by Brad Taylor
He heard the crashing behind him grow and began sprinting north on the sidewalk, ignoring the plan in a desperate attempt to escape. Gasping for oxygen, his lungs burning like hot coals every time he drew a breath, he speed-dialed Sanjar, praying he was in a position to react.
He heard his pursuer’s feet slapping sidewalk and knew he had only a few seconds left. The phone connected, and before he could even speak he heard, “I see you! I see you! I’m headed right at you.”
And his salvation appeared, swerving toward the sidewalk not more than thirty meters away.
He didn’t dare look behind him, didn’t dare lose a millisecond of his lead, knowing the man would use it unmercifully. And might still even without the look. He saw Sanjar slam into the curb and the back passenger door fly open. With his last bit of flagging energy, he churned his legs as fast as he could, then threw himself lengthwise in the back, screaming, “Go! Go! Go!”
He felt something thump the roof as they sped away. When he looked back, he saw the black man standing on the sidewalk, his fists clenched.
35
I passed control of the Iranian to Knuckles and said, “Decoy, what’s your location?”
“Family restroom on the other side of the souvenir shop. I got it locked down.”
I told Knuckles to remain with the man we’d caught, ensuring he went nowhere, then began jogging back down the path to the ticket office/souvenir shop. I was going to have to make some quick decisions, because we were now spread way too thin, with Lord knew how many threads blowing in the wind from our actions. I wasn’t even sure what I would do if Blood caught the general.
“Retro, what’s the status inside? What’s the tour group doing? Are we compromised?”
“No, we’re good. They heard something, but Koko stepped in and started asking questions like she owned the place. She’s now talking to the tour guide, getting him to start doing some in-depth history. Everyone seems to be enjoying it. Except for the tour guide. I think Jennifer knows more than him.”
Jennifer and her history knowledge. Who’d have thought that would come in handy?
“Can you break free?”
“Yeah, but Koko’s going to have to stay for cover.”
“Do it. Get up top. Help out Blood.”
He didn’t ask any more questions, knowing I didn’t have the answers. The command was simple: Figure it out.
I made it to the bathroom and knocked. When Decoy let me in, I saw the doctor sitting on the toilet with the lid down, staring at the floor, catatonic.
Before I could ask a question, Blood came on.
“He’s gone. A car pulled up outside the park and he jumped in it.”
Damn it. The other countersurveillance guy from the front of the park.
I said, “What the hell? You’re telling me a fifty-year-old Iranian outran you?”
I heard consternation. “Hey, I had to find him first. I was right on his ass. He was mine, and he knew it. He had an escape plan in place. That car didn’t appear by magic.”
“Okay, okay,” I said. “Knuckles, get with Blood and Retro and figure out an exfil plan with the package we caught. Let me know what it is. I want to be out of here in fifteen minutes or less.”
Knuckles said, “Uhhh . . . you know we all took the metro, right?”
I said, “Figure it out.”
I turned to the doctor. He gazed up at me, tears streaming down his face. He said, “You killed my son. You killed my son. . . .”
“Dr. Nakarat, your son is alive. We rescued him two days ago. The police here have been trying to find you to tell you that.”
He said nothing for a minute, his lips trembling. I expected him to leap up and hug me out of sheer joy.
Instead, he slid off the toilet in a ball and began weeping uncontrollably.
36
Malik sagged against the seat, getting his ragged breathing under control.
Sanjar said, “What happened? Where is Roshan?”
“I don’t know. Let me think for a minute.”
The one thing he was sure of was that Dr. Nakarat had brought the police. That was the only thing that could explain the events that had transpired. Malik was surprised at the doctor’s courage, given the fate that would befall his son and the absolute lack of any indication of such nerve.
And yet he had. He’d somehow met the police beforehand and had explained the entire contact plan. They had known about the virus before Malik had even entered the bunker. Before he’d staged his countersurveillance team, which is how they’d found Roshan. They had been one step ahead the entire time due to the doctor’s treachery. Which meant they would never have allowed the doctor to bring him live virus samples. What Nakarat had passed him had to be fake. A trick to entrap him.
The mission is done.
The thought brought a wave of shame. He had failed. Again. Not only that, but he’d lost one of his men in the process. He wanted to scream at the injustice.
He turned over in his mind what he could salvage. Anything to make the sacrifices worth it. And thought of the doctor’s expression in the bunker. The demand to speak to his son, and the look of absolute surprise at the mention of the police. As if he didn’t really know they were there.
The more he considered it, the more it seemed true. Why, if the doctor had gone to the police, would they send him alone into the meeting? With a dummy virus and vaccine samples? They would have known the whole plan for the meeting, including the tour group instructions. Why not build the tour group with nothing but special-tactics police? Have the doctor embed with them, then simply arrest him—eight or nine against one? Why go through the charade of sending in the doctor as a singleton?
