BioKill

by Handley, Stuart

  Lilburn had intended to inform the director about Lopez but didn’t get the opportunity.

  “Evangeline, you still there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sorry about that, I had Hall on the phone, we have a possible lead close to here. A helicopter set off an emergency beacon. Evangeline, do me a favor, go to Allan Hall and explain to him what Lopez has confessed. There is no other option. I have to go now.”

  “Be very careful. Please.”

  Lilburn burst into the motel room. “Boys, we got a lead. So saddle up, we’re outta here.”

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  The headlights from the Jeep cut through the dark as it sped down the country roads. Every so often the Jeep pulled over and Lilburn studied a map by the light of his cellphone.

  “It should be coming up soon,” Lilburn yelled above the noise from the open-topped Jeep. “We’re looking for Air Ag and Scenic Air.”

  It took little more than thirty minutes all up for the Homeland team to find the gateway to the hangar. Lilburn instructed the driver to carry on past the gate and stop further up the road out of sight. A short call to Albany advised they were in location and they were ready.

  “OK — let’s do it.”

  Darkness was like a cool mist, covering everything as far as one could see. Everything was monotone, either pitch dark or a lighter shade of black. All except the night sky, which was an immense charismatic masterpiece of contrasts. Twinkling stars illuminating from a black canvas with the power to mesmerize anyone who looked up into the silent astronomical symphony. None of them did.

  After a brisk, silent walk the four men crouched down. Watching, listening. The driveway entrance was some ten yards distant. From their elevated position off to the side of the road they could make out the shape of a large half-round hangar, one hundred yards away, across an open field. Light streamed from an uncovered window.

  Lilburn wanted to get away from the roadside as soon as possible. “Avoid the driveway. Go through this fence, the wires are loose. Move down about ten yards to the right and wait.” Instructing one man to keep cover, he led the others through the fence, keeping low. The remaining man then followed.

  Careful not to present their silhouettes, the agents scanned their objective from the side of the earth mound. Whispered speech was kept to a minimum. Lilburn instructed two men to circumnavigate the hangar, reconnaissance purposes only – one covering while the other moved. With no moon, progress was slow. A quarter of an hour later the pair returned. The hangar doors were shut, only the one window and one further, regular-sized door to one side of the large twin hangar doors were open.

  “Well, I guess this isn’t going to sort itself out.” Lilburn and the men took positions closer to the hangar. Deploying one man as cover, where he could see both the window and the doors, Lilburn advanced with the other two and took up a position between two parked cars to the side of the large building.

  One agent then went ahead and cautiously peered in through the window. He returned quickly. “Only part of the rear of the hangar is lit. There looks to be a sheet or some large white cloth hung up as a partition. That’s where the light is coming from, behind that sheet. Every so often I could see the silhouette of someone moving, I could make out a rifle. I’m fairly sure one or maybe two people are sitting in chairs, while two others are moving around. One of them has the gun.”

  “What about a helicopter or the van we’re after?” Lilburn wanted to know.

  “Just made out the rotor blades of a chopper. I couldn’t see all the hangar. It’s possible it’s there.”

  Lilburn had heard enough. There was a high probability the cell was inside, with civilian hostages. “Peel back to where we left Jones. We’ll pick him up, move back and set up an OP until we get back-up. Go.”

  The three men stealthily regrouped towards their covering agent’s position. The nearest man whispered, “Jones, we’re pulling back.”

  No response.

  “Hey, Jones.” The man reached forward and tapped the man’s shoulders. Still no reaction. Something was wrong; he gave him a harder push and felt something warm. “Ah shit.” Dropping his rifle, the agent rolled Jones over onto his back, revealing a gaping throat wound. “He’s dead!”

  “Watch your ass.” Lilburn and the other two immediately surrounded the body and dropped to their knees facing out, weapons at the ready, each man watching, listening for any movement.

  “What happened?” Lilburn whispered to the man who had raised the alarm.

  “His throat’s been cut.”

  “Hell.”

  Lilburn turned and briefly laid a hand on the dead man, then shuffled back to his position. “Yeah, he’s dead.”

