Nightmare Army

by Don Pendleton

  Firke smiled, his lips pressed together, tight and bloodless. “Yeah, but there’s a limit. Easier just to put lead in his head.”

  “Well, unless one of your men wants to volunteer for the testing...given their genetic makeup, it shouldn’t cause much harm...”

  Firke scowled at that, although the thought of putting his two team members who had screwed up and let the American escape under the needle had crossed his mind, he dismissed it with a shake of his head. After seeing what had happened to the people of Artakar, there was no way he’d let any of his people undergo the doctor’s tests. “Maybe...I’ll see what I can do.”

  “Make this happen, Mr. Firke, and I’ll reward you myself,” Richter said. “That’s a promise.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  As her plane descended on its final approach into Kinshasa International Airport, Lieutenant Cheryl Briggs, M.D., was still trying to sort out the sketchy data she had received only a few hours earlier regarding her reassignment. Even the summary report read like something out of a Michael Crichton novel.

  New man-made pathogen released on civilian population in Armenia...infected subjects exhibit extremely aggressive and violent behavior toward others, with an end goal of spreading the pathogen to as many people as possible... Suspects involved fled to Democratic Republic of the Congo... Rendezvous with Matt Cooper, Justice agent assigned to investigate the incident, locate the suspects and arrest them. Pathogen samples are to be destroyed...any recoverable data on the pathogen should be obtained for further study if possible.

  “Not exactly what I signed up for,” she muttered, although she also couldn’t deny a thrill deep inside her. Cheryl had joined AMRIID to help research and fight infectious diseases, and while a she had gone through the appropriate training, she had never been in the field in what could conceivably be considered a hostile situation. But this... Who knew what was really going on?

  As her plane touched down and she saw the distinctive yellow-and-blue terminal building in the distance, Briggs was acutely aware of the strife and trauma the country had gone through over the past few decades. Ever since obtaining its freedom from Belgium in 1960, it had ben racked by a succession of internal strife, military coups and a twenty-six-year dictatorship under Joseph Mobutu, an army general who had named himself president in 1971.

  After he was forced to flee in 1997 due to internal and external pressure, the indigenous group known as the Tutsi launched an invasion from Rwanda and Uganda, setting in motion a war that spread to envelop six other African nations. Sporadic fighting continued to this day among several groups based both inside and on the borders of the struggling country. It was particularly harsh for women, with an estimated 400,000 sexually assaulted each year. Briggs had looked out over the thick, verdant jungle on their approach and wondered how so much beauty could mask such depravity and destruction.

  She had been warned about attracting attention to herself, and had her service pistol with her, although it was currently in her suitcase, as the fastest, as well as the least conspicuous way to get to the Congo, had been by passenger airline. Even so, she was acutely aware of being one of only two Caucasians on the airliner.

  Briggs exited the plane, stepping out into the bright sunlight and suffocating heat. She walked down the mobile stairs, across the tarmac and into the terminal building. She headed straight for the luggage terminal, hoping that her suitcase hadn’t been opened, or even worse, stolen. Tapping her foot impatiently, she waited at the antiquated luggage stand, keeping a wary eye out for pickpockets and thieves. She had spent just as much time reading up on the city of Kinshasa, as well as the country, and was familiar with the con games and tricks unscrupulous people tried on foreigners. She was prepared to resist with any and all means at her disposal.

  Eventually her suitcase was trundled out and Briggs was relieved to see that it looked undamaged. Even so, she hauled it to a deserted corner, opened it and retrieved her 9 mm Beretta pistol, loading it and slipping it into her purse. Sensing eyes upon her, she turned, keeping one hand inside the handbag, to see a tall white man with black hair and piercing blue eyes striding toward her. He wore tan chinos, a white button-down shirt and a khaki tropical-weight linen sport coat.

  “Lieutenant Cheryl Briggs?” he asked as he came close. His eyes flicked down to her purse. “Matt Cooper. You have good taste in guns, I see.”

