The Shadow Dancers

by Angus McLean

  He freed the tie on the hood and lifted it far enough to uncover The Doctor’s mouth, allowing him to breathe. Blood streaked vomit dripped from the inside of the hood. The Doctor gaped like a fish, struggling to fill his lungs with oxygen. He coughed and spewed, gasping some more.

  ‘What do you mean she’s the one?’ Moore asked, crouching over him.

  ‘The white girl,’ The Doctor wheezed, ‘she will die.’ His chest heaved and shuddered as he finally got his lungs open properly.

  Moore mentally counted off-one full breath.

  ‘This girl?’ he said. ‘Or another one?’

  ‘The white girl.’ A second full breath. ‘New Zealand…girl.’

  Third full breath.

  Moore tugged the hood down over his mouth and The Doctor twisted, trying to break free. Moore rose half way, holding The Doctor’s legs under his right arm, the man’s shoulders and heads at an awkward angle on the ground. He took the water jug from Katie.

  The Doctor thrashed hard now but Moore held firm.

  ‘Which white girl are you talking about?’ he demanded. ‘This girl or Natalie Oldham?’

  ‘Paradise waits for…’

  Moore cut him off with a torrent of water over his face. The wet hood clung to the terrorist’s mouth and nose, bringing on an instant sensation of drowning, and he thrashed hard, whipping from side to side. Moore maintained a steady pour until the jug emptied. He passed it to Katie. In the torchlight her face was pale and drawn, her eyes wide. This was so far from her world it wasn’t funny.

  The Doctor let out a keening wail as he sucked in air. Moore kept him in the same position, knowing the pressure on his upper body would cause The Doctor immense pain and fear breaking his neck.

  ‘Tell me about Natalie Oldham,’ he demanded. ‘You start talking, Doctor, and I’ll stop this.’

  ‘You know him?’ Katie said with surprise.

  Moore gave a grim nod. ‘Yeah, I know who he is.’

  ‘You know…nothing!’ The Doctor screeched from beneath the wet hood. He kicked out to no avail.

  Moore gave him a shake. ‘Tell me about Natalie Oldham. Where is she?’

  The Doctor switched back to Arabic. ‘May Allah be praised...’

  Katie stepped forward now and began the pour, a steady stream of dirty trough water cascading down onto the terrorist’s face. He spluttered and coughed and writhed, weaker now. The Doctor let out an animal-like screech and bucked hard, Moore hanging on desperately to contain him.

  He mentally counted off the seconds, reaching fifteen before giving Katie the nod to stop. He dropped The Doctor down again and lifted the hood to help him breathe. Blood covered the chin and flowed down onto the throat.

  Alarmed, he jerked the hood up further. The Doctor was spasming now, thin gasping sounds emitting from his bloodied mouth.

  ‘Fuck!’ Moore ripped the hood away and grabbed the torch from Katie, shining it on the terrorist’s face. It was waxy looking and twitching, the mouth wide open. He checked the carotid pulse-nothing.

  ‘Is he dead?’ Katie asked, a distinct quaver in her voice.

  ‘The fucker bit his tongue,’ Moore muttered, peering into the blood-filled mouth.

  ‘Did I kill him?’

  ‘No.’ Moore stood, pushing away from the body. ‘He refused to talk; better to be a martyr than surrender to us.’

  ‘He bit his own tongue off?’ Katie sounded incredulous.

  Moore looked at her. ‘This ain’t fuckin’ tiddlywinks, Katie. These pricks are fanatics. He would rather choke on his own blood than give in.’

  ‘Jesus Christ.’ Katie stepped back, a hand to her forehead as it all sunk in. ‘Jesus fucking Christ…’

  ‘They may be jihadists, but there’s nothing holy about these bastards,’ Moore said grimly.

  He took his AK back from her then checked the pockets of The Doctor’s suit. He found a small amount of cash, a smart phone and a small, wicked looking dagger with a blade barely ten centimetres long. He stuffed them all into his own pocket, then dug into the inside pocket of the jacket.

  He produced a tall, slim black leather wallet. He put it down and held the light on it while he unfolded the wallet to inspect the contents. What he found made his blood run cold.

