by Matt Rogers
He hadn’t been expecting much — certainly not incriminating evidence that would reveal the exact reason for all the breathing apparatus’.
It still crippled his morale, though.
He was nowhere close to the truth. He had nothing to go off besides the remnants of something horrific. Every voice that could reveal anything about the situation had either fled, or been killed.
He never would have forced anything out of the trio of tribesmen down the trail anyway.
Dejected, he thumbed a button on the side of the video camera and the flashlight on the front of the device flickered into life.
For no good reason, he pointed the white beam down the length of the cave, peering further into the mountain.
The light glinted off a set of beady eyes watching him in the darkness.
17
He had the Jericho trained on the face in the blink of an eye.
There was no fear — nothing but intense focus and concentration. He tuned out everything else in his surroundings and narrowed his vision onto the eyes sparkling in the darkness. He dropped the video camera in one swift motion. The device clattered to the cave floor and came to rest on its side, flashlight still aimed directly down the length of the tunnel.
The tension amplified.
No-one made a move.
No-one made a sound.
Then the eyes began to move…
…and Slater froze.
He assumed the man had been crouching down, hovering a foot off the ground for tactical purposes. But when the head floated slowly forward, drawing closer to the mouth of the cave, he realised that it was no man at all.
It was an animal.
The creature slunk toward him, deadly silent, shackles raised. Slater scrutinised the outline for a long moment, until finally the beast came close enough and the camera light illuminated it.
A red desert wolf.
Eyes glowing menacingly in the dark.
Slater hesitated, unsure whether to gun the animal down where it stood. He knew little about the beasts, other than the fact that a handful of them roamed the desert. He didn’t imagine they would be unnecessarily confrontational, but to reassure himself he kept the Jericho fixed on the wolf’s snout.
Then it drew closer still, and he took a back step, recoiling in horror at what he saw.
In all his years as an operative, through all the mind-boggling situations he’d been involved in and the horrific sights he’d been witness to…
… never had he seen anything quite like this.
The animal limped pathetically into view, barely able to hold itself upright due to its condition. As it stumbled and lurched into clear view, its features illuminated by the harsh white light still emanating out of the video camera, Slater found himself completely stunned by what he was witnessing.
The wolf was coated from head-to-toe in crimson blood. The liquid seemed to leak out of every orifice, dripping gruesomely from its mouth and both its nostrils. The beast’s eyes — usually piercing and calm — were wracked with pain, bloodshot and rabid. As Slater’s muscles temporarily locked up in confusion, the wolf bowed its head and retched, hacking up a glob of blood onto the cave floor. It looked up at Slater, locking eyes with him.
For a moment, everything else fell away.
He stared into the gaze of the helpless creature. The wolf could barely stand, only able to drag itself out of the position it had been resting in to respond to the new arrival. When it made it into the glare of the camera light, it snarled once — feebly, with nothing behind the gesture — then collapsed in a pool of its own blood, its breath coming in rattling gasps.
Slater lowered the Jericho, shocked.
The first idea that came to mind was that the tribesmen were more sadistic than he had ever thought possible. Perhaps they had captured this red desert wolf when it wandered curiously into their encampment, and used it as a prisoner to take out their frustrations at the world. It was a grim idea, but Slater had been dealing with the unimaginable for as long as he could remember.
Nowadays, nothing surprised him.
But that didn’t make any sense. The wolf didn’t appear to be trapped in this cave.
It didn’t explain the gas masks, or the breathing apparatus’, or the fact that half the mountainside had been hastily deserted.
Then a second thought came roaring into his head, along with the blood rush of adrenalin flooding his senses.
Perhaps this was the reason for the masks. Perhaps this was a weapon like nothing he had ever seen before, a sinister infection that caused symptoms straight out of a horror film.
Perhaps the wolf had been a test subject.
As soon as the thought entered his mind, he turned on his heel and broke into a full-pelt sprint for the mouth of the cave. A terrifying wave of nausea washed over him, bringing with it the notion that he might already be infected. He knew enough about bioweapons to recognise the dangers of a test subject out in the open.
Probably why the mountain’s abandoned, he thought.
He didn’t understand how the tribesmen could have been so foolish.
He never would have imagined that a test would have been carried out anywhere other than a laboratory, expertly sealed to prevent any unexpected consequences.
Then again, that didn’t exactly align with the intellect of highlander tribesmen.
Still in disbelief, he broke out into open ground, legs pumping with maximum exertion.
Where on earth did they get a bioweapon?
What the hell is it exactly?
How virulent are the particles?
What are they going to do with it?
Question after question bombarded him relentlessly, to the point where he shut everything out and focused solely on the breath pounding in his lungs and his feet pounding against the smooth rock.
He made it to the encampment — halfway across the promontory, several dozen feet from the cave — and snatched up a gas mask from underneath the tarpaulin sheet on his way through. He never eased off the pace. The mask would likely achieve nothing, but if remnants of the virus hung ominously in the air all around the plateau, he wanted to use every available opportunity to avoid inhaling a particle.
