by Matt Rogers
The reality was something a little more visceral to behold.
King made it to the first truck and switched off the merciful part of his brain, like flicking a light switch. It wouldn’t do him any good, not in an environment like this. He wasn’t about to spare anyone that surrendered. They’d come here to kill him, and that, ultimately, was that.
So King got his hands on the first attacker — unarmed — and bundled him up against the side of the vehicle and thrust the blade up through the underneath of his chin. It skewered his brain and killed him on impact. King dropped his corpse and pivoted and found the second guy baring the switchblade, so King rammed a leg kick into the guy’s calf, nearly snapping the bone clean in two, sending him tumbling off his feet and the knife spilling from his grip as he reached for his leg…
So King forgot about him for half a second, just enough time to lunge past and stab the switchblade down so it plunged into the third guy’s chest, who moaned and went pale and crumpled.
King left the knife in his chest and pivoted back and stomped down on the second guy’s head, knocking him clean out, maybe killing him. No way to know for sure without a detailed analysis. And there wasn’t time for that.
King bent down and picked up the second guy’s knife and noticed the other six combatants realising what was unfolding, shrugging off their hesitation, preparing themselves to charge all at once.
King couldn’t let that happen.
Instead of meeting them head-on in battle, he leapt up into the SUV’s open driver’s door and threw it into gear and accelerated and twisted the wheel.
He spotted the shocked look on the original driver’s face, but King wasn’t aiming for him. That guy was useless, a pathetic spineless goon relying on his friends to do the dirty work. He wouldn’t know how to swing a fist in anger to save his life. So King spun away from him and aimed for one of the armed knife-wielders by the second car.
The hood crushed the guy before he could get out of the way.
King twisted the wheel again and crushed the second knife-wielder against the side of the second SUV.
Then he leapt out, barely registering the jarring impact above the guttural roar of adrenaline, and intercepted the third man with a flying crash-tackle.
The third guy wasn’t armed, so when they spilled to the ground in a tangle of limbs King stabbed him twice in the chest, thwack-thwack, and rolled to his feet.
Six down.
An uneasy silence stretched out as the final three men hovered by their vehicle, unsure how to interpret the shocking ballet of violence that had played out before them.
King turned to the original driver, and half-smiled back.
The driver’s own smile vanished, replaced by shock and awe.
‘Watch this,’ King said.
He advanced.
15
Slater kept sprinting flat out, barrelling toward the trio silhouetted in the doorway like a freight train.
Which, despite the fact he was unarmed, can be wholly terrifying when you’re not expecting it.
Two of them backed off. Only a few steps, but enough to show they were hesitant. They’d expected their target to waltz into the dining room, oblivious, and stab him in the back before he had the chance to react. Now one of their own was lying broken and unconscious on the hallway floor, and their target was running directly at them, apparently without a care in the world.
So of course two of them backed up.
They probably wanted the openness of the dining area to work with. They didn’t like the hallway. It was dark and cramped and favoured the guy who was outnumbered.
Like a miniaturised version of the Spartans at Thermopylae.
If all three of them had backed up, it would have been a brilliant strategic manoeuvre.
But one of them stayed right where he was, his teeth bared and his knife at the ready.
Brave.
No doubt about that.
But exactly what Slater wanted.
He slowed right down, leaving a few feet of space to work with, so he didn’t just sprint straight into a knife to the gut. When he slowed, the attacker swung the blade, as Slater expected him to.
It missed.
Not by much.
But it missed.
Slater heard the air whoosh, and the realisation struck him that the knife would have gutted him like a pig if it struck home. But then the blade carried on past, opening up a glorious half-second of opportunity. Slater kicked the guy squarely in the balls — an age-old guarantee of incapacitation — and when he buckled, Slater used the same leg to bend into a knee and drive upwards, impacting kneecap to forehead. It made a horrific noise as it slammed home.
The guy pitched forward and crumpled to the floor.
Slater stepped over him.
Picked up the knife.
Weighed up the distances, and the angles.
Figured he could take the risk.
He threw the switchblade like a fastball, making sure it struck blade-first. It was a small square blade, not a machete, so it didn’t embed itself in the enemy’s throat and stick there. Instead it grazed past his neck, cutting him deep along the way, failing to sever an artery but giving him something to seriously worry about. The guy felt the warm blood flowing down his neck and instinctively reached for his throat, shocked by the sudden pain.
Before he could recover, Slater was right there in his face.
Stomped down with the sole of his boot on the guy’s kneecap, shattering it, then simply muscled the knife out of his hands and used it to cut his throat properly, finishing the job.
The third guy put his hands up in surrender.
Slater stepped forward and opened up his hips and pivoted and swung his shin in a tight curve, landing it on the guy’s neck, and his eyes rolled back into his head and he went down awkwardly and hit the back of his skull on the edge of the nearest table on the way down.
He’d be out for a while.
Maybe even permanently affected.
