There was also what looked from the air like some sort of large pit with a floor that appeared to be bare dirt. Tariq frowned at that, pointed toward it, and asked Sanchez, “What is the purpose of that?”
“You’ll see, amigo,” Sanchez answered with a smile. “In fact, we have some entertainment prepared for you. We thought it might lift your spirits after your long captivity.”
Tariq had no idea what the man was talking about, nor was he interested in whatever Sanchez’s idea of entertainment might be. But the alliance between their organizations was important, so he supposed he would go along with whatever the cartel had planned.
The helicopter touched down. When Tariq climbed out, he saw several of his friends waiting for him, along with some of the cartel men. He embraced his fellow fighters for Islam and nodded to the other men as Sanchez introduced them.
Then the whole group climbed into waiting cars and headed toward the pit Tariq had seen from the air.
One of the men in the car with Tariq was his old friend Anwar al-Waleed. A tall, skinny man with thick glasses and a shock of black hair that tended to fall into his eyes, Anwar had been the mastermind behind the New Sun. It had been his idea in the first place to forge the alliance with the Mexicans, and he had been the driving force behind the establishment of the camp here at Barranca de la Serpiente. Tariq considered himself a fist in the service of Allah, while Anwar fought the holy war with his brain.
“It’s so good to see you again, Tariq,” Anwar said in his mild voice, smiling as he spoke. “Even though I hoped that the next time we greeted each other, it would be in paradise.”
“As did I,” Tariq said. “If only Allah had willed it so.”
“You will soon have another chance to strike at the godless Americans, my friend. Plans are already in motion.”
“Good. The day of holy reckoning for them cannot come too soon.”
People were converging on the pit from all over the camp now and gathering at its edge. There would be quite a crowd, Tariq thought, several hundred, in fact. When the little caravan from the landing strip came to a stop, he and the others got out of the cars and joined the throng. Most of them were Middle Eastern men, although a significant minority were Hispanic. Tariq saw no women, of course; they would not be allowed at a gathering of men like this.
The crowd parted to allow Tariq, Sanchez, Anwar, and the others through to the pit. Many of them reached out to slap Tariq on the back or the arm and shout encouragement to him. He was famous among them, he knew, because he had dared to carry the New Sun into the heart of the American city, but despite the fact that they admired him for his courage, he knew they were also well aware of his failure. That thought put the bitter, sour taste of gall in his throat, and he knew only one thing would take it away.
His own death in the service of Allah, striking a mortal blow into the heart of the infidels.
Most of the men were armed, either with pistols or automatic weapons or both. They would be a formidable army, Tariq thought, but their numbers were still too small. They could not hope to defeat the Americans by conventional means. That was why they had to rely on weapons of mass destruction. Only that would balance the scales and give their holy cause a chance of succeeding.
When they reached the edge of the pit, Tariq saw that a ladder was propped against its wall and several men had descended into it since he had seen the place from the air. The pit was roughly circular, about fifty yards in diameter, and some fifteen feet deep. The walls that had been cut into the hard ground were too sheer for a man to climb.
Two of the men in the pit wore ragged work clothes and bore the marks of rough treatment. Their faces were bruised and streaked with dried blood from an assortment of cuts and scratches. Both were Hispanic, and half a dozen other Hispanic men surrounded them. It was clear that the two men who had been roughed up were prisoners. The others held cudgels and looked quite capable of using them to beat the captives to death if they chose to.
“Are you ready?” Sanchez asked Tariq.
“Ready for what?”
“The spectacle of life and death.” Sanchez raised his voice and shouted orders in Spanish to the men in the pit. The club-wielding guards backed off, leaving the two prisoners in the center of the sunken area.
They climbed the ladder and pulled it up after them, ensuring that the prisoners were helpless to escape. Sanchez turned to one of the other men and snapped his fingers. The man stepped up and handed two machetes to Sanchez.
Stepping to the very edge of the pit, Sanchez called down to the two captives, “You know what you must do! May the best man win!”
He tossed the machetes into the pit.
Before the weapons even hit the hard-packed sand, the two prisoners were streaking toward them. A great shout went up from the assembled spectators.
Tariq understood now. He said to Sanchez, “They fight to the death, eh?”
“Exactly,” Sanchez replied with a smile.
“Did they transgress somehow against your rules? Is this their punishment?”
“Those two cabrones? They are not members of our group. No, we have a whole barracks full of men like them, men we have taken from buses we stopped on their way from one town to another. We take the most able-bodied men, the ones who look like they can fight . . . and the most attractive of the women. They service our men, and some of yours as well.”
Tariq nodded. Raping infidel women was allowed. Anything that caused pain to the enemies of Allah was allowed.
One of the prisoners had pulled ahead of the other. He reached the machetes first and tried to snatch up both of them, so the other man wouldn’t have a chance. He fumbled one away, though, and didn’t have time to reach for it again before the second man tackled him. They rolled across the sand as they struggled. The second man was able to twist the machete free from the first man’s grip and chopped at his head with it.
