Murphy's Lawless: A Terran Republic Novel

by Charles E. Gannon

  Naliryiz smiled. “You have been rather busy.”

  They laughed together. Murphy liked that feeling…and quickly tamped it down.

  “Now,” she resumed, “about your hand—”

  “I appreciate your concern, but—”

  “You will listen to me, now.” Naliryiz’s steel suddenly shone through, and Murphy discovered he liked that, too. A lot. “I do not broach this matter out of sympathy; I do so out of practicality, necessity. You must continue to lead effectively. The die is cast; the coming days will decide how it falls, but our future is now linked to yours. And, as you have no doubt foreseen, eliminating the transmitter is but a first step. Because Kulsis will not sit idly by and wonder why they have not received a message from their coursers. So, ironically, Kormak was correct in at least one regard: this is just the first step in a long, dangerous dance that will only become more desperate as it goes on.”

  Murphy pushed away the image of dancing with Naliryiz. “I suppose you are right, but really, I’m fine.”

  “So, you will not admit your condition, let alone discuss it.” She rose. “No doubt you are wise to resist any action which would reveal it and compromise your position. You think ahead to what would follow if others learned of it. Or if I am observed, or even suspected of, providing drugs that might control or at least lessen the trembling. Questions would be asked, and your condition revealed.” She nodded and headed toward the hatch. “I frankly expected no different. Not today, at least.”

  “Not ever, so far as I can tell,” Murphy said. Even he could hear the tinge of mournfulness in his tone. Wuss.

  Naliryiz turned as she reached the coaming; seen sideways, her narrow, space-born body almost seemed to disappear. “Every day reveals new problems and possibilities. We shall speak again.”

  * * *

  “So those are your weapons,” Bowden said, completing the walkaround of the interface craft. “Any questions?”

  “Nope,” First Lieutenant Thomas Byrd, said. “A super-size Sidewinder and a flying bomb that I need to guide into the target or show it a laser so that someone else can.” Byrd, a former US Marine F-4 RIO, had understood the Sidewinder immediately and had quickly picked up lasers and how the laser-guided bomb worked.

  His pilot when he’d been downed, Captain Sam Hirst, had understood the bomb almost as quickly and had identified the Sidewinder seeker head as coming from an AIM-9B.

  The third American aviator, USAF Captain Dave Fiezel, an F-105F pilot, had picked up the laser-guided bomb mission by likening it to suppression of enemy air defense, or SEAD, missions, where he’d fired anti-radiation missiles at Vietnamese SA-2 surface-to-air missile radar sites. Fiezel had Bowden’s respect; anyone who dueled with SAMs was a serious badass, even if he’d ultimately lost to one in the end.

  “I’m sorry,” Bowden said as he led them aboard the craft and into the cockpit, “but the cockpit controls we’ve put together for this are pretty bare bones. Nothing’s integrated very well, and none of it’s digital.”

  “Hah,” Byrd said with a laugh. “You’ve obviously never been in the cockpit of a Phantom.”

  “Hell, the Phantom’s state-of-the-art,” Fiezel said. “You’ve never been in a Thud.”

  Bowden chuckled. “Actually, I have; I saw it in a museum one time.” He smiled at the other aviators. “Okay, maybe you won’t be out of your element as much as I thought. Regardless, I’m going to have to teach you how to operate all this so that you can, first, fight your way into the target area and, second, blow up the giant antenna they’re building to call Kulsis.”

  Hirst nodded to the dual-piloted cockpit. “Will I be flying with Byrd?”

  Bowden shook his head. “No, you’ll each have a SpinDog who will fly the plane, while you work the weapons systems.”

  “RIO appreciation flights!” Byrd exclaimed happily. “Welcome to my world.”

  “Yeah, well, you’re finally going to get to fly in the front seat,” Hirst said, “instead of being a backseat driver like you normally are. Were. Welcome to my world.”

  Bowden smiled. It was obvious the two men had been a crew; they had the easy camaraderie that developed between two men who had flown together often.

