by Will Jordan
‘Jesus, are you all right?’ she asked, kneeling down beside him.
Despite everything, Drake managed a smile as he picked up the charred folder and held it out to her. ‘Never better, Sam.’
A few hundred yards away, Cunningham backed up against the rough brick wall of a block of flats, breathing hard and bleeding from the gunshot wound to his right arm. The injury was unlikely to prove life threatening, but he could feel blood trickling down his arm, dripping from his fingertips. Pain burned through him.
Drake had gotten the better of him. Despite Cunningham’s best efforts to mislead him, to stifle his investigation, to keep him safely ignorant, he had found Mitchell’s evidence. He should have killed him outright instead of trying to reason with him.
Now there was no telling how far this would go. It was out of control.
He had to report in. He hated the thought of admitting failure, especially when the stakes were as high as this, but there was no choice. His employer had to know what was going on.
With his good arm, he reached for his cellphone and dialled a number from memory. It wasn’t a number he’d had much occasion to call in the past, but he had committed it to memory nonetheless.
‘Is Drake taken care of?’ a deep, authoritative voice asked as soon as the phone was answered.
Cunningham gritted his teeth. ‘No.’
There was a pause on the other end. Not a long one, but long enough to assure him his news had not been met favourably.
‘What happened?’ Carpenter asked, his voice cold and emotionless. He had commanded men in battle for decades, had sacrificed lives and even risked his own on occasion. He wasn’t about to break down in anger now.
That would come later.
‘We found the safe house. Drake evaded me.’
‘And Mitchell’s files?’
Cunningham sighed and looked down at the ground, hating every word he was about to say. ‘He has them.’
A steady, rhythmic thumping prompted him to glance up just as a chopper roared overhead, skimming low over the rooftops. He couldn’t make out what type it was, but there could be no doubt it was heading for the safe house.
Nearby, a set of shutters flew open and an elderly man leaned out to watch the spectacle. Cunningham backed up, merging with the deeper shadows at a corner of the wall.
‘The Agency are here,’ he added, having to raise his voice to be heard above the din. ‘They’ve brought in air support.’
It took Carpenter only moments to reach a decision. ‘All right. Get your ass out of there. We’ll talk about this later.’
‘My cover’s blown,’ Cunningham said, knowing how feeble and pathetic he must have sounded. ‘Drake knows I was working for you.’
‘You don’t work for me, Cunningham. Not any more,’ the older man coldly informed him. ‘If you’re lucky you might make it through tonight alive. After that, you’re on your own. Now get the fuck out of there. I’ll deal with Drake.’
With nothing more to say, he hung up.
Chapter 49
‘Jesus Christ,’ McKnight gasped, eyes wide in disbelief as she skim-read Mitchell’s report, carefully leafing through the charred pages. ‘It’s incredible …’
Beneath her, the cityscape of central Kabul flitted by at over 100 knots as their Black Hawk helicopter beat a path through the night air towards Bagram Air Base.
The chopper had touched down in the waste ground behind the burning safe house a couple of minutes after McKnight’s arrival, disgorging half a dozen Agency security operatives who had quickly established a perimeter around the building.
After explaining himself and the contents of the damaged folder, Drake had been bundled aboard the chopper along with McKnight, Keegan and Crawford.
‘Carpenter arranged for Kourash to escape from prison,’ Drake said, shifting position to get more comfortable on the hard bench. ‘He was using him this whole time, planning attacks against our people, earning the trust of Taliban commanders so he could take them out.’
In his torn, burned and filthy clothes, his face smeared with soot, he was a pathetic sight. His ribs had been bandaged and a fresh dressing applied to the bullet wound at his side, though further medical care would have to wait until they touched down.
‘And Horizon took all the credit,’ Crawford finished for him.
Drake nodded. ‘They were trying to prove they could do the army’s job. If they take over security in Afghanistan, Carpenter and his mates stand to make billions.’
‘And your buddy Cunningham was in on it, too?’ Keegan said, seated opposite. He could see the hurt and betrayal in Drake’s eyes.
‘He did his best to steer us away from the truth, made sure we failed when we tried to hack Horizon’s computers.’ Drake swallowed a gulp of bottled water. His throat was still parched after inhaling several lungfuls of smoke. ‘He played us all. He played me.’
‘What’ll happen to him?’