Slater found it hard to care when the man had been ready to slit his throat seconds earlier.
Three bodies thunked to the floor. The thuds were hollow in the now-empty teahouse, and Slater realised with sudden clarity that there hadn’t been staff here in a long time. The driver and the guide had used this empty ghost town as a staging ground for an assassination attempt.
On that note…
Slater turned on his heel and went straight back the way he’d come.
To find Utsav.
16
King came in fast and hard, because that scared the shit out of combatants unaccustomed to violence.
Sure, they might be tough men with hard lives in the mountains. No doubt they’d been given some training in how to most effectively kill someone with a blade. But that was all theory and practice on target dummies. Not real, visceral, up-close madness.
King lived in that madness.
It was like his second home.
The closest guy recoiled — partly because he’d just seen six of his comrades die and figured his chances weren’t any better, but mostly because there was a two-hundred-and-twenty pound brute right there in his face. Instead of swinging with the knife he brought his hands up in an awkward defence, so King ducked low and plunged his own blade into the guy’s stomach. It happened so fast that he barely saw it himself.
Shlock.
In and out.
The guy went down.
But before he went all the way down King kicked him so hard in the chest that he plummeted back into the SUV, but not before catching one of the other thugs along the way. Both of them careened into the chassis and bounced off, and on the rebound King cut through the air with his right elbow, slicing it vertically upwards, catching the second guy in the nose with the elbow and in the forehead with his forearm. The impact rattled King’s shoulder, but rattled the guy’s brain harder. Both of them went down, one clutching his blood-stained gut, the other unconscious.
King stepped over them, and then i
t was like clockwork.
The last armed man was scared as hell. He dropped the knife and put his hands up. A natural human impulse when you think you have the advantage, then lose it all in a rapid frenzy of violence. He was probably friends with some of the men King had just killed. And although he had a weapon, he’d just seen eight of his colleagues meet the same fate, no matter how talented they were with a knife.
So he surrendered.
King wasn’t about to waste time tying him up.
He strode over, grabbed the guy by the head with two open palms, and drove his skull into the side of the SUV.
Lights out.
The village went quiet. It slipped straight back into its usual monotony, broken only by the occasional chilling howl of the wind. The cloud still lingered, draped over the half-demolished buildings like spiderwebs. King caught his breath, feeling every beat of his heart in his chest, and waited for the adrenaline to dissipate.
He didn’t need to rush.
The original driver wasn’t going anywhere in a hurry.
He was the only one left outside who was both alive and conscious.
King walked right up to him, kicked him in the side of the leg, and pressed a heavy hand down on his shoulder when he sank to his knees.
He lowered the knife into the guy’s field of view.
He said, ‘Still no English?’
The driver, pale and shaking, tried to keep his composure. He shrugged, as nonchalantly as he could manage. ‘Little bit of English.’
‘I think your English is more than acceptable. Shame you didn’t tell us sooner.’
‘You kill me?’
‘Maybe. I’m still considering it.’
‘You man of honour. You no kill unarmed man.’
‘I’ve done it before. Many times.’
‘That no good.’
‘And this is?’ King said, sweeping an arm around the village.
Nine men lay dead or unconscious.
‘You scary man,’ the driver said. ‘I don’t know what I get myself into. I no like this. We paid money.’
‘By who?’
‘Can’t say.’
‘Yes, you can.’
‘No. Can’t say. Don’t know. Utsav organise.’
‘Where is Utsav?’
‘Inside.’
‘With my friend?’
‘Yes. But maybe Utsav not alive anymore. If your friend like you.’
‘He’s a lot like me.’
‘Then no good for Utsav.’
‘You’re right about that.’
‘You still going to kill me?’
‘Maybe.’
‘I have family.’
‘So do I. Didn’t deter you.’
‘What that mean? Deter?’
King squatted down, so he could look the man in the eyes. He pointed an accusatory finger toward his nine incapacitated buddies.
‘They didn’t care about my family. Why should I care about yours?’
‘Because I don’t know what I’m doing. I just follow orders.’
‘I’ve heard that before.’
King got to his feet and said, ‘I still haven’t decided. So, until then…’
He kicked the driver in the side of the head, hard enough to put him out cold. Then he straightened up and adjusted his jacket and exhaled a cloud of breath into the chilly mountain air.
Silence.
Dead silence.
The village was like an anthropological exhibit.
And already King’s bones were heavy, wracked with tiredness, plagued by the intensity of that sort of exertion. He listened for the sounds of struggle inside the teahouse, but he didn’t hear a thing. Either Slater had already dealt with his own threats, or it was far too late to help. Either way, there was no need to rush.
But King wanted to know all the same.
Because the alternative would be … disastrous.
To both Slater’s wellbeing, and his own mental health.
As much as they might have fought, King realised with sudden clarity that he didn’t have anyone he was closer to in the whole world. Anyone who understood him like Slater, who shared the same mutually traumatising past.
