The Matt Drake Boxset 6

by David Leadbeater

  “Speak for yourself.” Mai evaluated everything quickly. “Take two minutes. Memorize what’s inside that box as best you can.” She raised her hands. “Do it.”

  Drake caught the gist of it. The box, at the end of the day, wasn’t worth their lives. If things got really tight and the friendlier team overcame them, giving up the box might just save their lives. Dahl flipped the lid open as the team walked straight toward the oncoming choppers.

  He handed sheaves of paper all around.

  “Whoa, this is weird,” Alicia said.

  Kenzie shuffled several sheets. “Walking into a fight whilst reading a thirty to fifty-year-old document written by Nazis and hidden in Hannibal Barca’s grave? What’s weird about that?”

  Drake tried to commit the passages to memory. “She has a point. Par for the course for SPEAR.”

  High altitude research project, he read. Initially created with the goal of studying the ballistics of re-entry at lesser cost. Instead of expensive rockets ...

  “I don’t know what the hell this is.”

  Non-rocket space launch. The project suggests a very large gun could be used to fire objects at high speed to high altitudes ...

  “Oh, shit.”

  Dahl and Alicia were similarly ashen faced. “This can’t be good.”

  Hayden pointed out the oncoming choppers, now in plain sight. They could see individual weapons hanging out of the helos.

  “And neither is that!”

  Drake handed over the papers and readied his weapons. Time for something he was used to and good at. Chatter flew at him from Hayden, Mai and Smyth, and also from the comms system that Lauren had patched in.

  “Israelis engaged with Swedes. Russia unknown ...” Then came bursts of static and quick translations from live feed communications that the NSA and other organizations had managed to listen in on.

  The French: “We are approaching the area ...”

  The British: “Yes sir, targets seen. We have multiple enemies in the field ...”

  The Chinese: “Are you certain they have the box?”

  Hayden led the way. They ran from the field. They ran without a plan. Careful gunfire made the choppers shy away and forced their ground pursuit to move with extreme caution.

  And then, as Drake had almost tuned out and concentrated on their new escape route, another voice cut through the static.

  Only briefly.

  Partially hidden under the noise, hard to properly make out, a deep drawl jabbed at his ears.

  American: “SEAL Team 7 here. We’re real close now ...”

  Shock jolted him to the core. But there was no time. No chance to talk. Not even a second to absorb it.

  His eyes though met Torsten Dahl’s.

  What the ... ?

  CHAPTER NINE

  “Tell the helo to back off!” Hayden snapped through the comms. “We’re gonna find a different way.”

  “You want it to hang around?” Lauren asked, making Alicia laugh even as she ran for her life.

  “Of course. Duck and cover. Don’t call us, we’ll call you!”

  Drake wondered if the day would ever end, then saw the full disc of sun hanging over the horizon and saw the irony. The ground ran in a series of hills, each one steeper than the next. SPEAR covered their asses as they reached the top of the hill, stepping carefully, then ran full-pelt down the other side.

  Gunfire erupted spasmodically from the rear, but it wasn’t aimed at them, probably the Israelis and Swedes trading blows. Appearing to the left and right were several more decrepit buildings, most built in shallow valleys, all deserted. Drake wasn’t sure what had made the people leave, but it had happened a long time ago.

  More hills and then a stand of trees to the left. Offering cover, the greenery and boughs clustered thickly. Hayden steered the team in that direction, and Drake breathed a little easier. Any kind of concealment was better than none at all. First Hayden and then Alicia flitted through the trees, now followed by Dahl, Kenzie and Kinimaka. Drake entered the wood, which left Mai, Yorgi and Smyth at the rear. Shots rang out, closer now, sending a bolt of apprehension for his friends through Drake.

  Turning, he saw Mai stumble.

  Watched her face bounce off the ground.

  “Noooo!”

  *

  Hayden skidded to an instant stop and turned. Mai lay collapsed on the ground in that instant, Drake stepping up to her, Smyth already bending down. Bullets thudded into the outer trees. Someone was close.

