Corrupted: A Jason King Thriller (Jason King Series Book 5)

by Matt Rogers

  He did so…

  …to devastating effect.

  The first snowmobile bore down on him in a kaleidoscope of light and noise. King spotted the outline of the driver and let loose a three-round burst.

  Clinical.

  He knew the muzzle flare and subsequent discharge would attract the attention of all four of them.

  Once he started, there would be no pause until the last man was dead.

  The driver of the first snowmobile took all three rounds to the upper chest. One of them must have punched through his throat. Arterial blood fountained into the freezing night, illuminated for an instant by the muzzle flare. He tumbled off the seat and the snowmobile tore past King’s position.

  King heard it roar away, kicking up snow on either side until it dipped off the edge of the cliff and tumbled into oblivion. The driver’s body disappeared amidst the churned snow, but King knew he was dead.

  He swung his aim to line up with the second snowmobile.

  This driver had impressive reflexes. He slammed on the brakes as soon as he saw his comrade fall. The snowmobile ground to a halt a dozen feet in front of King, sending a fresh burst of snow into the air. It temporarily obstructed King’s vision.

  As soon as the snow fell away, King saw the guy brandishing a high-powered assault rifle.

  He ducked low and charged, zigzagging between trees. The headlight blinded him as he ran. His world turned to madness. A volley of bullets passed over his head. He returned fire with a sharp burst, hitting nothing but air.

  He lifted his head and spotted the snowmobile only a couple of feet away. The driver stood up on the footrests, ass off the seat, trying to lock onto King with the Kalashnikov in his hands. King ducked again and sprinted the final stretch. He dropped his shoulder low and crash-tackled the man off the snowmobile.

  They sprawled into the snow, hitting the ground hard enough to knock the breath from both their lungs.

  But King came down on top.

  That was all he needed.

  He still had one hand clenching the grip of the M4A1. In one motion he rolled off the winded driver and swung the barrel around in an arc. As soon as it touched the guy’s head, King pulled the trigger.

  Two shots.

  One would have been enough.

  Panting, clawing for air, King sprung to his feet and stared around with wide eyes, assessing where the other two snowmobiles had disappeared to.

  Shit!

  An explosion of light sliced through the trees to his left. He spun around just in time to see a third snowmobile screaming across the terrain. It shot between a pair of trees and bore down on King like a freight train.

  Between him and the approaching snowmobile, the second snowmobile rested idle.

  Driverless.

  A barricade of sorts.

  The driver of the third snowmobile noticed it. He reacted fast, leaping off his own ride and hitting the ground in an expertly-timed tumble roll.

  King had no time to move.

  The third snowmobile crashed into the second in brutal fashion. It knocked the second away like a child’s toy…

  …straight into King.

  He took most of the impact to his left-hand side, turning away from the six-hundred-pound battering ram. Pain flared across his side and he twisted in the air, thrown off his feet by the sheer momentum. A dull throbbing sprouted behind his eyeballs as his head rattled from the collision.

  He smashed into the snow head-first, tumbling and turning, desperate to get his bearings.

  When he finally rolled to his feet a few feet away from where he had been struck, he found himself weaponless. The carbine rifle had been knocked out of his grip from the force of the blow.

  Everything hurt, all at once. But there were still two men breathing in these woods who wanted him dead — which meant as long as nothing was broken, he would continue.

  Suddenly vulnerable, his vision blurry and his hands empty, he searched for where the third man had landed.

  He spotted him — just over a dozen feet away — scrambling to his feet.

  Also unarmed.

  I can handle that, he thought.

  They stared at each other in the lowlight, separated by a stretch of land home to a sea of churned snow and a pair of destroyed snowmobiles. King heard a distant rumble to his left.

  He turned to see the edge of the cliff only ten feet away.

  That’s not good…

  The driver charged at him.

  26

  King sized the guy up as he approached.

  He was shorter — probably just under six foot, if he had to guess — but built like a tank. Muscles bulged under the cold-weather gear. The man’s face was mostly covered by a balaclava stretched over his nose and mouth. His eyes were hard and cruel.

  King saw the first blow coming from a mile away. The thug sprinted up to him and swung a wild haymaker with everything he had. If it connected, it would knock King dead — or at the very least caused massive neurological damage.

  The guy had experience, for sure. Not many people could throw a punch like that.

  But it was sloppy. King assumed the extent of the man’s training had been exacted on stationary heavy-bags.

  King jerked back a few inches — a risky manoeuvre, all things considered. He needed to be in range for what came next. The haymaker sliced through empty space, horrendously close to his chin. He heard the air whistling away from the missed punch.

  He dropped low — now only a foot away from the guy — and threw a savage uppercut, electing to sacrifice accuracy for power due to the proximity. His fist smashed into the guy’s ribcage hard enough to break bones.

  A devastating shot.

  The guy backed up a step, which was where King made a mistake. He didn’t follow up with another blow immediately. He hesitated, trying to work out exactly how much damage the uppercut had dealt.

  Not enough.

