Rogue mission, p.23
Rogue Mission, page 23
She had transitioned into a killer in one night. She had done it before, but never so callously. She had used a Taser when they raided that flat at Battersea. She didn’t want to hurt anyone. Thirty hours might have passed since then. It seemed like months ago.
Desperation. It made you kill people.
Dubois went to the end of the short hallway. Here, it opened out to the first deck. Charging out there seemed like a good way to get killed.
She stopped and looked back. Anastazja was with her. Behind Anastazja, the other women were crowding into the hall. There was a gap in their group where the dead man lay.
Dubois looked at Anastazja. Anastazja reached out and ran a hand over Dubois’s face. Her hand came away bloody. She made a sad face.
Dubois shook her head. There was no time for sympathy now. They had what Stark would call the initiative. They had to use it. She pointed to the ceiling. She turned her free hand upside down and made a sort of stick figure, with two legs walking. Then she pointed up again.
Anastazja nodded.
Dubois pointed out the doorway at the outside deck. Once out that door, they could go either way. She patted her own chest and made a gesture like turning to the left. Then she patted Anastazja’s chest and made a gesture like turning to the right.
Then she held up her gun and pantomimed spinning and shooting upwards.
If there was a shooter up there, who had the advantage, he would have to choose one of them first. Dubois would lead the way, putting herself at risk. That might give Anastazja a chance to fire. Dubois was almost certainly the better shot, but she couldn’t send Anastazja out first.
Anastazja nodded at all of it.
Dubois nodded, too. “Good.”
“Good,” Anastazja said.
Was it good? They would know in a few seconds.
Dubois took a deep breath. It could very well be her last.
She darted through the doorway, ducked low, and dove to the left.
THUNK! THUNK! THUNK! THUNK!
Gunshots hit the metal just above her head. She crawled like a worm. There was nowhere to hide. The shooter was above her head, firing down. There was no way to return fire. She was pinned. She tried to wedge herself against the low wall of the next deck. She tried to make herself as small as possible. She tried to make herself invisible.
THUNK! THUNK! THUNK!
The shots were hitting the flooring behind her, punching holes through it. The shooter was moving, getting a better angle. In a second, he was going to be right on top of her. She had to find a way to turn and at least…
BLAM!
A shot rang out behind her.
Then there was silence.
BLAM!
Another shot came. No one was shooting at her anymore.
She rolled back a tiny amount and peeked above the rim of the next deck. Halfway up another flight of stairs, a man stood. He had a rifle, but he was holding it in one hand. He swayed with the movement of the boat. Then he pitched forward and rolled down the stairs. His gun clattered down the stairs with him.
Dubois looked to her left.
Anastazja stood upright, holding her pistol in both hands, pointed up at where the man had just stood. A tiny amount of smoke rose from the muzzle of her gun.
The pilot house was up the stairs from where the man had just fallen. There was one man left on the entire boat. As Dubois watched, the man slid a heavy glass door closed and then locked it.
She stood. She went up the stairs on her side. Anastazja climbed the stairs on her side. She stepped over the dead man and picked up his rifle along the way. They converged at the doorway to the pilot house.
The man inside was thin and fit. He had a trim dark beard. He had deep black eyes. He didn’t appear the least bit afraid. More than anything, he seemed aggravated. The lunatics had revolted and taken over the asylum.
He waved at them, as if to wave them away.
“Get!”
Dubois could barely hear him through the thick glass. She could barely hear anything.
Anastazja lifted her pistol and fired at the glass without preamble.
BLAM!
RRRRIIIIIIINNNNNGGGGGGG…
The shot hit the door and whined off into the night. Anastazja reached a finger and touched the spot where the bullet must have hit. It had taken a tiny chip out of the glass. She looked at the man inside the pilot house.
His back was turned to them. He was doing something at the controls.
Anastazja dropped her pistol to the floor. She raised the rifle now.
