ARISEN, Book Eleven - Deathmatch (9 page)

These men sat or stood in or around rudimentary tents and lean-to shelters, shaving, sharpening blades, cleaning weapons, and otherwise getting ready to go out and kill people. Which they were always ready to do at a moment’s notice.

Team 1 were Misha’s favorites, his blooded and unstoppable cadre, his professional killers – his Myrmidons. From first man to last, they believed their leader to be not only the most fearsome and lethal warrior among them – but many actually believed him to be literally unkillable. Many had died trying. They had seen it – everyone had. Misha led from the front. And he rarely let anyone do any fighting or killing that he could do himself.

Or, as Juice had intuited the instant he laid eyes on him, back in that warehouse – you could always tell a warlord from his minions. He was usually the scariest dude there. And there were a lot of seriously scary dudes here – because they were some of the same ones. Swarthy and unshaven hard men, some with black skullcaps, mixed unmatched fatigues or scavenged outdoors gear. A lot of shaved heads, bulging muscles, scary guns, and gigantic knives – most from Melita-K, the Russian manufacturer beloved by Russian special operators.

They were armed mostly with advanced late-model AK-100 series assault rifles – with skeletonized stocks, integrated suppressors, transparent mags, polymer furniture. Very expensive optics. And high-quality accessories on the barrel rails: visible and IR lasers, Surefire tactical lights, day and night magnifying optics, EOTech holographic sights. No expense spared. Spetsnaz had been a major funding priority for both the Supreme Soviet and, later on, for Putin’s Russian Federation.

And ever since the fall, they took what they wanted.

Like Misha, more than a couple still nursed bad wounds from that warehouse fight – or, rather, from the treacherous use of their own IEDs against them. But none of the wounds were so severe as to slow them down. Just bad enough to make them really mean… and really pissed off.

There were a number of familiar faces missing, though. Some had been left behind – under the earth or on top of it, to rot or be eaten by the dead. Some, too wounded to travel, had been left behind to fend for themselves. Knowing these guys, though, Vasily would have been unsurprised to see some of them turn up again later, like Leonardo DiCaprio in
The Revenant
.

Except dragging the dead bear behind them.

All the losses meant there were openings in some of the team’s senior operational roles. And the Spetsnaz soldiers were already jockeying for them. Mainly, this meant figuring out how to kill their rivals in their sleep – before it was done to them first.

Weakness and humanity were always the enemy.

* * *

When Misha finally turned to face Vasily, he revealed another angry wound, right down his cheek and across much of his neck. It looked like it had been salved with something to prevent infection. But Vasily knew Misha wouldn’t have taken anything for the pain. Painkillers would have dulled his senses.

And dulled his fury.

Misha was currently armed only with his Desert Eagle .50 AE pistol, worn over his heart in a custom-made chest rig. The holster was custom-made because Misha – alone of anyone in world history as far as Vasily knew – insisted not only on carrying the Desert Eagle with the 10-inch barrel, but also on wearing it on his vest.

“So,” Misha rumbled. “The American pipe-hitters are here.”

Vasily nodded. “
Da
.”

“But – can you tell me why? And why here?”

Vasily nodded again. “It is just as you predicted. They have some kind of an inside line on the Index Case. At any rate, unless my English or my lip-reading fail me, they just spent much of the morning talking about ‘Patient Zero’.”

Misha squinted in thought, then tapped his pistol. While he did so, the Runt appeared again. “Colonel—” he said.

“You again,” Misha barked. “Get off our penises! The geniuses are thinking. We don’t need your negatons right now.”

“I’m sorry. But there’s an urgent radio call for you. It’s Akela. In Moscow.”

Hearing this, Misha rose from his tree-trunk throne and strode over to the tent with their long-range radio set, Vasily following. Their radio telephone operator (RTO) was already holding out a phone handset for him. He snatched it and stuck it up to his gigantic head.

“
Da
.” He listened for five seconds. “
Menya?
I’m on a boat, bitch! Ha ha ha ha!!” This last he said in English, before roaring with laughter. When he regained control of himself, he straightened up and said, “Okay.
Chto u vas yest’ dlya menya?
”

Then he listened for another thirty seconds, nodding occasionally – then made a vague and increasingly violent scribbling motion in the air, until someone handed him writing materials. He took them and began scribbling.