Drake paused. He didn’t imagine his friend’s future was looking good at that moment. ‘If he’s got any sense, he’ll disappear for good. If not …’ He shrugged, feeling no need to finish that line of thought. ‘The first thing we need to do is get people to Horizon headquarters. They took Keira. My guess is they’re holding her there.’
‘Unless they’re done with her,’ Keegan said, his face ashen.
‘They wouldn’t do that. Not yet,’ he said, not sure who he was trying to convince. ‘They would want to know how much she’d uncovered.’ He leaned forward, staring Keegan in the eye. ‘We’ll tear that building apart if we have to, but we’ll find her.’
The sniper nodded. He didn’t have to say what he was thinking – Drake knew well enough the bond that had developed between them.
Instead he glanced at McKnight; the woman who had played such a big part in all of this, and who wasn’t even part of his team. ‘Sam?’
She looked up at him, tearing her eyes away from the folder. ‘Yeah?’
‘I never got the chance to say this before, but … thank you.’
‘For what?’
‘For all of it. You risked your life for us more than once. We wouldn’t have made it this far without you. I won’t forget that.’
She nodded, understanding the sentiment and his need to express it. ‘Tell me something, Ryan. Are all your operations like this?’
‘Pretty much,’ he admitted, unable to hide a grin.
But it quickly faded as he glanced outside, catching a fleeting glimpse of something coming towards them, something that glowed bright red like a hot coal. It took him a moment to realise what it meant.
Too late.
There was a blinding white flash, and an instant later the world around Drake was engulfed in chaos. The aircraft heaved violently, throwing them sideways in their safety harnesses with bone-jarring force as a thunderous boom reverberated through the cabin.
Trailing smoke and flame, the stricken Black Hawk yawed wildly to port, swinging in a wide arc as the pilots fought for control and overcompensated in their panic. Blaring alarms mingled with frightened shouts and the scream of tearing metal as the overloaded airframe started to give way.
Snapped right off its damaged runners by the violent movement, the starboard crew door flew off like a piece of cardboard. Drake watched as the ground spun and lurched sickeningly beneath them, his view obscured a moment later by smoke from the crippled engines.
Caught with his safety harness unlatched, the aircraft’s door gunner fell, slid across the listing deck and disappeared out through the open door with a wild, terrified scream. Drake could do nothing but watch in horror, clutching the cargo straps behind him in a white-knuckle grip.
‘I’ve lost hydraulics!’ the pilot yelled. ‘Can’t hold it. We’re going down!’
The chopper yawed to starboard so hard that Drake could see nothing beyond the door but trees and fields. They had to be listing at 40 or 50 degrees by now. For a moment he thought the chopper was going to tip right over and plough in
to the ground. Then, in a final desperate effort, the pilot managed to haul the dying aircraft back from the brink.
It was only a temporary reprieve. Still locked in a death spiral, the big chopper ploughed through a stand of juniper trees, its rotors scything through branches and foliage like a knife through butter. Unable to take cover, Drake threw up his arm to shield himself as glass and pieces of tree bark peppered them.
His last sight was of a big area of flat open ground stretching out beneath them. Then his world was filled with a horrible sickening roar as the aircraft ploughed into the ground. The forward bulkhead rushed towards him, there was a flash, and then he knew no more.
Vermaak smiled as the wreckage of the stricken chopper came to rest amidst a cloud of smoke and dust. The Stinger had done its work with deadly efficiency, crippling the low-flying Black Hawk’s engines before the crew even had a chance to react.
It was almost too easy.
Reaching up, he pressed the transmit button on his encrypted radio unit. ‘They’re down,’ he reported, his voice calm and devoid of emotion.
The same couldn’t be said of Carpenter.
‘Move in,’ he ordered, his voice edged with tension and anticipation. His future depended on what happened here tonight. ‘I want confirmation those files are destroyed.’
‘And if anyone’s still alive?’ Vermaak asked. He knew the answer before he’d even asked the question, but he needed to hear it from Carpenter himself.
‘There were no survivors, understand? No survivors.’
Vermaak smiled again. Fighting and killing had become a mere matter of business for him over the years, but in this case, he just might take pleasure in putting a round through Drake’s head.
‘Understood.’
Drake’s mind drifted on the verge of unconsciousness, random thoughts and memories coming and going as if his brain were a misfiring engine. But somewhere deep down was a voice urging him to get up.