  “Boss, the lights have gone out in the hangar.” Lilburn turned to look for himself. Shortly after one of the large hangar doors opened, clanging and rattling on its runners, the unexpected clatter of noise in an otherwise quiet night jarring their senses, already primed by the death of their colleague. It was too dark to see anyone. Suddenly the entire hangar was lit up as all the lights inside flicked on. The beams penetrated the night out towards where the agents knelt. While they were far enough away from the hangar not to be directly lit by the lights, the light had an immediate result. It back-lit them for someone even further away.

  Lying prone on the other side of the narrow grassed runway, Bomani threw off the large sack he had covered himself with and tucked his phone back in his pocket. The placement of his rifle was such that all that was required was to raise it up, his cheekbone settled on the oiled wooden stock, his elbows and body acting as a steady tri-pod. He placed his forefinger lightly on the trigger and looked through the scope. As the lights came on inside the hangar and spewed out the open door, the three Homeland Security agents’ outlines stood out as inviting targets for the seasoned killer. It was only a matter of which one first.

  Neither Lilburn nor the other two saw the flash of the rifle shot, its timing in perfect coordination with the distraction of the hangar lights. The laws of physics dictate that a bullet travels faster than the sound it makes, and they say that if you hear the gunshot, chances are the bullet won’t hit you. Two agents heard the gunshot.

  The third was knocked off his knees and pushed violently forward as the bullet made a mockery of flesh, bones and internal organs.

  “The cars, head for the cars.” Lilburn yelled out.

  They scrambled to their feet and powered off as fast as they could. Another rifle report merged with the crack of a bullet speeding past them. Still in open ground, the only consolation was the darkness. A third shot. The cars were easier to see in the indirect light. Both men pushed their legs forwards and swung their arms as best they could, trying to gain any scrap of extra speed that might be the difference between life and death. Instinctively, Lilburn had timed the intervals between each shot; either a bolt-action weapon or someone with a semi-auto taking calculated specific shots, either way he expected to hear, or feel, one more round before they reached cover. “Arrgh!” His colleague crashed to the ground, the bullet had gone low and taken out the muscle on his left calf. Close enough to the cover of the car nearest him, the adrenalin and momentum of his fall carried him to safety.

  “How bad?”

  “Lower leg.”

  Lilburn knelt down, making sure he was safely behind the car. He saw the man gripping his leg and knew the pain he was in. Now, as the only one left uninjured, he needed to protect his companion. “That was a fucking ambush, they knew we were coming.” He took a quick look into the darkness and towards the hangar before ducking down again. No one followed. Lilburn reached into his pocket for his phone… it wasn’t there. Damn it.

  The wounded man did his best to provide his own first-aid while Lilburn remained on guard. Ripping what he could of his clothing he used the pieces to bind what remained of his calf together trying to stem the blood flow. The pain was intense but the man was tough enough not to yell out. “Any ideas, boss? The words c
ame out between clenched teeth.

  “I was hoping you had,” Lilburn replied. “Fuck it, two good men wasted. Someone will pay for this.”

  “How ’bout you start with the guy who shot me.”

  “I would, if I knew where he was. We don’t have a lot of options. Right now we’re sitting targets and he knows exactly where we are. He’ll be moving around in the darkness, looking for a good shot. Listen, you’re going to have to be the bait for a while, flush the prick out so I can get a shot. You up to it?”

  The man snorted. “Yep.”

  “I’ll need your carbine.”

  “Plug him right between the eyes.”

  Lilburn disappeared into the blackness. With the slight hill behind him, down from the road, he kept to a semicircle. He finished counting to forty and sat down, the M4 carbine ready. The wounded agent dragged himself to where he could safely send off a couple of rounds in the general direction of the shooter. Easing his arm around one of the car tires, his hand gripping his own 9 mm handgun, he finished his first count… 43, 44, 45. In quick succession he pulled the trigger, aiming blindly into the darkness, then huddled up.

  Lilburn didn’t have to wait long for the muzzle flash from the terrorist, who quickly responded with a couple of his own rounds in return, the bullets plowing into the car’s grille and tire. With his target’s position identified in the dark, he fired off a volley of rounds on semi-automatic, then hurriedly changed his own, now compromised, position. If the shooter was the man Lilburn thought he was, then there was no point in using the same tactic again, he wouldn’t be suckered twice.