“
Da. Ponyal. Fantastika! Molodtsy, volk
.” He tossed the phone back to the RTO, and stuck the sheet of paper in Vasily’s face, writing side out. Vasily pulled back far enough to focus and read the page, which contained twenty two-digit numbers.

“The radio encryption key of the American and British asshats. Now we don’t have to read lips.” He handed the sheet to the RTO. “Get this keyed in. And start scanning every frequency. Twenty-four hours, day and night, up and running five minutes ago, we never sleep.”

“
Da, boss.
”

“And now,” Misha said, grunting and stalking back toward his stump, “we shall see if those dickasses actually know anything…”

Live By the Sword

Clearing Outside Camp Davis

The air between Handon and Henno rippled with imminent violence, nothing moving in that clearing. Both still had their hands on their knives. They were like two freight trains racing toward each other at full speed, set to meet at the center of a trestle bridge over a deep canyon.

One that had been destroyed by air strikes.

But then an unfamiliar voice spoke out. It said:

“Wait – there’s another way.”

Faces blank, both Handon and Henno turned their heads to look at the newcomer.

“What?” Handon said.

Through the red mist that had descended over his vision, he recognized Baxter, driver of the gun truck that had extracted them. And, after their eight-hour overnight drive, Handon also knew he was a 25-year-old Georgetown grad, junior CIA analyst, and operator fanboy. Now, he was for some reason taking his life in his hands by venturing into the middle of the slow-motion collision between two truly fearsome operators, both with murder on their minds.

First clearing his throat, Baxter repeated himself. “I said, there’s another way to get Patient Zero. One that doesn’t get a bunch of kids killed – or sacrifice your irreplaceable Marines and sailors.”

“Oh, yeah?” Henno said. “And what’s that?”

“The Sword.”

* * *

Back in camp, as the rain tailed off, the others had slipped back out of the team tent, and were already around the fire pit when these three returned from the dripping forest. As they circled around again, Baxter caught the eyes of Kate and Jake – but particularly Zack. He realized Handon and Henno were watching him and waiting.

“Look,” he said, finally. “I think we all know Godane is dead. We saw Zack blow him back into his own fortress with the minigun.”

“We never saw a body,” Jake said, his face neutral.

Baxter nodded. “No. But we also never saw him alive again. Not once in all our surveillance and patrols since then. I say he’s gone.”

Kate said, “I think Baxter’s right.”

“And if I am right, and Godane is an ex-Sheik, then that leaves al-Sîf in charge.”

Handon said, “Who’s al-Sîf?”

“The previously mentioned unkillable badass with a giant sword.”

Handon didn’t look like he thought this was a big improvement. He also saw Jake’s expression darken at the mention of this guy. It looked like maybe the two of them had history.

Baxter scanned faces around the circle. “You’re going to have to bear with me here. But, basically, I believe al-Sîf is reasonable.”

Jake shook his head, obviously working to hold his tongue.

“He’s not a zealot, or even an Islamist. Hell, he’s not even religious – which means he’s not superstitious. Godane thought Patient Zero had magical powers. But al-Sîf knows better. I’m betting he kept it because the rank-and-file still believe Godane’s spooky bullshit. But he doesn’t.”

Henno said, “How do you know?”

“We were locked up in there a long time. And he and I had… I wouldn’t exactly call it a relationship. I was more like his pet Westerner. But we talked. And I think he’ll just give it to us, if we ask. No assault necessary.”

He could see skepticism on a lot of faces.

“He doesn’t think the plague was Allah wiping out the unbelievers – he knows it’s just a horrible disease. And he doesn’t want to be in charge of a new Caliphate – he just wants to survive. He’s a pragmatist. If we tell him we can cure the plague, he’ll see reason – if only because he’ll want the vaccine for himself. Worst case, we have to pay or bribe him somehow.”

Henno shook his head darkly. “No, it’s not. The worst case is we ask him, he tells us to piss off – and now we’ve told him exactly what we’re here for, and that we’ll be coming for it. We try this and it doesn’t work, then we’ve given a heads-up to the defenders, making the assault five times as hard. And that’s us fucked.”

