Moon Mask

by James Richardson

  Stopping just inside the courtyard of Fort Charles, leaving the motorbikes with four of his men, the Team Leader led his other three men the rest of the way on foot, moving fast and low.

  The strangely shaped building came into view.

  The Team Leader ordered the attack to begin.

  King followed O’Rourke up the rickety wooden steps. Despite the mission’s low risk rating, he nevertheless felt his pulse racing, adrenaline pumping through him, his own breathing echoing in his skull.

  O’Rourke reached the top step and held up a hand in what the archaeologist guessed was military-language for “halt.”

  King obeyed and watched O’Rourke pick his way stealthily over the strewn historical bric-a-brac which littered the floor. The African-American’s athletic form appeared as a dark silhouette through the eerie glow of his N.V.G.s.

  Sid watched the screen with apprehension, her own heart beating as fast as King’s as she watched her boyfriend move through the dark museum.

  “He shouldn’t be in there,” she whispered, more to herself than any of the others. “That woman’s insane. Ben’s not a soldier.”

  A reassuring hand squeezed her shoulder, followed by the scarily serious voice of the normally cavalier Nathan Raine. “Benny knows how to handle himself in a fight.”

  There was something in the man’s tone that scared Sid. Something certain. Despite Gibbs’ reassurances, she knew, Raine believed that a fight was inevitable.

  She turned her head to look up at him but his blue eyes would not meet hers. Instead they focussed beyond the laptop screen, out into the darkness of the Hand of Freedom building. A flock of sea birds took flight, wings flapping noisily into the night sky, the sound seeming to echo in the otherwise unnatural silence.

  She felt Raine’s body go rigid beside her, eyes sharp and intense.

  “What?” she dared to ask him.

  Raine’s voice was flat. Matter-of-fact.

  “Something’s wrong.”

  Peering through the infrared scope of an M14 Sniper Rifle, the interior of the upper floor appeared in crisp focus to SOG operative Nelson. Through it he saw O’Rourke moving across the landing towards the master bedroom. He saw the civilian scientist, Benjamin King, follow cautiously behind. He saw Garcia sweeping behind him, watching their six.

  What he did not see, however, was the black-clad soldier sneaking up behind him.

  If the radio call had come through a split second earlier it might have alerted Nelson to the danger. Gibbs’ voice, however, only came over his com at the exact same moment as the black carbon dagger blade slit his throat.

  “Nelson,” Gibbs hissed over the radio. “What’s your status?”

  The silence spoke words.

  Raine’s eyes glared accusingly at Gibbs.

  In the seconds after his bold prediction of doom, he had argued with Gibbs, demanding he check in with the two snipers he had positioned around the museum. Gibbs had protested for no reason other than because it galled him to be taking advice from the traitor. He couldn’t, however, give a good enough reason not to and so made the call.

  He had grinned almost triumphantly as Murray checked in.

  His grin faded at Nelson’s silence.

  “Shit!” Raine swore, sensing the trap springing. How he knew it was beyond him. To some it might have seemed as though he was gifted with some sixth sense. But he knew it was nothing more than instinct, honed by years of training, coupled with the ever increasing sense of paranoia which had only strengthened since going on the run.

  “Get them out of there!” he ordered Gibbs. Then, before anyone else could do or say anything, he was on the move, darting out across the courtyard towards the museum, ignoring Gibbs’ angry curse.

  “Possible bogey,” Gibbs’ voice startled King as it erupted into his ear. “Retrieve the book and evac. Discretion is no longer a goal.”

  “Copy,” O’Rourke responded instantly and all at once the slow-motion effect that had encompassed King burst forward with startling speed.

  O’Rourke instantly shifted from his stealthy progress across the first floor landing and ran towards the closed door of the master bedroom. He slammed his foot against it and it burst inwards. He swung in, training his rifle on-

  “Nothing,” he said in momentary confusion.