  The lights in the hangar went out, leaving faint starlight.

  There were two choices. Take the offensive and seek out the terrorist; it was possible he had taken him out with his volley. Or he could use the cover of darkness to get his man to safety. He chose the latter.

  Lilburn crept back to the cars, letting his comrade know he was advancing. ‘We’re bugging out. You want to come?”

  “Thought you’d never ask. Do you think you got the guy?”

  “It would be luck if I did. I’ll tell you in a couple of minutes.”

  Dragging his painful leg, the agent shuffled back in the direction of the fence line. Once clear of the cars, Lilburn helped support the man. As silently as they could manage the two climbed the easy rise to the road. They’d made a painful fifteen yards when the hangar lights were turned on again.

  “Keep going. That earth mound we used coming in, there, go to it.” Lilburn urged on the wounded man. The pair collapsed behind it. “Hey, you still got your phone, I’ve lost mine?”

  “Here.” The agent handed Lilburn his mobile. “HQ was the last number I called.”

  The call center at Albany transferred the call through to Director Hall to whom Lilburn tersely delivered a disturbing sitrep. Within minutes the nearest back-up was deployed, various commanders briefed, the drone aircraft given exact coordinates and medical staff organized, together with body-bags. The first deployment could be expected within fifteen minutes.

  Lilburn handed the phone back. “If we can hang on for fifteen minutes we’ll have troops on the ground.” Looking around the mound he noticed the lights had again been flicked off. “Fuck! Here we go again.”

  “What’s up, boss?”

  “What would you do if you were those fuckers? Your position has been compromised. You’re holed-up in a hangar with hostiles outside, you’ve got hostages and you’ve got your holy mission to complete. Add to that you’re a cunning psychotic piece of shit who doesn’t mind killing people.”

  “Well,” the agent gave a sudden hard inhale as pain surged through his leg. “Hell… if I were giving him advice I’d say go shoot yourself, but failing that I think I’d just fly out of there.”

  “First one ain’t a bad idea, but I think he’d take the second one. You think he’ll be good to us and wait for our back-up to arrive?”

  “We haven’t exactly been lucky tonight.”

  “That’s what I thought. Don’t go running off anywhere, will you?”

  The agent looked across to Lilburn. “What’s your plan?”

  “I’ll tell you once I think of it.” Lilburn slid away into the darkness clutching the M4 carbine and the Sig Sauer on his hip, leaving the wounded agent lying on his back making a wish upon the stars.

  Lilburn carefully made his way towards the hangar doors, not wanting to trip over any object hidden by the darkness. From inside the large iron building a helicopter could be heard winding up, the pitch rising higher and higher, the volume increasing. He tried to comprehend the helicopter pilot even contemplating flying out of the hangar, which wasn’t exactly the largest of buildings. The hangar doors must open wide enough for rotating blades, but it would be close — dangerously so. The rotors were turning and it seemed take-off was near. The nearer he came to the hangar, the faster he moved. The butt of the M4 Carbine’s stock was pulled into his shoulder, his view looking down the barrel. There had been no challenge — no bullets sprayed in his direction. He assumed there was only one reason for this; the two terrorists were in the helicopter. Reaching the side of one of the large doors he could feel a vortex of wind cascading out. The barrel of his weapon was an extension of his body and he thrust it into the cavernous space of the hangar. Immediately he was met with a stinging bath of dust, dirt and debris flung up from the spinning blades, together with a deafening roar. Lilburn flung an arm up to his face — his eyes were slits and the wind bit at his clothes. The whole situation was a potpourri of confusion and noise, then the helicopter’s powerful searchlight burst into a blinding dazzle. Matt Lilburn knew he had to react and fast.

  *

  “Get it out of here now!” Bomani sat next to the pilot, one hand gripping her collar and the other holding a knife.

