by Andy Remic
Nicky moved forward. ‘You really think these are the bad guys?’ she asked The Priest.
He nodded. ‘A high probability, I think. If it is as I suspect, and this splinter group of Spiral is seeking domination of our tribe, then this would make an ideal base for operations - especially as it is so easily defended and somebody with prior knowledge could use much of the equipment left behind when the base was demilitarised.’
‘We’ll soon fucking find out,’ said Jam. He pulled a balaclava over his wet face, and The Priest did likewise; now, all in black and carrying silenced sub-machine guns and pistols, the two men looked truly terrifying.
‘You be careful,’ said Nicky.
‘You two make sure we don’t get any nasty surprises from behind, yeah?’
‘Rely on us,’ rumbled Slater.
The Priest was checking Kamus through the binoculars. He tutted in annoyance. ‘There’s still a lot of activity; more Chinooks leaving the base. It seems we’ve decided to do this during one of their major operations.’
‘Good,’ snapped Jam. ‘They’ll be so busy they won’t see us coming.’
‘You wish.’ Slater grinned. ‘Go on, hole us some bad guys.’
Jam smiled grimly from behind the black mask. ‘I’ll do my best, my friend.’
The wind howled, rain lashing down in almost horizontal sheets. Jam stepped towards the edge of the precipice, and reaching up, attached the alloy skimmer with a click. It settled into place against the wide cable and a tiny blue light pulsed, then went out. Jam slipped his hand through the quick-release straps and looked out into the darkness and the storm. The cables were swaying and he swallowed hard. Deep below, falling away into nothingness, was a valley full of rocks, an abyss full of trees, a desolation of dark hell.
It would be a long, long tumble ... followed by a gravity-induced crush.
Jam breathed deeply. Then, nodding to The Priest, he pushed his Glock into his belt, gripped the skimmer with his free hand - and kicked free, wind buffeting his watering eyes as he soared out into the void ...
Feuchter awoke, cursing the pain in his limbs. His hand moved to the other side of the bed - to find nothing more than a cold depression. He scowled, ran a hand through his greying hair and sighed softly.
He rolled over with surprising agility, stood up and headed for the shower. He could smell himself, smell his own stink and the residue left behind by the Nex. The Nex always left their own curious aroma after sex; they always left their scent, their fluids, their essence.
Feuchter hated it. Hated that metallic scent, that copper stink ... hated the stench and bitter after-effects of a Nex coupling ... and yet he could not help himself, and he knowingly suffered the withdrawal symptoms for the intimate, ultimate pleasure of the high.
The comm buzzed. Feuchter halted, caught between the need to wash the stink from his skin and the need to take the call; he knew it would be important. It had to be important. A lot of bad shit was currently going down. ‘Fuck.’ He changed course, reached his desk and grabbed the receiver. ‘Yeah?’
Outside, beyond the false proximity supplied by his monitor, the sun had risen; golden light danced across the distant sand dunes. Wind shifted the sand in waves, a golden sea of rolling iridescence. But on this sour-tasting morning the incredible and magnificent sight of dawn beauty delivered via electronics did little to calm Count Feuchter’s sense of foreboding.
‘Gol is dead.’
‘Good. What about Carter?’
‘Carter is another problem.’
‘So they failed to neutralise him?’
‘More than that; he is now much more informed, has experienced the Nex first hand - and survived. Worst of all, I think he has discovered some of the links between the QIII and ourselves.’
‘Does he know that I am still alive?’
‘A possibility,’ said Durell softly.
‘I want him dead,’ said Feuchter. ‘And I want him dead and mashed into food for the Nex right fucking now!’ Feuchter’s voice had suddenly risen to an almost hysterical screech. He stood, stinking the surreal stink, his heart booming in his seemingly hollow chest cavity, hands slippery on the comm receiver.
‘Calm yourself,’ said Durell, his voice low, crackling.
‘I’ll fucking calm myself when he’s fucking dead,’ hissed Feuchter.
‘Now, you forget yourself,’ whispered Durell, his voice like a shadow passing over a grave.