Why indeed? Since it had allowed Malik to escape? If they really knew about the meeting, would they have left the escape hatch open? Wouldn’t they have done a complete reconnaissance and blocked all exits? This was their country, after all, and that’s what he would have done.
No, Roshan had alerted to something that happened outside, which indicated that the police were reacting to what they’d seen, not executing a plan.
Then he remembered the visit earlier at the lab and the doctor’s escape.
They weren’t after you. They were after him.
Which meant the virus was real.
The notion brought a sense of victory at first, then a terrifying dread: What if your fall broke the container?
He vividly remembered the bag flailing in the wind as he went down the slope, hitting his back repeatedly as he rolled. Afraid to touch the box of gauze, he first unwrapped the vaccine from the rag, relaxing a small bit when he saw the tube was intact. Wrapped around the tube appeared to be instructions for administration to a host, from the doctor. Doing what he could to save his son, and evidence that Malik’s thought process wasn’t off base.
He then gingerly opened the gauze box, trying to peek between the cracks, looking for liquid in the gauze, as if that would save him from the invisible death floating inside the car. He breathed a sigh of relief. The glass of the vial was unbroken, and the rubber stopper was in place.
He closed the box and thought about the mission. They had the doctor now, which meant they would know about the virus soon enough. He needed to get out of Singapore immediately, before they could collate their information and try to react.
He began cataloging what the doctor knew, what information they could glean that would prevent his own escape. Outside of a description, he could come up with nothing. The room at the Marina Bay Sands went to an Iranian account, yes, but the credit card trail would end there, under a wholly different name than what he was using. The same for the cell phones he’d bought. It wasn’t like Iran was going to help them in their search.
The thought of the cell phone purchase caused a bolt of adrenaline. The doctor still has the phone you gave him. With your number in it.
He picked up his own phone and stared at it, wondering if it was being tracked right this minute.
He sai
d, “Sanjar, drop me off at the next corner. I’m going to catch a cab to our embassy to coordinate transport of the virus. I’ll meet you back at the hotel in less than thirty minutes.”
“Yes, sir. What about Roshan?”
Another risk. Another gap in the mission, but a small one. Roshan, he knew, would say nothing. He was well trained and had nothing incriminating on him. If he stuck to his training, he’d be released in a matter of hours from the Singaporean police.
“Roshan is gone, but hopefully only for a short time. We must ensure his sacrifice is worth it. If we get caught, it will all be a waste. Have everything packed when I arrive. We’re leaving Singapore immediately.”
“Where? Where are we going?”
Malik picked up the vaccine, wondering if it really worked as the doctor stated.
“To meet a woman. A very special woman. Our shahid.”
37
Elina slowly walked down the aisle of the aircraft, trying to keep from bumping her carry-on into the man in front of her, the anxiety rising with each step. She reached the exit door, seeing the pilot smiling and wishing her well. She nodded, plastering on a fake smile of her own, and exited the aircraft into a world that frightened her to her core.
Moving with everyone else, she left the aircraft gate and entered the hallway of the Hong Kong International Airport, jostled by the waves of people all anxious to get to immigration and customs. She stood confused for a moment, wondering where she should go.
She had never traveled outside of the Russian Federation, and apart from one trip to Moscow, she had never been more than fifty miles from Grozny. In truth, she had never been on an airplane, a fact that she had lied about to her friends because it had brought a secret shame. Now it brought nothing but fear.
When she’d visited Moscow she had felt bewildered but at least could speak the language. Here, she was completely out of her element. Almost everyone was Asian, and they all appeared to be staring at her. Apprehension bubbled up inside her. A xenophobic feeling that was almost overwhelming, making her want to return home to what she knew. Return to where her mission made sense.
Straining to read the English on the airport signs, she began following the crowd, believing that they knew more than her. She couldn’t help but notice the Asians wearing surgical masks, just like the ones she had been instructed to purchase. The sight confused her. Made her question her purpose.
Surely I’m not going to martyr myself here. Why? What has Hong Kong done to Chechnya?
After the praise Doku had given her, she had agreed to the new mission. He’d said she might not understand the target she would attack, but that others did. Others who held the fate of her country close to their heart. He had admonished her not to question, but to simply execute. He’d ended by saying she would be the most valuable Black Widow in history. The one who would turn the tide against the hated Kadyrovtsy.
When she’d asked how an attack outside of Chechnya could do that, he’d initially told her that they required support for the fight, and this attack would cause others to provide help for their cause. That didn’t sit well with her. She may have been a simple peasant, but she wasn’t stupid. Something Doku was well aware of.
In a little bit of a pique, she’d said, “So I’m to sacrifice my life to ensure that we will be given arms? Is that it? You do them a favor, and they return the favor? Using me? Who will I attack?”
Doku had paused at that. Then he’d said, “No, no. You’re not something for simple barter. There are others who support the Russian Federation. Others who keep them in power and, by extension, keep the Kadyrovtsy operational. Your attack will cause them to cease the support.”
