The Terminals (30 page)

Cam considered the bird. Its white wings and body contrasted dramatically with its black head, and webbed feet that looked like they'd rather be in the water clung to a branch. A smallish beak belied its big voice.
Some type of gull
, Cam thought—a South American cousin to the sort that frequented the docks back home on Bellingham Bay and fought for scraps behind the waterfront restaurants.

“Siena,” Cam said, “do we have any food in the pack a sea gull might like?”

 

CAM'S PLAYLIST

34. FLY
  

by The Dread

35. TELL ON YOU

by Drummer Boy

36. MIGHTY MIGHTY

by Hydroplane

“Catch that updraft. Flyyy…”

Minutes later, the gull flew off with four tracking devices in its belly. Cam didn't simply bury the computer chips in a cracker. When the gull fluttered down to the food, he'd had Zara leap on it. She squatted a few feet from the bait, and then launched herself like a trapdoor spider, grabbing the gull by one foot with a single hand. She was so lightning fast and precise that Cam was relieved he'd never have to fight his way past her on a beach again. After the bird was secured, he'd stuffed the tiny chips into its mouth one by one and followed them with a nibble of cracker to make sure they went down. Then they had chased the madly squawking thing off.

It would serve. Gulls moved about. It wouldn't remain in the trees for long. In fact, it had likely only made a quick stop at the river on its way to or from the coast or the sinkhole. Cam couldn't smile—their circumstance was too perilous—but the image of men in boats circling a sea gull with guns drawn made him want to.

Afterward, they hiked for an hour more, setting out at a forty-five-degree angle from their previous path, in case someone was mapping the direction of their progress. Cam's enhanced teammates continued to pace themselves for him and Siena. He was grateful for that. The jungle terrain was alternately easier and more difficult, depending upon the density of the understory. Once, they sent Wally up a tree to see how far he could see. He saw the ocean behind them, but only green ahead. Siena recognized the area. It was the farthest she'd come on her own. The dull brown river that horrified her crept through the trees, ignoring its banks. They walked with it, but soon it was all around them. Cam could see the tension in her expression. She jumped at every sound, and kept her lower lip pinched firmly between her teeth.

They were navigating a low swampy area when Donnie dropped back to slog through the knee-deep water alongside him.

“Cam, I have something to say,” he mumbled, which was notable, because Donnie had said almost nothing since Owen had gotten shot, the same way he'd shut up for a time after Ari had been named team leader for mission one.

“Sure,” Cam said.

“What do you want me to do?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, what's my assignment? I feel useless.”

“We don't have assignments.”

“I think we should. Not that it's my decision. You're leader now. I concede that.”

“I'm not your leader. You don't need to concede anything.”

“But I was so wrong about it all. I don't even trust my own instincts anymore.” He grabbed Cam by the shoulders in a way that might have been horribly aggressive but was more likely a product of not realizing how much his strength had increased. Cam winced—it was like having each arm caught in a five-fingered vise.

“Oww,” he said evenly.

Donnie let go and took a deep breath. “Sorry. I'm lost here, Cam,” he said. “I need you to tell me what to do.”

“We're all lost, Donnie. But every one of us signed up for this. We were all wrong together. We bought into it.” Cam surprised himself by speaking slowly and gently. He felt like he was talking Donnie off a ledge. “We still don't even know what this is, right? Were those pirates really pirates? Who was the politician we framed? All we know is that somehow things got royally screwed up.”

Donnie stared blankly. “So what do I do?”

Cam sighed. “Security,” he said finally. “You're my muscle.”

Just then, Wally splashed through the mud toward them. “We're still being followed!”

Cam whipped around. “Where?”

“Maybe one hundred yards back. Solo dude.”

“How do you know? I can't see twenty
feet
.”

“I heard him crashing through the brush. Listen.”

Everyone froze and listened, their concentration absolute. Donnie and Zara exchanged a look. They heard it too. Cam strained. He heard nothing. Siena couldn't confirm it either. But Cam didn't doubt the senses of his enhanced teammates.

“You can tell for sure it's just one guy?” Cam asked the group.

“Yep,” Zara answered. Donnie nodded too.

“Gun?”

“No way to know,” Donnie said. “We need to assume so.” Having squared his role with Cam, Donnie fell into soldier mode.
Ari was right
, Cam thought. The guy was an a-hole, but he was someone you wanted on your team in a fight.

“Should we move along?” Wally asked.

Cam held his fist up for silence, studying their surroundings. “Maybe we can use this guy,” he said. “I want to know more about what's going on. I say we jump him. All in?”

They nodded. Cam took the pack from Siena and passed out darts. “Just one, and only if he's armed. Don't stick him twice.” He shot Zara a look. She frowned, but it was clear she got the message.

A kapok loomed in the river, large enough for their purposes. Cam doffed his pack and stashed it among the roots that poked above the water, hiding it just enough that it would be noticed, but not so much that it looked like it was meant to be seen. He sent Wally up. There were few low-hanging branches, but Wally was able to shimmy up using infrequent handholds. At times, he hauled himself upward with one arm or even leaped from one hold to the next. There was a crook in the branches fifteen feet up where he ducked out of the line of sight, but he left a shoe tantalizingly exposed. The rest of them took up positions along the shore fifteen feet away. It would be a long dart throw. He assigned Donnie to take the first shot. Then they waited.

