by Tony Bulmer
Erin heard all right. She was holding her phone three feet from her head and still she heard. She raised her other hand and slowly massaged her right temple. “What you are saying, is you are going to junk the entire show schedule for this evening. What you are saying, is that you want me to ring up every one of the quite literally dozens of people I have sweet-talked into lining up tonight’s guests. You want me to prostrate myself at their feet and make promises of later-date restitution.”
“I want you to hustle for the Hudster. Isn’t that what I pay you your exorbitant every-penny-you-are-worth salary for sweetcakes?”
“Let me guess? We are switching out the Hollywood A-list for your golf club cronies once again?”
“Those limp-wristed Hollywood clowns will dance to my tune and goddamn like it. The Huds Helman Show marches to the song of patriotism. America needs us tonight more than ever it has before. We must unfurl the flag of battle and step proudly forward, to support the needs of our country.”
Erin was already reaching into the kitchen cabinet to uncork the Tylenol. She tossed a couple into her mouth and dipped a wine glass under the faucet. “So let me guess. You rang up the Mayor, The manager of the Jets and that brain-ache recidivist From the N.Y. Port Authority?” Erin swallowed the water down. It hit her stomach in a cold unpleasant wave and hung there like lead.
Huds Helman let out a dry chuckle. “Of course I didn’t ring them, not yet at least. But as ever, you are right on the money my dear. I expect every one of those proud, upstanding patriots to be on board for tonight’s show. And don’t forget to dry ice those Hollyweird bozos until next week at the earliest. If I have to swallow down any of their whimpering-liberal anti-war bullshit any sooner than that, I will not be responsible for my actions, am I clear?”
Erin looked at the television. Talking heads against an apocalypse backdrop of total devastation.
—Cut to an exterior of the New Jersey FEDWIRE building.
—Cut to a close-framed scrimmage of Irving King, megalomaniacal head of Ploutos Capital Investments shouldering his way through the crush, as bodyguards and flunkies fought back the press melee.
Erin said. “This deal of yours Hudster. The one with your best buddy Irving. I have got a real bad feeling about it—”
“Are you kidding me? The guy is major league—a winner amongst winners. Nothing goes bad when you’ve got that kind of juice.” Helman paused. The sound of cigar smoke being exhaled forcefully drifted over the line. “Wait a minute. You are getting all teary-eyed aren’t you? What is the matter with you? You wishing you had hooked up with the winning side now? Well, let me tell you honey it is never too late. I can put a word in for you—matter of fact I got a meet with him tomorrow night upstairs at the Rock. Why don’t you tag along, see if you can snag yourself a slice of relationship destiny?”
“Real tempting Helman, but I got a busy evening lined up, scooping out cat litter. It ain’t what most people would call an evening, but I am thinking it will make me marginally less nauseous than hanging out with your friend Irving.”
“You got yourself a super-smart mouth on you lawyer lady. Which is precisely the way I like it. But don’t you go shooting your bitter little witticisms off right now. I need you to channel the hate; save it up for tonight’s show of hawkish hegemony. We are going to whip those towel-headed wasabi-loving reds into a puddle of rhetorical ruin. Are you with me?”
Erin sighed. “As ever Huds. But I think you will find it is Wahhabist.”
“Huh? That is what I said, isn’t it?”
Erin scrunched her face once more. “Not even vaguely close.”
A short puzzled silence followed more sounds of exhaled smoke, then—“Those terrorist fiends used some kind of radioactive super bomb on our curry loving compadres. You know that don’t you?”
“I didn’t know that.”
“No? Well, you better get with the program fast, because they will bring the same thing to us. Sneak on shore like the dirty little cowards they are, then blammo, thousands of God-fearing American patriots murdered in one giant mother-of-all explosions. It will be like 911 all over again, except bigger this time. That bomb they used in Mumbai outed the whole damn city. You know they got the same planned for us, don’t you—Miami, Houston, Chicago—maybe even NYC, if those filthy animals get the chance.”
