Jet dropped to the ground and landed in a crouch, and then was a blur as she ran to the stairs, which she took two at a time. At the second level she continued to Amir’s door, and after removing her headdress, she tucked it into a pocket. Switching the firing selector switch of the submachine gun to full auto, she knocked on the door and stepped back, the combat knife clutched in one hand by her side and the gun in the other, beneath the robe.
“Who is it?” a voice called from inside.
“I’m here to see Amir,” she replied, tensing in preparation for what was to come.
After a brief pause, the door opened and a man peered out at her. Seeing only a woman standing on the landing, he opened it further, and then he was flying back, knocked aside by a powerful kick to the door that nearly knocked it off its hinges.
Jet was through and slashing with the knife before he hit the ground, and blood fountained from his throat as she sliced through to the spine. She continued in a whirl to where Amir and the driver were rearing back from a dining table, both reaching for their pistols. Jet threw herself over the table and speared the driver through his right ear, driving the blade into his brain while leveling a kick at Amir that caught him in the chest and knocked him into the wall behind him.
She was on him before he could recover, and delivered two powerful strikes to the sides of his neck with her fists, leaving the knife in the driver’s head as he sank to the ground. Amir moaned and slumped over, unconscious. Jet rose and tossed the bodyguard’s guns across the room, and pulled the knife free and wiped the blade clean on the driver’s robe. She then moved to the front door and closed it after glancing out on the landing to ensure no curious neighbors had come to see what had caused the commotion.
The bodyguard lay nearly decapitated by the entry, and she stepped over him and walked to the sink to rinse the blood off her sleeves and hands. When the water had faded from pink to clear, she dried her hands, moved to where Amir was still out cold, and slapped his face, hard.
He grunted and his eyes popped open. She showed him the gleaming blade of her knife and gave him a murderous smile.
“You must be Amir,” she said. “How’s the slave-trading business, Amir? Going well?”
He tried to focus on Jet’s face, with obvious difficulty, and his breathing was a rasp. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse from the damage she’d inflicted on his throat. His Adam’s apple bobbed four times before he managed a response. “What do you want?”
She turned the knife blade to better catch the light. “You have one of my friends. I want to know where.”
He blinked rapidly in confusion. “I don’t…who?”
Jet sighed, her exasperation evident. “The woman you took from the hotel. There can’t be that many of them. Where is she?”
Amir cleared his throat and swallowed hard. “She’s your friend?”
Jet shook her head. “I’m asking the questions, Amir. If you want to see tomorrow, you’ll stick to answering them.”
His eyes moved to the driver and then to his bodyguard before returning to Jet and the knife. “You…you killed my men.”
She nodded. “Which should tell you that I’m more than willing to kill you if you don’t cooperate. Now, what have you done with her, and where is she?”
Amir sneered and uttered a harsh laugh. “You’re too late. They’re already on their way to get her.”
“Who?”
“Her husband.”
She moved the needle-sharp point of the blade a centimeter from his eye. “Where are you holding her, Amir? You can tell me now, or tell me when you’re blind. Doesn’t much matter to me which. In fact, I hope you do put up a fight, understand?”
He shook his head once and closed his eyes. When he opened them, he glared at her with startling intensity. “You don’t have a chance.”
Jet shrugged and moved the knife even closer to his pupil. “I’m sure it’s all hopeless. Now where is she? Final time, and then I start cutting.”
Five minutes later, Jet was back outside, her robe billowing around her as she ran to where she’d left the motorcycle. Amir had reluctantly given her directions to his facility before the knife had ended his stay on the planet, and she was now racing the clock to get there before Mounir could.
She straddled the motorcycle, depressed the starter, and the motor roared to life. Jet toed it into gear and twisted the throttle, and then she was flying down the darkened street, a dark form on a fast bike, the only illumination her bouncing LED headlight and the faint red glow of the taillight.
Chapter 20
The building where Salma was being held was a simple single-story storage facility surrounded by a three-meter-high wall. The district was mostly industrial, with a smattering of homes nearby, the middle of the Libyan desert obviously not big on zoning. Jet killed the engine and swung off the bike, and debated how to best approach it in order to maintain the element of surprise.
The walls were scalable for her with her parkour skills, in spite of the intentions of the builder. The question was what surveillance might be in place. Amir had insisted that there were only two men guarding the enslaved overnight, but there was a limit to how much she was willing to trust his statements, and she’d decided to assume the worst.
Jet removed her billowing robe so she would have full mobility. She didn’t require it any longer for a rendezvous, and even though the temperature was already dropping, she felt more comfortable in her black pants and shirt than the unwieldy cloak. She stuffed it into the saddlebag and checked the time, and then took off at a run toward the compound, zigzagging as she approached.
She didn’t slow at the wall, but rather ran up it at a diagonal. The two large steps she managed were sufficient for her to be able to grab the top and pull herself up. She surveyed the interior grounds, which appeared empty, and then dropped from the wall and continued to the darkened main building.
