Finding North

by Christian, Claudia Hall

  “Sir.” Sergeant Dusty and Margaret came from inside the prison. “We are ready for you.”

  “Thank you, Sergeants,” Alex said.

  Sergeant Dusty and Margaret had arrived the day before to check to make certain everything was set up according to their specifications. The Fey Team hadn’t left Denver until Alex and Raz had done a detailed review of Sergeant Dusty’s video and Margaret’s report.

  “Sir?” Leena asked.

  She gestured toward the door. James Kelly, MI-6 agent and John’s older brother, was standing in the doorway. She went through the door and into the prison. The Fey Team followed her inside.

  “We are ready for you,” James said. “As far as we can tell, he is unaware of the move. Stupid bugger.”

  “He’s not as dumb as he seems,” Alex said.

  “Maybe prison has made him stupider,” James shrugged.

  Alex, James, and Raz stepped into an elevator. Joseph, Leena, and Colin followed them inside. They waited until another elevator car arrived for the rest of the Fey Team, before heading down five floors. The elevator opened to light-grey concrete halls that tunneled under the old brick factory. They stayed on their elevator car until the Fey Team got out of theirs. The Fey Team surrounded Alex, Raz, and James and moved down the corridor.

  “As you know, he’s had no visitors,” James said. He took a black jumpsuit from Sergeant Dusty and nodded his thanks. “No packages. No phone calls. As far as he’s concerned it’s just another day.”

  They reached the observation room to the Boy Scout’s cell. A large man, the person she knew as Robert Powell lay on the prison cot with his feet hanging off the end. They had lain cinderblocks over the cement walls of the prison to match the Boy Scout’s usual prison cell. Everything else in the room had been taken from his cell in the UK.

  “I will tell you,” James said as he put on his jumpsuit. “It’s weird to see you without your usual jewelry.”

  “Jewelry?” Alex asked.

  “Trece,” James said.

  “A lovely accessory, isn’t he?” Raz asked.

  “Sparkles like the hope diamond,” James laughed. The team laughed with him, and Alex smiled. Just the sight of the Boy Scout set her on edge.

  “He’s not fit for travel,” Alex said. “White Boy, either.”

  “How is Vince?” James asked. “Royce?”

  “Healing,” Alex said. “Just going to take time.”

  “So, tell me,” James said.

  The Boy Scout roused from his sleep. He got up and urinated.

  “Did you lose anyone in your recommit-or-leave?” James asked.

  Alex shook her head but kept her eyes on the Boy Scout.

  “Clearly, I’m here,” James said.

  “They all said what you said,” Alex glanced at him.

  “Oh, yeah?” James said. “What’s that?”

  “You knew your life was in danger when we started working together. Nothing’s changed.”

  “Very true,” Raz said.

  “Leena was concerned about her mother,” Alex said. “Her mother has Alzheimer’s, but she realized that her situation would be harder if she weren’t on our team. Take the good with the bad, I guess.”

  Alex didn’t take her eyes off the Boy Scout. After all that time she had spent near him, she knew that he was agitated and ready to go off. She stepped back just a second before he pounded the mirrored glass.

  “I know you’re there,” the Boy Scout said.

  “He cannot hear us,” James said. “He cannot know we are here. He just thinks we are.”

  “Is he ever wrong?” Raz asked.

  “About half the time, actually,” James said. “UK protocol is to acknowledge the visit. Of course, we’re under no such pressure here.”

  “Hey, Grozny,” the Boy Scout said. “You got visitors?”

  “That’s his friend, Aslan Idrisov, from Grozny, Chechnya,” James said. “He calls him ‘Grozny.’”

  “He wouldn’t happen to be related to Abukhazhi Idrisov, would he?” Troy asked.

  “Grandson,” James nodded.

  “Why?” Alex asked.

  “Abukhazhi Idrisov was a Chechen soldier for the Soviets in World War II,” Troy said. “He has more than three hundred and fifty confirmed kills. Sniper. They rewarded him with a frosty death in a Siberian concentration camp.”

  “The grandson is a thug,” James said. “We were holding him for threats against the state.”

  “Were?” Alex asked.