  Kate could feel the sharp sensation of the knife point in the crook of her neck. Not one to back down when the situation got tough, Kate Leggat was known to stand her ground and bombard any adversary with a concoction of fact, fiction and just plain old-fashioned stubbornness. This time was different. The two Arab-looking men armed with a rifle and now Nathan’s 12-gauge shotgun had the upper hand from the get-go. They made it crystal clear they weren’t playing games.

  And Kate was worried. “I don’t know if we’ll make it out the door. If I touch it, even just a little, we could be killed.”

  “Then you had better not touch the door. Now fly this thing!”

  Almost overwhelmed with the unaccustomed violence, she fumbled with the controls. Turning on the helicopter’s forward light highlighted her fears about starting the helicopter in the hangar. Loose objects, such as paper, were flying around within the confined space, mixed with years of dust and dirt. Even without the two armed men in the cockpit, it was an extremely dangerous situation. She thought, for a split second, she saw someone standing at the doorway to the hangar, but one blink later and the figure was gone. It couldn’t have been Nathan. He’d been knocked unconscious only minutes ago, while still bound to the chair. The blade pressed harder into her neck, any more force and she knew it would break the skin. The passenger beside her screamed again. Kate did her best to ignore him, concentrating on what she had to do. She didn’t know if she could raise the helicopter sufficiently off the dolly, then keep it high enough to clear the hangar floor safely and low enough to pass through the doors. Not only was the height crucial, but to clear the doors without touching the sides with the blades would be a miracle.

  Somehow Kate cleared the dolly and maneuvered forward, centering the machine in between the open doors. It was now or never.

  Bomani had also seen the figure at the door, and guessed it was the man he had been told about: Matt Lilburn. He had proved to be a worthy opponent, it was only right that the Americans had sent a man of such caliber. He wished he could see his face when they took off into the night sky.

  Kate eased the machine forward, concentrating on the doorway. Ten, five yards, steady as she goes
. Her hands felt wet and slippery on the controls, perspiration from intense concentration dripping down her back. Kate was now beyond the point of no return, the tips of the rotors pushed out the hangar doors with the widest point of the rotating blades about to align with the doors. Holding her breath she inched forward, not daring to move her head or even her eyes from an imaginary point ahead beyond the light beam. I must be through by now.

  Bomani pulled the knife away from the pilot’s neck as she neared the doorway. He sat back in his seat and tensed up, knowing this was make or break time. His life was in the hands of the woman next to him and a little prayer would not go amiss.

  Bashir, sitting behind, shut his eyes. Both his hands had a vice-like grip on his seat.

  “We’re out. Oh my God… we got through the doors. Oh my God.” Kate felt a rush of exhilaration.

  “Now fly high and fast,” roared Bomani.

  Kate was in no hurry to gain altitude. Her protest gained her a poke in the neck with the knife; this time it drew blood. Slowly the helicopter began to ascend.

  The open doorway was no place to be. Lilburn retreated back to the corner of the building, away from what could become a tangle of iron and helicopter. Instinctively he crouched down as the machine nudged out into the open. Raising his weapon towards the cockpit, his finger was all but applying enough pressure to the trigger to fire. Lilburn hesitated, there was a civilian flying the craft, an innocent. Shit, shit. It was one of those poignant moments — less a decision, more a reaction. A moment where focus is so concentrated nothing else matters. Lilburn watched as the aircraft with the terrorist cell, a pilot and most likely the virus, was within feet of him. As if in slow motion, he watched it all drift away.

  They were so close. Lilburn sprang into action. Throwing his carbine to the ground he sprinted for the departing helicopter. The past hour flashed before him, the blood, the lives of his two comrades lost to the bastards in that machine. It made him mad, it made him strong, it made him fast. Lilburn lunged upwards, his feet leaving the ground, his arms outstretched, his hands open and ready to grasp. He touched the nearest skid simultaneously with both hands, locking on with a Herculean grip. The weight of his body was brought to bear on his arms as gravity tried to pry him free and send him falling to the ground. It wasn’t going to happen. Lilburn gritted his teeth, pulled himself straight upwards then brought a leg up to wrap around the skid. The attempt failed and his leg swung back down sending his body in a pendulum swing. Breathing out hard through his mouth he tried again. This time his heel caught… and that was enough to give him sufficient purchase to gain a more secure hold on the skid.