Exit Wound (31 page)

111

I got down on my hands and knees and crept to the edge of the trees. I could make out bodies about three hundred metres away. They stood on the middle of an expanse of tarmac that began where the firs ended. There was another little strip of forestry to the far side of them. The runway disappeared off to the right.

The tarmac dried in a steamy haze around their feet as they chatted. A table and chairs had been set up beneath a small gazebo beside them. It was like a fucking garden party.

I motioned Anna forward. All she could hear was their laughter. She couldn’t make out what they were saying.

I got out my camera and zoomed in on the two eggs on legs. I could hear Anna doing the same.

Spag and Brin stood next to each other in identical light cargos and blue fleeces. It was like one of them was holding up a mirror to the other. They covered their eyes with their hands as they heard the buzz of another prop engine, high up and behind us. Altun and the Taliban were still dressed for the boardroom.

I picked out movement in the trees beyond them. A fifth body stepped out of the shadows with a launcher on his shoulder. Almost immediately, he seemed to change his mind. He swapped it for a fresh one from the back of a people-carrier parked behind him.

He took a couple of steps towards the picnickers, who were now toasting each other. The Taliban watched the others gun a shot glass down their necks. I felt my face flush with anger. I’d have given anything for a weapon to help their party really go with a swing.

A jet engine sparked up above me.

All heads turned to the sky as the second drone came into view.

Altun offered the Taliban a baseball cap but he refused. He’d be used to the sun and, besides, he’d want an unimpeded view. Altun continued his sales pitch as the Taliban looked over at the firing station, then back up at the sky. He nodded slowly as the flares kicked off.

There was a deafening roar as the 16 left its tube. A cloud of smoke erupted beside the people-carrier and a white trail streaked up into the sky. Like its predecessor, it jinked left and right, up and down as it interrogated the flares and sniffed out the correct target.

Two more seconds and it made contact.

Three of them clapped gently as the remaining fragments of the drone cascaded downwards. The Taliban stared open-mouthed at the hole in the sky where there had recently been a plane. He was probably thinking he should have bought more.

I checked the people-carrier. The guy was already pulling out another missile.

I got to my feet.

‘Nick – where you going?’

‘To do what we came here for.’

She nodded.

I turned and ran back towards the bike.

112

I didn’t have time to tell Zar how lucky he was. If he’d been in the sidecar he’d have been coming with me.

I kick-started the Ural and bounced back onto the track, screaming over ruts and potholes towards the open tarmac. The chainsaw, helmets, wheelie-case, all the shit in the sidecar jumped and jolted as I rode out onto the pan.

I had to screw up my eyes. The sun glared off the wet tarmac. I squinted to see the bodies the other side.

The people-carrier was still stationary. The four men beside the gazebo spun towards the overworked motorbike. They didn’t know what it was, but they’d have guessed it wasn’t bringing dessert.

They started hesitantly towards the people-carrier. Before they could get there the lad who’d test-fired the missiles jumped into the wagon and it lurched towards me.

The four players melted into the trees.

Full revs, I aimed at the point where they’d disappeared, trying to outrun the wagon.

I knew immediately it wasn’t going to happen.

The Ural splashed into a puddle the size of a small lake and aquaplaned. I kept the revs up, kept looking the way I wanted to go.

The wagon was gaining on me. Within seconds it was all I could see in my mirrors.

I jinked the handlebars and swung left. The wheel of the sidecar lifted. I had to throttle back before we flipped.

The wagon closed tight up behind me.

Less than a hundred and I’d be in among the foliage.

The sidecar jerked and was suddenly in front of me. The bike was spinning. The fucker had kicked me up the arse.

I had to jump. If I didn’t get off, it was going to take me off. My right leg was hemmed in by the sidecar bars and air intake. If I didn’t go now, I might have to leave it behind.

Hands over my head, chin tucked in, I launched myself sideways. All I could do was curl up, fly, and accept the landing.

I hit the tarmac hard. The air was punched from my lungs. I skidded across the ground. All that lay between me and a severe cheese-grating was the set of 1980s waxies. My elbows and hands took the pain as I rolled and tumbled.

I flipped over onto my back and my head met the cheese-grater. The asphalt ground through hair and skin down to the bone. I was slowing down. I spread my arms and legs to create more friction.