Feuchter paused then; he caught the low undercurrent of danger in Durell’s voice. You did not fuck with Durell.
Nobody fucked with Durell.
He bit his lip. He closed his eyes for a moment, and then said, forcing his voice into a state of calmness which contradicted his present lack of karma, ‘What I mean to point out, sir, is that Carter has proved himself to be a very capable man - an extremely dangerous soldier. More, he has outsmarted and outstepped both the Nex and ourselves all the way to Kenya and beyond. If he knows that I live then he may come to find me. You did not see him in Schwalenberg, Durell; I have never seen a man move so fast. It was surreal. It was frightening.’ ‘Feuchter, your priority now is merely to carry on the QIII development for the next twenty-four hours, and then issue Directive 566. Carter is my problem and I can assure you that I will not fuck about with this man, frightening or not.’ The heavy sarcasm could not be missed.
Feuchter paused. Some of his earlier composure had returned and he cursed himself; he had displayed weakness. And to Durell of all people ... But he could still see those eyes, eyes that seemed to change colour - darken into molten amber - and Feuchter could remember Carter’s white-hot bullet drilling his stomach like a spinal worm, a manoeuvre so fast he had seen nothing: merely wondered why the fuck he was lying on his back with his flesh on fire...
‘Directive 566? Termination of those who refuse to convert?’
‘Yes.’ There was a cold ice-edge to Durell’s voice; the implicit challenge to Feuchter’s authority was there. ‘Most of the Q station are with us; but there is still a hard-core group who will not take a hint when it is tossed their way with candy. The days of Spiral are over - if they will not join us, they will die.’
Feuchter picked his next words with care, his mouth dry with the implications of what was about to happen... what he was being ordered to do ...
‘Sir, may I ask why now? We are not yet ready...’
‘You may. Gol is dead; but the schematics have not been recovered. And as we speak, Gol’s body has also not been recovered. If Spiral retain those fucking plans, they can build another QIII to challenge us - we may win the battle, Feuchter, but the war could never be ours. We need to be strong! Dominant! And we can’t do that until Spiral is extinct.’ Durell sighed on the comm. ‘Just carry out your orders, Feuchter: Directive 566. After twenty-four hours. You know the procedures. All working components are to be transferred to Spiral_mobile; even now Kamus is being emptied of all valuable stock.’
Feuchter’s jaw went tight and he gritted his teeth hard. He nodded - although there was nobody to witness this -and said, simply, ‘Yes, sir.’ He cut the line and stood—
Stunned—
Gazing at the monitor, which showed him the Rub al-Khali desert.
He could feel them; feel the workers, the programmers, the coders, the analysts, the developers - feel them around and above him, like workers in an ants’ warren. And he was the King Ant - with the power to close down everything with a click of his fingers.
And the order had come.
Everything of vital importance would be moved. Feuchter smiled then, a smile without humour, his tombstone teeth white against his lightly tanned skin. Moved. That was a term to use for the equipment but, unfortunately, not all of the personnel...
We know who you are, he thought.
And Spiral? Weak and powerless Spiral?
Your time has come.
Oh, how I have waited for this moment, he thought, his mind retreating over all the years, flowing back over the decades. Vi
sions flowered in his mind; flowered, blossomed, died. Feuchter remembered the Battle of Belsen; he remembered the Attack on Poland Ridge; and he remembered the mountains of Korea after the Bright War.
You are weak, Spiral, he thought.
And yes. We will make you strong again.
But first? First you must relinquish your greatest treasure...
The lives of those who will not betray you.
The Comanche flew low over the desert, its passing marked by the heavy deep thrum thrum thrum of its engines. Sunlight glittered from rotors, danced across the DPM paintwork, glinted across the smoked cockpit and the cramped occupants inside—
The Comanche banked gently, gaining altitude as it approached the mountainous regions of Northern Rub al’Khali. The Great Sandy Desert. Vast and wild and undiscovered.