  Briggs withdrew her hand and tried her best not to grin sheepishly or blush at the situation. “I believe in always being prepared, Agent Cooper.”

  “I couldn’t agree with you more. And call me Matt.” He smiled slightly, transforming his face from a serious mask into something somewhat less harsh. A moment ago he had been all business, but now he resembled another just adventurous tourist who had come to Africa. “Is this everything?”

  “Yes, I was told to travel light, and did exactly that,” Briggs replied as she wiped irritably at her pinned hair, which was already turning into a sodden, sticky mass at the back of her neck. “I trust you’ll be able to fill me in on what is going on regarding the subject of our mission?”

  “At the moment you probably know more than I do,” Bolan said as he picked up her suitcase and they headed for the main entrance. “We’re supposed to be meeting with a representative from the government, but keep your eyes open—in developing countries, corruption is a way of life. Often one can never tell how many payrolls a state employee is on.”

  “Right.” Briggs’s already jangly nerves twitched even more upon hearing that not-so-reassuring bit of news, but she quickened her pace to keep up with the taller man’s long legs as they headed for the exit.

  Near the doors, an impeccably dressed African man with fashionably short hair and wearing a neat shirt, sport coat and slacks approached them. “Mr. Cooper? Dr. Briggs? I am Evrard Kayembe, assistant to the governor of the city and province of Kinshasa, André Kimbuta. On behalf of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, we welcome you.” He showed them an official-looking government identification, which Bolan scrutinized carefully and then handed to Briggs for her review.

  Gratified that he hadn’t just assumed she’d go along, she examined it carefully, and saw that everything seemed to be in order, finally handing it back to Mr. Kayembe, who had waited patiently during the process.

  “I have been in contact with your Mr....Brog-nola,” he said with a smile, pronouncing the Stony Man liaison’s name with care. “And have made all necessary arrangements for both of you during your stay. If you will follow me, please.”

  He turned and headed toward the main doors. Briggs exchanged a glance with Bolan, who was already talking into his earpiece. He listened for a moment as he followed the shorter man through the doors. “Confirmed that this is the guy we’re supposed to meet, right down to his—” he pulled out his smartphone and looked at the picture “—mug shot.”

  “Okay then, into the woods we go,” Briggs said.

  Kayembe led them to a large, white Land Rover, complete with a roof rack and well-used front brush guard. “It is about an hour to the city proper. Just relax, and we will be there soon.”

  By unspoken agreement, Bolan took the front passenger seat and Briggs got into the back, on the driver’s side. Kayembe pulled out into the sparse traffic and drove away from the airport, heading toward the city.

  “When can we begin our search for the people we’re looking for?” Bolan asked.

  “That will be the first topic of discussion with our people,” Kayembe replied. “We have some promising leads that should help you quite a bit.”

  “Good.” Bolan’s eyes narrowed as he saw flashing blue lights in the rearview mirror. Glancing behind them, he saw another Land Rover approaching fast. “Are you speeding?”

  Kayembe checked the mirror and grimaced. “No, that is just the police escort I requested. Unfortunately they are not being as discreet as I would li
ke. Just a moment.” He pulled over onto the side of the road and the police vehicle followed, stopping a few meters behind them. Kayembe opened his door. “Let me reinstruct them as to what is happening. Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

  He got out and walked back to the driver’s side of the other vehicle, while Briggs and Bolan watched the conversation, though neither could make out what was being said.

  “What do you think?” she asked.

  “He left the keys, so if it is an ambush or shakedown, we’d have a means of escape,” Bolan replied. “His body language doesn’t appear to be nervous or threatened, and most important, no guns have been drawn from the police, so it looks like this is on the up-and-up so far. Still, keep your purse open.”

  She smiled grimly. “It hasn’t been closed since I got here.”

  “Good.”

  Briggs noticed that one hand was behind his back, as well. “I see you’re not taking any chances, either.”