  ‘What the hell is that?’ Katie asked, leaning over his shoulder.

  Moore slid out one of the tools. It was a scalpel with a long handle. Katie let out a gasp of horror. Alongside the scalpel was a pair of needle nosed pliers, a vicious looking dental hook, and various other implements.

  Moore looked up at Katie. ‘Tools of torture,’ he said simply.

  He stood and pocketed the torture kit. He checked the car and found the keys in the ignition. He went back to the bodies of the driver and bodyguard and snapped photos of them on the burn phone. He turned to Katie.

  ‘Let’s go.’

  Chapter Thirty

  Twenty minutes later they arrived on the outskirts of Adapazari.

  Moore pulled the people mover into the car park of a truck stop and parked up in a dark corner. A couple of big rigs were parked up and the diner/gas station was open.

  He checked the smart phone he’d taken from The Doctor and saw it was almost fully charged. Rather than mess around with it and risk tripping a self-destruct trigger in the hard drive, he used the burn phone instead.

  Punching in the Ops Room number from memory, he waited for several seconds before the connection opened with a bland male voice.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hotel California,’ Moore said, ‘five-two-eight-six-three-nine.’

  Silence for a moment.

  ‘Heat?’

  ‘De Niro and Pacino.’ Moore glanced at Katie who was watching him with a quizzical look. He rolled his eyes at her.

  ‘Location?’

  ‘Adapazari. Track this phone. I’ve been burned and need an urgent exfil. I have a passenger.’

  More silence. He had no idea who he was talking to but he had to trust that what he needed would be done.

  ‘Stand by.’

  The phone went dead. He looked at Katie.

  ‘Hurry up and wait,’ he said.

  She said nothing, and he knew she was still processing what they’d just been through.

  Four minutes later the phone rang. He hit the go button but said nothing.

  ‘Piccadilly Circus at lunchtime,’ came Jedi’s voice down the line. ‘The man wears a yellow raincoat.’

  ‘I prefer orange myself,’ Moore replied, ‘especially on a Tuesday.’

  Whoever came up with these security codes was obviously retarded, he thought.

  Jedi got straight to business and Moore listened intently. Two minutes later he disconnected and spent another two minutes messaging the photos to the Ops Room. He pocketed the phone and turned to Katie.

  ‘What’s going on?’ she asked. She had her arms folded across her chest and looked pale.

  ‘We need to get moving. We’ve got a pick up coming in about an hour and a half. We’re going to stop here for ten minutes for a clean-up then head to an RV.’

  Katie nodded again. He could see the exhaustion and strain in her face. He reached over and touched her knee.

  ‘This is all good,’ he said. ‘We just need to get ourselves sorted and get moving, then we’ll be outta here, okay?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ Katie nodded and unbuckled her seatbelt. ‘Let’s do it then.’

  Moore had recovered his Sig from the car, where someone had obviously stashed it as a trophy for later, and he checked the weapon’s state before slipping it back into the front of his waistband. He followed his companion across the darkened car park to the toilet at the side of the gas station. It was unlocked and he waited outside while Katie used the facilities. He found a tap around the back and cupped his hands to wash his face, neck and hands.

  A quick visit to the gas station shop restocked their supplies and a few minutes later they were on the move again. Moore’s hands and face smelt of the fragranced handy w
ipes and antiseptic he’d bought, he was steadily rehydrating and he’d cleaned up half a block of chocolate.

  Katie was quiet, munching her way through chocolate and crackers as the road hummed beneath them. Moore left her alone, figuring that she needed to work through the night’s events in her head in her own time.

  He knew what it was like. No matter how skilled he was, the darker arts had never been as easy for him as for other operators. The first man he’d killed had been a sniper shot at 350 metres in Kabul, dropping a guy who was spotting for insurgents waiting to ambush a Kiwi patrol. It was over in a second and he’d barely thought of it since.

  There had been others since then, and he was not immune to the demons who came creeping, sometimes at night when he was vulnerable, sometimes in the broad light of day when the battlefield was the furthest thing from his mind.