The man crept through the water, wary, no more than five feet from where Zara knelt, still as a statue. Cam had chosen the ruse well. The kapok demanded attention as soon as it came into view, and the corner of the pack caught the man's eye—a symmetrical, artificial object so out of place in a natural world. Wally shifted, making a faint scraping sound as a final enticement, and the man bit entirely. He kept his eyes up and eased past Zara without a glance. Had Cam known he would pass so close, he'd have given Zara the shot. Donnie was farther away. But the orders were already set.

This man was older than the last, with thinning hair. Like the first tracker, he didn't grab for his radio. To talk would make noise, and he had the drop on Wally if he remained quiet. He knew they were dangerous—as the other had said, they'd proven as much at the beach—and he clung to his gun.

Cam wondered about the drowning man's fate—a man could only tread water fully clothed for so long before he sank. This pursuer was too close behind them to have stopped to pull him out. He'd either missed his comrade or had seen him but not helped. Either thought was grim.

The hunter took aim, but shooting Wally in the foot didn't seem to satisfy him. He waited for Wally to move, standing among grasses so high they obscured him almost entirely. Cam could see Donnie's frustrated expression. His throw was iffy. But patience was not his greatest attribute. He took the shot. His arm whipped forward, and the dart flew. Its delicate flight clipped the grass, tilting its shaft. The tip hit the man's arm at an angle and barely pierced the thick fabric of his heavy shirt. He looked down, startled, like a picnicker who'd been stung by a hornet. The dart hung in the material for a moment, then dropped to the forest floor, its load only partially discharged.

The barrel of the gun drooped, then fell from his limp arm and splashed into the mud, but he didn't go down. Zara cocked her dart to her ear.

“No!” Cam shouted. “No second dart!” He couldn't be sure another wouldn't kill the man.

The man took off running, thrashing through the water. He was hindered by the loss of use of one arm and thrown off-balance.

“Get his radio!” Cam yelled.

Zara caught him easily, before he could reach for his radio with his working arm. She threw herself around his neck and rode him to the ground like a rodeo steer. The man had a knife, but no chance to pull it, and Zara was already beating him senseless when Cam arrived to stop her.

“Enough! We need him conscious.”

Siena brought the rope, and they tied him. Then Cam sat with him. He was balding and had narrow eyes. Caucasian, but his tan told Cam he'd been in the area for some time. His khaki shirt was new. The rifle was a Bushmaster AR-15, something Wally recognized and quickly claimed. Cam had heard of it. It looked military, but the AR-15 was one of the most common civilian assault rifles in the United States. Something easily purchased through any gun store. In fact, it was the type of gun used by a famous Washington, D.C., serial murderer to snipe innocent people.

Cam lifted their beaten captive's chin. “We have some questions,” he said.

 

CAM'S PLAYLIST

35. TELL ON YOU
  

by Drummer Boy

36. MIGHTY MIGHTY

by Hydroplane

37. LACE UP

by Game Day

“I'm the one who is gonna tell on you.”

Cam helped the man into a sitting position. “Let's start with a name. I know you'll probably make one up, but it gives me something to call you besides asshole.”

“Gary,” the man offered.

“All right, Gary. I need you to tell me some things. You know we're serious, right?”

The man who called himself Gary felt his head where Zara had slammed it into the muck repeatedly. “I'll talk. Just keep her away from me.”

“Should have thought of that before you came after us!” Wally snapped at him.

“Who sent you?” Donnie growled.

“And why are you trying to kill us?!” Zara interrupted.

“I'm just getting paid. That's all. I've got no animosity toward you.”

Wally pointed the rifle between his eyes. “Yeah? Well, how do you like me now?!”

Cam put a hand up to ease the barrel of the gun away, and he motioned his teammates back.

“How many more of you are on our tail?” he asked in a calm voice, though he didn't feel any calmer than the rest of them.

“Just me and the one you put in the killing jar. But I expect he's dead by now.”

“You didn't help him? Good god, why?”

“I didn't know him. I get paid to find you, not help the competition. If I stopped to fish him out, I might have lost you.”

Cam was shaken. He hadn't meant to kill the man.

Zara stepped in. “There were eight, plus Pilot and Ward. Four are out, by my count. I know you've been in radio contact. Where are the rest of them?”

“Back in the boats. Probably gone by now.”

“Stay here,” Cam said, and he pushed the bound man into the mud like a turtle on its back. “We need to discuss what to do with you.”

The team gathered a few yards away, just out of earshot.

“He's lying,” Zara said. “No English-speaking guy gets hired off the street and flown to South America. If they wanted thugs, they could have hired some local dirtbags.”

“I agree,” Siena said. “Thugs don't use the word ‘animosity.'”

“He's with the organization.”

Cam nodded. Ranuel the teenage pirate had been hired off the street. Gary was no Ranuel.

“We should off him,” Zara said.

Cam frowned. “Are we killing now?” he asked. “Did we switch from good kids to executioners when I wasn't looking?”