“Let’s hope they never do.”
“Hoping is good for nothing! We have to mobilize—Get on it. Take the fight to them. Tonight’s show is just the start. We are going to turn the tide on this right now. So get on those phones and jam baby-doll, the Hudster is rolling.”
The line went dead. Helman was gone.
Erin stood in her kitchenette looking at her phone.
“He just called me baby-doll,” she said.
Cosmo the cat didn’t care. He looked up, mewling.
He wanted his breakfast and he wanted it now.
40
U.S. Carrier Strike Group Ten,
372 nautical miles southwest of Mumbai India
The lights of the USS Harry S. Truman, flagship of U.S.N. Carrier Strike Group Ten, rose up through the mist that crawled in across the depthless black waters of the Arabian Sea. This was a cruel, alien world, beyond the comfort of civilization. Anything could happen in these dark, pirate-infested waters, so the ships of CSG Ten sailed in a constant state of readiness. Hawkish eyes watched the approach of the incoming flight from Mumbai, a soft radar blip moving in from the North. The flight was scheduled and transmitting the regulation ID codes, yet no aspect of the approach was left to chance. Anything moving in from outside the Strike Groups 200 mile control envelope was immediately flagged as hostile.
Karyn breathed deep and visualized a scene of pastoral tranquility. The trip from Mumbai had been anything but smooth. More than thirty SOG troops packed inside a cabin designed for just over twenty. The tilt rotor Bell V22 Osprey was just the kind of aerial vehicle the Navy needed for fast moving special operations. It was not however designed to carry passengers in luxurious comfort. The cabin was cramped and unpressurized. The muscled throb of the heavy lifting engines all-pervasive. Every member of the Special Operations team had to wear oxygen masks so the Osprey could fly at altitude. The thick, humid, air inside the aircraft closed in, becoming chill as the Osprey climbed high over the monsoon weather system. In the reptilian gloom of the low-glare combat lighting, the stale hiss of hosed air became the only constant.
Karyn felt curious eyes upon her, staring out of the enveloping gloom.
The turgid atmosphere closed in.
She wore sunglasses.
She chewed peppermint gum.
She took slow, deep breaths, focusing on her flow of Dantian energy. She let the flow transport her into a transcendent world—a benevolent, peaceful, place where tranquility reigned supreme.
But the grumbling throb of the engines cutting through the monsoon night brought her back to the realm of the now—trapped in a flying meat locker, with men of the gun. How many times had she lived through the self same routine in warzones all over the world? Too many times to mention, and always it was the same—soul deep horror; a crawling sense of impending doom. At any second the end might come. A final explosive dénouement vaporizing every trace of her being—every mission was the same, another spin of the wheel of fortune, another turn closer to the final inevitable outcome.
Karyn frowned, trying to pull away from the dark thoughts that consumed her. But the dry, bitter taste of gunfire rising in her throat pulled her back to the now. There was no escaping her karma. She felt the inevitability crawl through her—the filth and squalor of advancing death invading every part of her psyche.
Outside, in the eternal night—roiling blackness everywhere.
One more bomb—they said. But how could that be true? There would always be others—A bomb for every diseased interpretation of every diseased ideology on the entire planet. The sharp angular face of Zhàn Tao rose up to her out of the cursed darkness now, it hung
there taunting her, his lips parting slowly, revealing, razored teeth. There was no limit to greed, or fear, or death. Men like Zhàn Tao would always impose the horror of pure will on the lives of the many. It was the way of the predator. His kind knew no other way. But could he really be responsible for the Mumbai blast? The gains he would make from such a play seemed tangential at best.
She looked at Jack Senegar then, sitting there wordlessly, his face softly illuminated by the glow of his cell phone. He never answered her question—Are we involved Jack? Karyn played back the moment again and again in her mind. Her asking the question, him turning wordlessly, staring into the hurricane-wash of the approaching transport. And now, the moment had passed; they were trapped inside this flying coffin—masked, confined, surrounded by a conspiracy of inquisitive minds. To talk right now would be unthinkable—it would be against protocol.