  The guy ignored the pain that would no doubt be burning through his torso and twisted at the waist, again putting maximum effort into a strike.

  This time, it was a scything roundhouse kick, aimed at King’s stomach.

  This time, it connected.

  King felt the burly shin crunch into his abdomen almost before he saw the kick coming. It had years of martial arts training behind it. The guy had utilised the opportunity to its fullest.

  Agony flared through his stomach. The pain was so intense that for a brief instant he felt his legs buckle. His body threatened to collapse into the snow, which would line him up perfectly for another kick to the side of the head.

  That would put him out for good.

  Mentally, he battled tooth and nail for control of his motor functions. As soon as he found them, he exploded into action. He knew he only had a few seconds of life-and-death adrenalin before the pain caught up to him.

  He snatched a handful of the guy’s khaki jacket and tugged him into range. With his other hand, he jabbed a straight right into his face. He’d thrown the punch with half his usual power, but he knew the importance of accuracy when it was needed.

  He felt the guy’s septum shatter under the punch.

  With the same arm, he smashed an elbow across the guy’s jaw. A sharp crack echoed off the nearest trees. Something was broken — indiscernible exactly what in the chaos, but it signified damage dealt.

  Stunned by the two blows, the guy stumbled.

  King darted out of range, taking a half-step back to line up for the final blow. He sucked in a breath and launched a scything front-kick. His boot crunched into the same rib he had injured earlier.

  Due to a combination of momentum and the act of recoiling from such a painful blow, the mercenary lost his footing.

  He slipped desperately, knowing fully well how disastrous losing his balance would be in this situation.

  Too late.

  King sprinted forward, wrapped two hands around the back of his jacket and hurled him off the edge of the cliff.

  The guy let
out a noise somewhere between a grunt and a yell. He fell head-first, tumbling away into the darkness. King lost sight of him within a couple of seconds.

  He turned away from the cliff and peered back into the forest, searching for the fourth and final mercenary.

  Nothing.

  Both sets of headlights fixed into the two unmanned snowmobiles had flickered out. They had been destroyed in the collision, plunging the surrounding area into darkness. King tried to make out the faint glow that signified where the fourth snowmobile would be located.

  He couldn’t make out a thing.

  The guy’s disembarked, he thought.

  Smart.

  After taking the glare of a headlight directly in the eyes moments previously, his eyes weren’t used to the night. The fourth man could be anywhere amidst the trees. King crouched low, his heart pounding, blood boiling in his ears.

  Exposed to whoever may be approaching.

  There was a flash of movement to his right, near the area where he had parked his own snowmobile. He dropped to the ground, minimising the target area that the mercenary had to hit.

  But the guy wasn’t heading for King.

  The distinctive sound of a pull-start echoed through the forest. King recognised the noise, but stayed frozen in place, trying to ascertain what was happening.

  Another tug of a cord and an engine spluttered to life.

  His own engine.

  He began to make out the outline of the man hunched over his snowmobile, reaching for one of the handlebars. Before he could do anything, the guy steered the vehicle in the direction of the cliff and tugged the throttle.

  King could simply watch as his snowmobile — along with the duffel bag containing all his supplies — accelerated over the short stretch of land and dipped nose-first into empty space.

  Five seconds later, he heard the six-hundred-pound vehicle obliterate against the bottom of the valley.

  ‘I hope you needed that bag,’ the final mercenary roared in stunted English. ‘You are a dead man.’

  King spotted his M4A1 rifle ahead, wedged into the snow at the base of a tree. He scrambled through the freezing powder and snatched it up, checking the weapon was set to fully-automatic out of instinct. He wouldn’t make the same mistake twice.

  A ripple of discomfort spread through his abdomen as he straightened. He hoped the muscles weren’t torn. Anything that impeded his movement would cause grave problems down the line.

  The last man came stumbling out of the tree line with the barrel of his automatic rifle sweeping in all directions.

  The guy hadn’t a clue where his enemy was.

  King took his time lining up the shot. He didn’t want to expend a single bullet that wasn’t necessary — especially given what had just transpired.

  The mercenary stalked along the edge of the drop, crouching low as if that would protect him from being exposed. He hadn’t spotted anything yet.

  King put a single round through his throat.

  The grisly result was masked by the darkness. King heard the slump of a body against the powdery ground and then a sharp whisk as the guy tumbled off the cliff-face, tipping the wrong way in his death throes.

  King wondered if the man would feel the impact far below.

  Probably not.

  The bullet would have killed him.

  A particularly vicious gust of wind whistled through the forest, adding to the unease that ran through King. He always felt this way in the aftermath of brutal conflict. There was a silence that resonated more than usual, a sudden quiet, in direct contrast to the violence that had just unfolded.

  He lowered his weapon and scrutinised the two remaining snowmobiles. They were in bad shape. Dented plastic hung off each chassis and both had snapped skis and twisted rear tracks.

  Not drivable.