  There had been one occasion when he was mountain biking in the Waitakere’s and an hour into it he came round a curve in the track and nearly ran down an insurgent standing to the side with half his face blown off.

  The bastard had followed him, appearing at every turn in the track for the next hour, just standing and staring at him with a single cold, dead eye, and congealed blood bordering the gaping wound in his head. He hadn’t been seen for over a year now but Moore was conscious that he would probably never fully leave.

  They’d been driving for nearly an hour when Katie finally spoke.

  ‘It’s pretty fucked up, isn’t it?’ she said.

  She paused as if compiling her next sentence. Moore waited.

  ‘I mean…that was pretty fucking intense wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yep.’ Moore nodded, his eyes on the road. ‘It was.’

  ‘They were going to kill us weren’t they?’

  ‘No doubt.’

  ‘And that guy…the one at the end. In the suit. He was a bad guy, wasn’t he?’

  He could feel her looking at him now. He kept his eyes ahead.

  ‘He was. They all were.’

  ‘But he was someone wasn’t he? You knew him.’

  Moore nodded again.

  ‘He was someone alright.’

  ‘Who was he?’

  Her stare was penetrating his skull now and he fought hard to resist. He knew what she wanted, what she needed. Confirmation that her perception of the situation was accurate. Affirmation that they’d done the right thing. Fair do’s, but she was not in the circle of trust yet.

  ‘He was a senior member of ISIS. He was an interrogator and torturer.’ Moore glanced at her now. ‘The world’s a better place without him in it.’

  Katie gave a small nod. Her eyes were still wide. Moore hoped she didn’t have any more questions on The Doctor. She didn’t let him down.

  ‘I don’t how I should be feeling about what happened,’ she said quietly. ‘I know it’s wrong but I feel…I dunno…relieved, or like…kind of glad?’ She shook her head as she struggled with the emotions. ‘Not glad…but like, more than relieved I guess.’

  Moore nodded.

  ‘Fair enough,’ he said, ‘you should. I know what you mean, and it’s okay to feel like that.’

  ‘But glad that someone’s dead?’ Katie’s tone was confused.

  ‘It’s not about being glad,’ he said. ‘Not glad. Relieved is good, it’s normal.’ He felt like he was talking to a raw recruit, and in some ways he guessed he was. ‘You should be relieved that you survived; like you said, it was pretty fuckin’ intense. But you made it through in one piece, and nobody can ask for more than that.’

  Katie was still silent, but he knew he had her ear now. She was listening to the voice of experience, seeking solace and comfort. It was important to get this right, for her sake. It was a one-shot deal. If he screwed this up, she would struggle to get her head round it, if she ever did.

  ‘Those guys brought the fight, remember. They kidnapped us. They planned to kill us. This was all their game.’ He looked at her again, meeting her gaze firmly. ‘But we played it better, Katie. We beat them at their own game and we walked away from it. Your training, your instincts, your guts-that’s what got you through. And you should be proud of that.’

  She went silent again, jamming her hands between her thighs and staring out the window at the darkness beyond. Moore alternated between watching the road and checking on her. He saw the glisten of a tear rolling down the side of her nose and she turned further away, subtly wiping it away and giving a sniff.

  ‘I was shitting myself,’ Katie said suddenly, ‘but when we came out of that room, it was like there was hope. I knew that we at least had a chance of getting out of there.’ She turned to him now, crossing her legs under her and leaning half against the door. ‘You probably don’t get that though, do you? You must live and breathe this shit.’

  Moore pulled a face.

  ‘Fear is a healthy emotion as long as you can control it. If it paralyses you from acting then you’re dead. But if you can get a grip on it it makes you more aware of what you’re doing, less likely to do something stupid.’ He glanced at her. ‘I still get nervous. I’m glad I do. If I didn’t I’d be a psychopath.’

  ‘Have you ever been wounded?’ Katie asked.

  He gave a short nod.

  ‘Couple of times.’

  Katie fell silent again and Moore didn’t elaborate. She didn’t need to know he still carried shrapnel, and she didn’t need to know about the months of rehab he’d gone through to get back to active duty again.