  “What?” King came up behind him, peering in at an empty room, and the un-slept in bed. “Where’s Mrs Marley?”

  “I’m right here, mon,” Mrs Marley’s gruff, heavily accented voice came from the shadows across the landing. King swung to face her and didn’t even have time to shout as the obese Jamaican woman levelled her two-hundred year old British infantry musket at him and fired!

  “Ben!” Sid screamed at the screen as she saw the gun blast, from Ben’s point of view. It was as though she was living his last moment of life with him, as him.

  She practically felt the thunderous jolt of the musket blast slam into his chest, throwing him backwards and over the landing railing. She saw the world spin, the chasm of the jumbled museum spinning around and around, the glass display case rushing up to meet him.

  It shattered in a tremendous explosion of glass as King’s limp form smashed through it.

  “Shut the hell up!” Gibbs snapped at her. Her outburst had surely given away their position but the woman did not care. Like Raine before her, she charged out from hiding and ran towards the building.

  Even as King plummeted to his death, O’Rourke and Garcia shook off their surprise and levelled their weapons on the insane Jamaican. But they didn’t have a second to contemplate pulling their triggers as, at that moment, the entire north wall of the building exploded in an eruption of fire and debris, consuming the two soldiers and Mrs Marley.

  Through the fiery breech, four black-clad soldiers swung into the building. “Fan out,” the Team Leader ordered, surveying the destruction. “Find the diary.”

  28:

  The Hand of Freedom

  Port Royal,

  Jamaica,

  All hell broke loose.

  Running down the west face of the Hand of Freedom building, Raine was pretty much shielded from the blast of C4 which the four soldiers had used to rip open the north wall. Nevertheless, the pounding heat picked him up and hurled him forwards, sending him sprawling across the brittle grass.

  Only seconds later he was on his feet again and charging for the door. The lock already picked by Garcia, he had no problem slamming through it, twisting through the second, inner door and into the museum.

  Huge chunks of masonry had smashed through the display cases and crushed dozens of artefacts but luckily the explosion hadn’t erupted into a massive fire.

  Amidst the destruction he saw the prone form of Benjamin King lying sprawled upon the smashed remains of the display case he had landed on.

  He ran to the fallen man’s side. “Benny,” he hissed, touching his bloodied head. He checked for a pulse.

  “You, stay here,” Gibbs ordered Nadia as he climbed to his feet seconds after the explosion had lit up the sky. “All units,” he called into his throat mike. “Move in! Secure King and the book!”

  He broke cover, hauling his HK-416 from his shoulder and charged towards the building. “Eagle Eye, we need air support. Now!”

  Responding to the expert skills of David Sykes, the helicopter twisted through the clear Caribbean sky and dropped towards the ground, pulling up at the last possible second and swinging around the hand-shaped building.

  From the large halogen lamp attached under the nose of the bird, a brilliant beam of light lit up the smashed building.

  Raine’s fingers expertly found a pulse in King’s neck and he felt the archaeologist stir. He had landed face down on top of a glass and wood display case and now rolled painfully onto his back. His Kevlar body armour had protected him from the brunt of the musket shot and the impact with the display case, but Raine could hear a rattle in the other man’s chest
as he breathed. A broken rib, he guessed, hoping he hadn’t punctured a lung. His eyes were dazed and blood ran around his neck and shoulders from a gash on the back of his head.

  “Try not to move,” he told him. “You’ve got a concussion and-”

  “The dairy,” King gasped. Raine glanced to the top of the stairs, knowing the archaeologist was right. The diary was the primary goal.

  “I’m on it,” he said, taking King’s handgun from its holster. Gibbs’ orders be damned- he needed a weapon now. Then, just before dashing into the wreckage, he added with a grin. “Don’t go anywhere.”

  On the balcony the black-clad Team Leader rolled Mrs Marley over. Blood ran down her face from where she had impacted with a large chunk of spinning debris but she was still breathing.