  Then the undergrowth erupted. Figures leapt out, one striking Hayden in the lower body. She staggered, but kept her feet. A tree trunk struck her spine. She ignored the jolt of pain, raised her gun. Then the black figure was at her again, striking with an elbow, a knee, a knife ...

  Hayden twisted with the lunge, and felt the edge of the blade pass her stomach by a hair’s-breadth. She fought back, an elbow to the face and a knee to the stomach to force a little space between them. She was aware of Kinimaka and Alicia struggling to the right, of Dahl kicking out at a figure he’d felled.

  Of Drake lifting up a limp Mai.

  Bullets flew between the trees, shredding the leaves and vegetation. One felled an adversary, but not for long. The man soon rose, clearly wearing some form of Kevlar. Hayden’s vision was then full of her own opponent—a man from the Mossad, features engrained with raw and vicious purpose.

  “Stop,” she said. “We’re on the same—”

  The punch in the mouth stopped her. Hayden tasted blood.

  “Orders,” came the thick reply.

  She blocked more blows, forcing the man away, trying not to bring up her gun even as he wielded his knife. The blade tasted bark, then dirt. Hayden kicked the man’s legs out as Drake pelted past, racing along the trail and further into the trees. Smyth watched his back, striking an Israeli in the face and sending him back into the underbrush. Kenzie came next, face for once hesitant and eyes wide as if searching for someone familiar.

  Hayden pushed her way toward Drake.

  “Mai?”

  “She’s fine. Just a bullet to the spine is all. Nothing spectacular.”

  Hayden blanched. “What?”

  “Jacket stopped it. She fell, hit her skull. No biggie.”

  “Oh.”

  Alicia ducked under a vicious elbow attack and used a judo throw to send her opponent crashing beyond the trees. Kinimaka bulldozed his way through another Mossad soldier. For a few moments the way was clear, and the SPEAR team took full advantage.

  Every ounce of experience came into play as they ran at full pace, without thought of slowing down, through the twisting, dipping, hazardous cluster of trees. A gap was introduced between them and the Mossad team, and the thick foliage was the perfect cover.

  “How the hell did they get around us?” Drake yelled.

  “Must have been when we stopped to check the box,” Hayden said.

  Smyth clucked loudly. “We were watching.”

  “Don’t beat yourself up—” Hayden began.

  “No, my friend,” Kenzie said. “They are the best at what they do.”

  Smyth grunted as if to say so are we, but otherwise held his silence. Hayden saw Kinimaka stumble, huge feet landing in a pile of springy loam, and moved to help but Dahl had already steadied the big man. The Swede swopped the box to the other arm, pushing the Hawaiian with his right.

  And now another danger added to the mix—the unmistakable sound of a chopper sweeping overhead.

  Would they open fire?

  Would they sweep the forest with bullets?

  Hayden didn’t think so. A thousand things could go wrong with such irresponsible action. Of course, these guys were under orders from their governments and some of the clowns sat back home in their warm or air-conditioned offices cared naught for what happened outside their ivory towers.

  The clapping of rotors passed above. Hayden kept running. Already, she knew Mossad would be hot on their team, and perhaps the Swedes and Russians behind them. Noi
ses came from the left and she thought she saw more figures—it had to be the Russians, she thought.

  Or maybe the Brits?

  Fuck!

  They were too exposed. Too unprepared. In real effect, so were all the teams out there. Nobody had expected everyone to arrive at once—and that had been a mistake. But tell me a plan that would cater for this?

  Drake trail-blazed ahead, slowed down not at all by Mai’s weight. Alicia pounded at his heels, watching to left and right. The path meandered aimlessly, but generally in the right direction, and Hayden sent out a thanks for that. She heard Smyth spray bullets to their rear, discouraging the pursuers. She heard several cries to the left, as if two forces had met.

  Crap, this is some crazy shit.

  Drake hurdled a fallen tree. Kinimaka smashed through it with barely a grunt. Splinters exploded in all directions. The terrain began to slope down and then they saw the edge of the forest. Hayden snapped into the comms that they should slow—nobody knew what on earth could be waiting beyond that tree line.