  “Byrd, you’ll be flying with Lotho Ferenc. Hirst, you’ll be with Jukhal Samkamka, and Fiezel, you’re with Burg Hrensku.”

  “All right,” Byrd said, sliding into the copilot’s seat on the left. Unlike the US military, where the fixed-wing “pilot-in-command” was normally on the left, the SpinDog lead pilots sat on the right, like in US helicopters. He looked down at the switches labeled in English. “What have we got here?”

  * * *

  The pager in Murphy’s quarters toned. He rolled up into a sitting position, tapped his data slate, saw Makarov’s face. “What is it, Pistol?”

  “Sir, you asked for me to notify you when I had a breakthrough on the black-market activity among the men.”

  In retrospect, since the SpinDogs didn’t seem to be part of the transaction chain, Murphy had mentally relabeled it as a “unit barter economy grown large.” But he had asked Makarov to keep an eye on it and find the ringleader, so…”Tell me what you’ve got, Pistol.”

  “A sharp drop off in missing items and stores. Also, no mention of illegal card- or dice-games.”

  Murphy thought. “Did this start about, oh, four days ago?”

  Makarov paused for a full three seconds. “Why…yes, sir. How, how did you know?”

  “Remember that guy you tagged as your suspect, the one who was on my chopper when it went down?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, he went dirtside five days ago.”

  “And you think he could be responsible for so much of this illegal activity?”

  Murphy couldn’t smother a rueful bark of laughter. “‘Responsible for so much of it?’ Makarov, I’d take long odds that he was behind all of it.”

  And good luck to the fresh marks waiting to be fleeced down in Starkpatch…

  * * * * *

  Part Six: Vat

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Mogadishu, November 1993

  The Range Rover had seen better days, as had the streets it was navigating. Back home in Romulus, Michigan, the ratio was about one pothole for every yard of road. Here it was about one yard-sized pothole for every foot of road. The heat in the back seat was sweltering, but the Rover had probably never had air conditioning, and you were crazy to drive through Mogadishu with the windows down. The truck caromed over a particularly deep pothole, and his head bounced off the roof.

  “You good, boss man?” the driver asked. He was about 6’ 9”, maybe more, and would have been considered skeletal back in the States. If he had been born there, he might have been a high school basketball star. Here, he looked decades older than he was and was missing his left leg below the knee, probably courtesy of some unknown close encounter with the indifferent nature of high explosives.

  The man was definitely speaking a version of Afar; it wasn’t pure Somali. African dialects weren’t in his collection, so when this opportunity opened up, he started learning them. He’d gotten pretty good with Somali over the last two weeks, but Afar was trickier.

  “Yeah, A-OK,” Victor said in Afar and flashed the man a thumbs-up. The driver beamed at him, his brilliant white teeth offset by his ebony skin. He couldn’t tell if that meant he was speaking the correct language or not. Knowing my luck, he works for Aidid.

  A shrill squawk from his backpack made him jump. He’d forgotten about the sat-phone. Despite the literature, it didn’t work in Somalia often and almost never in Mogadishu—there was too much electromagnetic garbage in the air with the US military in town.

  He fished it out and flipped the huge antenna up. The signal bar showed minimal. With a shrug, he stabbed the Connect button with his thumb. “Talk quick; signal sucks.”

  “Vat? Damn it, man, about time. Where you been?”

  “Snap, you idiot, it’s three o’clock here. The mee
ting, remember?”

  “Jesus, I forgot. Look, man, you gotta get outta there. Now.”

  “What the fuck you talking about? General Aidid is interested in the bees. Like really interested.”

  “Yeah, well, the FBI just cleaned your place out.”

  Victor felt his blood run cold. He licked his lips and sat up straight in the seat, something a white guy in fatigues shouldn’t do when riding down a street in Mogadishu, especially in daylight. “What did you say?”

  “I said the F-fucking-B-I, just hit your place. I’m on a burner phone at the airport. I’m getting out of Dodge. This is your only warning. Good luck.”