  One of the other soldiers came out from the master bedroom. “No sign of the book,” he reported.

  The Team Leader needed no extra prompting. He slapped Mrs Marley across the face with such force that it shocked her back to consciousness. Her eyes wandered, terrified, before focussing on the soldier.

  “Where is the Kernewek Diary?” the Team Leader demanded.

  Mrs Marley sneered at him then spat out a sticky wad of blood and mucus. It splashed against the Team Leader’s unmasked face. He drew back his fist and slammed it into the old woman’s nose. It exploded in blood.

  “Where is it?” he growled.

  Gasping back sobbing racks of agony, Mrs Marley nevertheless remained defiant. The Team Leader quickly drew his holstered handgun, black, unidentifiable, and pressed the muzzle hard against the woman’s fat kneecap.

  “Where is the book?” he said again, his voice cold, icy. Uncaring. Despite the blood that soaked her, Mrs Marley never shifted her defiant gaze from her torturer’s face. “Fine,” the soldier shrugged and squeezed the trigger.

  The head of the soldier in the doorway exploded in a splatter of blood and gore, shocking the Team Leader. He whirled in time to see an American soldier with a mop of black hair and intense blue eyes launch himself from his cover on the top step and train his M1911 semi-automatic handgun on him.

  Mrs Marley took his lapse in concentration to make her own unexpected move. Mustering agility she didn’t know she possessed, she hauled her feet up and slammed her incredible body weight into the Team Leader. He sprawled across the landing, his own rifle scattering just out of reach.

  Raine dashed forward, hurdling the corpse of the man he’d just killed and homing in on his second victim just as two soldiers ran onto the landing from the bedroom doorway. They opened up with fully automatic rifles, hundreds of bullets hammering into the wall behind him. In the blink of an eye, he scanned his surroundings and then hurled himself away from the gunfire and into the stinking bathroom.

  It looked, and smelt, as though it hadn’t been cleaned in years, but Raine didn’t focus on the stench. He knew that in mere seconds the two soldiers would come swinging around the doorway, guns blazing. He hurriedly unlocked the bathroom window and pulled himself outside, tucking his gun into his waistband as he clung onto the plastic guttering that ran around the building, just above the level of the window.

  It wouldn’t hold his weight for long, he knew, so he quickly shuffled along it to the next room over. As he had hoped, the master bedroom’s window was open and so he easily slipped back inside the building, landing softly upon the filthy, broken bed.

  He heard the shuffle of boots as the two soldiers spun around the wall and into the bathroom. “He’s not here,” one of them called to their leader.

  “Forget him,” the team leader snapped. “Find the goddamn book!”

  Raine dropped to the floor of the ransacked room and rolled under the bed, remembering the video stream he had seen earlier of Mrs Marley retrieving the diary from under the floor boards.

  The floor was now sticky and damp from the blood of the soldier Raine had felled near the doorway. He ignored it and quietly pulled up the first floor board, then the second. The treasure chest was still hidden underneath but, oddly he noticed, the large brass key he had seen was still in the lock.

  He lifted open the lid and looked inside.

  There was no diary, only a single piece of paper with something scrawled across it. He lifted it out and, in the gloom underneath the bed, read it.

  “You want the book,” Mrs Marley had written defiantly, as though she knew they would come for it, “then come and get it!”

  At that moment, the Super Stallion’s bright light exploded in through the windows and the hole in the building’s north face while, simultaneously, Gibbs, West and Murray ran into the lower floor of the museum and opened fire on the soldiers.

  “Ben!” Sid cried as she ran into the museum seconds ahead of Gibbs’ team.

  Gunfire echoed through the ruins of the building as Gibbs, West and Murray fanned out, pummelling the upper level with bullets.

  The attackers scrambled for cover, forgetting Raine, and returned fire, strafing the exhibition cases which exploded in violent eruptions of wood and glass.

  “Sid!” King called weakly to her, taking cover behind one of the cabinets. Sid ducked behind the same cabinet, narrowly avoiding the hailstorm of bullets.