Karyn reached inside her jacket and ran her fingers across her rosary. Out here in the endless darkness the power of righteousness was her only friend.
The Osprey curved lower now, the black ocean rising up towards them at an alarming rate. But the flight was not destined to fall short of its target. The expert Navy fliers manhandled the over-laden craft at the very limit of its performance envelope, causing every last bolt in the trembling airframe to scream out in protest. At the very last moment, the giant tilt rotors angled upwards and the V22 came swooping in, towards the flight deck of the giant aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman.
The wheels of the Osprey had barely kissed the deck and the HST’s deck crew already had the doors to the aircraft popped wide to the elements. A thunderous wave of humidity swallowed the interior. The roar of flight deck noise folded in over the frenetic scene as the SOG troops raced for the freight elevator. Dozens of flight deck controllers in ear mufflers and high visibility vests guided the way. The Navy knew how to run a kick-ass operation there was no doubt about that.
Karyn and Jack dismounted last. There would be no post-operative debrief. For them, the mission was ongoing. Somewhere out there in the vast, dark, rain-filled night, the giant container ship Maharashtra was heading away from them, loaded with a cargo that could bring devastation to an entire city.
41
The Faz Huq Villa Islamabad Pakistan
The men were calling out in the night, their hard guttural voices sweeping towards her on the soft night air. Lauren had no idea what they were saying. She didn’t need to know; their hard, aggressive tone said everything. The men were moving in from the road now, combing through the undergrowth, heading through the orchard into long the grass where she was hiding.
A flatbed pick up truck roared down the road, followed closely by another. More voices, followed by the sound of a loud argument. Lauren looked around her in desperation, the ground was cold and slimy—it was so unpleasant—melting to the touch like pottery clay. The undergrowth was wet too, sodden by the endless monsoon rains. As she scurried forward on hands and knees, the thick reed-like grass grasped and sliced at her, impeding her progress.
As she got further into the orchard, the relentless sound of insects drew in around her. They knew she was coming. They were broadcasting every move she made. Why in the name of God did they have to be so loud? The men on the road would surely hear the cacophony of the insect betrayal—wouldn’t they?
As desperation took hold of her, Lauren almost felt like crying now. In the past, she had read a whole bunch of self-help books on how to be a better and stronger person. She bit her lip and tried to remember every bit of advice she had gotten from them. How many of those things had she read? Dozens at least, every one of them full of righteous preaching on how you could work at being a better person, so you could swallow down the shit life threw at you day after day. But now, in her time of need, every piece of advice those books had offered evaded her. All hope clouded by a fog of panic. Pathetic really. What would all those big-billing psychiatrists she had visited down the years make of that? Crawling in the mud, she imagined her learned advisors standing around her, pitying and judging her with their clever faces and contemptuous expressions. It didn’t matter how many of those frowning fraudsters she visited, she still felt just as vulnerable and out of her depth with life as she’d always felt. Of course, she had tried to hide those feelings, just the same as her mother before had done—that judgmental bitch. She acted tough like a good little suburban housefrau was supposed to. But she was just as weak as everyone else; swallowing down the pain with vodka and pills, chain-smoking cigarettes and hoping hubby would hurry back from his long, hard days of whoreing and drinking with his golf buddies.
Lauren put her hands over her head and held on tight. She scrunched her face tight to avoid the cry of anguish that was welling up inside of her. Why had she listened to her goddamn mother? All those hectoring promises of an easy life—just so long as she made nice and played the game—married a powerful, wealthy man with a future. It had all come to this—crawling through a muddy field at night, in the middle of God knows where; with a bunch of gun-toting religious radicals hunting her down so they could gang-rape and murder her, most likely.