Still not convinced, she’d said, “Who? What others?”
“You’ll be told that when the time comes. Remember your operational security. Remember your training. And trust that we know what we’re doing.”
Now, standing on a moving sidewalk, a bit of technology that almost caused her to fall over, surrounded by Asians who would have had trouble finding Chechnya on a map, she wondered, Am I simply a pawn? Something to trade, like the saddle for a horse?
She banished the thought immediately. Doku was an honorable man. Someone who had fought and bled for their country. He had always treated her with respect and had never lied. She would trust in what he said. At the very least, she would meet the contact and let him tell her the mission.
She stumbled off of the moving sidewalk, almost run over by the scrum of passengers speed-walking behind her. She let them pass and chose to continue in the center of the terminal, without the mechanical help.
She continued on, seemingly walking for miles. She became more and more anxious, feeling a tightness in her chest that left her unable to catch her breath. She believed she was heading the wrong way and had no one to turn to for help. She was petrified to ask directions. Convinced they’d see through her subterfuge. Convinced someone was going to stop her, question her, and then arrest her. She had done nothing wrong, but the fact that she held a forged passport from the country of Latvia did nothing but increase her fear.
She saw the sign for immigration ahead and let out a mental sigh. Just get to the hotel. One step at a time. Get to the hotel.
She was chanting the mantra in her head when a shorter Asian woman, wearing a surgical mask, stepped into her path.
In accented English, she said, “Please remove your head scarf.”
Elina felt faint. She barely understood the woman and wanted to turn away, to flee back to her plane and demand it return her home.
“What? Remove my head scarf?”
The woman nodded.
Elina began to panic, believing there was some magical piece of technology that could spot an imposter. She stuttered, stalling for time, when the woman pointed to a desk behind her.
The counter was curved and modern, with a plethora of computer displays behind it, all manned by other Asians in masks. It had a placard on the front that read TEMPERATURE CHECK in English, along with Chinese symbols that she assumed said the same thing.
The woman said, “We check passengers for sickness. Your scarf blocks the sensors.”
For the first time, Elina noticed the myriad of cameras around her, all screening the flow of people into the immigration area.
She removed her scarf, feeling sick to her stomach. The woman nodded and smiled. A man behind the desk waved her on, and she entered immigration, confused by the whole process.
She stood in line behind an affable man with an English accent. He attempted to strike up a conversation.
“They’re serious about the flu, aren’t they?”
She nodded weakly, afraid to open her mouth.
“I come here all the time, and I always wonder, if I had a cold, would they keep me out? How can they tell the difference between bird flu and the common cold with just a temperature check?”
She nodded again, the conversation hammering home how little she knew of the world.
Bird flu? What on earth is that?
38
Kurt Hale fiddled with the Proxima projector, mindlessly adjusting the focus yet again. It didn’t help him make a decision, but it did kill a little more time.
Ten minutes until the council update. Or what may forever be known as the first spontaneous combustion of the president of the United States.
The video-teleconference with Pike in Singapore had been over for more than two hours, and he still couldn’t decide what catastrophe he should broach to the Oversight Council first: the fact that Pike’s team had ignored orders and unilaterally attempted an Omega operation against an agent of a sovereign country—and failed—or the fact that that same agent was now running loose with a lethal and highly pathogenic genetically engineered bioweapon.
Maybe lead off with the one Iranian we did manage to catch, along with the fact that we have no support assets in country to exfiltrate him.
The thought made his head hurt. Jesus. What a goat rope.
He
remembered his last conversation with the secretary of state, Jonathan Billings, and knew he was going to get roasted—although at the end of the day, he stood behind Pike’s actions. The only thing Pike could have done differently was alert the police when he realized he was following the doctor. Instead, he’d attempted an interdiction with his team, and Kurt understood the decision.
Given Pike’s status in the country, he couldn’t call the police himself without an avalanche of repercussions and questions to answer. He would have had to call back to the Taskforce, then have them inject the doctor’s location into the CIA network, followed by the station alerting their liaison. In other words, lose the doctor yet again.
No, Pike had made the right call. If he’d stood on the sidelines, the doctor would have been killed, and they’d have no idea what they were up against.
At the end of the day, hunting humans was an imperfect science. The target was usually someone who had lived on the run for a while, honing his survival instincts and wanting to live to fight another day. You just couldn’t predict every outcome. The unexpected happened, and you either rolled with the punch or ceased to exist. Operations weren’t video games with checkpoints that you could attempt over and over until you found the perfect solution, although he’d have a hard time selling that to this crew. Most of the Oversight Council had no idea what the Taskforce did to accomplish missions and lived in a zero-tolerance world.
A world that doesn’t exist.
The door opened and the members of the council all began to file in, right on time. Last was the president, who said, “Hey, Kurt. These emergency meetings are getting to be standard procedure. From the message you sent out, this sounds like the Cuban Missile Crisis. Tell me that was just your way of ensuring we all showed up.”