Robert Ludlum's the Treadstone Exile

by Joshua Hood

  It was small, not much larger than a pencil eraser, but he knew from the weight on his chest, and the wet rattle that came with each breath, that the bullet from Zoe’s Glock 19 had done its job. It had punched through his ribs and torn a hole in his lung, leaving him with an infantryman’s nightmare—the sucking chest wound.

  Hayes had treated enough of them to know that the pressure building in his chest was from the fluid filling his collapsed lung, and that if he didn’t treat it soon, he would drown in his own blood.

  He lifted an object that looked like a tan Sharpie from the floor and tore off the cap, revealing a 10-gauge decompression needle the length of his index finger. Holding it in his left hand, Hayes probed along his ribs with his right, found the intercostal space, and used his thumbnail to make a mark.

  Switching the needle to his right hand, he picked up the empty casing and put it in his mouth. He placed the tip of the needle over the indentation, bit down on the plastic, and in one sure stroke, drove the needle deep into his chest.

  His world exploded in a mushroom cloud of pain and Hayes bit the plastic casing hard enough to crush it between his teeth—but he could breathe, and that was all that mattered.

  The act of stabbing a needle into his chest had sapped the last of his reserve and sent his blood pressure dropping like an elevator with a cut cable. Knowing that he was seconds from passing out, Hayes scrambled for the auto-injector, managed to tear the cap free and press his thumb against the trigger, firing the needle into his thigh.

  The five milligrams of epinephrine hit his central nervous system like a shot of ether, the double dose of synthetic adrenaline racing through his veins.

  Now get the hell up.

  Hayes lurched to his feet, eyes locked on the Land Cruiser across the street. He staggered across the parking lot, the blood running from the knife wound, coiling over the front sight of the STI in his hand and splatting like raindrops on the asphalt.

  After ten feet, Hayes knew he didn’t have the strength to make it in one shot and cheated left, angling for the hood of the closest bullet-riddled pickup. He was almost there when he caught movement a foot to his right, saw one of the wounded men reaching for a rifle.

  “Seriously?” he asked, as the man grabbed the pistol grip of his AK.

  The man flipped onto his back, grunting from the effort of leveling the rifle at Hayes’s chest.

  “I’ll fucking kill you,” he hissed.

  “Not without clearing that jam,” Hayes said, firing a shot through the center of the man’s skull without breaking stride.

  He shuffled to one of the vehicles and leaned against it, the blood dripping from the barrel of the STI. But he knew he wasn’t going to make it to the Land Cruiser.

  Just need to sit down for a second.

  He slumped against the 6x6 and dug the burner phone from his pocket.

  What the hell are you doing? the voice demanded. They’ll find you.

  But Hayes didn’t care. He was dying.

  Gritting his teeth against the pain, he dialed the number and leaned his head back against the tire.

  Please pick up, he begged.

  Hayes was about to give up, let the darkness take him, when the line connected, and Annabelle’s sleepy voice came through the headset.

  “Hello?”

  He tried to speak, to answer, but the sound of her voice was like a shot of morphine, rendering him speechless.

  “Adam . . . is that you?”

  “Y-yeah, baby,” he croaked, “sorry for waking you up . . . but . . .”

  The pain rolled up his body like a river of fire, its all-encompassing heat taking his breath away, threatening to consume him from the inside out.

  “What’s wrong? Are you hurt? Adam, talk to me.”

  Hayes was panting now, the sweat bucketing down his face, the beat of his heart erratic.

  “Annabelle . . . I’m not going to make it . . . I want you to know that I’m s-sorry . . .” He paused to catch his breath, the tears burning his eyes, rolling down his cheeks. “Sorry I wasn’t a better man.”

  “No, Adam! You listen to me . . . I don’t care what you have to do, you come home to us. Your son needs you . . . I need you.”

  Before he could reply, Hayes heard the unmistakable thump-thump of approaching helos. He tracked the sound east, to the rosy-fingered dawn spreading across the horizon, watched the two black specks racing toward him.

  You’re too late.

  She was screaming now, her voice sharp as shattered glass. “Adam . . . Adam, are you there?”

  “Yeah . . . I’m here.”

  “You listen to me,” she sobbed, “you have to come home. Your son needs you . . . I need you.”

  “You tell Jack that I love him.”