Maybe it didn’t matter.
Maybe he was already doomed to the grisliest death imaginable.
With his heartbeat pounding in his ears and the foggy breathing mask pressed awkwardly to his face, Slater found his senses clouded. He could barely see where he was going, let alone concentrate on his surroundings.
It meant that — as he tore across the encampment and burst out between a pair of mud brick huts on the opposite side — he didn’t hear the pick-up truck barrelling in his direction.
He didn’t even know anyone else was in the area.
So when the hood of the vehicle crunched into his abdomen — a head-on, albeit slow-moving collision — and flung him off to the side, he couldn’t believe what was happening until it was too late.
Again?
He thudded into the rock, rolled once, twice. Lost the gas mask in a frantic scramble. It tumbled away.
Sizing up the situation in an instant, he made out the shape of another Land Cruiser — this one jet black — towering over him, having screeched to a halt alongside him. It had been on its way into the encampment when it hit Slater hard enough to cause serious injury.
He spotted automatic weapons in the hands of the men piling out of the cabin. They were panicked, scrambled, unfocused. They hadn’t spotted the location he’d come to rest at just yet.
Fuck, he thought.
Instinct took over, and he jammed the Jericho desperately into the back of his waistband, hiding it from sight.
He had a zero percent chance in a head-on gunfight against three heavily-armed hostiles.
It was time to play the role of an innocent, hopelessly-lost tourist.
Long shot — but the only chance he had.
He prayed that he wouldn’t end the day in a bodybag.
18
‘Hey!’ he screamed, contorting his features into twisted terror. ‘Help!’
There were three weapons in his face before he had the chance to say anything else. He stared up at the steel and the faces beyond, wondering if this would be it, if a decade of defying the odds and making it out of situation after situation with his life would come to an abrupt end on a scorching Yemeni mountainside.
It would only take a single twitch of a trigger finger to send him into the great beyond.
With nothing else to do but feign naivety and hope for the best, he studied the features of the three men holding the weapons.
They were vastly different to the initial trio he’d encountered. These men must have come from Qasam, unless there was another way up to the promontory.
Two of them wore neatly pressed, official-looking military uniform. Slater noted the plush black caps on their heads and the shiny combat boots on their feet. The breast pocket of each outfit sported some kind of official military insignia, but Slater had no idea who or what it symbolised.
The pair looked to be in their early twenties, youthful yet determined. There was no hesitation in their eyes. They were ready to kill on this mountain, if it was required.
The other man hung back, wielding a similarly fearsome rifle — another Kalashnikov — but dressed differently to the two soldiers. He wore the traditional dress of the other tribesmen, albeit with a little more flair. He was older and angrier, with sharp lines creased into his forehead. Slater put his age at somewhere near sixty. Despite his cracked skin and sun-scorched features, he looked agile, sporting a wiry frame mostly covered by traditional cloth.
‘Help me,’ Slater said, pointing to himself, making eye contact with each of the soldiers in turn.
The older man might see straight through his lies, but Slater was banking on the inexperience of the soldiers to save his life. There could be little doubt as to how he had ended up here. But there was always the chance that…
‘You are American?’ one of the soldiers said, scowling.
Slater paused. He hadn’t been expecting that. ‘Yes. You speak English?’
All three barrels remained trained directly on his face.
The soldier nodded. ‘Little bit. Just me. These two — no.’
‘Who are you?’ Slater said. ‘Please help. I don’t mean any trouble — I just want to get the hell out of here, man.’
‘What are you doing?’
‘Lost. Very lost.’
The soldier scowled, staring around at the plateau. ‘No. Not lost. Up here for something.’
Slater widened his eyes, charging his expression with fear, shaking his head from side to side and stammering for relief. ‘Definitely not. Very lost. Took a wrong turn. Someone was shooting at me. He killed three people down there.’
It caused the soldier to hesitate. That was all the reprieve Slater needed. Immediately, the life-or-death tension injected into the confrontation melted away, enough to convince Slater that he would make it through the next minute without catching a bullet. He’d slid enough intrigue and mystery into his vague statements to make the soldiers want to know more.
‘Shooting?’ the soldier said. ‘Explain.’
‘Can I get up?’
The soldier looked across at his comrades. The other soldier shook his head vigorously. The elderly tribesman paused for a long moment, regarding Slater with an intense stare. Then he nodded once, barely noticeable.
‘Yes,’ the first soldier said. ‘Up. Now.’
Slater clambered slowly to his feet, keeping his arms spread to indicate that he meant no harm. He stood up, and a searing hot flash of pain gripped his mid-section. He winced, but avoided doubling over in agony. The Land Cruiser hadn’t been travelling fast, but even a ten mile-per-hour impact with a truck hurt like all hell.
He wondered if he had torn a muscle.
Goddamn hope not.
‘W-who are you?’ Slater stammered, hunching over to accentuate defeat and submission. He didn’t want them thinking he might put up a fight at any moment.