  “Oh my god,” she gasped upon seeing a flow of blood dribbling down King’s neck and shoulders from a wound to the back of his head. His eyes rolled and he struggled to stay focussed.

  Sid grasped his face and forced him to look her in the eyes.

  “Stay with me Ben,” she pleaded, seeing his eyes loll backwards again. She turned and, shielding her face from flying splinters of wood, she shouted at Gibbs. Her voice, however, was lost beneath the terrible noise of the gunfire. The SOG team had been locked down by the elevated attackers and now struggled to return fire, themselves taking scant cover where they could find it.

  Then she remembered the throat mike which had been taped to her larynx earlier that day and, pressing it softly, she called to Gibbs again.

  “Ben’s been hurt,” she told him. “We need to get him to safety.”

  Face grim and focussed, Gibbs heard Sid’s voice come in through his radio ear piece. “None of us are going anywhere at the moment,” he replied, unleashing another barrage of fire. Then his assault rifle clicked empty and he hurriedly ejected then inserted a new magazine. “Raine,” he redirected his next query. “Do you have the goddamn book?”

  “I think so,” Raine whispered into his own throat mike, still hiding beneath Mrs Marley’s broken bed. Between the discarded sheets, past the body of the soldier, he had a perfect view between the copious bosoms of the enormous Jamaican woman sprawled across the landing. And there, nestled between her giant breasts was the spine of a book.

  “Gotcha,” he hissed as he scrambled forward.

  Sid shielded her head and did her best not to scream as shards of glass and splinters of wood flew all around her, peppering her flesh. She hunched over her boyfriend’s prone body, cupping his face in her hands. His eyelids flickered shut. Not a good sign.

  “No, Ben, stay awake!” She slapped his cheek, desperate to ensure he remained conscious. If he went to sleep, she feared he would never wake up again. “Ben!” she shouted at him over the thunder of automatic weapons. His eyes fluttered open, locked on to hers, filling her with resolve.

  “Come on,” she said, “I’m getting you out of here!”

  She wrapped his arms around her shoulders and struggled under his weight. She could feel his legs desperately trying to work, to help her but it was as though they were made out of jelly.

  Filled with determination and fuelled by adrenaline, she let out a loud scream of frustration and dragged him physically towards the door.

  “What the hell is she doing!?” Gibbs demanded of no one in particular as he saw Sid drag King into the fray, struggling towards the door.

  “Cover them!” he ordered West and Murray. With their backs to the enemy, the two civilians would be mowed down in seconds. Unless h
e gave them something else to shoot at.

  He broke from cover and ran straight at the enemy position, his finger squeezing his rifle’s trigger, spewing a torrent of burning metal bullets at the attackers.

  Despite himself, Raine couldn’t help but be impressed by Gibbs’ ferocious frontal assault. Not only did the ballsy action force the attackers to duck for cover, but it gave him the opportunity he needed. He darted out of the bedroom and slid to his knees next to Mrs Marley’s now unconscious form.

  Dodging bullets, the Team Leader hurled himself around the corner, out of range of the Americans weapon. He took a second to slam a fresh magazine of ammo into-

  He couldn’t believe what he saw.

  Right in front of him, only four feet away, having crawled across the landing, the blue eyed American perched above the Jamaican woman’s body, his hand extracting a book from between her enormous breasts. Realising he had been caught, the American looked up at him with a ‘hand-in-the-cookie-jar’ expression on his face and grimaced.

  “This isn’t what it looks like,” he said.

  The Team Leader aimed and fired but the American was fast. He rolled over the carcass of the soldier he had shot in the head and vanished back into the stinking bedroom.

  Down below, the ugly soldier who had so brazenly assaulted his team’s position ran out of ammo and gave his men the opportunity they needed to scramble out of cover and resume firing down on the Americans.

  But the Americans were no long important. He knew where the book was.