  “You are going to tell him yourself, do you hear me?”

  “Not this time, baby,” he said, his voice barely a whisper.

  The stabbing pain in his heart sucked the breath out of him and he was aware of the phone falling from his hand, plastic clattering against the asphalt, Anabelle’s tiny voice screaming through the speaker.

  So tired.

  Hayes’s breath caught in his throat and his heartbeat slowed to an erratic thump, the downdraft of the lead Osprey touching down on the far side of the parking lot pushing him over. He lay on his side, vision narrowing as the squad of camouflaged men came bounding down the ramp, eyes determined beneath the black-and-green greasepaint smeared across their faces as they rushed to him.

  Then there was darkness.

  57

  USS BATAAN

  Levi Shaw sat in the back of the lead Osprey, the expressions of the Marine Raiders packed in around him unreadable beneath the greasepaint. They were a battle-hardened team, combat-seasoned from multiple deployments running ops in some of the roughest corners of the world.

  Shaw, on the other hand, was an outsider and could sense that his mere presence on the op made the men nervous.

  “Feet dry,” the pilot announced over the radio.

  While the team leader barked last-minute instructions to his operators and the medical team triple-checked their aid bags, Shaw tugged a thirty-round magazine from his plate carrier and slapped it into the magwell of the CAR-15 resting barrel-down between his legs.

  He grabbed the charging handle and was pulling it to the rear when he heard the team leader’s voice over the radio.

  The Raider captain inched closer to Shaw.

  “Sir, what are our ROE?”

  “ROE?” Shaw asked.

  “Yes, sir, our rules of engagement?”

  “I wouldn’t worry too much about that, young captain,” Shaw said over the chunk of the bolt slamming a seventy-gram TSX boat-tailed hollow-point into the chamber.

  “Why is that, sir?” the man asked, the confusion on his face evident.

  “Because that man down there,” Shaw said, nodding toward the window, “doesn’t tend to leave many survivors.”

  “But if there are any survivors . . . if he missed any?”

  “Well, if that’s the case, you boys feel free to send ’em to hell for me.”

  Before he could answer, the pilot was back on the radio, his voice hesitant as he held the massive tilt-rotor in a hover.

  “Pretty tight down there, sir. We are going to have to find an—”

  But Shaw had already ripped the headphones from his ears and was rushing to the flight deck.

  “Put it down,” he ordered.

  “Sir, it’s too tight,” the pilot said. “It’s not safe.”

  “Either you put this bird down, or I will,” he said, aiming the CAR-15 at the controls.

  All it took was one look into Shaw’s eyes and the pilot’s hesitation evaporated. “You better hold on,” he said, nosing the Osprey over the wall.

  Shaw stayed in the c
ockpit, any questions he’d been harboring about if Hayes had lost his edge since leaving Treadstone evaporating when he saw the bodies and the piles of expended brass that dotted the parking lot.

  “Holy shit,” the copilot said, “who the hell is this guy?”

  “That’s classified,” Shaw said, turning back to the cargo hold.

  A minute later the Osprey was on the ground, the Marine Raiders bounding down the ramp—Shaw tight on their heels.

  “Sir, it’s not secure,” the team leader advised at the bottom of the ramp, but Shaw brushed him off and sprinted after the trauma team.

  By the time he caught up with the medics, they had Hayes laid out on the sidewalk—one medic already doing chest compressions while a second took a pair of surgical shears to his bloody pant leg.

  “This guy needs a priest, not a medic,” one of the men said.

  Shaw wanted to threaten, to beg them to save Hayes’s life, but before he could figure out which one to pick, Captain Fox was pulling him away.

  “Sir, these guys are the best in the business. Let them do their job.”

  Shaw nodded, helpless to do anything but watch as the trauma lead barked out an order.

  “Jonesy, get a bag of O positive started. Eric, tell the crew we are wheels up in five. I want the crash cart charged and the norepinephrine ready the second we hit the ramp.”

  “Roger that, boss,” the medic said.

  While Eric keyed up on the radio and advised the surgical team on board the second Osprey, the team leader opened his aid bag, pulled out what looked like a toy drill, and snapped a large-bore needle to the end.

  “Jonesy, you got my blood?” he asked, pressing the needle to Hayes’s shin.

  “Right here, boss,” the medic answered.

  “All right, here we go.”