Dubois covered her ears.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
Anastazja fired the gun again and again. The door chipped, then it cracked, and then an entire chunk of it caved in. Anastazja stopped firing. She reached a hand through the jagged hole, unlocked the door, and opened it.
Dubois looked at her. Who was this person?
The man at the controls turned to them. His eyes were hard and not amused.
“Don’t shoot me,” he said. “I have no weapon.”
“Take this boat to land,” Dubois said. “I don’t care what country.”
The man shook his head. “I cannot do that.”
Dubois was in no mood to argue. “Listen to me.”
“The boat will explode in six hundred seconds. There is an autodestruct mechanism. I activated it. It’s my job to do that if the boat falls into enemy hands. You are enemies, yes?” He gestured out the door. “The dinghy is no good. There’s just a big oar. They took the outboard motor three weeks ago and never replaced it. Don’t ask me why.”
He slipped between the two women as if they were at a cocktail party.
“Dinghy holds four, maybe six.” He shook his head and laughed. “You can have it. Good luck. I’m a better swimmer.”
He started down the stairs. He was already removing his jacket. Anastazja raised the rifle as if she would shoot him in the back. Dubois put a hand on the rifle barrel and pushed it down. She shook her head. “Don’t shoot him.”
The man pushed his way through the women coming out onto the deck. He went down to the swimming deck where Dubois had first come aboard, removed his shoes, and dove into the water. A few seconds later, he was swimming through the dark water.
Dubois looked up. There was a glow in the distance in the direction the man was headed. There was land over there.
She turned back to the controls. A readout in front of her couldn’t make it any more obvious.
514:59.
And counting down.
She pushed Anastazja out the door. “Let’s go.”
Dubois looked down at the women gathered there. The dinghy was up on a winch. “Does anyone know how to put that dinghy in the water?”
Amy Hegel raised a hand. “I do.”
“Do it! Do it now. And get everyone in there. This boat is going to explode.”
“We won’t all fit,” Amy said.
Dubois shook her head. “Make them all fit. Stuff everyone in there.”
“It’s going to be too—”
“Do it, I said.”
She pushed Anastazja again. “Go, go, go!”
Dubois went to the controls. There was a radio here. She switched it on and picked up the mic. It should be preset to the right channel for transmission. She depressed the button on the mic.
She was not a boating person. She didn’t know what to say.
“Mayday, mayday,” she said. “Requesting immediate assistance.”
She began to say that in several languages. She had no idea where they were or who might respond. “Mayday, mayday.”
She looked at the countdown.
388:34. And counting.
She heard a splash behind her. She turned and looked. Amy had just dropped the dinghy into the water. The women were scrambling over the sides of the boat.
“Get them in there! Get them all in there! There’s an oar! Use it to row! Get out of here!”
She spun back to the radio.
“Mayday! Mayday! This is Agent Mariem Dubois of Interpol. I am on a yacht, maybe in the Adriatic Sea. Maybe near Albania or Greece. We need help. This boat is about to explode.”
305:01. Time was flying by.
She looked again. The women were all in the boat. It was packed. It was overpacked. There was no room at all. The group of them looked like a refugee crisis. They seemed like they could capsize the thing at any moment. The dinghy drifted away from the yacht. It rose on a swell.
Most of the women were sitting or lying in the bottom, trying to keep the thing stabilized. Amy stood among them, holding the giant wooden oar. She beckoned to Dubois.
“Go!” Dubois shouted. “Row! I’m right behind you.”
Amy started to row. The dinghy began to move away into the darkness.
Something was buzzing now. Dubois returned to the controls. There was an old-style telephone on the control board. It had a red button light next to it, which was flashing. The phone was buzzing. Dubois picked it up. It was attached to the board by the kind of looping wire that phones used to have.
“Hello?”
“Agent Dubois,” Jan Bakker said. “Is that you?”