When I finally came to a stop I couldn’t seem to function. I tried to get to my feet. I couldn’t. My vision was blurred. The back of my head felt like a blowtorch was trained on it.

I could see the blurry shape of the van. I saw the door open. The body behind the wheel began to get out.

All I could do was stagger towards it.

113

I hurled myself at the driver’s door and rammed it as it opened. There was a pistol in his left hand. His arm was extended. The metal frame banged against it. I held it there, slapping him like a drunk.

It wasn’t working. He screamed at me through the window as I pulled the door open and he started to launch himself out. I slammed my weight against it and rammed his head back against the trim. His arm came down. I tried to kick the pistol away. He screamed as I held him there, kicking again and again at his hand, sometimes hitting, sometimes missing.

The pistol finally dropped. I yanked open the door again and slammed it hard into the side of his head. He collapsed into his seat. His head crashed into the steering-wheel, then slumped towards the footwell. His jaw came to rest on the door-sill. I raised my foot and kicked down. There was a loud crunch as his jaw gave way and the top of his head carried on four or five inches more towards the tarmac.

The rest of him poured out of the wagon and hit the deck. He wasn’t going anywhere. My head was still spinning. I tried to take deep breaths.

The whine of jet engines sparked up on the other side of the firs.

I stumbled over to the weapon and picked it up. It was a Makarov. I slipped it into what was left of my jacket pocket as the Falcon’s engines got louder. It was still the other side of the tree-line but definitely on the move.

I looked through the windows of the wagon. The seats were down and there was a stack of long green plastic containers in the back. I pulled up the tail hatch and grabbed the handles of the top two. They were light. They’d already been fired. I pulled them out and chucked them down beside their owner.

The next two were heavy.

The nose of the Falcon emerged from the far corner of the tree-line, about four hundred away, turning slightly left, then right again as it positioned itself for take-off.

I spun back to the container and took a long, deep breath. I had to be in control.

My heart-rate slowed, and so did everything around me.

I knew what I wanted to do. I knew how to do it.

I mustn’t rush. If I rushed, I’d fuck up.

The four catches along the side of the tube flipped open easily. I lifted the lid. The 16 and its two-kilogram warhead nestled in a solid-foam cut-out.

The engines screamed as the Falcon developed the thrust to rattle down the runway and take off.

I pulled the weapon from its housing and hefted it onto my shoulder.

I was calm. I was in control.

The sun glinted on the clean white fuselage, still wet from the rain. I just hoped they were looking out of their windows and could see what was about to happen.

I turned on the power pack and heard the gentle whine of the electrics sparking up.

Everything was self-testing. It completed in seconds. As the Falcon’s engines reached take-off power, I took my final deep breath.

114

The aircraft rolled, and was soon roaring down the tarmac, piercing the heat haze and throwing up a huge plume of mist.

I positioned the range ring of the sight on my target. I’d need to keep it there throughout the engagement sequence. Like Paul (not Pavel) had said, the SA-16 was an all-aspect missile. You could engage the target from any angle.

There was no IFF on this one. The Taliban didn’t need it. Neither did I. I felt with my forefinger for the arming switch on the right of the grip stock. The Falcon was halfway down the runway. I pushed the switch forward from safety to armed. The weapon readied itself for firing, super-cooling the seeker to allow it to lock onto the target’s primary heat-source, those three engines on the back. When enough infrared energy was detected, I would hear a high-pitched signal.

It was too easy. The electronics buzzed loud into my ear as it locked on.

The front wheel lifted from the tarmac.

My right ear filled with a high-pitched whine.

The seeker had a firm lock and was tracking the heat-source. We were ready to rock and roll.

I pulled the trigger just as the rest of the aircraft left the tarmac and tried to gain height.

Paul (not Pavel)’s words echoed in my head:
provided the aircraft was below 10,000 feet, its destruction was 99.9 per cent guaranteed
.

The missile made me wobble as it exploded from its tube. The white smoke trail was almost perfectly horizontal. It created a little white circle as it rolled over to the left, corrected itself, then jinked a little to the right as it locked on.

The aircraft was no more than a hundred metres from the ground when the missile struck. There was a small explosion. No big fireball, just debris falling away from the rear of the target.

