by Gary Haynes
“Will you take me to where he lives?”
“If you wish,” Khan said. “First, I will drink tea with my brother. It may be my last.”
33.
Sandri Khan drove Tom in the Mazda past Hasni’s house. He parked up beside a row of kachnar trees, their dense foliage minimizing the glare from the highway’s LED streetlights. Hasni’s house was on the other side, forty metres back, the front entrance illuminated by powerful floodlights. It was relatively isolated; the length of a football pitch from the nearest building. A twenty-storey, apex-roofed skyscraper jutting up from a pink-slab plaza. Tom told Khan to wait in the car, leaving the bugs in the bag. He’d do an initial recon first, without any incriminatory evidence if the worst happened. Khan just shook his head. But Tom had guarded buildings for years. If this one had a soft spot, he’d find it. He wouldn’t even have to scale the wall around the garden. The bugs’ robust design meant they could withstand a drop of twenty metres onto a hard surface and were pliable enough to remain operational after being run over by a family car. But he still needed a soft spot from which to launch the bugs into position.
Getting no more than a few metres down the sidewalk, he saw a white Rolls-Royce pull into the driveway leading to Hasni’s home, small Saudi flags hanging limp above the hood, diplomatic plates front and rear. The car stopped and an armed guard ducked down to the front window. A few seconds later, the gate opened and the car moved forward.
In his experience, the rears of buildings were always less well protected than the façades. He hoped this one wouldn’t be any different. He’d look out for gaps in security cameras. A patch of dark, or an overhanging tree. An area not protected by static guards, or outside their line of vision. Potential cover created by bushes or long grass. A back door not fitted with a video entry system. A window covered by shutters or hinged grilles. Anything that would allow him to toss the spy camera over the wall and into the garden undetected.
As he jogged across the street, he darted left, following the dark flank of the walled house from a suitable distance. But as he closed the gap to about fifteen metres, the whole area was lit up by floodlights. Shielding his eyes from the white light, he made out a bunker half sunk into the ground in front of the wall, the muzzle of a heavy machine gun sticking out of it. Knowing he had set off an invisible microwave beam, or a passive infrared variety, the modern equivalents of a tripwire, he stepped back. A second later, he heard a dog barking and the sound of pounding boots behind him.
Turning, he saw two guards in dark-blue combat fatigues emerge from the shadows. They both wore ball caps, emblazoned with the No Fear logo, a favourite of Pakistani elite forces. One of them was looking at him through the iron sights of a sub-machine gun; the other holding onto a black-and-tan Doberman that was already on its hind legs, straining at the leash. As it snarled white froth oozed from the sides of its mouth. Tom was ordered to raise his hands and stand still. As the one without the dog got to him he drew back his sub-machine gun, threatening to thrust the butt into his face. Tom winced involuntarily. But he wasn’t hit. Instead, the guard shouldered his weapon and frisked him brusquely. Satisfied, he gestured with a flick of his head that Tom should move. Passing in front of him, his hands still raised, Tom was kicked hard in the left buttock with the guard’s heavy boot. The crude message was clear enough: keep moving or else.
Feeling humiliated, Tom was led towards the front of the house, the guard with the dog bearing off halfway down. He figured he was checking to see if he’d been alone. About ten metres from the gate, he counted the steps behind him from a given point. The guard was less than half a metre away. Swiftly, he returned the kick, as he thrust back with his right leg, catching the guard in the lower stomach with his heel. The man groaned as Tom twisted around. As the guard raised his head, Tom struck him under his jaw with his open palm. He’d not hit him hard enough to break his neck, but the blow had rendered him unconscious.
He heard the dog barking again. He decided that if he grabbed the man’s gun, he would evoke a shoot to kill response, so he opted for a less obvious choice of weapon. Tom unhooked a pair of metal cuffs from the man’s belt, a makeshift knuckleduster, and straightened up. As the guards on the gate began shouting out, he darted for the shadow, quickening his pace as he saw the street. He began to sprint. The barking got louder. He figured the brute had been unleashed. Risking a glance over his shoulder, he saw it bounding up to him. If he kept running, it could catch him, pin him to the ground and take a chunk out of his neck.