The first man jerked aside, barely avoiding the killing blow, and scrambled after the other machete. He grabbed it and twisted, flinging the blade up just in time to block another stroke from the second man. The machetes clashed with a loud ring of steel against steel, and again the spectators surrounding the pit shouted in bloodthirsty eagerness.
The blades continued to clang against each other as the two men fought their way to their feet. It was a raw, desperate battle, a matter of sheer survival. Neither of the men in the pit was particularly skilled with the machete, but skill played little part in this contest. Speed, strength, stamina . . . and luck. These things would decide who lived and who died.
Long minutes went by as the men hacked clumsily at each other. Some of the blows found their targets and left behind gushing wounds, but none bad enough to put an end to the fight. Big drops of blood spattered on the sand like crimson rain as the combatants circled, lunged, twisted, and darted.
They were tiring before Tariq’s eyes. Sweat ran in rivers from their faces and soaked their shirts; their chests heaved wildly as they struggled to draw in enough air to keep fighting.
Then luck played the part it was always destined to play. One of the men slipped, his foot sliding almost out from under him as he tried to avoid a wild swing of the other man’s machete. Instinctively, he threw his arms out to the sides in an attempt to catch his balance and keep from falling.
That left him wide open for a split second, and his opponent recovered from the missed swing in time to seize the opportunity. He brought his machete around in a chopping, backhanded blow. The blade struck the other man at the juncture of his neck and right shoulder and bit deep into muscle and bone.
The wounded man screamed and staggered. His right arm wouldn’t work anymore, so he couldn’t raise his blade and defend himself as his opponent ripped the machete free and struck again, swinging it so hard this time that the blade went halfway through the man’s neck and lodged in his spine.
That finished him. Blood gouted in a grisly fountain as the man toppled over to lie twitching while the rest o
f his life poured out onto the sand. The victor planted a foot on the dying man’s chest and wrenched the machete loose.
The shouts from the men around the pit were deafening.
Tariq leaned closer to Sanchez and said, “They fought well, for amateurs.”
“They had good reason to fight. Not only were they promised that the victor would have his freedom, but that his wife would be turned loose as well. A man always fights more desperately for his loved ones than for himself.”
Tariq nodded. Sanchez was right about that.
A couple of men lowered the ladder into the pit again. Several others descended while the winner of the battle tossed his bloody machete aside and fell to his knees. He covered his face with his hands as he tried to catch his breath. A shudder went through him. As far as Tariq knew, the two men had been friends. But they had been forced to battle to the death anyway.
One of the cartel men picked up the machete that the dead man had dropped. He nudged the victor with the point and spoke to him. Tariq couldn’t hear the words, but he saw the horrified expression on the man’s face as he looked up at his captors.
“Now he must fight again,” Tariq guessed.
“Yes,” Sanchez said. “Delicious, is it not?”
Tariq smiled in agreement.
The surviving prisoner suddenly turned and tried to scramble away on hands and knees. The other men went after him, grabbed him, forced him to his feet, and marched him back to face his new opponent, who stood there patiently tapping the flat of the machete blade against the palm of his other hand.
As the cartel men backed off again, the prisoner looked down at the weapon lying at his feet. Evidently recognizing the inevitability of what was going to happen, he scooped the machete from the ground, let out an incoherent yell, and charged his new opponent.
“If by chance he wins . . . ?” Tariq said to Sanchez.
The slimly handsome man shrugged.
“Then another will test him . . . and another and another, if necessary.”
It wasn’t going to come to that, however, as Tariq saw almost right away. The prisoner was too exhausted, too weak from his own wounds, too unskilled to match the deadly abilities of the cartel man. The blades rang together several times as the cartel man fended off the ferocious but awkward attack, and then the prisoner’s luck ran out. Steel winked brightly in the sun as a fierce, powerful stroke by the cartel man sent his blade shearing completely through the prisoner’s neck.
The man’s head toppled from his shoulders and thudded to the ground as his body remained on its feet, swaying for several seconds while blood bubbled out of the severed windpipe. Then the headless corpse fell over, too.
The cheering was even more thunderous this time.
“Once more the hondura de sangre has drunk deep,” Sanchez said.
“I don’t know the words,” Tariq said.
“It means pit of blood,” Sanchez explained.
Tariq said, “Ah,” and nodded slowly.
He would not be satisfied until all of America was a hondura de sangre.
CHAPTER 31
West Texas
Bill was sitting at the desk in the living room of his quarters, a laptop open in front of him as he studied satellite photos of a rugged, mountainous region. Barranca de la Serpiente was located somewhere in that wasteland, according to the sketchy intelligence they had been able to obtain. But they didn’t have an exact location, and it would be best to know where they were going before they launched their attack.
Unfortunately, with every day that passed, Bill worried that whatever new hell they were brewing up down there below the border was that much closer to fruition.
A knock sounded on the door. Bill knew how secure the base was, so he didn’t hesitate to call, “Come in.”
Henry Dixon opened the door and walked in, his gait somewhat deliberate as always but not so much so that anyone would notice it if they didn’t know he had lost both legs in Africa. Bill grinned and said, “Henry. Good to see you. I didn’t know exactly when you’d get here.”