Lauren bit her lip. You always did have a stubborn streak of independence. Her mother liked pulling that one out. She said it like having your own mind was a bad thing. She had used it as a whip of judgment, ever since Lauren was little—kept right on using it again and again. And still she used it, delighted in using it, used it in company with the prefix—my precious daughter—always did have a stubborn streak of independence. The denigrating words echoed and resounded. Her mother—that bitch—she had an answer for everything. Well, what would she do right now, if she were stranded in this hellish landscape, so far from her sycophantic dinner party friends and her booze-addled comfort zone?
Lauren felt the emotions surge then. She clutched at her face with her filthy mud-caked hands, attempting in vain to stem the tide of rueful laughter. Hot tears streamed down her cheeks. She sat there, in the mud and the filth, sobbing and laughing in turn. The outpouring of emotion was a cathartic moment, an empowering point of realization—
She was on her own—totally on her own.
No help was coming, not ever.
If she wanted to get out of this, she would have to do so by herself.
Lauren sniffed, and wiped her face off on a corner of the dirty sheet that she had wrapped about herself sari-style. She was a strong-minded independent woman for heavens sake. If she put her mind to the task she could tackle any kind of challenge that came her way. After all, she was smart—super smart—smarter than every one of her loutish captors. What use was an Ivy League education, if it couldn’t be used to defeat a bunch of flip-flop wearing tribal herdsman? Such ruffians talked constantly about martyrdom, but wasn’t she the real martyr here? Lauren felt indignant now. These loutish provincials had no concept of the power of real women. Perhaps they thought of the female sex as slaves and chattels—feeble-minded accoutrements of their vile and malodorous world? Well, they were wrong. She would show them. They had no idea who they were dealing with, no idea at all.
Lauren rose up on her haunches and peered over the top of the long grass. The turban wearing hoards had fanned out now, moving in from the road in a wide line. If she stayed where she was, they would find her for sure. She turned, scoped a 360 glance all around. Over the far end of the orchard beyond the darkened meadows lay rolling foothills that rose steeply towards the mountains. It was a long way to the mountains, mile after mile of open country. If she headed that way, her captors would find her for sure. No, she had to think smart—move tangentially in a direction her enemies would never imagine. She dipped down. Her only chance of staying free was to outflank the line of searchers. She had to move fast, scramble away just as fast as she could and disappear into the darkness. The long grass and the trees would give her cover. The cacophony of insects ravaging the night with their calls would serve as a distraction against her passage through the rustling undergrowth. Lauren scurried away through the lon
g grass, moving with confidence, like a mountain cat. She smiled. How enchanted the readers of Vogue and Vanity Fair would be, by the tales of her wild adventures. How thrilled the viewers of Sixty Minutes would be, as the dramatic reconstruction of her escape played out on
prime-time television.
42
USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75) Arabian Sea
Karyn had a bad feeling. The doomed silence of the exfiltration from Mumbai had left its mark on her brooding psyche. The dark forces of international conspiracy were at work once again. In the old world, where great superpowers and nation states battled for supremacy, such conflicts were clear-cut, their parameters neatly delineated. Now, things were different. The world had entered into a dark new age of global conflict, where there were no clear sides to back, just a swirling melee of combatants spread across a global battlefield.
The Mumbai atrocity was only the latest in an increasing number of attacks, designed to sap the morale world governments. Vast corporate interests had already eroded the power of the once powerful nation states, replacing their ancient structures of government and democracy with a new hegemonic power that subsumed and destroyed anything that stood in its way—the Humanistians—a new post democratic power that moved beyond the old forms of tyranny into an age of endless globalized domination. There was no room for the individual in this new world, no room for God either—the overlords of the new emergent future ruthlessly suppressed dissent wherever they found it, crushing all opposition beneath the power of one all encompassing world-view.
For many long decades, the descent into this Faustian world of global decline had been moving forward by degrees, the new powers of global domination marshalling their forces, and covertly extending their powerbase. But now, the pace of change was entering a new and violent phase, as the death spasms of old world governments grew ever more pronounced.