Tom stopped and turned. As the dog got within range he saw it launch into the air. He flung himself to the right, the dog passing a few centimetres from his shoulder. Pivoting around, Tom saw that it had landed badly, its front legs twisting. He bunched his right-hand fingers around the bottom half of the cuffs and, as the dog struggled to reverse, he bent over and yanked up one of its hind legs, immobilizing it. He used the makeshift knuckleduster to hammer it into submission, pummelling its ribs as it twisted its head, desperate to get a hold on him. After the fifth punch, it made an agonizing sound, its hard body going limp. Tom dropped the leg and ran towards the street, a couple of rounds whizzing through the air about him. He guessed that the guards were firing randomly in his general direction, since the men he’d seen lacked the benefit of night vision, and he was still shrouded in darkness.
As he got to the street, he heard the Mazda’s engine revving, and noticed that the front passenger door was open. Before ducking in, he saw powerful lights scanning the grass where he’d felled the dog. Other guards were shouting and running about, as a monotonous, high-pitched Klaxon alarm system started up. He knew Khan was right. It was impenetrable, at least without a company of Screaming Eagles parachuting down inside the walls to back him up. He banged the door shut.
“Are you satisfied now?” Khan asked.
Tom nodded, crestfallen. He turned around and saw that a couple of the guards had all but reached the sidewalk. “Let’s get the hell outta here.”
34.
Khan stopped the car after about ten minutes, opposite a partially lit government office block.
“We should split up,” he said. “At the very least they’ll be looking for two men in a dark Mazda.”
“You’re right,” Tom said, his mind fighting to control a rising sense of panic.
Khan turned sideways in his seat. “Before you ask, the property has a concrete tunnel running underneath, secured with eye-recognition blast-proof doors. There are three safe rooms on different floors with metre-thick walls lined with steel plates and filled with sophisticated comms. And when he travels around the city, he is accompanied by military vehicles in a limo that can withstand an attack by an RPG. You should go back over the border and go home. Never return to Pakistan.”
“So why did you bring me here?” Tom asked.
“I was ordered to do what you asked, within reason.”
Tom figured Crane had wanted to make a point. He had. But it was helluva way to go about it, he thought. He had a vague notion that Crane’s motives for letting him come here were more complicated. But for now, they would have to remain unknown.
“But I will tell you something,” Khan said. “There is only one way to get to Hasni. His son, Mahmood.”
“No,” said Tom. “I don’t hurt children.”
“He is not a child. He is, I think, twenty-two. A student at your Harvard University,” he replied.
Tom thought about it. Mahmood was barely a man and likely innocent of his father’s crimes. But he knew he had no other option to get to Hasni in the short timeframe imposed by the video. It took ten years and billions of dollars to find bin Laden, and, despite the most sophisticated surveillance equipment in the world, if it hadn’t been for waterboarding the CIA would still be looking for him. He didn’t like it, but it was a fact.
“Very few people know of his true identity. He goes by an assumed name. You should know that Mahmood is protected by a bodyguard. Do not underestimate this man. H
asni would only entrust his son’s safety to one who is formidable. His name is Zafar. A squat man with a bearded face; eyes like black diamonds. Mahmood is scrawny and clean-shaven. And before you ask, I do not know where he lives.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Tom asked.
“Hasni is responsible for killing many of my friends. He would kill me, too, if he knew what I’d done.”
Tom figured it would be a waste of words to ask him what he’d done. Truth was, he didn’t care.
“Mahmood’s assumed name is Hassan Rind. I prayed about this on our way here. God has spoken to me. He has told me I can trust you, American, despite your lack of manners.”
Tom heard the sound of a car pulling up close behind them, the headlights flooding the side-view mirror. The lights were extinguished and the engine turned off. He watched Khan check the rear-view, a worried expression crossing the Pakistani’s hollow-cheeked face.
“Who is it?” Tom asked.
“ISI.”
35.