  “I try not to,” he replied, still watching the conversation, which came to an end with Kayembe waiting for another man to emerge from the back of the police SUV. The two men walked toward the first vehicle again, splitting up to go to their respective sides.

  “Looks like one of the policemen is riding with us,” Bolan said. He did not remove his hand from the small of his back.

  The doors opened and both men climbed in, Kayembe talking as he sat behind the wheel. “Officer Nestor Muamba, may I present Lieutenant Cheryl—”

  As he spoke, both the police officer and Kayembe raised short-barreled pistols, each one aimed at the person in the seat next to him, and pulled the triggers.

  Briggs jumped when the pistol next to her made a loud coughing sound, and looked down in disbelief at the brightly colored dart sticking out of her side. She suddenly felt weak and sleepy. She tried to pull her pistol, aware of some commotion in the front seats, but her arms and legs felt as if they weighed a thousand pounds each. Even her head felt too heavy to keep upright.

  As it lolled against the headrest, she watched the man across from her take her purse and remove her pistol and her smartphone. She fought to keep her eyes open, to fight, to scream, to do anything, but she couldn’t move, couldn’t think, couldn’t do anything but slip into the long tunnel of darkness that appeared before her.

  The last thing she remembered hearing was the deep voice of her ambusher. “Where you’re going, I doubt they’ll care what your name is....”

  * * *

  AT STONY MAN FARM, Barbara Price had called an early meeting to update everyone on where they were with this rapidly developing new mission. In attendance were Hal Brognola and Aaron Kurtzman, with Akira Tokaido pulling double duty by both monitoring their computer network and attending via Skype.

  “Good morning,” she said. “First, I wanted to wrap up the tail end of the mission that uncovered this mess. I’ve just received word that Alexsandr Sevan was received into Department of Justice custody earlier this morning. In a rare show of interdepartmental cooperation, the DoJ and FBI are working together on his case. Sevan won’t be going anywhere for a long, long time. Good job, everyone.”

  She opened the tablet in front of her. “Now, on to more pressing matters. There’s been a rather interesting development regarding this pathogen mission.”

  “Only one this morning?” Kurtzman snorted. “Or perhaps you’re referring to the Chinese definition?”

  “Trust me, it’s plenty big enough to complicate matters.” Price’s tone was so dry it could have parched toast. “Akira caught it during his analysis of the data and flagged it for immediate attention, hence this meeting.”

  Brognola frowned. “If it’s that important, why wasn’t I notified immediately?”

  “It reached me only twenty minutes ago, and there is no immediate crisis regarding it at the moment, there’s only the matter of how to proceed.” She took a seat. “Akira, if you would, please.”

  The genius hacker cleared his throat. He had a lot to report, and some of it wasn’t happy news. “Okay, so, we were able to track that second incursion team back to their airport—”

  “Hold up, Akira, that reminds me,” Brognola said. “I thought we had eyes on the Armenian village the whole time Striker was there. According to the after-action report, from the onset time of this virus, they would have had to plant it sometime in the twelve hours before his mission began. Why didn’t we see them come in?”

  “I’ll answer that one, Hal,” Kurtzman replied. “We had allocation for the drone for the original mission window, plus an extra twenty-four hours either way, as per standard operating procedure. As you know, the mission ran long due to the delayed arrival of the primary target. Striker made the call to wait him out, but the drone had to be recalled, as it was assigned somewhere else after that period. By the time we got another one onsite, a fifteen-hour period had elapsed where we did not have aerial reconnaissance capability.”

  “Fair enough,” Brognola grunted. “I know that we can’t always get what we want when we want it. There are protocols in place. But what about Striker? He was watching them like a hawk, but said he didn’t see anything out of the ordinary, either.”

  Kurtzman and Tokaido exchanged a glance. “Extrapolating from our best data, we theorized that they came in through the sewer system, the outflow point of which is on the other side of the village,” the young hacker said. “Striker couldn’t have seen anything from his vantage point.”

  “Exactly,” Kurtzman stated. “We’re good, but even we can’t work miracles all the time.”

