by Dale Brown
“I want to hold the Osprey off as long as I can,” he told Melissa. “It’s a straight shot for us through that field and then up the hill and over. Flash and I can get there pretty fast. Can you keep up?”
“I can keep up.”
Danny led the way at a strong trot. The circuitry in the night vision screen on his helmet could turn the dull dusk as bright as day if he wanted, but Danny found that too distracting: it looked so real that it was hard to remember it was just being synthesized by the sensors; in his opinion, that made it easier to subconsciously miss something. So he stayed with traditional night vision mode, which made it clear that he wasn’t seeing the entire picture; the difference could be critical.
When they reached a narrow dirt road on the other side of the field, Danny picked up his pace, sprinting about thirty yards to a stream that emptied into a small pond near the railroad tracks about a quarter mile away. The streambed was rocky, and he had to pick his way, glancing back every so often to check on Melissa behind him. Her breathing was labored but she was keeping pace.
“Subject jeep has stopped in residential area,” declared MY-PID.
“Why?” asked Danny.
“Insufficient data, operand uncertain,” said the Voice, getting technical on him.
“Display jeep video feed in lower screen one,” said Danny.
The image from the Global Hawk popped into the lower-left-hand side of his visor. It was grainy, magnified beyond its optimum size. Danny couldn’t make out much more than an indiscriminate crowd.
He slowed, then stopped so he could focus on the image. He was worried that Li Han was there.
“Subject identified as Milos Kimko — confirm he’s at the jeep site,” Danny told MY-PID.
“Confirmed.” A box appeared around the figure in the passenger seat of the jeep.
“Is Li Han there? Subject code-named Mao Man — is he at the jeep site?”
“Negative.”
“Confidence level?”
“Confidence level 98.3 percent,” said the computer tartly.
“Where is he?”
The building two miles east of town was highlighted.
“Confidence level?”
“Confidence level 98.2 percent,” snapped the computer.
* * *
Melissa saw Danny stop a few yards ahead. Even though she was straining, she waited until she caught up to him before slowing. She huffed for a few moments, trying to get her breath back.
“I thought you’d tire eventually,” she said to him.
He turned toward her. With the shield on his helmet down he looked like a space traveler.
“What’s that?” he asked, pushing the shield up.
“You’re tired?”
“Just checking to make sure we got the right place.”
“Do you always run to your targets?” Melissa asked. The front of her thighs were suddenly stiff. She pumped them slowly, knowing she had to keep them loose.
“If necessary.” Danny gave her a tight yet disarming smile. “Once we bring the Osprey in, the Russian will know something’s going on. If word gets to Li Han, we’ll spook him.”
“I see.”
“There are two possible buildings,” he told her. “We’re not sure which one they meant, but they’re close to each other. We’ll check them out, then set up an ambush. Ready?”
Not really, she thought, but there was no way she would admit it.
* * *
Danny set out again, this time at an easier pace. They crossed the stream and trotted down in the direction of the abandoned warehouse area.
The two buildings MY-PID had marked as the possible meeting place were located right next to the tracks. One was small and squat, little more than a locker. The other, about thirty yards away, was a three-story shell, a ruin that towered over everything around it.
Danny slowed to a stop about two hundred yards from the building. The back of the house where Li Han had been when they left the bug was to his right, nearly a quarter mile away. The warehouse they had raided was in the complex, a half mile to the east, directly on his left as he looked at the three-story building.
“What do you think, Colonel?” asked Flash. “We close enough?”
“Big one first,” said Danny, magnifying the image the helmet was projecting. If people were around, they were well hidden. “We check them, bug them, then swing around to the other side and wait. This way, when the Osprey comes in, we’ll have the far side covered.”
Danny lifted the visor and looked at Flash. The trooper nodded. Melissa was a few feet away, hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath.
“You all right?” Danny asked.
She held up a hand, waving at him.
“Does that mean yes or no?” he asked, coming over.
“I’m good,” she gasped. “You set a pretty quick pace.”
“I like to run, I guess.”
“So do I.” She looked up and smiled. “At least I thought I did.”
“Can you breathe?”
“I can breathe,” she snapped.
“Come on around this way. We’re going to check the buildings. If they’re empty, we’re going to bug them, and then duck back to a spot over there where we can cover them both.”
“What if they’re not empty?”
“Then we’ll deal with it.”
Chapter 19
Duka
The body they dragged through the yard of the house and into the dirt road was barely recognizable as a human being. It had been battered and its clothes almost completely torn off, except for the shoes. As Kimko approached, it looked more like a collection of meat held together in a mesh sack.
Remarkably, the man was still alive. He writhed and jerked, arms flailing. Kimko watched as the men pulling him let go, ducking away as if afraid of his blows.
Two men nearby held torches; they threw a yellow hue around the semicircle of tormentors and victim. Half a dozen Sudan First soldiers stood in a loose circle watching the man as Girma walked over and laid his boot into his midsection. He placed it there gently at first, letting it rest easily on the man, who paused his writhing to stare up at him. Girma grinned, then stomped. The man curled around the blow, gasping.
