by J. M. LeDuc
CHAPTER 24
As the Covenant Team readied themselves for the return trip to Kiryat Yearim, Brent was busy thinking.
Seven had seen that same expression many times before. “What’s on your mind, Colonel?” he asked.
Brent brushed his hair back and looked at his best friend and mentor. “If you were the guys that we are following, what would you do next?”
“I would try to take us out,” Seven answered.
As those words were coming out of his mouth, a huge smile lit up his face.
Brent nodded his agreement. “In order to get to Elephantine, you have to take a ferry out of Cairo. That is the best place to find and try to kill us,” Brent said. “We need to hitch a ride on that ferry and take care of some collateral damage. Then we can double back to Kiryat Yearim.”
Seven pulled his tin of tobacco out of his back pocket, pinched off a bit, tucked it behind his lower lip and smiled. “That’s why you’re the Colonel. You are the man with the most devious mind.”
“Don’t sell yourself short, buddy, you taught me everything I know.”
They soon found themselves on a boat full of camera-ready tourists, heading out of the harbor on their way to Elephantine.
“There is food on the bottom deck,” Brent said. “We might as well blend in with the natives as long as we are on this floating tourist trap.”
“I hope they have cheeseburgers. I have been craving one ever since I got catapulted out of that jet,” the Bishop said.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d swear you were pregnant,” Seven chided.
“You know I get hungry when I’m nervous,” the Bishop said, heading towards the stairs. Thinking about what he had previously said, he stopped and asked, “Speaking of the jet, how are we getting back to Palm Cove? Commercial airliner, I hope.”
Seven slapped him on the back, laughing, “Ye of little faith, padre.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Bishop Jessup yelled as he followed the boys down the stairs. The only response he received was laughter. He blessed himself repeatedly, saying, “Dear Jesus, get me home in one piece and I promise never to leave there again.”
The three of them found a table where Bishop Jessup ravaged his cheeseburger like he hadn’t eaten in weeks.
Brent was thinking of the Bishop’s previous words. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, padre,” he said.
“Hah, what do you mean?” he mumbled with a mouth full of food.
“That line about never leaving home again. You do remember that your destiny lies in Rome, don’t you?”
Swallowing, the Bishop said, “With all that’s been happening, I forgot about my appointment by the Pope.” Taking another bite, he pondered, “I’m not sure I want to accept it.”
“Why’s that?” Brent asked.
He shrugged his shoulders. “I like what I do. Running the shelter and helping some of life’s less fortunate rekindle their faith. It’s the first time since I entered the seminary that I feel like I’m truly doing God’s work.”
“I can’t argue with your logic, but God wouldn’t have given you the Gift of Letters if He didn’t want you to use it.”
The Bishop dipped a french fry into a glob of ketchup, and hungrily brought the dripping mass to his lips. As he chewed, he thought about Brent’s words. “Who says I can’t do both? Why does the Cardinal of Letters have to reside in the Vatican? Anything that needs translating can be overnighted to me or it could even be sent to me via the Internet.”
Thinking about it, Brent’s eyebrows rose in thought. “Point taken. I guess it’s something you have to discuss with God when the time draws closer,” Brent said. “I don’t think Cardinal Bullini is going anywhere for at least a few years. He’s a spry old dog.”
“I hate to interrupt your discussion on the fate of the Bishop, but it seems we have company,” Seven whispered. Looking Brent in the eye, he said, “Your eight o-clock, the guy in the jeans and polo shirt. He has a striking resemblance to one of the men Alana described in the marketplace three days ago.”
Brent made eye contact and agreed.
“I saw him when I went to the bathroom,” Seven added. “You have to pass right by him to get to it. He wouldn’t have even registered on my radar except that he’s packin’. He has what looks like a semi-automatic pistol hidden in the waistband of his pants. The moron thinks he has it hid by his oversized shirt, but when he sat down the back of his shirt rose up just enough for me to get a peak at it.”
“How was he able to get it on board? We all had to pass through a metal detector before boarding.”
“Like ours, Bishop, his gun has no metal pieces,” Brent said. “The casing and the bullets are probably made out of a hard rubber and the trigger and other parts are probably carbon fiber. He would have passed right through.”
“How do you want to handle it, Colonel?” Seven asked.
Brent looked at the Bishop and smiled.
“Oh no,” the Bishop whispered. “I’m not going to be the guinea pig again.”
Brent leaned over the table in order to keep voice down. “You only have to be yourself. You’re going to walk up to the guard at the front of the boat and tell him who you are. The Egyptian authorities have a great deal of respect for the clergy, even those who are not Muslim. Then you are going to tell him that you just came out of the bathroom and noticed what looked like a gun poking out of our friend’s trousers.”
A few minutes later four heavily armed guards came running through the dining area, yelling something in their native language. Most of the people on board were Egyptian and when they heard the soldiers’ voices, they screamed and dove under their tables. Before he had time to react, the guards had surrounded the gunman, their weapons pointed straight at him.
That’s when all hell broke loose.
