by AJ Stewart
Fontaine’s radio crackled.
“Cible se dirigea vers la sortie nord,” said Babar.
Hutton frowned at Fontaine.
“The guy is headed for the north exit,” translated Fontaine. “Yusuf, let’s roll.”
“Babar,” said Fontaine. “Anglais, s’il vous plaît.”
Yusuf drove them north two blocks on a two-lane thoroughfare. It was a major road, with a median strip up the middle, which did nothing to ease the traffic. Yusuf stopped at a corner that put them two blocks southwest of the mosque. They waited.
“Target is on street. Heading northeast,” said Babar.
They waited. For a good minute there was nothing, as if Babar had turned his comms unit off. Then he crackled back to life.
“Target turned into an alley. Then he backtracked. He came right past me, mon Adjudant. I think I am made.”
“Where did he go?” asked Fontaine.
“Back onto street and left. Back to the southwest.”
“Okay, we’re down that way. We’ll pick it up.”
They heard Babar say, “Wait, is that—”
Fontaine missed the last as he leaped from the SUV. He headed northeast toward the rear side of the mosque.
“Repeat, Babar.”
No response.
Fontaine picked up his pace and kept his eyes ahead, looking for the target. The street was getting busy with men coming from their prayers.
“Babar? Come in.”
Nothing. Fontaine kept walking, a fast march. A pace he could keep up for twenty hours.
“Fontaine,” said Hutton from the car. “I see the target. He crossed the street to the other side and has continued southwest. He is waiting to cross the main road.”
“Stay on him.”
Fontaine reached the rear of the mosque. It was a nondescript location, a wall, a door. No signage. The blue domed roof was the only giveaway of its purpose. Fontaine figured if you needed more information then it wasn’t a place you would go. He marched on along the street. He kept going until he hit a cross street. Too busy. Not a street that Babar had described crossing. Fontaine backtracked. He found a gap between a building of unknown usage and a tall wall. An alley. The sun was still better than forty-five degrees in the sky, but the alley was tight and the shadows were long. Fontaine unclipped his holster and put his hand on his PAMAS sidearm. He moved down the alley.
It felt like New York City. He had been there once, as a child. His father had been called to the UN building for meetings, and he brought his boys along. Because they had to visit their homeland, to see the great metropolis. The most stunning city in the world. The streets had felt like canyons, the buildings immeasurably tall. The sun shone on the north-south avenues for what felt like only minutes a day. Fontaine had the same feeling now. The sun was up there, but it wasn’t helping him. The alley felt dark despite the heat. He moved cautiously. He passed darkened windows without glass, open to the whatever cooling breeze came down the alley. It wasn’t much. Then he saw a figure. A man.
Further down the alley, against the right wall. A person was sitting there. Fontaine pulled his gun. It might be someone taking a midafternoon nap in the shade, or it could be a ruse. Not the first time a slumbering street person turned out to be an enemy with a weapon. He pressed up against the right wall of the alley and slid closer. And closer still.
He was only about five meters away when he recognized the shape. The broad chest, the thick legs. The brown, sun-kissed skin. He took the last steps at pace, involuntarily breaking into stride. An ancient urge signaling him to move faster. He dropped to his knees and grabbed the shirt of the man and felt every muscle in his body tighten. His jaw clenched and bile burned his throat.
Babar lay against the wall. His head lolled to the side like he was drunk or unconscious. He flopped against Fontaine’s chest. But he was wasn’t drunk, and only in one sense was he unconscious. His throat was cut open. Hacked open to the spine. His entire torso was caked in blood. It had stopped running because so much of it had left his body so quickly. Fontaine looked at the jagged hole, split from one ear, across the Adam’s apple to the other ear.
His radio burst to life with the sound of Hutton’s voice.
“Target is getting into a vehicle. Looks like a private vehicle. If I’m not mistaken it’s a Caddy.”
Fontaine said nothing.
“Fontaine, do you copy? Where are you?”