The two soldiers shifted in their body language, dropping their guards ever so slightly.
The elderly tribesman was too experienced for that.
He remained deathly still, unwavering with the grip of his Kalashnikov.
The first guard jabbed a finger in the direction of the old man. ‘This is Sayyid. He leads this camp. What are you doing on his premises?’
‘Like I said,’ Slater muttered. ‘I’m completely lost.’
‘This is a long way to get lost,’ the man said, raising an eyebrow. ‘Long way up the mountain.’
He stepped a little closer and re-aligned his aim. Slater shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. He wasn’t going anywhere fast.
They were still highly suspicious.
And they had every reason to be.
Behind the pair of soldiers, Sayyid cast a dark look around the encampment. His beady eyes flicked across the contents of the site. He grumbled under his breath, and his gaze wandered across to where the gas mask lay wedged between two sheets of rock, half of it buried in the crevasse. It had skittered away when Slater had been hit by the vehicle.
The man’s eyes widened at the sight of it.
Slater recognised a shift in the atmosphere. Suspicion turned to outright disbelief. He watched Sayyid freeze as he noticed the gas mask. The elderly man raised a finger and pointed it accusingly at the mask. His eyes locked onto Slater, full of questions and anger.
The first soldier got the drift of Sayyid’s discontent. ‘What were you doing with that?’
Slater shrugged, feigning innocence. ‘It looked strange. I picked it up. Please, I don’t know what’s going on.’
Sayyid scowled and shook his head. The man strode away, heading for the cave on the opposite side of the encampment.
The cave containing the infected desert wolf.
Slater hesitated. There were a thousand thoughts racing through his brain — and he couldn’t let any of them show.
Was the elderly man involved with this?
Was he oblivious?
There was too much happening to process. The terror of a potential infection had been temporarily subdued by the arrival of the new party, but now that an uncomfortable silence had settled over the encampment Slater had all the time in the world to worry.
He watched Sayyid continue his strides and disappear into the mouth of the cave.
Ten seconds later, a yell emanated from the darkness.
Slater froze.
The outburst wasn’t typical of someone who had encountered a shocking sight. It sounded more like frustration.
Sayyid was involved.
And he knew that Slater hadn’t been here for no reason.
The contents of the cave had clearly been tampered with.
The elderly man came hurrying out of the mouth of the cave, back into the sunshine, pointing another accusing finger at Slater from across the promontory.
He began to bark a command to the pair of soldiers holding Slater at gunpoint.
Both men turned their heads ever so slightly to listen to the tribesman’s orders.
Slater had no doubts as to what Sayyid was demanding.
Kill him.
He reached out, wrapped a hand around the thin barrel of the nearest Kalashnikov, yanked the gun away from his own face, and broke the guy’s leg with a single vicious side kick.
19
The first soldier — the man who spoke rudimentary English — had been standing far too close for comfort. It played to Slater’s strengths. He thrived in close quarters combat.
Incredibly foolish from a tactical standpoint, but the guy had likely been trying to intimidate.
Slater didn’t imagine that the Yemen military were at the forefront of combat strategy.
In fact, he doubted they had any experience against highly-trained combatants.
It would be disastrous for them.
The
first soldier slackened the grip on the Kalashnikov as his right leg gave out completely. Slater heard the audible snap of bone as he slammed his shin into the side of the guy’s knee, but by the time the man hit the ground Slater already had the weapon trained on the second guy.
He didn’t quite have the urge to kill the soldiers.
Not just yet.
He had no idea if they were truly involved in this or not.
So — before the man could even register how the situation had changed — Slater lowered the barrel of the AK-47 and sent two rounds through the guy’s kneecap, blisteringly loud.
He ducked for cover behind the rear tray of the Land Cruiser as Sayyid let loose with a volley of shots from across the plateau.
There was nothing like the pulse-pounding jolt of energy that came from the emergence of combat to eliminate the fear of infection. Slater forgot all about the presence of the mystery virus as he flattened himself against one of the Land Cruiser’s panels.
Heavy gunfire cracked all around him.
Sayyid was a good shot.
There was no noise from the two downed soldiers on the other side of the Toyota. Slater imagined they were tending to their injuries. The man who had been shot would be scrambling to stop the blood flow, fully aware of the consequences if he let himself bleed out. The man with the broken leg was less of a threat, seeing that Slater was clutching the guy’s weapon.
The torrent of bullets ceased temporarily. Whether Sayyid was out of bullets or had simply chosen to hold his fire, Slater kept himself pressed against the Toyota regardless.
After a beat of hesitation, he leant around the rear tray, taking a peek through the middle of the encampment.
There was no sign of Sayyid.
The mouth of the cave lay empty.
Then, movement.
Slater silently raised the barrel of his Kalashnikov.
An animal limped slowly into the light, emerging from within the cave.
The red desert wolf.
Still bleeding horrendously.
The rabid animal had heart — that much was clear. It hadn’t accepted its death yet. Slater stared into its broken eyes and paused.