CHAPTER TWENTY NINE
1:25 a.m. Central European Time
Pasuri Ullishte (Olive Grove Estate)
In the mountains near Upper Qeparo
Albanian Riviera, Albania
“This thing is wrecked, man.”
The Land Rover was on its side. It was ripped full of holes, like Swiss cheese. There was shattered glass everywhere around it. Steam was still rising from the front end.
Just beyond it, Alex was standing by himself on a small hill, smoking a cigarette. He hovered there in the shadows, like a wraith.
“How did it end up over on its side like that?” Troy said.
Gallo shrugged. “Goddard and I pushed it over. I thought it made a better barrier like this. They would have to shoot through the roof, through the whole car, to get us.”
“You guys must have been on the juice,” Troy said.
Gallo laughed. “It was like when a young mom lifts a tractor trailer off of her toddler. We didn’t know our own strength.”
They were standing around in the aftermath, and in the general destruction, after the battle. The car was toast. Trees were down. There didn’t appear to be anyone else in the house. Gallo said he thought at least a dozen guys had evacuated, running off overland, when he opened up with the MAC. No one wanted to get hit by that thing.
Goddard was on the ground again. He sat in a ball, his legs pulled up to his chest, his arms hugging his knees. He was staring at his feet. He didn’t seem to be that badly injured—not physically at least. But that final burst of combat had broken his mind.
“How you doing, Goddard?” Troy said.
Goddard didn’t even look up. “I need to find my sister.”
Troy nodded. “I know. I need to find my partner. We’re working on it.”
But were they really? What work could they do? They had found four women here at Baruti’s house, and those four were effectively rescued. But Dubois, Goddard’s sister, the ambassador’s daughter, and whoever else… where were they?
A telephone rang. It was at their feet here somewhere. Troy crouched down, pawed through some shredded metal and broken glass, and came out with the phone. It was his phone anyway. He must have dropped it. He glanced at it, but the screen was shattered. He couldn’t make out anything.
He pressed the answer button from memory of where it was.
“Hello?”
“Agent Stark? It’s Jan Bakker.” His voice rang out into the night. The phone was permanently on speaker from now on.
“Hi, Jan. How’s your night?”
“Fine. I’ve been monitoring broadcasts from boats on the Adriatic Sea. A distress call went out from a yacht. It was Agent Dubois. She identified herself. I tracked the location. It’s perhaps eighteen kilometers almost due west from your present location. Then I used a satellite to get in touch with the pilot house itself. Dubois answered. She has twelve other women with her. The ambassador’s daughter is with her.”
“Is my sister there?” Goddard said.
Troy held up a hand. “Stop. What’s the distress?”
“It’s a mayday. The women took over the boat. The pilot seems to have activated a self-destruct feature before leaping overboard and swimming for it. There’s a dinghy, but it won’t hold everyone. Dubois believes the boat is going to explode.”
In the near distance, Alex had pitched his cigarette and was already moving toward the helipad.
“Eighteen kilometers?”
“Yes,” Jan said. “About eleven of your miles.”
Troy shook his head. They weren’t his miles. He didn’t invent them. He didn’t keep them in use among hundreds of millions of people, despite all efforts to eradicate them.
“What about my sister?” Goddard said again.
“Is Amy Hegel on the boat?” Troy said.
“I don’t have a comprehensive list.”
Troy looked at Gallo. He gestured at Goddard with his head.
Keep him here.
Goddard didn’t look like he was going anywhere. He was still on the ground, wrapped in a ball. Despite his muscular frame and his balding head and his large ears, at the moment he reminded Troy of a small child.
Gallo nodded.
Then Troy was running. On the helipad, the rotors of the chopper were already turning. The engine was revving up.
“Jan, I gotta go. Thanks for the info.”
“Good luck,” Jan said.
Troy ducked low and darted to the helicopter. The passenger side door was open, and he slid into his seat. It was a small, sleek helicopter, with space for exactly four people, and little extra room in the cabin for so much as a handbag. There were a pair of headphones on the seat. Troy put them on.
