by Matt Rogers
‘Just to rest. I’ll be fine.’
None of them seemed like they believed him, but they didn’t want to stare, so they transitioned back into uneasy conversation amongst themselves. Slater lowered his damaged forearm underneath the table so no-one else could press him on it.
Then he sat there thinking.
About bodyguards, and porters, and black-operations coordinators, and secret presidential campaigns, and Maoist splinter groups, and special risks insurers, and professional negotiators, and severed fingers, and swollen eyelids, and slashed forearms, and twisted ankles, and sweat, and blood, and toil.
It all tied together — somehow, some way.
He was dull and unfocused. He could admit that. The mind and the body had their limits. There was only so much willpower to go around. Right now all he could focus on was his compromised physical condition, and his efforts to downplay them. There wasn’t a whole lot of mental processing power left over to connect the dots. If he was back home in a warm bed, uninjured, full of energy and vigour, he’d solve the puzzle in a heartbeat. But he was here, hanging onto his sanity by a thread in the mountains of Nepal, wondering how King was even going to get out of bed in the morning.
If he can walk tomorrow, then we have a chance.
If not…
He’d never backed out of an operation, and although they’d never explicitly discussed it, he figured King was in the same boat. It’d disrupt their identity, ruin the momentum they’d spent their whole lives building up. You put doubts in someone’s head one time, and it festers like an infection. It spreads fast, and Slater had no doubt that if he quit out here, soon enough he’d be finding all sorts of excuses to get out of future operations.
No, it was all or nothing in this game.
And tomorrow, it would be all or nothing too.
The food came out, mostly fried rice and eggs and toast, heaped high on plates. Slater accepted it with a smile and carted it upstairs. King was in the same position, unwavering, staring at his inflamed ankle, willing it better.
Slater said, ‘Has the ibuprofen kicked in?’
King didn’t react.
Slater said, ‘King.’
The man looked up.
Discomfort creased his features.
‘It’s not doing much,’ King said.
Slater couldn’t be sure, but he thought he saw a flicker of doubt on his comrade’s face.
He handed him the plate of food and said, ‘Eat. Try not to think about it. We’ll assess it in the morning.’
‘How’s your arm?’
‘I’m trying not to think about it.’
It hurt.
A lot.
They ate on their beds, and then Slater went downstairs and refilled their water bottles. He came back up and dropped iodine tablets into them, and when the twenty-minute wait was over he added BCAAs and they both sucked the fluids down with greed.
Then they settled onto their beds and lay in mutual silence.
Trying not to think.
Trying not to worry.
Both more exhausted than they even thought possible.
‘We have a lot of ground to cover tomorrow,’ King said softly.
‘We do.’
‘You think they’ll come for us tonight?’
‘I don’t know why, but I trust the owner.’
‘So do I. Still… he might not have a say in it.’
‘We were discreet enough. There weren’t exactly a whole lot of witnesses when we first walked in here. I think we’ll be okay.’
‘You’d hope so. Seems like neither of us could mount a resistance even if we wanted to.’
‘Maybe we should concede this time.’
King looked over, and Slater could see his pupils were hazy and unfocused. ‘You think?’
‘Let’s sleep on it,’ Slater said. ‘We’ll figure it out in the morning. I can’t think straight right now.’
‘They know we’re on the trail,’ King said. ‘So what’s the point of walking anymore? Violetta can fly reinforcements over and send them in by chopper.’
‘Can she?’ Slater said.
Silence.
Slater said, ‘Anything they try now will be too late. Kidnaps don’t drag out for weeks, especially not in an environment like this. It’s us, or nothing. They think by heading further up the mountain they’ll exhaust us, and they’re right. But it’s one more day. We can do anything for one day. And then we’ll be right there, and we can get her back.’
‘Her, and Perry or the porter if they’re innocent.’
‘The girl is the priority.’
‘I know.’
They settled back into the quiet, but before they drifted off Slater said, ‘I guess it doesn’t matter if we get ambushed tonight, does it?’
‘And why’s that?’ King mumbled.
Slater lifted the P320 out of his waistband.
He said, ‘Because for the first night since we touched down in this country, we have guns.’
42
King cracked an eyelid open.
Light filtered in through the open curtains.
It was morning.
He swung his legs out of bed, still desensitised by the numbing effects of deep sleep. He’d drifted off somewhere around eight in the evening, and now it was a touch before six in the morning. He found his smartphone and cancelled the impending alarm, set to go off in a few minutes’ time. Across the room, Slater slept undisturbed.
King took a deep breath, steeled himself, and touched his bad foot to the wooden floorboards.
Twang.
Painful, for sure.
But manageable.
He nearly sighed with relief. Then he shrugged it off, recognising that this was no victory. The real test would be what happened later in the day, when he racked up the miles and wore down his body. His stride would get less controlled, sloppier, more prone to error. He could picture himself putting his foot down on a sharp descent and feel his ankle exploding, which would happen if…
If.
The key word.