  It took him two minutes to find the fourth man’s snowmobile. The guy had disembarked a few dozen feet into the woods, parking the vehicle behind a tree in an attempt to employ stealth. King started the engine with a few vicious tugs of the ripcord. He switched the headlight on, lighting up his surroundings.

  He started the journey back to the outpost, carrying the M4A1 on his back and a couple of extra magazines in various pockets of his jacket.

  All the rest of his gear was smashed across the rocks hundreds of feet below.

  27

  King knew something was wrong the second he arrived at the outpost.

  The wind had all but disappeared, replaced by something close to serenity. It was too quiet. The door to the storage shed swung back and forth on its hinges, creaking. All the lights across the four buildings had been shut off.

  The lodge’s door lay on the carpet within, forced off its hinges.

  He parked the snowmobile by the front deck and stepped down onto flat ground. His boots crunched against the fresh powder. Somewhere in the distance, thunder boomed, resonating softly across the outpost.

  King checked the M4A1 had ammunition in the magazine and was ready to fire.

  He crept onto the front deck, trying to cause as little noise as possible. If there were hostiles here, they would have heard him coming anyway.

  They would be ready.

  Staying low, he darted in through the open doorway and slapped his hand against the inside wall — where he remembered glimpsing a panel of light switches.

  He hit a switch, and a group of the pale light tubes running along the ceiling came to life.

  There were no mercenaries lying in wait. There wasn’t a living soul inside the lodge.

  But the three health workers were still here.

  King bowed his head as boiling anger threatened to take hold.

  Sarah. Carmen. Jessica.

  The trio lay on the far side of the room. The carpet around their heads was stained with blood — three identical pools of crimson soaked into the light grey flooring.

  Each sported a cylindrical hole in the centre of their foreheads. Their skin had turned pale and clammy when they had been killed. Based on the freshness of their corpses, King guessed they had been murdered less than ten minutes previously.

  Gunned down. All at once.

  He didn’t let his gaze linger on them any longer than he needed to. He spun on the spot and put an enormous hole through the plaster wall with a single, furious kick.

  ‘Fuck!’ he roared to no-one in particular.

  The syllable sliced through the silent air, echoing through the outpost. No-one heard it. Whoever had done the job was long gone. Not part of the search party. King knew he had drawn all the men stationed at the outpost away from the mountain.

  Someone else…

  He grimaced, suddenly dejected. He begrudgingly anticipated the conversation with Isla that was sure to follow.

  I’m sorry.

  I tried my best.

  Briefly, he wondered if he really did. Maybe if he had done things differently…

  He shrugged it off. If he had stayed at the lodge, they all would have died. He needed the trees and the tight spaces and the confusion to gain the upper hand.

  One assault rifle against four on open ground could only achieve so much.

  Contemplating his next move, he noticed a soft blinking light on the edge of his vision. He turned to the source.

  There was a small translucent dome fixed into the upper corner of the room by two chunky screws. Behind the glass, a tiny red light flashed on and off — King counted a full second between each blink.

  ‘Security camera,’ he muttered.

  He left the lodge and crossed the empty field of snow, heading for the watchtower. If his best guess was accurate, the footage might be collected on a bank of computers in the tower. He couldn’t see any other use for the building. The camera would also likely be linked to the mine Sarah had briefly talked about — so that the leaders could keep an eye on the remote locations under their control.

  On the way there, he considered the scope of his issues. He had no idea why the workers had been taken,
or who had taken them. They were heavily armed and had over a dozen men at their disposal. If King was lucky, he had taken out most of their forces.

  If not…

  There were seven WHO workers left unaccounted for. All men, apparently. King was yet to find out what purpose they were serving.

  He reached the tower and shimmied up a thin steel ladder that had been frozen over by the elements. It led to a narrow balcony with grated metal flooring running around the length of the room within. He found the nearest door — made of wood, thankfully — and smashed it open with three well-placed kicks to the space around the lock.

  He stepped into a freezing cramped space packed with banks of electronic equipment. Cable management had been ignored entirely. Wires sprawled across the flimsy desks, twisted and knotted at random. Various power switches glowed softly in the lowlight.

  Communications equipment, King guessed. So they could keep in touch with the others.

  Whoever the others were…

  He crossed to the nearest computer and booted it up. Electronics weren’t his forte, but he thought he could manage.

  He was presented with a home screen and set to work attempting to locate the security footage.

  28

  Vadim Mikhailov arrived back at the gold mine in a fuming rage.

  He jumped the snowmobile through the open warehouse door and ground it to a halt on the concrete floor. He ignored the skis grating against the ground underneath.

  The vehicle could implode for all he cared.

  He leapt off onto solid ground, heading for the elevator at breakneck speed.

  If there’s even the slightest chance that we’re compromised…

  The satellite phone at his waist started to vibrate, an incident which could only spell trouble given the nature of the individuals who had access to it. With fury tearing through him like liquid fire, he pulled the phone free and stared at the incoming number.

  Shit, was all he could manage to think.

  He answered, ensuring his voice remained neutral. ‘Yes?’

  ‘How are things proceeding?’ a stern voice said.