Handon considered this. As usual, Henno’s thinking was clear and incisive. But was the risk he pointed out fatal? Because this might be a chance to avoid a frontal assault that would be extremely risky and costly, at best. Not that Handon was counting the cost at this point. But this thing wasn’t over, and someone had to stay alive to finish it.

“Can we contact him?” Handon asked.

“Absolutely,” Baxter said. “We can even do it encrypted.”

Handon looked over to Jake, who said. “Yeah. They ended up with some of our radios after the battle there. One vehicle set and three team radios.”

Left unsaid was whose radios those had been. Fallen friends.

“How do you know?” Handon said.

“Because they’re dumbasses,” Baxter said. “And don’t even know
how
to update encryption keys. We’ve been listening to their radio traffic at will for the last six months.”

“I’m not convinced,” Handon said.

Henno nodded. “Now you’re using your fucking head.”

“But I’m not ruling it out, either.” Handon knew he had to make a decision, and without a lot of delay. But it was a huge decision point, and he was determined to take a few minutes with it. In fact, he wanted to talk it through – with someone he could confide in, and who wasn’t Henno.

Ali – that was who he needed.

“Top.”

He turned to find her standing ten feet behind him.
Jesus
, he thought.
You’d think I’d have gotten used to her doing that by now…

“I need to brief you,” she said. “Urgently.”

Handon looked around the group. He trusted everyone there – he had to. And there wasn’t time to pick and choose who got read in. “Go,” he said.

“There’s someone out in the forest – and they’ve got eyes on us.”

“Who?”

Ali knew who it was. She just couldn’t prove it. “Unknown at this time. Unknown numbers and disposition.” She paused before tacking on editorial commentary. “But we only know one other force that’s been poking around Africa lately. And, whoever it is, there’s definitely someone out there looking at us. We’re not as safe here as we thought. So whatever play we’re going to run, I suggest we do it fast.”

“On me,” Handon said to Ali. Turning to the others, he said, “Get to work on the assault plan. I’ll be back in fifteen.”

* * *

Four minutes later, the two of them were up on the crown of the mountain, laid out by Ali’s rifle. She pointed out to Handon where she saw whatever she’d seen in the forest below.

“Okay, got it,” he said. “But that’s not why I came up here.”

Ali nodded. She’d figured, and figured he’d get to it.

Now he filled her in on everything she’d missed that morning, from the impossible and discarded plans for assaulting the Stronghold to their one potentially viable plan – including its one inconceivable option: using the Warsangali children as an expendable diversionary force. And finally to the prospect of just calling up and asking if they could have Patient Zero.

“Yeah, that’s a tough one,” she said when he finished. She was mainly glad this wasn’t her decision. But she also knew Handon had come to rely on her, and more importantly, to trust her judgement. She figured he was confiding in her now because he knew with her he didn’t have to be utterly resolved, and free of doubt, as he did around the rest of the team.

He said, “We’ve gotten burned too many times.”

She knew what he meant: by trusting other people. Trying to help those girls on the pirate boat, for instance. But that made her think of Emily, the girl they had rescued – and also her sister, the one they hadn’t. And some part of Ali, one she didn’t totally trust, wanted to tell Handon to have faith in humanity, to trust, just one more time.

She looked across at him, draped in his heavy mantle of leadership and loneliness. And she herself felt the burden of whatever she was going to say next – because she knew he would probably listen to her. And whatever they did next was going to have eternal consequences, and not just for everyone on the two teams.

For everyone left alive.

* * *

“Make the call,” Handon said, striding back into the team tent, which also held Triple Nickel’s set radio. For better and worse, the tent was occupied by Jake, Baxter – and Henno.

Henno stood up to his full height, opened up his chest, and angled his head toward Handon. “We can’t trust these fucking al-Shabaab guys,” he said. “Fuck sake, we can’t even trust
these
guys.” He nodded at Jake. “No offense.”

“None taken,” Jake said. Then he also stepped toward Handon. “Because you’re right. Trusting al-Sîf would be a huge mistake. That son of a bitch has got a lot of blood on his hands. Including my teammates – and some of my closest friends.”