No amount of hypotheticals really mattered, because right now he could get out of bed.
He roused Slater, who opened his eyes calmly, as if he’d been faking sleep all along. That was the reality of a combatant accustomed to black operations — you had to be completely alert in a heartbeat. There was no time to stretch and yawn and shuffle around under the covers. Everything had to happen now.
‘How is it?’ Slater said.
‘I can walk.’
‘Then let’s get this done.’
They took turns in the shower, opting not to go through the hassle of paying for hot water. King let the ice-cold stream numb him from head to toe, and he let the jet pour onto his ankle for close to a minute. Then he stepped out, taped it up, put clean clothes on, laced up his hiking boots, and went to check on Slater.
Who was also dressed. Also laced up.
They were ready.
It was the same deal as every morning in Nepal. There was no fanfare, no celebration that they were up and moving. Just quiet acceptance of what was to come, and then they put their heads down and got to work. They paid cash for the room and the food, and were the first of the guests of the day to leave the teahouse. They had their duffel bags over their shoulders and were putting one foot in front of the other before either of them had the chance to comprehend what they were getting themselves into.
And then everything settled into monotony.
Suffer for long enough, and it all becomes the same. King already knew that, but he took advantage of it by keeping as much of the trek as monotonous as possible. He put his right foot down and winced, and then covered more ground with the next stride on his good leg. It hurt for the first half-hour, then he warmed up and settled into a rhythm. Of course, it still ached, but he’d repeated the process so many times that it no longer mattered.
They trekked up toward Namche Bazaar, and the air grew cold as they climbed above ten thousand feet in altitude. The wind packe
d extra bite, aided by the heavy cloud. It was overcast as they kept treading through the dirt, and although the trees around them were still lush green in colour they could see the rising prominence of snow-capped mountains, both ahead and off to each side. They strode over bridges crossing pale blue glacial streams, and let droves of mules past, ever paranoid of another assault.
They were an hour out from Namche when it happened.
King was the first to spot the pack of mules heading their way, descending the slope they were in the process of climbing. He whistled to Slater and they stepped to the right, pressing themselves against the cliff wall. The other side was home to a sheer drop, and neither of them wanted to spend their whole lives completing the most dangerous operations imaginable just to succumb to a careless mule knocking them off the edge of a mountain.
So the pack sauntered past, laden with gas bottles, and King’s guard wavered as he studied the Nepali man bringing up the rear. The guy was tall and wiry with rippling corded muscle packed onto a skinny frame. He nodded to each of them, and started to carry on past…
And then his hand scythed through the air.
A sudden movement.
King had his hands around the guy’s throat before he could blink. In one smooth motion he shoved him forcefully toward the edge of the cliff, pushing him off-balance so the guy teetered toward the drop and—
Slater screamed, ‘No!’
King froze, holding the guy in place. The man’s feet were inches from the ledge.
Then he noticed the panic in the guy’s eyes, and the absence of weapons in his hands.
Oh.
He gently took his hands off the man’s throat.
Slater muttered, ‘He was going to strike the mule. Not you.’
Sure enough, the mule at the back of the group was frozen in place — something both he and Slater had witnessed dozens of times before. Often they needed a slap on the rear to get going, which was precisely what the guy had made to do.
King said, ‘I’m sorry.’
The man massaged his sore neck, and stared at both of them in anger. He clearly wasn’t a weakling — he had a tough life, and a strong build, and would ordinarily have thrown a punch in retaliation for such a brazen act. But he must have felt King’s grip strength and assumed the man he was dealing with was a different breed of human, because all he did was snort with derision and stride off down the trail after his mules.
Slater said, ‘You can’t let that happen again.’
King put a hand out and pressed it against the rock wall, steadying himself. For some reason, the wind felt colder than usual. A chill ran down his spine, and he shivered.
He said, ‘I’m exhausted.’
‘So am I. But you came that close to killing an innocent man.’
‘I know.’
‘Don’t let it happen again. If we need to rest, that’s what we do. I don’t want your mental health jeopardised by this. I can’t let you get paranoid.’
‘I’m not paranoid.’
‘I would be. In fact, I am.’
‘Then that could happen to you, too.’
‘The end of the day,’ Slater said. ‘That’s it. That’s when we’re done. It’s close to midday now. There’s a half-day left. Then we’re out of here. All we need is absolute focus for twelve hours. Understand? Until then, neither of us can drop our guard.’
‘Roger that.’
‘Let’s go.’
They walked onward.
43
Slater was the first to reach Namche Bazaar.
The town was constructed in the shape of an amphitheatre — the buildings were laid out in a tiered “U” shape around a hill on the mountainside. He strode through the entrance archway symbolising their arrival in the town, and bent over momentarily to catch his breath.
They were making fantastic time.
And neither of them had hit a mental or physical wall yet.
King pulled up beside him, and they stared up at the sea of brightly coloured roofs — stark reds and blues and greens set against the backdrop of the enormous mountain they rested on. Up above Namche, they could see the terrain become increasingly barren. They were close to twelve thousand feet, and soon the altitude might start to have an effect.