They were brothers.
So King powered straight into the building, no matter the consequences.
He plunged into darkness, went to the end of the corridor, and listened hard.
He thought he heard a creak to his left.
He turned that way, surged forward a few steps, and threw the door open.
He came face to face with Utsav.
17
The guide was suspended from the wooden rafters by his belt, his face dark blue.
His body swung gently in the muddy light.
King paused in the doorway, watching, thinking.
On the outside, as stoic as always.
On the inside, strangely hollow.
He’d seen so much death in his life. He’d caused most of it himself. What was one more body to add to the count?
But something about this one set his nerves on edge, made him shiver involuntarily. He quietly stepped back and closed the door and put his hands on his hips and turned—
Slater almost walked straight into him.
Their switchblades came up in mutual anticipation, but as soon as they recognised each other in the semi-darkness they relaxed.
Slater said, ‘You okay?’
‘Yeah. I’m not hurt.’
‘No, I mean … you look like you’re about to throw up.’
‘I might.’
‘Why?’
King jerked a thumb toward the closed door. ‘Our guide’s in there.’
‘Did you kill him?’
‘Didn’t have to.’
Slater let the words sink in.
He stood there, chewing his bottom lip, figuring out how to respond.
Eventually, he said, ‘How’d he do it?’
‘His belt.’
‘Damn.’
‘Are you genuinely disappointed?’
‘Only because I wanted answers.’
‘Me too, buddy.’
‘How many did you handle?’
‘Ten. Plus the driver.’
‘Jesus Christ.’
‘You?’
‘Four. Plus the guide. But he handled himself, I guess.’
‘That’s a sizeable force.’
‘They were amateurs.’
‘Doesn’t matter what they were. They tried to kill us all the same.’
‘Who are they?’
‘If I had to guess … they’re the desperate. I’m not about to feel sorry for them, but I doubt there’s much motivation in their heads besides instant gratification. It’s the same everywhere, not just here. All you need to do is find those with nothing left to live for. Who think they’re just a cog in a machine and that life is passing them by. Offer them a life-changing sum of money to stick a knife in someone’s back and they’ll do it without blinking.’
‘Did you leave any of yours alive?’
‘A few. They’ll be concussed, though.’
‘We could quiz them.’
‘They won’t speak English.’
‘You sure about that?’
‘On the off chance they do, we won’t get any information out of them. You think they know details?’
Slater turned on his heel and walked away.
King watched him leave, flabbergasted.
‘What are you—?’
‘Follow me,’ Slater said.
They made it to the dining area, now seemingly brighter as the murkiness outside intensified. Under the artificial glow they stared down at the three men Slater had incapacitated.
One was dead, the other was bleeding out, and the third was still twitching in unconsciousness.
Slater said, ‘Look closely at them.’
King looked closely.
It only confirmed his prior suspicions.
All three were small men, almost certainly Nepali, with slim build
s and old faded clothes. They wore a mixture of plaid shirts and sweaters made of thin scratchy wool, and pants made of coarse fabric. They were locals.
Slater said, ‘You really think Parker’s bodyguard is behind this?’
‘Why would this exclude Perry?’
‘The connections. Seems he has a grip on every trekking company in Kathmandu if he’s the mastermind.’
‘Not really,’ King said. ‘You ever thought about how many trekking companies there are in that city? We need to speak to Violetta. Maybe she went through the same organisation that Parker did.’
‘She wouldn’t have. Unless she’s stupid.’
King didn’t bite. He was too deep in thought.
He said, ‘It does make it less likely, though. I’ll give you that.’
‘What do we do now?’
‘Keep driving.’
‘You think that’s the best idea, given…?’
He didn’t finish the sentence. He just gestured to the hostiles he’d mauled.
King thought harder.
Then he said, ‘I don’t see why not. If it’s the porter, then we’re either wrapped up in something larger than we thought and not safe anywhere, or we’re in the clear. There’s a fair chance that was the entirety of the forces he had available. Might be smooth sailing from here on out.’
‘I doubt that very much.’
‘Based on what?’
‘Almost every operation we’ve ever been on.’
‘Correlation isn’t causation—’
‘Yeah, yeah,’ Slater said. ‘I know. But honestly, when has it ever been smooth sailing?’
‘Noted.’
‘I think we should wait to see what Violetta has to say.’
‘Are you getting cold feet?’
‘If we make it to Phaplu, we might as well paint a target on our backs. Utsav and the driver both knew where they were taking us. They’ll have something in place for contingencies.’
‘Or they planned on overwhelming us with fourteen men right here,’ King said. ‘They didn’t know who we were, exactly. They just knew we were trouble.’
Slater said, ‘Your call.’
‘We keep going.’
‘Because of a hunch?’
‘Because of the girl,’ King said. ‘She’s still missing. No matter who’s behind it. Clock’s ticking.’