  “He was the Boy Scout’s neighbor for a few months to create the bond,” James said. “He was downgraded and is doing the rest of his time in the north. We replaced Idrisov with one of our own. Chechen born, London raised. He’s there now.”

  “What you want?” a voice yelled in response to the Boy Scout’s yell.

  “You have visitors?” the Boy Scout asked.

  “No, no visitors,” the voice yelled back. “Just sleep. You sleep?”

  The Boy Scout grumbled and went back to his cot.

  “Sergeant Dusty?” Alex asked.

  “Sir?”

  “Can you check to see if there’s a link between the Boy Scout’s grandfather, Josef Yakovlev, and Abukhazhi Idrisov?” Alex asked.

  “Yes, sir,” Sergeant Dusty said. “I will start our list.”

  “Thank you,” Alex said.

  “It’s a good question,” James said. “I doubt there’s a direct connection, but plenty of Russians went over with Operation Paperclip. You do know that the Boy Scout speaks fluent Russian.”

  “No,” Alex said. “I knew he spoke multiple languages like we all do, but no, I didn’t know he spoke Russian.”

  “He prefers English,” James said. “But according to our language experts, Russian is most likely his native tongue.”

  They watched for a few minutes. The Boy Scout lay back down on his cot.

  “Shall we?” James asked.

  “Fey Team, cover up,” Matthew said.

  The Fey Team pulled up their balaclavas. On Alex’s instruction, they had rotated their scarf colors from their usual color. Alex wore Vince’s white scarf with chartreuse lines of thread. She’d planned to stay in the background. Matthew wore Alex’s usual white-and-bright-blue scarf, while Leena wore his usual white-and-burnt-orange scarf. Matthew gave James a black balaclava and Royce’s white-and-maroon scarf. Raz traded his white scarf with deep-navy-blue thread lines for Trece’s white-and-cherry red. Zack took Raz’s scarf and gave his white-on-white scarf to Margaret, while Cliff wore White Boy’s white-and-forest-green scarf.

  She didn’t think the change of color would throw off the Boy Scout. He would know her the moment she walked into the room. She only hoped to disorient him enough to see if there was a human being behind the rage and bravado.

  “Let’s do this thing,” Matthew said when everyone was covered up.

  Raz and Colin entered the Boy Scout’s cell.

  “What the fuck?” the Boy Scout yelled.

  Raz and Colin grabbed him by the arms and pulled him off his cot. The Boy Scout started screaming at the top of his lungs.

  “Strip,” Colin said in Russian.

  “You can’t do that!” the Boy Scout said.

  Matthew and Troy came into the room. Together, the men removed the Boy Scout’s clothing. They shackled his legs and chained his hands behind his back. After dropping a black hood over his head, they dragged him, kicking and screaming, to the infirmary. They chained him to the table, and Colin gave him anesthesia to knock him out. When he was under, MJ used an ultrasound wand to check him for explosives. Finding him clear, they dressed him in loose sweats and a sweatshirt. They dragged him into an interrogation room with a one-way glass wall. They locked his shackles to the floor and his wrist to the table. In this room, the table was bolted to the floor. The team filed into the room.

  “Ready?” Alex asked.

  Matthew sat down across from the Boy Scout. Alex and Raz stood behind him. Zack, Cliff, and Troy stood
behind them. Leena, Colin, and Joseph stood behind the Boy Scout. Margaret and MJ remained outside the room to help if needed.

  “Yes, sir,” MJ said.

  He shot the Boy Scout full of amphetamines. The Boy Scout came around with a jolt. He started screaming for his lawyer.

  “You’re no longer in the UK,” Matthew said.

  Startled, the Boy Scout looked at Matthew.

  “You’re in the first class accommodations of the Central Intelligence Agency,” Matthew said.

  The Boy Scout became eerily quiet. Matthew let the silence drag.

  “Where?” the Boy Scout asked.

  “Afghanistan,” Matthew said.

  The Boy Scout started screaming for his friend. Rather than blow the work of MI-6, they let the Boy Scout scream. After a few minutes, he stopped screaming. They waited. Matthew cleared his throat, and the Boy Scout attacked. The shackles and ties held him down. Joseph pushed him back into his seat and held his handgun to the Boy Scout’s head.