Tom grabbed the rear-view and twisted it, scanning the car behind. Two thick-set men sat in the front seats of a black Mercedes, the half hidden bulks of more behind. He saw the front passenger door open and a man got out, his broad-shouldered frame swaggering towards them as if he’d watched too many dubbed Mafia movies.
Tom heard a shout just as Khan twisted the ignition key. As the car drove off a handgun was discharged. The round hit the rear windshield, the impact sending tiny shards of glass onto the back seat. It passed between them with a loud hiss and penetrated the plastic dashboard. Khan hit the gas and zigzagged into the outside lane, careering past a taxi. He honked the horn at a man on a moped, who wobbled but remained upright. Tom turned around and saw the Mercedes speeding up behind them. With that, the car engine started to splutter, and small geysers of hot steam rose from the air vents. Khan swerved behind a gold-coloured Lexus and slowed down.
“Damn them to hell,” he said.
The steam was obscuring the windshield and Khan tried frantically to clear it with his sleeve, but to no avail. Tom wound down the window and put his hand over a vent, but the steam burned him and he winced. Khan swung the car to the left, cutting back into the inside lane, and accelerated off the asphalt highway. The car dipped into a storm drain runoff, and rose up the kerb of the sidewalk before crunching forward onto a piece of waste ground between two apartment blocks. If the car had shocks, Tom figured they weren’t functional ones. As the car barrelled ahead he held the passenger door handle tightly, rocking with the impact, too preoccupied now with the recklessness of the manoeuvre to worry about the ISI. Khan was driving blindly.
“Stop the damn car!” Tom said.
Khan slammed on the brakes and the car shuddered to a halt. Tom nearly hit his nose on the dash, but put up his free forearm just in time, banging his forehead on it. Ignoring the throbbing pain, he ducked down and pulled his SIG from the bag in the footwell, chambering a round. As he straightened up Khan put his hand gently on his right forearm. Tom felt bad, but he knew he couldn’t save the secretary from a Pakistani prison cell. He nodded and picked up his bag before opening the car door, hearing the Mercedes coming up close behind.
“I won’t–”
“Go,” Khan said.
As Tom propelled himself out of the car, he swivelled his head and saw the Mercedes bouncing forward, its headlights blinding his eyes. He turned and raced over the waste ground. Hearing rounds being fired behind him, he stopped instinctively. Twisting around, he watched Khan knock out one of the lights and aim at a front tyre, a round ripping open the rubber, flattening it.
The muzzle of a sub-machine gun poked out of the rear window of the Mercedes. Tom dived for cover onto the hard ground, grazing his knees. He saw the flash as a burst was fired, but the car had dipped into a small crater as the weapon had been discharged. The spray of bullets cut a shredded line less than a metre from his prostrate body, the stony soil peppering his face. If it hadn’t been for the uneven ground, the burst would have likely cut him in two.
He pushed himself up, turned and ran, leaping over mounds of hardened cement and rusted girders, the land being an abandoned construction site. He skirted around behind a blackened, portable cement mixer, and saw that Khan was keeping the ISI men at bay, his rounds bouncing off the Mercedes’ hood and slamming into the open doors. He’s a brave man, Tom thought. He spun around and sprinted towards the end of the site, careful not to sprain an ankle on the lumpy earth. Fifty metres on there was an industrial chain-link fence, about three metres high.
Reaching the fence, he heaved his bag to the other side. He stepped back before running at it. He managed to scramble over, ripping his linen shirt on a protruding piece of wire. He crouched down, the lack of streetlights adding to his sense of isolation but keeping him hidden.
36.
A few hundred metres from the fence, the streets of the Blue Area were almost deserted. A cool breeze played across Tom’s face, although he still felt clammy. He shuffled along the sidewalk, his ankle beginning to ache from the drop. As he passed a large, detached house surrounded by a brick-built privacy wall he saw a man watching him from an upstairs window and did his best to speed up. He wasn’t sure where he was going. He just wanted to get the hell out.