Kimko saw the man’s face clearly as he turned in his direction. It was Gerard.
A shudder of revulsion ran through Kimko. If the man had any true courage, he would have died fighting rather than letting himself be captured and humiliated.
Animals.
“How great are you now, Gerard?” yelled Girma. “Now that your bodyguards and lackeys are gone? Where is your haughty manner?”
Girma kicked him in the head. Blood spurted onto Kimko’s boot. This enraged him; he stepped back, than lowered his AK-47 and fired point-blank into his enemy’s skull. The men nearby shielded their faces against the bits of flesh and blood that splattered toward them.
“Let the dogs have his body!” yelled Girma. He fired into the dead man’s midsection to emphasize his point.
A woman screamed inside the hut on the other side of the road. Gunfire quickly followed. Kimko turned in time to see three soldiers, none older than fifteen, emerge from the hut. It took absolutely no imagination to realize what they had done.
“We are in control!” yelled Girma, clapping Kimko on the back. “Come! We will go and get your airplane. You are our hero. You have made all of this possible, with your weapons.”
Chapter 20
Duka
They went to the smaller building first. Even at a trot, Melissa found it hard to keep up with Danny and Flash. They were dressed in full combat gear, helmets, vests, and heavy boots, along with their guns and assorted equipment, and yet they moved like cheetahs, leaping forward. She quickened her pace, then dropped belatedly as they hit the dirt.
“What?” she said, but either they didn’t hear or simply ignored her, rising and moving in opposite directions to flank the concrete structure. Unsure what to do, Melissa decided to follow D
anny; she half crawled, half ran in an arc behind him.
“Clear,” hissed Danny when she caught up to him.
At first she thought he was giving her some sort of command, but then realized he was telling Flash over the radio that there was no one on his side.
“Come on,” he told her. “Let’s have a look. I want to plant a bug inside.”
The only opening was a steel door, secured by a combination lock. Danny took out a small key gun — a lock-picking device that offered various small picks to work keyed locks.
“I hate picking locks,” he said.
“Here, let me see,” she told him.
Melissa took the small device — folded, it was about the size of a pocketknife — and worked the main lock on the door, clicking the tumblers quickly. But the combination lock was wedged in a way that prevented her from seeing the back. She twirled the dial a few times, then tried a popular combination, passing thirty-six, then coming back to twelve, then coming back as she gently applied pressure, hoping to find the last number.
She didn’t. The lock remained fastened.
“You’re going to have to remember some numbers for me,” she told Danny.
Holding the lock in her left hand, she put her right ring and middle fingers through the lock and began turning the dial gently back and forth, feeling for the gates. She ended with ten numbers, separated by four digits.
“What are you going to do? Try every combination?” asked Danny.
She wasn’t, just the most likely ones, which on that sort of lock were almost always the solutions. She went slowly at first, then fell into a rhythm. She got it on the fourth try.
“Here you go,” she told Danny, slipping the lock off its hasp.
He creaked the door open, dropped to his knees and peered inside.
“Forget it,” he said. “Inside’s filled with junk. They’re not meeting here.”
* * *
They were halfway to the second building when MY-PID told Danny that the Russian had just gotten into his vehicle.
“They’re on their way,” Danny told Flash over the radio. “Drop back and cover me. I’ll get some bugs down.”
“Yeah, roger.”
Danny turned back to Melissa, who was huffing next to him as he ran.
“They’re coming,” he told her. “I want you to hide over there.”
He pointed to the ditch across the road. It was about thirty yards from the building.
“What are you going to do?”
“I’ll get a bug in and get out.”
“Is Li Han coming?”
“He hasn’t made a move yet that we’ve seen. Stay back,” Danny added. “If you see anyone coming, just keep your head down. We’ll take care of it.”
He didn’t wait for her to answer, sprinting toward the building. Much of the roof had fallen in, and the UAV’s infrared camera could give MY-PID a fairly clear view into about two-thirds of the interior. There was also no door, and hence no lock. Danny stepped over a small pile of rubble into the ground floor and scanned the interior. An old desk sat to his left, surrounded by bricks and the debris. The two floors above looked like the broken teeth of a sawed-off comb, jagged and leaning down. He hopped onto the desk, reaching up to the remains of the floor above, and placed a bug there.
“Subject is estimated to be two minutes away,” warned MY-PID.
Danny jumped back down. As he turned to go, he realized he’d left two large boot prints on the top of the desk. He swept the top with his hand, but that only made things look even stranger — now the desktop was the only thing in the place not covered with dust.
Not sure what else to do, he reached his hands under and pulled the desk up onto its back, removing the top from sight. Then he spread bricks and some large beams over the area.
“Subject is thirty seconds away,” warned the computer.
“What happened to my two minutes?” he demanded.
MY-PID took the question seriously and asked him to rephrase.