  Drake slackened the pace only a little. Alicia flanked him to the right and Dahl pounded up to the left; together the three of them breached the cover and entered a narrow valley protected on both sides by steep brown slopes. Kinimaka and Kenzie were hammering their heels in an effort to provide support and then Hayden broke cover too, now trying to ignore the growing burn in her chest.

  They’d been running for longer than she wanted to think about.

  And the nearest town was miles away.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Drake felt Mai start to struggle a little. He gave her a minute, knowing she’d come around fast. In that fleeting moment he spotted something flat, gray and winding that made his pounding heart skip a beat.

  “Left!”

  The whole group broke to the left, guarding their flanks carefully but unnecessarily as their competitors were still unseen. Drake allowed Mai to struggle a bit but held on. Pretty soon she drove a fist into his ribs.

  “Let me down.”

  “One sec, love ...”

  Alicia glared over. “You enjoying it that much?”

  Drake hesitated, then grinned. “There’s no safe answer to that one, love.”

  “Really?”

  “Well, think about it from my point of view.”

  Mai solved his dilemma by using his spine to push off and flip to the floor. She landed well but swayed in place, holding her head.

  “See,” Drake said. “In my defense, she does seem shaky.”

  “Your head will be shaky if we don’t get a move on.” Alicia pushed past and Drake followed, watching Mai a little longer until she straightened and fell into the pace. The group raced up an embankment toward the blacktop.

  “First tangle with Mossad.” Dahl stretched. “Nothing spectacular.”

  “They were holding back,” Kenzie said. “As you were.”

  “Second tangle,” Drake said. “Remember that village in England? Yonks ago.”

  “Yonks?”

  “Ages.”

  “Oh.” Dahl paused for a second then delivered: “BC or AD?”

  “I think they’re calling it BCE now.”

  “Bollocks to that.”

  The road stretched in both directions, deserted, potholed and in need of repair. Drake heard the flak-flak of the chopper coming around and then more gunfire. He turned to see it being fired upon from the forest, wondered if it would simply carpet the area with bullets, and then saw it veer away sharply.

  “Can’t take the chance,” Dahl said. “Guess that must be the Chinese and they can’t hear chatter as we can.”

  Drake nodded silently. The chatter hadn’t revealed anything new recently. Not since ...

  Hayden gave out a quiet cheer. “I see a vehicle.”

  Drake dropped low and scanned the area. “So what do we have behind us? Mossad and the Russians in the trees, hindering each other. The Swedes somewhere near the Russians? SAS?” He shook his head. “Who knows? Best guess—skirting the forest. They all know if they expose themselves they’re dead. Which is why were still alive.”

  “Chinese in the helo,” Smyth said. “Landing there.” He pointed to a series of shallow dips.

  “French?” Yorgi asked.

  Drake shook his head. Joking aside, the French may even have held back to test the water and allow their opponents to thin themselves out. Shrewdly winning the day at the last minute. He stared at the approaching van.

  “Guns up.”

  Smyth and Kenzie took point, standing at the side of the road and pointing their weapons at the approaching van. Dahl and Drake had placed a couple of heavy boulders in the road. As the van slowed, the rest of the team came from the rear, carefully covering the vehicle and ordering its occupants out.

  Alicia threw open the rear door.

  “Whoa, it stinks!”

  But it was empty. And Drake heard Kenzie asking a question in Turkish. He shook his head as Dahl smiled triumphantly. Full of surprises that girl. “Is there any language she can’t speak?”

  The Swede guffawed. “C’mon man. Don’t leave yourself so wide open.”

  “Ah,” Drake nodded. “Yeah. The language of the gods.”

  “Ey up, love. Fancy a shag? Yeah, I can just hear your sweet accent rolling off Odin’s tongue.”

  Drake ignored it, concentrating on the two Turkish people, who appeared genuinely terrified.

  And genuinely Turkish.

  Hayden bundled them back into the truck, following close at their heels. Dahl grinned once more and then followed her, gesturing at the rest to jump in the back. Drake saw his reason for mirth an instant later, then stared back at Alicia.