He thought about ringing Crane. But what could he do? he asked himself. Maybe he could get an asset to pick me up? As he took out the cellphone from his bag, he watched a police squad car slow down as it levelled with him. A white Honda Civic with a dark-blue stripe down the middle, the words “CAPITAL POLICE” on the side. An officer peered over and shone a flashlight into Tom’s face.
“You. Stand still,” he shouted in Urdu.
The car eased into a rest stop about three metres ahead, and Tom sensed his heart rate race. As the cop opened the passenger door Tom risked walking towards him, doing his best to calm himself down. The cop was maybe twenty, clad in dark pants and a light-blue shirt, a black beret riding high on his thin, pockmarked face. He figured the cop had taken him for a vagrant or worse. He was filthy and dishevelled, his clothes ripped. Not your average Blue Area occupant. Then: maybe the ISI has put out an APB already, he thought. But the cop’s hand didn’t go for his handgun in a leather holster on his hip.
“What are you doing here?” the cop asked.
“I’m lost,” Tom said as he reached him.
The cop raised a hand to his lapel radio, said, “You’re coming with me. You–”
He didn’t get the rest of the sentence out. Tom had taken advantage of the raised hand, whipping out a stinging right hook to the liver just below the floating ribs. The cop groaned and sank to his knees. Tom thought about bringing his elbow down onto the back of the cop’s neck, just hard enough to keep him quiet, but the punch had left his victim gasping for air and it wasn’t necessary. Instead, he reached into the bag and pulled out his suppressed SIG. Rushing forward, he ducked down into the space where the car door had been left open. The other cop was older, probably in his mid-forties, with a bushy moustache and double chin. His left hand was pulling at a Steyr AUG rifle lodged upside down in metal brackets between the two front seats.
“Don’t do it,” Tom said, the SIG raised.
The cop’s hand hovered over the rifle before slowly moving back to his waist.
“Take off your radio,” Tom said.
The cop obeyed. Tom reached over and took it from him, threw it to the ground and stamped on it. Pointing his suppressed SIG, he shot the car radio with a round, the circuit spitting out sparks. The cop almost leapt off his seat with shock.
“Ease your sidearm out. Toss it over here,” Tom said, motioning to the seat next to him.
The cop did so. Tom unclipped the rifle’s magazine and slipped it into his bag, together with the cop’s Beretta before ducking out.
“I’ll just disarm your friend. Then you can drive him away. No one is going to get hurt here.”
“He looks hurt to me,” the cop said.
“Maybe
his pride, is all.”
“You will never get out of Pakistan,” he said.
The cop grinned. For a fleeting moment, Tom thought the cop knew something. He had no idea how, unless the ISI had in fact distributed his description. Either way, he needed to move. His grinning face had rattled him. He walked over to the winded man, smashed his radio and disarmed him. He started to run, sprinting for a hundred metres or so, ignoring the pain in his ankle.
He saw an alley bordered by a small, wooded park area to the left, and the side security wall of a hotel to the right. He checked the wall for CCTV cameras and shielded his eyes as he spotted one. He guessed he had less than half an hour before the cops reported the incident back at the station. He took off down the side alley, deciding to get out of Islamabad on his own, remembering what Crane had said about using a cab if his car gave up on him. With luck, it would be the quicker option.
37.
Linda could still smell the sea. She had been given a meagre meal of fish and rice, together with a bottle of water and a fresh set of clothes to wear: sweatpants, a black T-shirt and sweater, although the burqa had been left in the cell. The effects of the drug had abated fully, and she was lucid. She had no idea how she would escape at this point, but just the thought of it made her feel strangely elated. Sitting against the wall, she nodded, her mind made up.
A couple of minutes later, the cell door was unlocked and a man came in, his face obscured by a ski mask, his hands gloved. She noticed at once that he carried a long pair of hairdresser’s scissors, a mirror and a plastic bottle. He placed the items on the stone floor and stepped back.
“Cut and dye hair. Like this,” he said, taking a piece of paper from his pocket and holding it before her face.
She glanced at it. It was a childlike sketch of a head, the hair coloured in with a marker pen.