The Falcon seemed almost to hesitate, and then dropped back down in a slow clockwise spin. It impacted beyond the end of the runway, throwing up walls of mud around its final resting-place.

A few pieces of wreckage fluttered from the sky like industrial-strength confetti.

As I threw down the tube and staggered towards the driver’s seat of the people-carrier, the third drone scudded across the sky, chucking out flares as it went.

The back of my head felt like it had been dunked in acid. I got into the wagon and hit the ignition. The bike was lying on its side, engine still throbbing. The chainsaw lay about fifteen metres away.

I picked it up. This wasn’t finished.

115

I sped along the runway towards the crash site as hundred-dollar bills fluttered out of the sky. Thousands of the things papered the wet tarmac – it looked like Broadway after a ticker-tape parade.

In the distance, the Falcon looked like a broken toy in a lake of mud. The back third of the fuselage had snapped clean off and lay about a hundred metres from the main section.

I swerved round another chunk of twisted aluminium. The last thing I wanted was a puncture. We still had to get out of this fucking place and I reckoned the Ural had already done its bit.

Brin was moving – staggering – across the tarmac. I swung the wheel towards him. He took another couple of steps, turned and looked me in the eye. His face and hands were charred, his clothes tattered.

My foot hit the accelerator. The people-carrier must have been doing at least forty when it hit him. It didn’t connect with the same explosive force as one of his 16s, but it was the best I could do.

He flew backwards three or four metres. I hoped he’d have massive internal damage. I wanted him to know the meaning of pain before I killed him. I turned back and came to a halt a couple of metres from his burnt and shattered body. I pulled myself out of the wagon. He was face down on the tarmac. His back heaved a couple of times, but each breath sounded like a death rattle.

I pulled him over onto his front and stood above him. Brin’s eyes stared at me. His brow furrowed. Maybe he was trying to work out where he knew me from. He was welcome to try, but it wasn’t going to happen.

He gasped and jerked as I raised the weapon. I didn’t care if he was about to die anyway, I wanted to make sure the job was done – and I wanted to make sure it was me who did it. I had some promises to keep.

I flicked off safety and aimed at his head. I fired just once. I was going to need every round I had.

He lay completely still. His eyes stayed open.

I turned away, leaving him lying in a fast-spreading pool of his own blood, just like he’d left Dex and Red Ken.

I surveyed the wreckage five hundred away. Smoke curled from the gaping hole at the back of the Dassault, but there were no flames.

Neither was there any movement.

Fuck that. I needed to take a closer look. I climbed back into the wagon and drove.

116

The rear section lay on its side, minus the right-hand engine and tail wing. I could see now where the cash had come from. The cargo hold was below the two side engines. The missile’s kinetic energy had ripped apart the alloy boxes inside.

I didn’t want to fuck about with the doors and emergency hatches. If anyone was alive in there it would give them time to think and react. The only way I was going in was via the mess of wires, panelling, seats and jagged metal where the back section had once been attached. From the noise I’d be making, they might even mistake me for a rescuer.

I stopped the wagon at the end of the runway. I was going to have to walk the rest of the way through ankle-deep mud.

I grabbed the chainsaw off the back seat and checked the mag on the Makarov.

I started walking. I was on auto-pilot. This was my time. Nothing was going to stop me. Nothing. I was doing what was right.

With the chainsaw on full revs, I sliced through the twisted wreckage in my path. As soon as there was enough room for me to squeeze through, I dumped it in the mud. I drew down the Makarov and stepped into what was left of the plane.

The smoke-filled cabin was in shit state. Yellow oxygen masks dangled from the ceiling. Seats had become grotesquely distorted. The fuselage had buckled. The dark leather sofas round a fixed coffee-table were upended. Sparks jumped from severed wiring and at least four different warning alarms were going off. They were so loud I could no longer hear the chainsaw still chugging away behind me. I could smell burning electrics, cigar smoke and alcohol.

The crew door swung open and the two pilots saw me. Then they saw the pistol. The door cannoned shut again and I heard bolts slamming home.

Altun was sprawled on the floor to my left, nursing an arm that flopped like a broken wing. It was covered with blood. A champagne bottle was emptying itself onto the thick pile carpet next to him.

His eyes were glued on my weapon. He opened his mouth, but I spared him the indignity of begging. ‘This is for Red.’ I double-tapped him in the head.