Alex was going through his pre-flight checks, punching through a bunch of screens on the touch pad. In a couple of moments, he was done.
The helicopter lifted off into the dark sky. It rose above the olive trees of Baruti’s estate, then Alex banked it left. The ground fell away below them. The steep, rugged hillsides plunged to the twinkling lights of a seaside town far below.
They were moving fast, the chopper accelerating into the wind. Everything in front of them was the black darkness of the sea.
As they flew, Alex dropped it down, closer and closer to the water. He continually monitored his instruments. Visually, there was nothing to see yet.
“All right, I have it,” Alex said. “There’s something out here.”
Then the boat was there, straight ahead, lit up in the darkness.
“I see it,” Troy said. This was the first time he was allowing himself some anticipation. It sounded like Dubois was alive and well. The relief was nearly overwhelming. His body was starting to tremble, whether that was because of Dubois, or because so much adrenaline had been flooding his system, or maybe a little of both.
“Looks like a pleasure craft, about fifty meters long,” Alex said.
Suddenly, it exploded.
“Oh my God,” Troy said.
The explosion didn’t happen all at once. It seemed like a daisy chain, beginning in the bow of the boat, and then passing along to the stern. Flames licked at the water where the boat had just been bare seconds ago. Another explosion went up, burning debris flying into the air. More debris was strewn across the water, floating on the swells. Some of it was on fire. The water itself was on fire where oil and fuel had spilled.
Smoke rose into the night, black against black.
The boat was still there, engulfed in flames, the light of it reflecting on the mirror of the water’s surface.
Had Dubois really been on that boat?
Troy turned to Alex, who was frantically communicating with someone on the radio.
“What just happened?” Troy said.
But Alex didn’t answer. He was too focused on the conversation in his headphones. Troy couldn’t hear that conversation.
They flew in low and passed over a lifeboat. Troy looked down—it was a rubber dinghy, like a Zodiac, way too overloaded with people. The people were women. He was sure of it.
“Was your friend Dubois on there?” Alex said.
“I don’t know. There was too many of them. I couldn’t tell.”
“I’ll call that lifeboat’s location in.”
Alex banked and came around toward the burning yacht again. It was ablaze like a beacon in the night. Flames licked at the sky. The scene was like an ocean apocalypse.
The smell of smoke and burning fuel filled Troy’s nostrils as they passed over it.
“Stark,” Alex said, his voice low and tense. “Over there.”
Troy followed Alex’s pointing finger and saw a small figure bobbing in the water. He squinted through the smoke and saw that it was a woman, barely keeping her head above the waves. There was a lot of floating junk around her.
They moved in close. It was Dubois.
“Get me closer,” Troy said. “I’m going in.”
Alex didn’t bother trying to talk him out of it.
“There’s probably a flotation device under your seat.”
Troy reached under his seat. There was. He yanked open the strap and pulled it out. It was a square floater, like a nearly flat pillow, with straps to put your arms through. It wasn’t much.
“Here, take mine too,” Alex said.
He had pulled it out. He handed it to Troy. Troy pushed open his heavy door. He kept his head low and slid his feet out onto the landing gear. His feet were still bare from before.
Alex had them in a hover, the rotors beating the waves and creating a violent ripple on the surface, a sort of shirr.
Dubois was about fifty feet away. They were probably two or three stories in the air. Troy edged out further onto the runner, his hand still gripping the door. He took a deep breath, gripping both flotation devices under one arm. Then he dropped into the black water.
He fell through the air, longer than he expected. He hit the water and found himself going down and down and down. The water was colder than he had imagined.
He kicked his legs through the blackness and came up for air. He sputtered and coughed. It was chaos on the surface. Smoke was blowing across the water. He got his bearings and launched himself toward the figure of Dubois.