Jet paused at the entrance. If she went in through the front, and the innkeeper had decided to risk death and called someone inside, she’d be walking into gunfire. But there was no alternative, other than to hope that her knocking gambit, which had worked at the apartment, would work inside a locked, walled complex that nobody should have been able to penetrate.
She circled the building, looking for a window that she could access, but all were either glass block near the roof, or had iron bars over them. Frustrated by the security, she crept to the rear exit and tried it. To her surprise, it opened, and she stepped into a darkened corridor with doors on both sides that stretched half the length of the building, the walls unplastered and constructed of local brick.
Jet inched along the hall and paused at the first door, eyeing the heavy steel bolt that barred it. She reached out and slid it open and pulled the door wide. Inside was a naked girl, no more than sixteen, huddled in a corner, her coffee-colored skin covered with bruises. The stench of human waste was overpowering, and Jet backed away from the doorway and whispered to her, “You’re free to go out the rear door. Wait for a few minutes. How many of them are there?”
She didn’t seem to understand Jet’s Arabic, but Jet tried again. “Your captors. How many?”
“I…I don’t know.”
“Okay. I’m going to ask you to stay quiet, and when I call out to you, run for the gate. I’m going to leave it open. Understand?”
“They’ll kill me if I run.”
“The dead can’t hurt you. They’ll all be dead in five minutes.”
She stared at Jet in disbelief. “Who…who are you?”
Jet’s expression hardened. “Their worst nightmare.”
She continued along the hall, throwing open the cells, which contained mainly women from sub-Saharan Africa, and repeated her instructions to each. All were so broken she had no doubt they wouldn’t budge until she told them it was safe, and many probably still wouldn’t dare move, fearing some unknown threat if they did. The cruelty of the situation broke Jet’s heart, but she didn’t have the luxury of doi
ng any more than she was doing, and couldn’t risk discovery by taking more time to help than she already had.
Jet reached the end of the hall but hadn’t found Salma. She pressed her ear against the wooden door and heard music from the other side, nothing more. Jet swung the submachine gun up and then slowly twisted the heavy handle until it was open. She took two deep breaths to steel herself and then pulled it open an inch to look through, gun at the ready.
Only two men were visible, sitting on a sagging couch in front of a television, AK-47s leaning against the wall by the main door. They were engrossed in some TV program that was the source of the music, and Jet raised the gun and stepped through the door, her boots silent on the stone floor.
“Tonight’s your lucky night,” she said.
The men stared at her like she was a demon, and the closest one dove for the rifles. Jet fired a quick burst at him that stitched through his rib cage, and he fell short of the guns, blood pumping from the wounds. The second man sat motionless, his mouth an O of surprise, ears ringing from the suppressed fire in the enclosed room.
The wounded man’s breath gurgled from the bullet holes, and ruby bubbles formed and popped with each labored exhalation. Jet moved to him and put a single round through his forehead, and then looked to the other man with murder in her eyes.
“Where’s the woman you kidnapped from the hotel?” she hissed.
The man tried to form words, but failed the first attempt. When he finally managed, his voice was gravelly and uncertain. “She’s…not here.”
Jet aimed the submachine gun at his stomach. “Yes, she is. Amir told me.”
He shook his head. “No. They came and took her.”
“When?”
“Twenty, thirty minutes ago.”
“Where are they taking her?”
The man spat at her. “Why should I tell you anything? You’re just going to kill me.”
“Do you want to die gut shot, or do you want me to leave a gun with you to finish yourself off? Gut shot takes many hours to die, and is excruciating. So do you want to keep your friend here company for hours before the two of you go to hell? Or have the means to end it painlessly?”
He thought about her words, and when he spoke again, his voice was heavy with defeat. “They…they’re headed south on the road to Murzuq.”
“Where’s that?”
“Two hundred kilometers.”
“What kind of vehicle?”
“White pickup.”
She eyed him. “Where are the keys for the front gate?”
He glanced over at the square table by the window. A key ring sat on top of it.
“Do you have a car here?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No.”
She walked over and picked up the keys. A groan and then a long death rattle emanated from the wounded man on the floor. She scooped up the keys, and as she did so, the man on the couch lunged for the rifles.
Jet’s gun barked death, and the man’s head exploded as a dozen 4.6mm rounds tore through it and spackled the wall with blood and brains. She hurried back to the hall with the cells and called out in a loud voice, “The slavers are dead. You’re no longer prisoners. I’m going to open the front gate. I have the keys. Anyone who doesn’t have clothes, there are two dead men in the front of the building with robes. You’re welcome to them if you don’t mind a little blood. And there are some curtains on the windows that could work in a pinch.” A head poked from around one of the doorways, and then another. “I wouldn’t stay here very long. There’s no telling when more of them will show up.”
She ran the length of the corridor, repeating her message that the women were free. When she reached the last cell, she looked in on the bruised girl.
“I know it’s been hell, but you have to get out of here now. Go. Don’t wait. Get one of the men’s robes and go.”