  Chapter Thirty One

  They drove in silence for another half hour, until the phone on Katie’s lap told them to turn left in fifty metres.

  Moore followed the instructions and they took a narrow side road off the highway for another half a klick before pulling up. They were at a deserted gas station in the middle of nowhere. Paint peeled off the sides and the pumps were long gone.

  They got out and stretched their legs, the night air chilly but refreshing. Moore rolled his shoulders and arched his back, popping a stiff joint in his neck. He shook himself like a dog and took some deep breaths, clearing the fug from his brain. As he drained his water bottle he saw a set of headlights approaching from the other direction.

  At the same time his iPhone rang. An American accent started talking as soon as he answered.

  ‘Move that vehicle around the back, man. We’re thirty seconds out.’

  The connection was gone just as quickly as it appeared and Moore followed the instructions, guessing their exfil crew had them under obs via night vision gear-or possibly from an unseen aircraft.

  The other vehicle pulled in as he alighted from the people mover again. The high beams blinded both of them as the doors flew open on the other vehicle and dark figures fanned out.

  ‘Hands on the side of the car,’ barked a voice from behind the lights. ‘Feet apart.’

  Moore and Katie did as they were told and were quickly frisked and disarmed. Their watches and phones were taken from them. Their papers were checked and the people mover was cleared. Moore kept his head down until hands turned him and a torch was shone in his face.

  Behind the light a bearded white guy checked his face against his passport before cutting the light and walking him to the other vehicle-a van with tinted windows and bench seats in the back.

  He was guided into the middle row and Katie was placed beside him. She looked at him in the darkness but said nothing.

  The driver had stayed put with the engine running. Two guys got in behind them, both carrying compact Colt Commando rifles. Their bags were loaded in and the last guy took the seat in front of them, turning to address them as the van began to move off.

  He was a thickset man somewhere in his thirties with a ginger-tinged beard. Like the others he was dressed in a loose fitting shirt of neutral colours and jeans. He had a baseball cap down low over dark eyes.

  ‘Welcome aboard the Exfil Express,’ he said. ‘My name’s Todd and I’ll be your tour guide tonight.’

  His accent was from somewhere
in the Mid-West, Moore guessed.

  ‘Don’t worry about the rest of these dudes here,’ Todd continued, ‘they’re just along for the ride. Just sit back and relax, we’ll wake you when we get there, okay?’

  ‘Where’s there?’ Katie asked.

  Todd grinned somewhere within the forest of a beard.

  ‘Well there is there, missy,’ he replied. ‘It’s not here, and that’s a good thing right?’

  Todd held up their pistols. The van was picking up speed.

  ‘I’ll hang onto these for now. I understand you also have some phones to share with us?’

  ‘Got ‘em here, Top,’ one of the guys behind them said. His accent was pure Southern California-laid back surfer dude.

  Moore turned to look at him and the guy grinned back, pearly whites in a deeply tanned face topped with a blonde mop.

  ‘Hey buddy,’ the guy grinned.

  Moore tilted his chin, saying nothing.

  ‘Good talk man, we should do it again sometime.’

  Moore gave a smile and turned back to the front.

  ‘Thanks for coming to get us,’ he said to Todd, who was clearly the leader. ‘Appreciate it.’

  ‘Anything for our Kiwi pals,’ Todd replied. ‘Get some shut-eye if you like, we got a drive ahead of us.’ He kicked a bag at his feet. ‘Got some scoff here if you haven’t eaten.’

  Moore nodded his thanks and settled into his seat. He didn’t need to eat and there wasn’t much else to say. He guessed these guys were either Delta Force or Green Berets-or the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment (Delta) and the US Army Special Forces, as they were officially known-or maybe from the Special Activities Division of the CIA.

  Whoever they were, they were good and he felt safe in their hands. Within minutes he was asleep.

  He was awoken some time later by the van slowing down. Moore felt Katie’s weight against him when he woke. It wasn’t unwelcome. It was still dark outside and he could hear propellers turning.

  Katie woke when the van came to a stop and the side door was thrown open. Todd alighted and spoke to someone out of sight if the passengers. Katie stirred and lifted herself off Moore, wiping her mouth self-consciously.