  “We have a few questions,” Matthew said. “We don’t really care how we get the answers.”

  He nodded to the one-way glass. The light went on in the room behind, showing a sophisticated interrogation room. The room was set up for every form of “advanced interrogation.”

  “In fact,” Matthew said. “I don’t think I’d be over-stating it, but most of us would like to see you strapped to a car battery.”

  “Water boarded,” Raz said with a snort.

  The Fey Team played along by nodding their heads.

  “Prove it,” the Boy Scout said.

  Leena took out a knife and sliced off his right earlobe. The Boy Scout screamed. MJ came in to sprinkle anti-coagulant on the wound. He left without bandaging it.

  “Your family has been told that you are gravely ill,” Matthew said. He nodded to Joseph.

  “Full-blown AIDS,” Joseph said.

  “YOU CAN’T DO THAT!” the Boy Scout screamed.

  “Mmm,” Matthew nodded. “I think we already have. You see . . .”

  Matthew looked at the Boy Scout.

  “No one knows you’re here,” Matthew said. “No one cares if you disappear forever. You’re in prison for the rest of your life. If we make you a eunuch, who would know?”

  A flicker of fear flashed across the Boy Scout’s eyes before he sniggered. His entire presence exuded arrogance.

  Alex’s stomach dropped. Something was wrong.

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  She slipped out of the room and sent Margaret inside. The sound of Alex’s boots echoed off the concrete floors as she paced back and forth.

  Had they been sold out?

  Had someone on her team betrayed this mission?

  Jesse appeared in front of her.

  “What’s going on?” Jesse asked in Spanish.

  “Feeling,” Alex said.

  “Of?” Jesse asked.

  “He’s ready for this,” Alex whispered. “Expected it, even.”

  “That makes sense,” Jesse said. “He would have expected us to come to ask him questions.”

  Alex shook her head.

  “What’s going on?” MJ asked.

  She’d forgotten he was standing outside the interview door.

  “Nothing,” she smiled and nodded.

  “Were you talking to Jesse?” MJ asked.

  “Uh,” Alex said.

  “Dad’s journals and shit said that the only reason Dad survived so long in the field was because of your ‘feelings,’” MJ said. “You just said that word — feeling. What’s going on?”

  “Just a feeling,” Alex shrugged.

  “Of what?” Jesse asked.

  “Did he say something?” MJ asked.

  “He asked me what I was feeling,” Alex said. She walked away from MJ and Jesse. “I have the feeling that . . . he expected us to be here, planned for it . . .”

  Alex nodded and turned around.

  “He’s always so self-assured,” Alex said. “Confident . . . He was afraid, just for a second, like . . . like . . .”

  “He’s already given up his life,” Jesse said.

  “We need to get out of here,” Alex said. “Now.”

  MJ tapped three times on the door. The Fey Team quickly filed out of the room.

  “What’s going on?” Joseph asked.

  “He’s already given up his life,” Alex nodded.

  “Fuck,” Matthew said. “How do we get out of here?”

  “Sergeant?” Joseph attempted to raise the desk Sergeant on the ear bud communicator. “Sergeant, are you there?”

  “Anything?” Alex asked.

  Joseph shook his head. They ran to the elevator. The elevator cars were open on their level, and they filed in.

  “They aren’t going to work,” Jesse said.

  James pressed the buttons and nothing happened. The elevators were locked open. James called to the operative playing the Boy Scout’s friend. When he didn’t respond, James and Troy ran down the hallway.

  “Shit, shit, shit,” Matthew said. “God-damned Boy Scout.”

  “Don’t panic,” Alex said. “Sergeant Dusty?”

  Troy and James returned with the news that the operative who was playing Idrisov was dead. His throat had been cut probably around the time they’d taken the Boy Scout. The soldiers looked at each other. They had been together the entire time they’d been on this level. They were supposed to be the only people in this part of the facility.

  “There’s a stairwell over . . .” Sergeant Dusty turned in place in the elevator landing. “There.”