Natasha gazed down at the mountains, the narrow crevasses and rocky gullies, the spirals of rocky depression, some filled with the fresh clear water of mountain streams, the occasional herd of antelope or gazelle on the lower slopes casting eyes upwards and scattering as the Comanche droned like a huge insect low overhead, below radar. Natasha spotted lone huts and small villages huddled into the sides of the mountains for protection; some villages were of mud brick, some of canvas, sheltering beneath the wide swinging woods of poplar before the land dropped sharply, dizzyingly to the lowlands south and west of the marshes and then on to the desert.
Carter stirred, his eyes coming open.
‘How are you feeling?’ asked Natasha.
‘Like a man who’s been shot.’
‘Much pain?’
‘I’ve felt better,’ said Carter.
‘Well, you’re all sewn up, and on the road to recovery. I think you’ll probably be stiff for a few weeks.’
‘Huh. Not the story of my life.’ Carter winced. He pulled himself higher in the cockpit, gazed out, down, head rattling with the noise from the twin LHTec engines. He watched the mountains roll down into deserts. He gazed out to the east, but could see no sign of any major city. He rested his head back, mind spinning, confused after recent events. He glanced at Natasha - who was staring down at the landscape flowing like a sand river below them.
‘How about you, Nats? Are you OK?’
Natasha did not turn, her gaze fixed on some distant invisible point.
‘Yes.’ Her voice was cold.
He took her hand and squeezed her warm flesh. ‘I’m sorry. About Gol - what he did was a brave thing. He did it to protect his mission, his organisation. He was the key to stopping the enemy; he knew the schematics would allow us time, would slow down the QIII’s dominance ... whoever wants that processor working obviously has big plans for its implementation. And if it really can predict the future...’
‘If?’
Carter shrugged. ‘Sounds impossible to me. But if it can - then whoever controls such a weapon, for that is what it is - whoever controls such a weapon will be powerful indeed.’
‘There’s more than that, Carter.’
Carter frowned; half in pain, half in confusion.
‘Yeah?’
‘This system - the schematics I saw, in its early stages of inception: they were mind-blowing. If it became operational in the wrong hands - it could take over world finance, it could fuck Wall Street and the Dow Jones straight up the arse. But more than that, it would control…’
‘Weapons?’
Nats nodded. ‘Everything is computerised, Carter. Missiles, strategic instructions, the whole Battlegrid ...’
‘And nuclear weapons?’
‘Oh yes, Carter.’
She glanced down at him, her eyes red-rimmed. ‘I loved Gol, Carter, y’know? Even after our fight... even though our hot words tore each other to shreds... and then, in Kenya when we made up, when he took me in his arms again, everything in the world felt right. Everything became good again and I suddenly realised how much I had lost. I loved him - and I know he died protecting Spiral but—
‘But?’
‘I can’t help thinking there is something out of place.’
‘Like the Nex?’
‘Yes.’
Carter smiled grimly. ‘If we find who controls the Nex, we find out who is after manipulating the QIII. And we know that same fucker is the one who’s been tagging Spiral and the DemolSquads.’
Natasha merely nodded, and Carter reached over and wiped away the tears that glistened on her cheeks. ‘Now is not the time to be talking of this,’ he said. ‘Maybe Gol is still alive.’ His words slipped out, sounding lame even to his own ears. But he had to force himself to say it; he had to try and help Natasha and he knew - knew that silence was sometimes a good thing but he so desperately wanted to help her, to ease her pain, to make the hurt come better ...
Natasha did not reply. She gazed back out of the window but her fingers took Carter’s hand and squeezed. He said no more but was merely there - there for her.
Carter laughed inwardly.
I wonder just how powerful this QIII really is? he thought.
And more importantly, who seeks to control it? To dominate the world?
The face of Feuchter floated into his mind; he remembered that chilling smile, and the look in the man’s eyes. He had believed; believed in his actions, without a hint of insanity. He would have killed Carter there and then and not thought twice about it...
You fucker, Carter thought.
But then - that was too easy. Feuchter was not in charge; he was a lackey, a stooge, a slave to somebody bigger and altogether more intimidating. Somebody who was trying to undermine and destroy Spiral... but Spiral was almost invisible. Its acts were legendary, but its name was unknown outside—
Realisation came like a shot from the dark.