  “Snap!” Vat yelled into the phone, but a series of clicks and a rapid beep told him that half a world away, his long-time buddy Sammy “Snap” Baker had just broken the disposable phone in half and tossed it into the garbage. “Fuck,” he said quietly. Someone had dropped a dime on his operation. It wasn’t Snap, or he wouldn’t have risked everything calling him. Who then?

  Doesn’t matter. Not now.

  “You good, boss man?”

  Vat looked up at the driver. Did the man know more than four words of English? He’d been taking Vat to the hotel—more like armed compound, really—provided for him upon arriving in Mogadishu. Vat didn’t know the driver’s name. He’d just gotten into the car General Aidid’s aide had pointed to.

  “Can you take me to the American base?”

  The man’s big friendly smile disappeared in an instant. Yeah, definitely Aidid’s man. “You go hotel.” Vat made a face, and the driver repeated the statement in Afar, confirming Vat’s earlier guess.

  Vat shook his head hard. “No. The American base,” he said in the driver’s language. He reached into his duffel, fumbled around, and pulled out a pouch. He held up two crisp $100 bills. “Base.” The look of hunger on the man’s face was unmistakable, still he hesitated. Vat added two more bills. The hesitation disappeared as the driver reached for them. Vat handed him two and held two back. “You’ll get these when you drop me at base.”

  “Okay, boss man,” the driver said, in English this time, his face hard but determined. $400 US in Mogadishu could buy you a new life, or better yet, a ticket out. Vat wondered what his own ticket would cost.

  A bullet came through the side window as they turned onto a side street.

  The driver gunned it. Vat fell sideways and let his momentum carry him to the floor, pulling his bag with him. His hand went back in and came out with his pistol. In a couple of years, it would be known as a Glock 26. Right now, it was an un-serialized preproduction present from a friend. Super lightweight, super compact, and loaded with 9x19mm parabellum, NATO standard. The 10-round magazine and small size had been a surprise to more than a few people with ill intentions toward him.

  What fucking good will it do against a sniper?

  He briefly wondered if Aidid had targeted him. No, he was being paranoid. Aidid would just have the driver pull over and a couple guys would have blown Vat’s brains out in the middle of the road; no need for the cloak and dagger shit. Someone had probably seen the camos. Shit.

  The Range Rover’s motor slowed. Vat dropped another hundred over the front seat. “Do. Not. Stop,” he said, carefully pronouncing every word. The engine coughed and roared again as the driver punched it.

  No more bullets followed.

  Vat stayed on the floor.

  He dug through his bag and grabbed the folder with his proper documents and secured the gun in its Velcro retention strap inside the bag. He destroyed the ID he’d entered the country with beyond recognition and stuffed it under the driver’s seat. Nobody would have any idea who that guy was.

  He risked looking up from behind the seat and saw they were approaching the base’s checkpoint. A pair of armored personnel carriers flanked the concrete barriers, and he realized how fast the taxi was moving.

  “Whoa, slow down!” he barked in Afar. “We don’t want to give the guards the wrong idea.”

  “Okay, boss man.”

  The driver slowed and soon a young soldier on one of the APCs waved them to stop.

  “Stop and identify yourself!”

  “I’m good from here,” Vat said and pushed seven $100 bills at the driver. The man took them, amazed. “Good life, my friend.” The driver nodded as Vat slowly got out, holding the bag in one hand, high and to the side.

  “My name is Alex Finnigan. I’m a US military contractor!”

  “Keep your arms raised, turn around, and slowly back toward the APC.”

  He did as he was ordered.

  Five minutes later, the Range Rover drove off.

  An hour later, he was climbing into an idling UH-60 Blackhawk.

  “Get me out of here,” he said to the pilot.

  “As soon as my other passengers arrive,” she replied.

  Vat grunted, sat down, and strapped in. At least he was on his way out of Mogadishu. Soon he’d be on a chopper back to the world. Once there, his papers would have him on a flight to the Czech Republic in a few hours. He would put the shit back in the horse once he got there.