Brent could hear men running down the stairs and saw six heavily armed men appear from around the corner. Brent grabbed the Bishop by his shirt and shoved him under the table. As the men started shooting, both Seven and Brent dove for cover and drew their guns. Thirty seconds later, the six men were presumably dead. Two of the Egyptian guards were killed and the other two were wounded. The original gunman was standing next to his table, holding a young girl as a shield.
With a heavy British accent, he said, “It seems we have a bit of a dilemma, doesn’t it?” His free arm was wrapped tightly around the frightened young girl’s throat. He pulled her into him, practically cutting off her air supply. “It appears you have two choices, gentlemen. One, you drop your weapons, and I don’t kill this child, or two, you don’t and I do.” He accented his words by tightening his grip even further, causing the girl to gag from the pressure.
“Interesting,” Brent said, as he moved out into the open. “I was thinking the same thing. The two choices thing. The only thing is, my thoughts are a bit different.”
As he spoke, he became animated, waving his arms around. He and Seven knew extraneous movement would put trepidation in the mind of the gunman. Seven used the enemy’s momentary loss of concentration to also step out into the open.
“You see, I was thinking our two choices were this. One, you let go of the girl and we let you live, or two, you don’t and we put a bullet square between your eyes before you take your next breath.” Brent nonchalantly shrugged his shoulders and smiled. “But that’s just me.” Taking his eyes off of the assailant to reach for a bite of the Bishop’s cheeseburger, he added as he chewed, “so you were right when you so aptly said, ‘we have a dilemma’.”
The gunman cocked the trigger of his gun and pressed the barrel firmly to the temporal region of the girl’s skull, “So how do you suppose we reconcile of differences, mates? You see, the difference between your choice and mine is this, I’m expendable and I know it. I care more about the Brotherhood and the recovery of the Ark than I do my own life. You on th
e other hand. . . I’m not so sure.” When Brent and Seven did not respond, he continued, “So, like I was saying before you rudely interrupted, I suggest you drop your weapons, or spend the rest of your lives with this child’s blood on your conscience.”
Seven stepped forward, so that he was now standing next to Brent. “May I make a suggestion, Colonel?”
“Please, I could use a little input right about now.”
Making sure he had the colonel’s attention, Seven looked up at the ceiling fan that hung down by a single insulated wire. “I propose that we do as this chap says and put down our weapons and go to plan B.”
“Plan B, huh.”
“Yep, plan B,” Seven replied as reached into his pocket and took out his tobacco tin.
Brent thought back to the arrest of Donavan Ferric. During the scuffle they used sleight of hand to take out his henchmen.
“Do you still hate the English accent as much as you used to?” Brent asked.
“Can’t stand it,” Seven said, pinching off a healthy chunk of tobacco and placing it between his lower lip and gum.
“In that case, I guess you’re right. I don’t want that child’s death on my conscience and I know her parents certainly don’t want to see her harmed,” Brent looked over at the terrified parents, clutching each other and their other child. “So I guess we have no choice but to do as this gentleman says.”
“Yep, no choice,” Seven added.
In complete unison, Brent and Seven let go of the butt of the handguns and let them dangle from the one finger that had held the trigger. “We’re going to squat down and place our weapons on the floor and slide them over to you. That is what you want, right?” Brent asked.
His manner of speech guided the gunman’s thinking in the way Brent wanted it to go. “Yes,” the man said. “That’s exactly what I want. Nice and slow or this pretty little thing dies.” He gave the girl a peck on the cheek. “It would be a pity to kill such a fresh young thing.”
Brent and Seven slowly squatted down and placed their pistols on the varnished hard wood floor. With one finger on the butt of the guns, they slid them towards the armed man, at the same time making them spin in slow motion. They never took their eyes off of the assailant as they slowly stood back up.
“Brilliant show,” the Englishman said.
“I hate that accent,” Seven said as he spit a wad of tobacco juice across the twenty foot divide that separated them.
The tobacco spit landed directly on the shoe of the gunman, causing him to look toward the ground.
In a blur of speed, Seven reached behind him, drawing his knife from its sheath and threw it across the room. The man looked up just in time to see it sail way over his head. The apparent ineptitude of Seven’s throw made him laugh, as he watched it sail off its intended mark. His laughter turned into a look of hatred as he moved his semi-automatic pistol away from the girl and towards Seven.
Cocking the trigger and aiming it in Seven’s direction, the gunman heard a snapping noise above his head and looked up. He saw the fan plummeting towards his head. In a defensive maneuver, he let go of the girl and brought both of his arms up to protect himself. In an instant, that most in attendance would later say they never saw, Brent withdrew his blade and threw it in one fluid motion. Seconds later, the gunman lay flat on his back with the ceiling fan on top of him and Brent’s knife planted deeply in his skull. Right between the eyes.
An hour later, the Egyptian authorities heard back from their superiors, the ones Brent asked them to contact. The guards unhandcuffed both Seven and Brent. Brent had explained to them earlier that the rest of the assailants were not dead, just knocked out. The police apologized profusely for treating them like they were criminals, only to have Brent and Seven shake their hands and tell them they did the right thing.
