authority on malaria vaccines. Can you verify that what I am holding is indeed a vaccine against the deadly Hanuman type of malaria that is spreading all over India?”
“Yes it is,” Rajiv said. He cleared his throat and continued, seemingly unprompted. “And furthermore, it’s not only the sole vaccine against the current strain, but for all strains of malaria as well. You took it from my laboratory in Kerala, India.”
“You mean to say that this vaccine can prevent all known forms of malaria in the world?”
“That’s my belief.”
The cameraman panned back to Abu, who seemed to study the vial with renewed respect. “New Delhi has no choice but to surrender. In the meantime, I am preparing to contaminate the world’s blood supply with the new malaria. The clock is ticking.”
Bernard stared at the president. “He’s talking about killing us all.”
“Or saving us all. He’s got a vaccine for all forms of malaria.”
“Sir, we can’t ignore this. This is worldwide.”
“Furthermore,” the young doctor continued as the camera swung back to him, “I believe that the substance in that vial can do more than prevent the disease, it can help us cure it. Stop the disease in its tracks.”
“You can cure all forms of malaria?” Abu asked, his voice modulating wildly with incredulity. The camera returned to him in time to show an inspired, if devious, smile spread at the corners of his bearded mouth. “Look out, world.”
The video image blinked off, leaving the president staring at a burst of noisy static. Then the lugubrious closing theme music and visuals to “Nightmare in Kashmir” took over the screen.
“Vic?” Charles called, his face frozen. “Get me Vic.”
“Vic, do you mind explaining to me what all this malaria business has to do with Kashmir,” President Charles Damon said, staring at his calm national security advisor and trying to look at the situation rationally. “I thought they were two, unrelated issues.”
“Could be. Or could be they’re two sides of the same issue. It depends on what Abu Khan has in mind. Clearly he intends to control India. Most likely his stronghold is in Kashmir. If that’s the case, then he might see this as a fundamentalist takeover, most likely coordinated with bin Laden’s efforts in the islands of the Indian Ocean. Perhaps Abu might impose al-Shari’ah, or Islamic Law, and send India’s fifty-year experiment in democracy down the drain.”
“Why does Kashmir welcome him? I didn’t know that Kashmir was a hotbed of fundamentalism.”
“Kashmir, while mainly Muslim, has never considered herself an Islamic state. Fundamentalism has only been introduced to the Valley recently by Pakistan and the Mujahideen, who see Kashmir’s resistance to Indian rule as a holy war. My guess is that Abu was trained in Pakistan or Afghanistan and currently has safe passage in Kashmir.”
“But if he’s trying to take over India, why is he up there?”
“It could be that our soldiers scared the crap out of him. He might have been preparing a more gradual takeover of India, but we’ve forced him into the open. Into the media.”
“Forced him to hold India hostage.”
“He may have resorted to extreme measures.”
“My God, what have we created?”
“Actually we created the epidemic as well, and we spread it. We created the Hanuman type malaria in Atlanta. And according to Abu Khan, our missiles released the mosquitoes from their breeding tanks in Afghanistan. Then Operation Fatal Sting apparently forced him to resort to extortionist tactics. I would say we both created the monster and pushed him over the edge.”
Charles cast about in despair. “Who knows all the pieces and players. Who can get us out of this mess?”
“I’ll talk with Bronson.”
Abu watched with satisfaction as a convoy of Indian Army trucks wound their way toward his encampment up the desolate canyon from Kargil, Kashmir. One truck bore the Indian Army commander from Jammu City, having capitulated to his demands.
The other trucks carried a supply of malaria-contaminated blood from various sources within India. The convoy trundled over the rocky entrance to his camp and ground to a halt before a building marked “Export.”
Abu’s men, wearing crisp military fatigues, formed a bucket brigade and began off-loading boxes marked “Hemoglobin” and stacking the contaminated blood in the warehouse.
He felt elated as he trudged over the frozen ground to another warehouse, this one marked “Clinic.”
The wooden door shuddered as he pried it open. Standing under a florescent tube, his brother leaned over a long lab table lined with empty syringes.
Rajiv turned with a
n annoyed shiver when he felt the cold blast coming through the doorway. Then he frowned even deeper when he realized who it was. “I’ll never make enough of this stuff by myself.” He pointed to the cardboard boxes stacked from floor to ceiling. “Even if I fill all these up, it won’t prove to be a drop in the ocean to save India.”
“We’ll save India in other ways,” Abu reassured him. “What you produce will protect my men, and they will offer this same protection to other good men they recruit around the country.”
He gestured outside at his armed camp. “These men will form a chain of command in each city and village in the land, from the Himalayas down to Sri Lanka, from Rajasthan to Assam. By the end of December, we’ll leave this desolate place and spread out across the subcontinent.”
He winked as if they were a team.
“We’re coming up in this world, aren’t we?” he continued. “The entire Moghul Project is in your hands now. Only you have the power to save lives. I have the sad obligation of choosing which ones.”
“You lured me here to create vaccines for the world, not just a few…”
“And I thank you for coming back to me,” Abu said. “The world thanks you. And shortly, you will mass-produce a vaccine for the world.”
Rajiv looked out the dusty window at men loading boxes into the Export warehouse. “What’s in those trucks?”
“Blood contaminated with the Hanuman type malaria. That’s how we’ll spread our influence to other countries.”
Rajiv looked appalled. “Abu, you can’t do this. Do you think Father would approve?”
“We have no father any longer.”
Rajiv set down the test tube he was holding.
Abu explained. “Father made a terrible mistake by exposing our underground movement. He let that American woman infiltrate the organization, and she led the Marines, or whoever they were, all the way to Casa do Rio.”
“What did you do to Father?” Rajiv said, realization dawning on his face.
“He’s in Allah’s hands.”
Rajiv slumped against the table. “And Mother?”