  He pointed to an unmarked door. He went to the door. It was welded closed. Sergeant Dusty’s hand ran down the weld. He nodded.

  “Troy?” Alex asked. “Leena?”

  They shot down the surveillance cameras with their handguns.

  “Cliff?” Sergeant Dusty asked.

  Cliff was already digging in this backpack. He took out a portable plasma cutter and a pair of dark glasses. Sergeant Dusty plugged in the plasma cutter.

  “No one ever checks pilots,” Alex said to James.

  She nodded to Cliff, and he started cutting into the door. He was able to easily cut a panel out of the first layer of the steel door. He’d almost finished the second layer when the power went out.

  “Zack?” Alex asked.

  He took a small sledgehammer out of his backpack and banged at the panel. The metal shattered and they were able to get inside the stairwell. The team started moving into the stairwell.

  “Zack?” Alex asked.

  “USAF command says two bombers are inbound to this location,” Zack said.

  “How did he . . .?” Margaret started.

  “Power’s off,” Sergeant Dusty said. “The facility blocks all communication with the outside. That’s why we have their ear buds. It must have gone down when the power went out.”

  “How much time do we have?” Alex asked.

  “Ten minutes, max,” Zack said. “The entire base is slated for decimation. Rigged to blow in ten minutes. They had a report that we’d left with the remaining prisoners. The go-ahead was given by the desk Sergeant fifteen minutes ago.”

  “When we had the Boy Scout in the infirmary,” Matthew said.

  “They’ve started the launch and sent two B52s,” Zack said.

  “How did we not know this?” Alex’s voice rose with fury.

  “Messenger!” Zack said.

  “Up,” Alex ordered.

  “Count the stairs!” Sergeant Dusty yelled. “We need to go exactly thirty stairs.”

  Troy and Matthew took the lead and began to count. Their voices echoed around the concrete stairwell. The team followed, with Joseph, Raz, and Alex in the back.

  “Thirty!”

  They heard Sergeant Dusty say something. There was banging on the wall. By the time they got there, Colin had taken over the sledgehammer, and there was a sizable hole in the wall. The team was ferrying pieces of concrete away from the small space of the thirtieth step.
Joseph took over from Colin.

  “What are we doing?” Zack asked.

  “We’re connecting into the Afghan tunnel system,” Alex said. “How many headlamps do we have?”

  The team went through their pockets and packs.

  “They were created during the war with Russia,” Sergeant Dusty said. “We just have to get out of the blast radius. This tunnel will take us to Kabul.”

  “How do you know this?” MJ asked.

  “Four headlamps,” Matthew said.

  “Pass them out so we have one at front, middle, and end,” Alex said.

  “I was on the tunnel crew my first tour here,” Sergeant Dusty smiled. “We mapped the entire system. Most of the tunnels aren’t used. A few of them up in the mountains are a real pain in the ass.”

  “I thought that was a Marine team,” Margaret said.

  “Clearly not,” Joseph said and gave the sledgehammer to Raz.

  Raz took a turn pounding on the rock wall behind the concrete. Within minutes, they were looking at the side of a thin tunnel.

  “Go!” Alex said.

  Sergeant Dusty went first, and Alex followed. The rest of the Fey Team squeezed into the small tunnel behind them. With just enough space to belly-crawl, the tunnel seemed to go straight up toward the surface. They moved at a fast, aerobic pace and were soon covered in sweat and dirt. They were nearly a half-mile away and only a foot or two from the surface when they heard the deep rumble of the black site exploding.

  The shock wave knocked them onto their bellies. Alex hunched her back and tucked her head to keep falling rocks and dirt from injuring her. Her mouth and nose filled with dust and smoke. She felt the shock wave ripple through the mountain. With each wave, the sand and rock shifted around her. She covered her mouth with Vince’s scarf, but every breath sucked more dirt into her lungs.

  The smaller blasts were followed by one large, earth-shattering blast. For a moment, Alex felt the dizziness she’d felt before when her head was out of whack. She closed her eyes. When she opened them, she wasn’t seeing double anymore.

  “Report!” Joseph screamed.

  Raz scrambled to Alex to make sure she was all right. She touched his face and felt him smile.