Danny bolted to the door. He sprinted toward the spot where he’d left Melissa, bounding in with a head-first dive.
“Here he comes,” said Flash.
“Any sign of Li Han?”
“Negative.”
Chapter 21
Duka
Kimko got out of the jeep and walked over to the building, trying to get as much distance between himself and Girma as possible. He needed a plan to get away from him. The odds of that happening peacefully shrank exponentially with each khat leaf Girma stuffed into his mouth.
The sun had gone down about a half hour before. Li Han was undoubtedly waiting somewhere nearby, watching. Hopefully he wouldn’t be spooked by Girma and his men.
Maybe he’d kill the bastard. Now there was a possibility, Kimko thought. Maybe he could work that into the deal.
The building was a wreck, though at least this one couldn’t be blamed on Girma. Kimko took a small LED flashlight from his pocket and shone it around the place. There was a battered desk and a massive pile of debris, and nothing else.
The hell with the UAV, he decided. He was getting out of Africa as soon as possible. He’d walk if he had to.
“Where is your man!” shouted Girma, back near the truck.
Kimko could shoot the bastard himself — but could he take the bodyguards as well?
Girma walked through the door. “Where is he?” demanded the African. His AK-47 was slung under his shoulder, his hand near the trigger.
“He’s late,” said Kimko.
“Ha! You see — you cannot trust these people. Chinese.”
“He’s working with the Brothers,” said Kimko.
“Ha, the Brotherhood are cowards. You see, none of these people have the strength of Girma. Girma is a lion!”
Girma is an asshole, thought Kimko.
“How long do you wait?” Girma asked.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t wait!” shouted Girma. “You go to see him.”
“I don’t know where he is.”
Girma smiled. “You are with the lion now. Come.”
Chapter 22
Duka
The women had settled into a kind of semicomatose state of shock, huddled together next to the ruined outbuilding on the slaughterhouse property. Gunfire continued sporadically in the city, stoking up for a few minutes, then dying down, like a fitful whale surfacing for a romp before heading back to the depths. Nuri knew from MY-PID that the Sudan First army was routing Meurtre Musique. It was a murderous fight, with the defeated shown no mercy; both sides simply gunned down anyone who attempted to surrender, women and children included.
“Looks like some of them are headed in our direction,” he told Boston. “Can we call in the Osprey?”
“They ain’t gonna make it,” said Boston. “They’re waiting for Li Han to show up at the meeting. Colonel Freah wants the MV-22 to stay away until they make the attack. Might spook him.”
Naturally, thought Nuri. It was the right decision, but it didn’t make things easier for them.
“What do you think we should do?” he asked.
“I say we cross out of this field and head north,” said Boston. “We get into the brush, hide there. Sitting here makes no sense. The tangos are more than likely to come up and look in the building. I know I would.”
“You think we can get them moving?”
“We can always carry them,” said Boston. “I’ll scout down to the road and come back. Be ready.”
Nuri got up and went to the nurse, Bloom. She was holding the baby in her arms, swinging him gently back and forth. The baby’s mother was passed out next to her, slumped backward against the side of the building.
“We have to move,” he said. “The troops are coming this way.”
“They’re exhausted,” said Bloom.
“We have to move.”
“I can’t.”
“We have to.” Nuri looked at her. “You’re with MI6?”
She shook h
er head. “I was. I quit.”
“Well don’t quit now.” He reached down and helped her up. Then he looked at the woman who’d given birth. Her mouth gaped open; Nuri wasn’t even sure she was still alive until he bent close and heard her breathing.
There was no way she was moving on her own. He dropped to his knee and shifted his shoulder so he could lift her in a fireman’s carry. He rose with a grunt, stumbling back a step, not quite balanced. Then he started to move toward the road.
There was a low whistle in the air behind him.
Shit, he thought as the mortar shells began to land near the main building.
Chapter 23
Duka
“Where’s the Russian going?” Flash asked Danny over the radio as their subjects got back into the jeep.
“Damned if I know.”
“They didn’t take anything.”
“Yeah, I know. Stand by.”
Danny had MY-PID replay the translated conversation. It sounded as if the African Kimko was with knew where Li Han was.
“What’s going on?” asked Melissa.
“They didn’t want to wait for Li Han,” Danny told her. “I think they’re going to find him.”
“Shouldn’t we go there?”
“Let’s let them get there first,” said Danny. “If I bring the Osprey in, Li Han may run.”
“It would be easier to talk to you if you didn’t have the helmet on,” Melissa said. “At least flip the shield up.”
“I’m watching them,” he told her.
“Oh.”
He flipped the shield up anyway. “I’m not trying to be rude.”
“I know. I just — I’m not familiar with your gadgets.”
MY-PID told Danny the car was stopping at the house where they had placed the initial bug. He flipped down the screen again and watched the UAV feed as the men went to the door. The African who’d been talking to the Russian took the lead. Their two escorts fanned out around them. There was a flash, then they entered the building.