The girl gave her a blank stare, but nodded. Jet checked her watch, calculating how much of a head start the truck with Salma had, and shook her head. She couldn’t delay any longer.
“I have an extra robe if you want to come with me,” Jet said.
The girl stood and walked unsteadily to the door. “This is real?”
“Yes. You’re free.”
She shuddered, partially from the night chill, and partially from adrenaline. Jet sighed and offered her hand. “Come on. Let’s move.”
The girl hesitantly reached out and took it, and then they were hurrying through the door and around the building to the front gate. When they reached it, Jet tried several of the keys until she found the correct one and pushed the barrier aside. She looked over her shoulder and saw a half dozen of the women following them, and smiled grimly. Damaged as they were by their ordeal, at least they now had a chance. Of course, the town was filled with predators, so there were no guarantees they wouldn’t wind up in similar circumstances, but she couldn’t save the world. She’d done what she could, and if it wasn’t enough, it was because she had someone else to save.
“This way,” she said, and winced at the thought of the girl having to run on the street with bare feet. There was nothing to be done about it, though, so she pulled her along until they reached the bike. Jet pulled the Berber robe from the saddlebag and handed it to her, along with a headscarf, and cranked the engine as the girl pulled the robe over her head and fumbled with the hijab.
“Be careful in town,” Jet said. “My advice is to get clear of Sebha. Here’s some money. Find a way to get to Tripoli, at least.” Jet handed her two hundred dinars, which was a small fortune for a native girl, and her eyes welled with tears.
“Thank you,” she said. “Thank you so much. I was trying to get there when they grabbed me.” She swallowed hard. “It’s been…horrible.”
“How old are you?”
“Fifteen.”
Jet’s stare burned with anger. “Where are your parents?”
“Both dead.”
“You don’t have anyone you can turn to?”
The girl shook her head. “N-no.”
“Well, now you have some money. Get some shoes, and talk to… Find a woman at the marketplace who seems nice. Look for someone with a kind face. Ask her the safest way to travel to Tripoli. If she can’t help, perhaps she could at least recommend someone or some way. There could be a bus or something.”
“I…I will. I’ll do that.”
Jet looked at the waif, barely more than a child and already badly scarred for life, and her heart ached for her, but there was nothing more she could do. She donned her helmet and gave the girl a wave.
“I have to go. Be safe,” Jet said, and roared off into the darkness, trying to remember what street would take her to the southern edge of the town, pushing the thought of the stranded girl from her mind, her mission now at the forefront of her thoughts.
She reached the limits of the urban area and turned onto the only road that led south. Jet increased her speed until the wind was tearing at her clothes, and she kept up the pace past orchards and planted fields. When she reached a fork in the road, she stopped to consider which leg of the branch to take. One ran west, the other south, and she spotted a small sign blown half off its support with Murzuq glowing in her headlight by the side of the latter.
Jet steered onto the road and had to slow considerably, the condition of the pavement so bad it was almost like riding over rough terrain. Eventually she discovered that the area by the shoulder was the least rutted and pitted, and was able to increase her speed until she spied taillights far ahead. She killed her headlight and slowed while her eyes adjusted to the darkness, which was offset by the light of a thousand stars and a waxing crescent moon. After a minute, when she felt confident enough in her vision, she sped up again and closed the distance between her and the truck.
As she did, she realized that she didn’t have a strategy to stop the terrorists when she caught up with them. She didn’t know whether they had Salma in the truck bed or in the cab, so she couldn’t just pull up to t
hem and empty the submachine gun into the cab. Even if Salma was in the bed, Jet couldn’t predict what would happen if she shot the driver. The truck might gradually slow and roll to a stop, or the driver could stiffen and speed up, or twist the wheel and flip it, or run off the road and flip it when the front wheels hit the sand without anyone steering.
Which left Jet with only two options: follow the truck in the darkness and hope that it stopped at some point for the men to relieve themselves, or cut around it and lay a trap farther down the road. What kind, she didn’t know, but if the men’s bladders were empty and she didn’t risk breaking her neck riding on sand in the darkness, the entire adventure would have been in vain. Jet eyed the gas gauge and swore – she hadn’t bothered to fill the tank in Sebha because there had been plentiful gas available, and she hadn’t banked on making a midnight run into the desert.
The slaver’s words came back to her. The terrorists were headed over two hundred kilometers south. With under a quarter tank and no reserves left, there was no way Jet would be able to make it.
Which left her with only one choice: she would have to brave the terrain and make good enough time that she could cut the truck off and lie in wait for it, and do so within the next fifty to sixty kilometers, or she’d be without sufficient gas to return to Sebha. And there was unlikely to be anything resembling a filling station where they were heading, so when she ran out, it would be game over for good, especially if Salma were injured.
Resigned to spending the next hour or two in impossibly treacherous conditions, she twisted the handlebars and tore off onto the sandy stretch that ran parallel to the road, the dirt hard packed enough that she could steer but still so dangerous at speed that if she made a single miscalculation, it would be the end of the bike and, with it, her life.
Chapter 21
Sahara Page 11