He fought hard to release his jaw.
“Fontaine, come in,” she said again.
“Hutton. Man down.” He spat his words out.
“I’m coming. Where are you?”
“No. Don’t lose the target.”
“Where are you?”
“Alley. East of the mosque.”
He heard no reply. He just looked down on his old friend. A massive bear of a man. Like most of his brothers in the Legion, Babar’s origins were a mystery, his reasons for joining his own. He and Fontaine had been in the same intake. Babar had joined in Paris, Fontaine in Marseilles, but they had met during the Legion equivalent of basic training in Aubagne. They had trained together on Corsica and joined the 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment together and served side by side in Africa and South America. And when Fontaine had been tapped to form a new specialist team to hunt down terrorists, Babar had been the first team member Fontaine selected. Now he looked at his old friend. The smile was gone from his face. His mouth was contorted like an animal.
“Oh, no.” Fontaine heard the voice but didn’t turn to it. Hutton dropped to her knees beside him and made to feel for a pulse. It was a reflex action, the last action of hope, but she stopped herself before her hand touched the open wound that had been Babar’s neck.
“The target,” said Fontaine.
“Yusuf is following. He’ll radio. What happened?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know.”
They stayed as they were, silent with their thoughts, until the radio hissed.
“Mon adjudant? Gorecki.”
It took Fontaine all his effort to speak, as if the air had been taken from him.
“Please tell me he didn’t get the shipment?”
“Negative, mon Adjudant. He just left, with a decoy cargo.”
Fontaine looked at Hutton. “He’s gone?”
“Oui.”
Fontaine thought for a moment.
“Secure the cargo,” he barked. “And I mean secure.”
“Oui, mon Adjudant. And then?”
“Rendezvous. And keep your eyes open.”
“Is everything okay, mon Adjudant?”
Fontaine felt the anger well in his jaw again. “No, Gorecki. The whole world is going to hell. Secure, then rendezvous. Eyes open. D’accord?”
“Oui.”
Chapter Sixteen
Hutton walked back out to the street and made some calls. It wasn’t really acceptable for a woman to be making phone calls on the street, especially a stone’s throw away from a mosque, but she was beyond caring about local sensibilities. She got plenty of angry looks from men as they walked by, and she returned a face of granite and an icy stare, daring them to do something about it.
Her series of calls led to a contact in the Ministry of Interior. Officers of the Iraqi Federal Police arrived, led by a large, clean-shaven man in a beret. He directed his team down the alley and they took over the scene. Fontaine took some convincing to leave, but Hutton told him to let them do their work, that there was nothing more he could do for Babar.
They stood at the corner of the alley. Police vehicles cordoned the alley off, which drew a crowd as it would anywhere in the world. Hutton explained to her Iraqi contact what had happened. She described Fontaine and his team as personal security contractors, and the suspect shipment as belonging to their client. She didn’t mention the possibility of stolen weapons. That was something for later, once she heard back from New York.
They were still at the scene when Yusuf returned in the SUV. He hadn’t radioed and th
ey had forgotten about him. The police forming a cordon around the scene yelled at him to back up when he stopped near the alley, but Fontaine rushed forward.
“Leave him, he’s with us.”
Hutton’s contact shouted some orders and the officers backed off. Fontaine watched Yusuf step through the cordon. There were no barriers but police with rifles held back a growing crowd of onlookers. Fontaine ran his eye across the crowd. He didn’t see the attraction, especially in a city that had already seen so much death. Men stood with cigarettes in their mouths, and children clung to their legs. There were even a few women. Fontaine glanced back at Yusuf as he came forward but something tugged at his memory. He looked back into the crowd and saw the eyes.
The same calculating eyes that had swept the lobby of the hotel in Baghdad, the same eyes he had looked into in the corridor after meeting the general. Fontaine and the so-called private locked eyes.
Then the private ran.