It had to be somebody on the inside.
It had to be somebody high up in Spiral.
Betrayal.
The word tasted bad on Carter’s tongue, and he drifted off to sleep once again, loss of blood making him unnaturally weary. His dreams swirled, with hordes of Nex armed with machine pistols and masks struggling to climb over their dead comrades to get at him, to maim him, to kill him...
And then Gol was there. A colossus, a huge gun in his hands, cutting the Nex in half with streams of bullets.
‘What are they?’ cried Carter. ‘What the fuck are they?’
Gol smiled; a sickly-sweet smile; then ripped off his face to reveal the copper eyes of a Nex ...
Carter came awake with a hiss.
It was night. He was alone in the cockpit of the Comanche, a blanket wrapped around him. His tongue ran around the stale interior of his mouth and he gazed out of the cockpit, up at the clear black sky. Stars twinkled far above.
The virgin silence was infinite.
He eased himself up, released the cockpit hatch and struggled down the ladder. Natasha and Langan were seated beside a small - very small - fire. Langan was brewing coffee over the flames in a small pan.
Carter looked around warily. ‘Is it safe to light a fire here?’
‘We’ve checked out the surroundings. We’re miles from any settlements - single houses, even.’
‘I don’t like it. People can see it from miles away ...’
‘And they can hear the roar of a Comanche from even further. We needed a break, Carter. I need a break - I’m not a fucking pilot from God, you know. Have you ever seen what happens to a Comanche when the pilot nods off?’
‘How long do you need?’
‘Yeah, I’m feeling fine and thanks for your concern. About three hours and some strong coffee. And maybe then I’ll be ready to take on the vast endless unexplored open spaces of Rub al’Khali on a wild-goose chase with no real set objective ...’
‘Feuchter is at the end of it. That’s objective enough.’
‘Is he really going to have all the answers?’ asked Langan.
‘Only if I ask the right fucking questions,’ said Carter. He settled beside the fire, his blanket still wrapped around his shoulders, his face still grey
with exhaustion. He smiled weakly at Langan. ‘You seem a tad on edge, my friend.’
Langan patted Carter’s arm. ‘I could say the same about you, but you’ve recently been shot so I think I’ll forgive your tetchiness. Also, flying illegally over Rub al’Khali ground is not my idea of fun. If we’re caught trespassing in Saudi airspace ... they’ll either send everything they fucking have at us and claim some breach of international law, or it’ll kick off some major fucking United Nations fuck-up and we’ll all be in the shit.’
‘We’ll just have to stay covert, then.’
‘Easy for you to say. I’m the bastard with the responsibility.’
‘How we doing for fuel?’
‘I visited a Spiral dump while you were asleep. We’re fully fuelled and ready to rumble.’
Carter nodded, and rested his head and back against the small clump of boulders beside which Langan had built the fire. He said, his eyes closed, ‘I suggest we stay here for the rest of the night. All get some much-needed rest. How far to where you reckon this Spiral_Q computer processor development centre actually is?’
‘We’re presently about a hundred and fifty kilometres south and west of Tabuk. As long as we keep away from all major civilisation - not exactly difficult in this area -then we can carry on skirting down towards the Jaba Sawda and the desert to the west; that is our final destination. We’ll be able to head for the rough co-ords Gol gave me before he ...’ Langan’s voice trailed off. He glanced at Natasha whose eyes were closed, her face stony. ‘I can have us there within two hours, but from here on in it’s a much harder ride; there’s definitely a heavier military presence although I’m not sure why, probably soured relations with another Middle Eastern State, OPEC or the OIC. It’s also easy to spot that we shouldn’t be the fuck where we are. We’re not exactly flying in diplomatic colours; and this Comanche is quite obviously a war machine. We’ll have to move more slowly, more cautiously. And the cherry on the Bakewell is that I am unfamiliar with the terrain.’
‘I wish I hadn’t asked.’
‘It would have been better for you to go in over land.’