  “Got it.” Brognola twirled his finger in the air in the universal “keep going,” sign.

  Tokaido checked his notes again. “Okay, where was I? Right. The good news is that while we didn’t see them, they didn’t see us, either, and apparently assumed that once Striker and the others from the village left, that was the end of it. They were decidedly lax in covering their tracks as they went to the airfield and boarded a private jet, which took off and landed in the Congo, which everyone already knows. The interesting thing is who the jet was registered to. Although they tried to hide it, they didn’t do it well enough. The plane belongs to a holding company of Stengrave Industries.”

  That got Brognola’s attention. “Stengrave? The Swedish multinational corporation?”

  “The same,” Tokaido replied. “We’ve prepared a quick-and-dirty summary of their operations around the world. Biochemical, manufacturing, computer technology—they’re into just about anything on the cutting edge of technology.”

  “Let’s see what his company’s been up to, as well.” Brognola flicked through electronic pages. “They’re working with just about everyone around the world, from landing contracts with State, Agriculture, NASA, even Homeland Security. They’ve also partnered with private businesses around the world, including a dozen Fortune 100 companies.”

  “Not to mention that they’ve diversified over the past decade.” Price paged forward to a long list of the company’s subsidiaries. “They own stakes in a military vehicle manufacturer as well as one that makes body armor, and even a bioresearch and development laboratory dedicated to perfecting the human body. Sounds a bit ambitious for a company that got its start manufacturing low-end medical equipment, don’t you think?”

  Kurtzman and Brognola scanned the page she was reviewing. “Depends on what they’re doing with it,” the computer expert replied. “There are two current research fields regarding improving the human soldier. The first is through external technology—exoskeletons, real-time adaptable camouflage, remote-piloted drones or robots to remove the wounded from the battlefield, that sort of thing. The second one is to improve from the inside, including artificial stimulants, selective genetic modification and much more. We’ve come across the latter a time or two.”

  “Hmm, curiouser and curiouser,” Brognola said. “Looks
like they’re even hedging their own bets. Recent investments include purchasing a controlling interest in a robotics R and D lab in Massachusetts last year.”

  “That just seems like good business to me,” Price said as she leaned back in her chair, arms crossed. “After all, why put your eggs in one basket? Whichever route proves most effective—and profitable—they’re in a position to be on the inside track. And besides, just because one country goes one way, doesn’t mean another country wouldn’t be interested in a different approach.”

  “Be that as it may, the fact that they’re involved and the head company owns a subsidiary that sounds suspiciously like it could be in the business of creating bioweapons means they deserve a closer look ASAP,” Brognola said.

  “Bear, Akira, you guys know what to do,” Price said. “Also, what’s the latest from Striker?”

  “He checked in on touchdown and said he had made contact both with Lieutenant Briggs and a government official,” Kurtzman said. “They were heading into the city to meet with other government officials.”

  “An afternoon yakking with government middle management?” Price and Brognola shared a grin, knowing full well the big man’s disdain for bureaucracy. “Hopefully Striker will at least attempt to be diplomatic.”

  “Let me know the moment he checks in. I want to be sure he’s updated on everything, Akira. Akira?” Price repeated when she saw the young man staring at something on another monitor.

  “I’m afraid the enemy knows Striker is there.”

  Price closed the tablet on the table in front of her and gave him her full attention. “Go ahead.”

  “Reviewing the satellite communications traffic coming out of the region over the past forty-eight hours, I found this excerpt of conversation that was received by a deputy minister in Kinshasa three hours ago,” Tokaido stated. “Just so you know, this is raw data.”

  He touched a screen next to him and a sound file played back, completed with the jagged green bars of a voice stress analyzer. Price heard an unfamiliar voice discussing the arrival of the Army lieutenant, and providing the description of an unnamed man who sounded like Bolan, with a Mr. Sambele, who promised to follow up with the volunteers. The unnamed man suggested that when the pair was apprehended they be turned over to him.