Fontaine took off without a word. He charged the cordon of police. His rapid footsteps drew their attention and as they turned he burst through. He pushed past the throng and onto the street. The private was on the other side of the road, headed down another alley by a store that seemed to trade in used vacuum cleaners. Fontaine didn’t wait for the traffic. He charged across to the sound of horns and abuse yelled in Arabic. He pulled out his PAMAS G1 and ran into the darkened alley. The buildings weren’t as high so it wasn’t as dark as the alley that Babar’s body lay in but it was dark enough. He kept to a wall and trained his weapon side to side. There were doors that looked like rear entrances to businesses. He gently tried a couple but they were locked. The alley cut at a right angle and Fontaine edged across to the inside of the corner, crouched and then spun around, weapon held up.
This part of the alley was brighter, the sun streaming directly down it. At the far end was a square busy with activity. The sand-colored uniform was running out the end of the alley. He aimed and got the man in his sights, and then he dropped his aim and ran. He couldn’t fire. He used 9mm parabellums, which for the most part would remain inside any target he hit, but there was always a chance of a round going through and hitting a civilian, or worse, a civilian walking across the alleyway as he fired.
Fontaine heard the whiny splutter of a motorcycle as he ran, and as he reached the street he saw the private pull away on a dirt bike. He skidded out into traffic with no apparent regard for his own well-being and hit the gas. Fontaine looked around. There were a few cars and the odd bicycle on the road but commandeering a vehicle wasn’t as easy as it looked in the movies. It didn’t matter anyway. There was no point. The only way to follow a motorcycle through the traffic and people was on another motorcycle and at that moment there wasn’t one in sight. He clenched his jaw in frustration as the sound of the dirt bike was swallowed by the city. Then he holstered his handgun and made his way back to the crime scene.
“What was that all about?” Hutton asked when he got back.
“Tell you later.” Fontaine approached his driver. “What happened?”
“I follow the car, sayidi.”
“So where is he? You shouldn’t have left him, Yusuf.”
“Sorry, sayidi. But I cannot follow where he go.”
“What do you mean? Where did he go?”
“He drove to the border, sayidi. He went into Iran.”
Fontaine turned to Hutton who had joined him. Her jaw dropped open.
“Iran?” she said.
“Yes, miss,” said Yusuf. “I watch him go straight through. No problems.”
Hutton looked at Fontaine and then glanced back at her contact by the alley. He stood at attention, watching her.
“I need to update the locals,” she said, walking away.
“I am sorry, sayidi,” said Yusuf.
“No, Yusuf. I’m sorry. You did well. You could do no more.”
“What happened here, sayidi?”
Fontaine glanced back at the alley. Hutton was talking with her contact from the Federal Police. He didn’t look happy.
“We lost a man,” said Fontaine. He turned to Yusuf. “We lost Babar.”
Yusuf nodded and closed his eyes as if offering a silent prayer. For a moment Fontaine wished he had such recourse, to offer a prayer of his own for his fallen friend, and perhaps receive some guidance in return. But he didn’t believe he was going to get divine intervention. He was the intervention. He saw Hutton break from her contact and walk back to them.
“He’s not confident. He says if the guy was Iranian they’ve probably got no shot at finding him. He wants to inspect the cargo.”
“No chance,” said Fontaine. “Did you tell him where it is?”
“I told him I don’t know where it is.”
Fontaine nodded.
“Thanks.”
“Hey, it’s the truth. I don’t know what your guys have done with it.”
“We need to get back to base. We need to think this thing through.”
“I need to pass this Iran thing on to my guy in New York. It might help pinpoint who he is.”
They got into the backseat of the SUV and Yusuf pulled away, headed for their hotel. Hutton opened her laptop and sent a message to New York. Fontaine opened his comms and hailed Gorecki.
“Status?” he asked.
“The package is hidden behind some disused containers. It’s as secure as it’s going to get. We need to make an evac plan, but we’re going to need paperwork to get it out if we don’t want to make a scene.”