The Bishop sat off to the side looking perplexed.
“What’s on your mind?” Brent asked.
“If you and Seven don’t exist, at least not in any database, how were the Egyptian authorities able to verify who you are?”
Brent and Seven pulled out their wallets and showed their IDs. “You’re members of the Vatican’s Swiss Guard? Are you kidding me?”
“Not so loud,” Brent said. “We just got out of handcuffs. I really don’t want them put back on. We told them that we were here to protect the Pope’s emissary—you. Their superiors were able to contact the Vatican and have our stories verified.”
“Do you two ever tell the truth?”
The side of Brent’s mouth rose in a sarcastic expression. “Only when all else fails.”
“You two never cease to amaze me,” the Bishop added.
“Not to change the subject, but did you notice that every one of the bad guys bore the same tattoo on their left forearm?” Seven said.
“Yeah, a picture of the Ark with double swords crossed in front of it,” Brent said.
“It looked a lot like what was cut into the chest of the messenger in Medinat,” Seven said.
By the time the passengers stopped talking and rehashing what they saw with each other, the boat’s captain came over the loud speaker to announce that they would be docking at the island of Elephantine in ten minutes.
“Have you noticed the crewman who keeps looking at us and talking on his cell-phone?” Seven said.
“Yeah,” Brent acknowledged, “same tattoo. When we get off the boat I want you to shadow him.”
Seven nodded and put a new pinch of tobacco behind his lower lip. “Will do, Colonel.”
Looking around the boat, Brent said, “I’ll keep watch to make sure he doesn’t have any buddies waiting to ambush us.”
Before the ferry docked, Brent went to the captain and asked him to tell the crew to please go around and ask the passengers not to talk about what had happened while they were still in the port and to please not point them out to anybody. He said he believed that there may be more gunmen in the port and he didn’t want a repeat of what just happened.
Disembarking, everyone tried to do as Brent asked, though he noticed that most eyes would linger on them as they walked past.
Walking down the gangway, Seven nudged the Bishop with his shoulder as the moved forward. “You’ve been kind of quiet. Are you alright?”
“That’s a stupid question, don’t you think?” His words were curt. “I spend all of my days trying to save souls, and the two of you take them without remorse.”
CHAPTER 25
Stepping off the gangway, Brent directed the Bishop to the side, away from the traffic flow. Seven stayed put, keeping watch on his new friend.
Brent roughly grabbed the Bishop by the shoulders and turned him so that they were facing each other. “Don’t ever assume, what you don’t know, Bishop Jessup. We do what we do out of necessity, not because we like it and not without remorse.
”Like you, we do what we were trained to do and like you, we do it to save lives, not to take them. If you don’t understand that, I suggest you get on a plane back in Cairo. I’ll contact Joan and have a first class ticket waiting for you at the airport.”
Brent didn’t wait for a response. He let go of the Bishop and walked away to join Seven. Moments later he heard footsteps coming up fast from behind.
“I’m sorry. I had no right to say what I did and I certainly have no right to judge you. Please accept my apologies.”
Seven reached behind and pulled the Bishop up between them. “Rule number one, padre, there is no whining in public and rule number two, we never apologize for saying how we truly feel.”
The Bishop looked from one to the other. “So we’re good.”
“Always have been, my friend,” Brent said. “Now what do you say, we go buy one of those tourist maps the kid is selling.”
“Why? I thought we were heading back to Cairo.”
“A plan is only as good as its
details,” Brent said. “We’ll board the tour bus and then at the first stop, Seven and I take care of our extra baggage. We need their leader to think we’re headed for the ancient Jewish Temple. You’ll stay on the tour and meet us back at the pier when it’s over.”
At the first stop, Brent and Seven quickly broke away from the group and headed for the woods. They ran in a zigzag pattern in opposite directions. Once they were deep enough in the woods, they both dropped to the ground and waited.
Lying there, Brent thought back to his advanced training, before the Phantom Squad was ever formed. He could hear Seven’s voice in his mind.
“The best place to hide from your enemies is in the open, but covered up,” Seven had instructed. To demonstrate, he spit on the ground, and kicked some dirt over it. “It’s right there, but it can’t be seen. Your enemies will always look to the most remote places first. It’s just basic instinct.”
Brent quickly covered himself with leaves and debris that he found around him. Lying there, he began to hear voices approaching.
“You only get one chance, then you lose the upper hand,” Seven had said. “You better make it count.”
Watching five men walk right past him, Brent gingerly pulled his bow out of his backpack.
Seven, I hope you’re with me on this. As the enemy walked fifty yards past him, he rose up from his earthy tomb, drew back an arrow and let it fly. The arrow found a home in the skull of the man trailing behind. Running as fast as he could, Brent hid behind the huge trunk of a tree.
From his vantage point he witnessed another man fall, Seven’s arrow embedded in his temple. The remaining three men ran in every direction to try to take cover. Brent pulled back and let his next arrow take flight. The man who ran to his right fell before he ever reached the safety of the large tree in front of him.