“I came in a little while ago,” Dixon said. “Been clearing up a little family business. I could have been here sooner if you needed me, but I figured you’d let me know if you did.”
“Yeah, I would have. We’re not ready to go yet, by any means. The last two members of the team aren’t even here yet. They were supposed to be, but there was some last-minute holdup. Somebody at the DOJ found out that Madigan and Watson were being ‘transferred’—” He made air quotes around the word. “—and got a bug up his ass about it. Clark had to do some fast tap-dancin’ to get it all straightened out.”
Dixon grunted and said, “They ought to call it the Department of Injustice the way it’s been run the past dozen years. Whatever happened to upholding the law the way it’s written, rather than to suit your own political agenda?”
“Why, that’s the old-fashioned way of lookin’ at it, Henry. We’ve all got to be modern and progressive now, not tied down to some moldy ol’ Constitution.”
Dixon rolled his eyes and said, “You know the wheels are all going to come off one of these days, don’t you?”
“Sure. And by the time they do, I plan on bein’ so far back in the woods nobody’ll ever find me.”
“Assuming you live through this mission. Assuming any of us do.”
“Yeah,” Bill said. “There’s that to consider, too.”
“Hiram Stackhouse wants me to do this, and I owe that man big-time, so I’m in all the way.” Dixon sat down in one of the armchairs. “You might get me a beer, though.”
Bill grinned and got up to go into the kitchen.
As he came back with the beer, someone else knocked on the door. He handed the bottle to Dixon, then went over and opened the door.
Megan Sinclair stood there with a sheaf of documents in her hand. She wore jeans and a short-sleeved silk blouse and looked as elegant and lovely as ever. She looked past Bill at Dixon and said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t know you had company.”
“Henry’s not company, he’s part of the team,” Bill said as he stood aside. “Come on in and I’ll introduce you.”
“Don’t get up,” Megan told Dixon as she came into the room. “I know who you are, Mr. Dixon.”
“Then you know I was raised to be a gentleman,” Dixon said as he stood. He held out a hand to her.
As they shook, Bill introduced them, adding for Dixon’s benefit, “Megan is Colonel Sinclair’s daughter.”
“Old Iron Ba—”
Megan smiled when Dixon stopped short in what he was saying. She said, “It’s all right, Mr. Dixon. I know some of his men called my father Old Iron Balls. He deserved the name, too.”
“Yes, Miss Sinclair, he did. But he was a helluva commanding officer.”
Bill asked, “You want a beer, Megan?”
She shook her head.
“No, thanks. I came across something that’s got me thinking.”
Bill gestured at the papers in her hand and said, “I figured as much. Why don’t we take a look at it?”
They gathered around the coffee table as Megan spread out the documents on it.
“Some of these are news reports,” she explained. “Others are intel I picked up from hacking into Mexican law enforcement networks.” She said that matter-of-factly, obviously knowing that no one connected with this mission was going to object to a little cyber-piracy in a good cause. “In the past six months, more than a dozen buses have been hijacked in the northern part of the Mexican state of Chihuahua. Passengers have been robbed and sometimes killed, and many of them have been kidnapped, carried off by the attackers. The victims have been both men and women.”
“Sounds like somethin’ those lowlife cartel hombres would do,” Bill said, remembering how that busload of high school students had been kidnapped and held for ransom several years earlier. “Have there been ransom demands?”
Megan shook her head.
“These aren’t the sort of peo
ple whose families could pay a big ransom, or even any ransom,” she said. “They’re working people. Farmers and small businessmen for the most part.”
“Why would the cartel go to the trouble of kidnapping them if they couldn’t make a profit?” Dixon asked.
“I wondered about that, too. In fact, that’s what caught my eye and made me see the pattern here. After that it didn’t take long to come up with a possible answer.”
Bill smiled and said, “You may not know it, but when you were in Special Forces, the CIA tried to steal you away a time or two. Seems they thought you’d make a good analyst for them. They were right.”
Megan didn’t seem to hear the compliment, but Bill figured she really did. She said, “This ties in with that training camp. If you’re going to teach people how to kill, you need victims for your students to practice on.”
Bill had already made that same leap of logic. He nodded and said, “Those poor devils taken off the buses would work for that.”
“The men would,” Megan said. “The female prisoners would be forced to serve as prostitutes for the men being trained at the camp.”
Dixon cleared his throat. He and Bill were both of a generation that felt a little uncomfortable at hearing a young woman speak so bluntly about such a thing, but they both had no doubt that Megan was right.
“You’re thinkin’ that we’d be able to put this to use?” Bill asked.
“I thought it might help us locate this so-called Snake Canyon.”
“How can it do that,” Dixon said, “if nobody’s been able to find those people who were kidnapped?”
“Well, those people can’t help us . . .” Megan said.
“But if the right fellas were to be on another bus that was hijacked . . .” Bill said.
Dixon frowned.
“Ah. I see now what you’re talking about. Walking right into the jaws of a trap.”
Bill’s brain was working furiously as he turned over the possibilities of using the intel Megan had brought to him. He said, “Nobody would suspect that a couple of poor laborers might have GPS chips implanted under their skin.”
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