  “How bad is it back there?”

  *

  The truck bounced and jounced and tried to destroy itself on the decrepit road.

  Alicia held on for dear life. “Is he trying to hit the bloody bad bits?”

  “Probably,” Smyth said miserably, holding his nose and a filthy strap tied to a strut inside the van. “I smell goats.”

  Alicia narrowed her eyes. “Oh yeah? Friend of yours?”

  Kinimaka sat at the rear of the truck, desperately gulping lungfuls of fresh air through gaps where the rear doors met. “Must ... be ... farmers, I guess.”

  “Or goat smugglers,” Alicia said. “Never can tell.”

  Smyth grunted in anger. “When I said goats, I meant generally.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

  Drake kept out of it, taking shallow breaths and trying to focus on other things. They had to trust Hayden and Dahl up front to keep them safe and find the best place to go. The comms remained silent except for the occasional blast of static. Even Lauren stayed quiet, which also helped in its own way. It told them they were relatively safe.

  The team complained loudly around him—their way of coping and taking their minds off the animal stench. Comparisons to Swedish bathhouses, American restaurants and London hotels were proffered in good sport.

  Drake let his mind wander from Yorgi’s recent outburst and need to share a terrible secret, to the new understanding between Alicia and Mai, to the other troubles that beset the SPEAR team. Hayden and Kinimaka remained at odds, as did Lauren and Smyth—though the latter were dissected by a little more than disagreement. Dahl was working his socks off with Johanna, but there again the job stood in the way.

  Something more urgent and implacable prodded his brain. Secretary Crowe’s irritation that they hadn’t followed orders in Peru and the sure knowledge that a clandestine, top-secret second American team was here. Somewhere.

  SEAL Team 7.

  The questions were countless and inexplicable. What was the answer? Did Crowe no longer trust the SPEAR team? Were they backup?

  He hadn’t forgotten about the large question mark still hanging over Smyth’s head, but couldn’t imagine any other scenario. Crowe had sent Seven to watch over them.

  Drake quelled the anger. She had her own job to do. Black and white was a life visi
on shared only by fools and crazy people. His deep musings were interrupted by Hayden.

  “All clear behind and up front. Looks like we’re approaching a place called Çanakkale, on the coast. I’ll wait until we’ve found a place before contacting the helo. Oh, and Dahl’s had chance to pick this box apart.”

  The Swede took their minds off their situation for a while as he explained what the sheaves of paper appeared to represent. More than war, it was its very declaration. Hannibal, it seemed, had been chosen merely as a symbol.

  *

  “No clue as to how Africa became one of the four corners of the earth?” Mai asked.

  “Not a bloody thing. So we can’t anticipate where the next Horseman will be.”

  “Look into the past,” Kenzie spoke up. “In my job, my old job, the answers were always buried back in time. You just have to know where to look.”

  Lauren chipped in then. “I’ll try that.”

  Drake fought the plunge and sway of the truck. “How far to Çanakkale?”

  “Entering the outskirts now. Doesn’t look too big. I can see the sea.”

  “Oh, you win.” Drake remembered a game from when he was a kid.

  “I saw it first,” Dahl said with a smile in his voice.

  “Yeah, we used to play that too.”

  The truck pulled over, and pretty soon the rear doors were opening outward. The team jumped out and took in amazing lungfuls of fresh air. Alicia complained she felt ill and Kenzie pretended to faint in the English manner. This perked Alicia right up. Drake found himself staring hard and staring in amazement.

  “By ’eck,” he muttered on purpose. “Well I’ll be a monkey’s uncle.”

  Dahl was too gobstruck to comment.

  An enormous wooden horse stood before them, somehow familiar, brooding over a small square surrounded by buildings. Rope seemed to bind its legs and was strung around its head. Drake thought it appeared armored and majestic, a proud manmade animal.

  “What the hell?”

  Crowds flocked around it, staring and posing and taking pictures.

  Lauren spoke via the comms. “I guess you just found the Troy horse.”