Might.
That was the problem. Neither of them knew how their bodies would react. They’d never been this high before, and there was no way to train for it down at sea level. Even if there was, they wouldn’t have had the time. They stared at the looming backdrop, both uncomfortable, both questioning themselves.
Slater said, ‘Any symptoms yet?’
‘No,’ King said. ‘But it’ll be hard to tell until it hits us properly. I’m so focused on my ankle … everything else is taking a back seat.’
‘Same with me and my arm,’ Slater said.
But it wasn’t really his arm. It was his heart. Maintaining such an extreme pace over this terrain with less and less oxygen to work with was gruelling, and the smartwatch on his wrist told him he’d been averaging 175 beats per minute for the entire morning. He’d been ignoring it as much as he could, but it was finally starting to take a toll, especially as the oxygen decreased with each passing hour.
And it was only going to get worse.
He tried to force it out of his mind, but it was difficult.
How was he supposed to rescue Raya from a horde of Maoist rebels if he could barely use his muscles when he got there?
That turned his attention to something else, and as they strode up through Namche, he said, ‘What exactly is the plan when we get there?’
‘I’m waiting on word from Violetta,’ King said. ‘If there’s no more intelligence to work with, we’re just going to have to keep our eyes peeled. I’d say it’s a comprehensive operation to move Raya and any other hostages from teahouse to teahouse along a populated trail. We’ll be able to spot anything suspicious if we’re looking for it, and then we follow it to its conclusion. But we need daylight to do that, so…’
‘We need to keep moving,’ Slater finished.
King nodded, his face ghost-white. ‘We keep moving.’
They paused for a few minutes in one of the bakeries to load up on carbohydrates, ordering nearly everything in the window and chowing it down between swigs of water. They didn’t even take a table. Then they swung their packs back over their shoulders and continued up to the peak of Namche Bazaar, passing open-air markets and endless teahouses and, surprisingly, an Irish pub.
The buildings fell away after that, replaced by barren plains dotted with handfuls of trees. This landscape was a world away from the forests they’d hiked through earlier in the morning. Slater took his mind off his throbbing arm and managed the odd look over his shoulder to admire the astonishing view of Namche and the endless mountains and valleys behind it.
‘We’re just a couple of dots,’ King said at one point, awed by the scenery. ‘We’re nothing.’
Slater couldn’t help but agree. It made them insignificant, their goals wholly unimportant, their grievances not the slightest bit concerning compared to their gargantuan surroundings. Somehow, it gave him strength. He treated the pain as nothing, the discomfort as miniscule. He kept walking, and didn’t stop, and didn’t even consider taking a break.
Neither did King.
Together they pushed all the way up to thirteen thousand feet, and when they finally reached the peak of the next mountain they stared out at a plummeting descent of nearly fifteen hundred feet, spiralling its way down into a forested valley.
They stood at the edge of a small settlement, sporting a single teahouse and little else. Slater’s pulse pounded in his ears, his breath wheezed in his throat, but overall he was okay.
Mentally, he was prepared for the final stand.
One last battle.
But does it ever go the way you think it’s going to?
He said, ‘Have you seen anything?’
Wordlessly, King shook his head. ‘We’ve only passed trekkers
. I’m sure of it.’
‘Same.’
‘Then they must be ahead.’
‘They were spotted just above Namche yesterday. Which means they can’t be more than a day’s journey ahead. What we could effectively cover in half a day. What’s the time?’
King checked his watch. ‘Nearly five p.m.’
‘Shit.’
Neither of them said a word.
They knew what it meant.
They weren’t going to catch them before the sun went down.
44
King sat down hard on the nearest rock and pulled the satellite phone from an easily accessible compartment in his duffel bag.
Violetta answered quickly enough. ‘You got her?’
‘No.’
‘You found her?’
‘No.’
‘Where are you?’
‘The map says we’re at the settlement of Long-Ma. It’ll be dark in an hour. I need to know if you want us to push through in the dark.’
‘How tired are you?’
‘We’re fine.’
‘You sound like you’re barely staying awake. I’ve never heard you talk this slow.’
‘We’re okay.’
‘I don’t believe you. The answer is no, I don’t want you to push through in the dark.’
‘Violetta, this is our—’
‘You’ve made incredible progress, Jason. You and Will have covered more miles in three days than I thought humanly possible. But you can’t fight them in the dark in their own backyard. They’ll see you coming from a mile away — there’s no chance you’re trekking through the night without using your headlamps. You’ll be sitting ducks.’
‘It’s the only way…’
‘No, it’s not. The only way you pull this off is to get as much sleep as you can and reach them by the middle of the day tomorrow.’
‘How are you so sure?’
‘Because they were spotted at lunchtime.’
King sat up, ramrod straight. ‘Where?’
‘Well, Raya was. At the Phorste Thanga guest house, which is—’
King stared down the mountainside and added, ‘Just down there.’
‘Yes.’