“D’accord. How is the environment?”
“The protest lost steam after the target left. They’ve all but dispersed.”
“Roger that. Rendezvous?”
“On our way.”
Fontaine held back the news of Babar until he could face his men. They bypassed the lounge and settled in a space near Fontaine’s billet that would have been a living room were the place an apartment. There was only one chair, which was offered to Hutton. She declined. They all sat on the floor. Fontaine passed on the details of Babar. He gave them some time to process it. Each man did so in silence. It wasn’t the first brother they had lost. From their first day, Legion training had been brutal and guys had died doing it. And more guys had died in the field since. But Fontaine knew this was more. They were a small, specialist unit. A tight group in an army of brothers. He knew each man would grieve later in their own way. Manu would meditate on it, much like Babar himself would have done. Thorn would throw himself into preparation for the next operation, keep himself busy. His personal version of make-work. And Gorecki would think. And think. And then he’d plot revenge.
“You want to tell me why you ran off at the scene earlier?” asked Hutton.
“I saw a familiar face in the crowd,” said Fontaine. “The so-called private who brought General Thoreaux to the hotel.”
“Really? The general is still in Iraq?”
“No,” said Gorecki. “He is back in Djibouti. It is confirmed.”
“But his driver is not,” said Fontaine. “He was there. He got away on a motorcycle.”
“Do you think he killed Babar?” asked Manu.
“It’s a hell of a coincidence for him to be in Basra.”
“Why?” asked Hutton. “What’s his motive?”
“Orders. But for General Thoreaux to issue such an order, it’s a big step.”
As they sat on the floor in silence Hutton heard a ping from her laptop and she tapped away and then spent time reading. Then she looked up at the group, each a thousand miles away. She brought them back.
“We know who the guy from the meet is.” All eyes on her now. “He’s Iranian military intelligence. His name is Ahmad Kirmani.” She spun the laptop around to the room. On the screen was a photograph. Not the image they had sent to New York. One New York had sent back. Kirmani was standing to attention as if watching some kind of military parade. He was in uniform. Fontaine noted the silver hair at the temples. And the eyes. Shrewd, calculating. As if he was wat
ching a parade but thinking about how he could use the parade to his advantage.
“He looks important,” said Gorecki.
“Apparently he’s quite senior. A confidante of the minister of intelligence who is himself close to the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei.”
“So what is a highly placed Iranian intelligence officer doing running guns in Iraq?” Fontaine asked.
“They’re not exactly friends are they, Iran and Iraq?” said Manu.
“True, and I can see this guy organizing arms for militants in Iraq,” Fontaine replied. “What I don’t see is him driving the truck.”
“Unless the shipment is more important than we think,” said Gorecki. “It did have biohazard labeling.”
“My gut tells me that’s a ruse,” said Fontaine.
“I agree,” said Hutton. “If you are smuggling a biological weapon, you don’t label it as a biological weapon.”
“Double bluff?” asked Thorn.
Fontaine shook his head. “Too easy to check, right?”
“Biological or not, we agree it’s important for this Kirmani to be the delivery guy?” asked Hutton.
She received four nodding heads.
“So we need to know what’s inside,” she said.
“We can’t open it at the port,” said Thorn. “I got a tiny video scope inside. The container has a fairly sophisticated security system with multiple cells for motion detection. Basically while you are trying to turn one off, you are triggering another.”
“Can you get around it?” asked Fontaine.
“Of course, mon Adjudant. But I need some specialized equipment. It may take some time to get. And Dennison might figure out he’s got the wrong box. He might come back looking for it. I think first we need to move it.”
“I agree,” said Fontaine. “We need to make the container lost. That’s the first thing. Gorecki?”
“We can get a truck big enough. There’s a depot nearby to the port. No real security. I’d bet the keys are hanging on a pegboard in the office. But we’ll need a way to get it out of the port. They’ll want to see some kind of paperwork. Unless we drive straight through the gate.”