  He pulled the trigger, the electric motor barely audible over the thump of the rotors as he drilled the needle into the bone.

  “All right, I’m in,” he said, disconnecting the drill from the needle, taking the tube running from the bag of O positive that Jonesy handed him and snapping it into the base of the needle.

  Then they were moving, Hayes bobbing on the stretcher as they rushed back to the Osprey.

  EPILOGUE

  UNDISCLOSED LOCATION

  One minute Hayes was gone, floating through the endless black that separated the living from the dead, and then there was a distant spark on the horizon, the murmur of voices, and invisible hands dragging him toward the light.

  He fought against the tide, tried to pull free, but it was too late.

  The pain came back with a vengeance, hard and fast like a punch to the gut. He opened his eyes and saw the masked faces hovering over him.

  “Wh-what are you . . .”

  “Doctor, he’s awake. Blood pressure 140 over 90 and rising.”

  “That’s impossible,” a man said.

  The instant he stepped into view, Hayes reached up and grabbed the man by the front of his scrubs. “What are you doing to me?” he demanded, pulling him close.

  “Shit, someone dose this guy before he tears the sutures.”

  Hayes shoved him away and was reaching for the IVs stuck in his arm, ready to tear them free, when Shaw stepped into view.

  “Adam, calm down,” he said, grabbing his hand. “It’s okay. You’re safe now.”

  “Safe?”

  “Yes, you’re safe. Just relax, I’ve got you.”

  Then the drugs kicked in and it was back to the black.

  Hayes wasn’t sure how long he’d been out, but when he finally came to, his mouth was dry and his mind was fogged from the drugs.

  He tried to sit up but had barely lifted his head from the pillow when the vertigo and rush of nausea told him it was a bad idea.

  “Easy, son,” Shaw said, stepping into his line of sight.

  “W-water,” he croaked, nodding to the pitcher sitting on the bedside table.

  “The doc didn’t think you were going to pull through,” Shaw said, filling one of the Styrofoam cups with water, “but I guess you showed him.”

  Hayes took the cup, water spilling over his chin as he gulped it down. “More,” he said, handing the cup back to Shaw, studying him as he refilled it. Noting the fresh sutures on his cheek, the cuts that crisscrossed the man’s hands.

  “You look like shit,” he said.

  “Yeah, well, you’re no spring daisy yourself.”

  This time he savored the water, his mind filling with a thousand questions as Shaw walked to the window and pulled back the shade.

  “Why?” Hayes asked, squinting against the onslaught of sunlight that filled the room.

  “Why what?”

  “Why’d you come for me?” Hayes asked.

  “Old and sentimental, I guess,” Shaw answered with a sly smile.

  “Funny. What happened to your face?”

  “Carpenter tried to kill me,” Shaw said. “Slick son of a bitch sent a couple of his hitters to ambush me on my way home.”

  “Because of me?” Hayes asked.

  “Because of us,” Shaw answered, returning to his bed. “When I let you go off on your little crusade it made certain senators think that I’d gone soft. And let’s face it, with you gone, Treadstone’s nothing but a paper tiger.”

  “Killing senators is what got me into this mess in the first place, Levi,” Hayes said.

  “I’ll handle Miles and Carpenter,” Shaw said, patting him on the hand. “You just get healthy. I’ve got big plans for you when you get back.”

  “Who said I’m back?” Hayes asked.

  “Well, I did save your life,” Shaw grinned, “so it’s either come back to work or spend the rest of your life owing me one.”

  “Still a devious son of a bitch, I see,” Hayes said.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” Shaw said, getting to his feet. “Now get some rest, son.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  Joshua Hood is the author of Warning Order and Clear by Fire. He graduated from the University of Memphis before joining the military and spending five years in the 82nd Airborne Division. On his return to civilian life he became a sniper team leader on a full time SWAT team in Memphis, where he was awarded the lifesaving medal. Currently he works as the Director of Veteran Outreach for the American Warrior Initiative.

  Robert Ludlum was the author of twenty-seven novels, each one a New York Times bestseller. There are more than 225 million of his books in print, and they have been translated into thirty-two languages. He is the author of the Jason Bourne series--The Bourne Identity, The Bourne Supremacy, and The Bourne Ultimatum--among other novels. Mr. Ludlum passed away in March 2001.

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