  It wasn’t too late.

  He kept telling himself that, even as he stepped up into the Blackhawk…

  * * * * *

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  55 Tauri B, August, 2125

  Vat blinked and sat up with a start, the after-images of a horrific scene spinning away from his conscious mind. He was in a Blackhawk spinning toward the water. There was fire, smoke, and the screams of people and tortured metal.

  “What the fuck?” he asked and looked around.

  He was in a gray room. It was obviously a hospital, though it lacked all the usual technological accoutrements. The air smelled funny, like a military flight but not, and the light had an unusual quality to it. All the furnishings were utilitarian, cheap and drab. A sandy-haired man in a strange flight suit was sitting nearby. He didn’t have any insignia, and the Velcro patches were missing except rank and name. Vat instantly recognized him from the helo, though he was dressed differently now, making the dream real with a sudden lurch.

  “We crashed,” Vat said, his throat dry.

  “Sort of,” the man said. He had bronze oak leaves on his shoulders. So, a major then. The name tag said, “Murphy.”

  “Care to explain?” Vat asked.

  “In good time. How do you feel?”

  “Fine, for a dead guy.”

  “You’re obviously not dead,” Murphy said.

  “Did I miss my flight?”

  “You could say that,” Murphy said under his breath, but Vat caught it and narrowed his eyes. Murphy plucked a file from a case sitting on the floor next to him and opened it. Printed on the front was an image of Vat from his DoD contractor dossier, taken two years after his departure from the US military. He’d always hated that damned picture.

  “Alex Finnigan,” Murphy said, reading. “Contractor with the Department of Defense.” He read the appropriate number. “You’ve done dozens of mid-level operations over the previous six years, and all reviews were favorable. You make a modest income, have a house in Tulsa, lease a 1990 Corolla, and pay your bills on time. It doesn’t say here if you help your neighbor take out the trash.”

  “Sure, all records with the DoD are public. You going to—?”

  Murphy held up a hand, silencing him. “Let me finish. A review of your dossier in 1991 revealed several inconsistencies, such as rental receipts not matching locations and a link to a Cayman Island offshore account. In essence—” he held up the file, “—this is all bullshit.” He dropped it into the case.

  Fucking hell.

  Murphy pulled out another file. This one had Vat’s old US Army file picture. He hated that one even more. “Victor Allen Thomas, First Lieutenant, US Army.” He read off Vat’s serial number. “You generally go by an acronym of your three names…Vat?” He looked up at Vat who nodded. “Graduated high school in Romulus, Michigan, summa cum laude, went to UM, where you got a Bachelor’s of S
cience in Global Logistics and Supply Chain Management.

  “ROTC. Commissioned August 1984. Branched 92D, Aerial Delivery and Material, but you often worked with the quartermaster’s office.”

  Murphy went on to detail Vat’s career until the end. “Promoted to first lieutenant in 1987, and you received a general discharge the same year.” Murphy moved the papers around, and Vat realized they were not the typical US government printouts. These had a strange metallic look to them. “Interestingly enough, there is no detail on the reason for the general discharge, be it court proceedings, JAG, or general officers’ notes. Just a separation order.”

  Murphy looked at Vat, who merely shrugged. He didn’t feel like giving the major any more information than he had given anyone else over the years. The major could go pound sand.

  “Well, fast forward to your alter ego, Mr. Finnigan-slash-Thomas. Under the guise of your contractor license, and with contacts no doubt made during your time as an officer in the US military, you embarked on a career as an international arms dealer. A rather lucrative one, based on the aforementioned Cayman Islands account. At the time of your accident, you had a balance—”

  “So, the helo did crash? We were shot down?”

  “Yes, Vat, without a shred of doubt. You, me, and everyone else aboard that helicopter should have died. But only the copilot and crew chief were killed.”

  “How is that possible?”

  Murphy put the file into the case, sat back, and sighed. He looked at Vat like a principal would a student who’d landed in his office for the umpteenth time. “I don’t know what to do with you, honestly.”