Another one down.

I moved along the cabin. Everything was still in slow motion. I was floating.

The Taliban was on the right, hiding behind a section of brown leather. His eyes met mine. He knew what was coming. He didn’t even flinch as the weapon came up. He stared, and waited.

‘This is for Tenny.’

I fired.

One more to go.

I moved deeper into the cabin, clearing a path through the oxygen masks with my Makarov’d right hand.

He was in the far right-hand corner, struggling to get up. His lap was wet. Either it was champagne or he’d pissed himself. There was a cigar on the floor, still smouldering. ‘Nick! Is that you, Nick? You’re supposed to be stood down!’ A cut that started just above his right ear ran all the way to his neck. ‘We’ve got to get away out this shit. Come on, let’s go.’

He staggered to his feet. ‘It’s been a total fuck-up. They should have called you off. They were told to.’

He took a couple of paces but I pushed him back. He toppled into one of the leather chairs. His eyes never left the weapon. He looked up at me, his arms outstretched. ‘Nick, what are you doing? I’m on your side here, that’s why they should have pulled you out. What’s the deal?’ He saw my head. ‘You OK?’

‘Why aren’t you dead?’

His hands came up in mock surrender. ‘Dubai? I didn’t know that was going to happen. I took a round myself.’ He pointed to his side. ‘Luckily it didn’t hit anything vital. I’m not carrying, by the way. I’m going to show you.’

He lifted his fleece and the polo shirt beneath to show a dent in the side of his overflowing gut. ‘I didn’t know. I swear.’ He shook his head. ‘Your people were told to back off. Now they’ve really fucked up.’

‘I’m afraid I’m going to have to take all the credit for that. What were you up to, Spag? Doing your Ollie North impression again?’

He pointed beyond the gap in the tail section. ‘You see that shit out there?’ He meant the carpet of dollar bills. ‘That’s the money we’re going to use to fight fucks like him.’ His podgy finger moved to the Taliban. ‘That fucking Obama and his new fucking broom . . . He’s cutting our budgets left, right and centre . . . He’s fucking up our world, Nick. My world and your world. But we’re putting that right.’ He gave me his trademark leer. ‘Damn right we are!’

I kept quiet. Neither of us had anywhere to go right now.

‘I used the gold to buy the missiles from Vladislav. You remember him?’ He didn’t wait for an answer. ‘Then I geared up by trading the missiles to the Taliban for heroin, via that fuck Altun.’

His hands finally came down. ‘Iran’s having an election soon, Nick. The Taliban paid us way over the odds to get their hands on the missiles. We’re going to flood the country with their heroin and pocket the proceeds. Double whammy! The CIA needs black money to finance guys like me and you.’ He reached out a hand for me to help him up.

I stared along the barrel. ‘Not me, Spag. I was stood down. But you know why I’m here. You were there when it happened.’

His jaw dropped. ‘This whole thing – for two guys? You’re kidding, right?’

I was almost in a trance. I just looked at him, wondering when I was going to pull the trigger. ‘Not just two. There’s Tenny, and all the others like him.’

‘Big boys’ rules, Nick. They knew what they signed up for. This is bigger than them.’

‘Wrong.’

As I brought the weapon up he sprang towards me, slapping my hand off to the left.

The weapon spun and he started running for the gap.

It was OK. I had five or six metres. I wanted to take my time, get it right, savour the moment.

I turned, brought the weapon back up – even thought about my stance. Nice stable position with the feet; weapon solid in the right hand; web of the thumb and forefinger tight into the back of the grip. Nice straight right arm; left now bent, fingers closing over the right wrist.

Both eyes open, fixed on the foresight so it was clear and sharp, I took aim in the centre of the big, now out-of-focus mass dodging the oxygen masks and debris.

The pad of my right forefinger rested on the trigger.

‘Nick! Nick!’

She stood in the opening, right in my arc of fire.

‘Out of the way!’

He saw his chance. The gap between them closed.

I started to run.

The chainsaw engine roared, but it was drowned almost immediately by Spag’s high-pitched scream.

Red stuff exploded over the rear cabin as he fell to his side, the chainsaw still embedded in his chest.

Drenched in his blood, Anna dropped to her knees and vomited.

I jumped over the American’s body and put my arm around her shoulders.