Sensations came first. He could feel dry wind-blown grit peppering his face and eyes, mixing with the warm slickness of blood dripping down the left side of his face. The chill night air carried an odd mixture of burned plastic, cordite, oil and aviation fuel.
And in a flash, his memory of the sudden explosion, the sickening crash came flooding back. They were down, but they were alive. They had survived.
It must have been Horizon. Somehow they had tracked his chopper and shot it out of the sky, just as they had done with Mitchell.
You have to get up. Get up now.
With great effort he forced his eyes open. The crew compartment was a mess of broken equipment, shorted-out instrument panels and buckled metal.
Something fluttered past his face. A piece of paper, burned and charred along one edge. They were everywhere, he realised; scattered all across the crew compartment like litter. Mitchell’s evidence folder, torn apart during the crash. He watched as another piece, caught by the fitful breeze, slid across the deck and out through the gaping hole where the crew door had been.
With his growing awareness came the first waves of pain. He felt as if he had been sealed inside an oil drum and rolled off the edge of a cliff, his body battered and thrown around the enclosed crew compartment like a rag doll. Still, experimental movement of his arms and legs told him that nothing was broken. He could still function.
The chopper was lying tilted on its port side at about a 45-degree angle. Crash-landing in open ground, it must have tipped over into some depression or down an embankment before coming to rest.
‘Drake?’ a weak voice called out. ‘You okay? What the fuck happened?’
Looking over, he saw Crawford struggling to get up, his face tight with pain as he clutched his left arm. His harness must have come undone during the crash.
‘We got hit by a missile.’
Crawford’s eyes opened wider. ‘Horizon.’
‘They’ll be coming for us. They won’t take any chances.’ He would have done the same thing in their position. He glanced left, seeing Samantha still strapped into the seat opposite, her eyes closed and her head lolling to the side.
‘Is that arm broken?’
Crawford shook his head, flexing and tensing the limb experimentally a few times. ‘Feels kinda weird, but I don’t think so.’
‘Good. Check on the pilots.’
As Crawford clambered through into the cockpit, struggling to keep his balance on the listing deck, Drake looked over at Keegan, who was fighting to disengage himself from his harness.
‘John?’
‘Yeah?’
‘You all right?’
At last his harness released and he pitched sideways, slamming into the deformed airframe with a hollow clang.
‘Is it a cliché to say I’m too old for this shit?’ he groaned.
‘Only if you’re a cop.’ Drake pointed to the starboard crew door, now raised up off the ground because of the helicopter’s tilt. ‘Get up on lookout. I’ll get Sam.’
‘On it, buddy.’
As Keegan clambered to reach his improvised vantage point, Drake released his own harness and unstrapped himself. Bracing his boots against what had once been the port side airframe, he stumbled through the wrecked crew compartment to reach McKnight.
A quick check of the pulse at her neck confirmed she was alive. She must have been knocked unconscious on impact.
‘Sam, wake up,’ he hissed.
There was no response.
‘We’ve got company,’ Keegan called from above. ‘Three vehicles inbound.’
‘Shit,’ Drake said under his breath. ‘How far?’
‘Three hundred yards, maybe three-fifty.’
It was them, he knew. A Horizon strike team were coming to finish them. Just as with Mitchell’s chopper, a couple of thermite grenades tossed in through the open hatch would be enough to kill them all and incinerate whatever evidence had survived the crash.
There was no time for gentle coaxing; if they didn’t get moving, they were as good as dead. Turning his attention to McKnight, he drew back his arm and slapped her hard across the face. ‘Come on, Sam! Wake up!’
The blow snapped her head around, but slowly her eyes fluttered open as consciousness returned. She stared at him for a moment, struggling to focus. ‘Ryan?’
‘Yeah, that’s right. It’s Ryan.’
‘What happened?’ she asked, looking around at the wrecked compartment.
‘We took a Stinger hit. We crash-landed. Hang onto me,’ he advised, unlatching her harness. He caught her as she fell forward, but was unable to keep from groaning in pain as his broken rib protested at his exertions.
‘Are you hurt?’ he asked, hoping she hadn’t noticed.
‘I don’t think so.’ She was well and truly conscious now. Pushing her dishevelled hair out of her eyes, she looked at Drake again. ‘They’re coming to kill us, aren’t they?’
The grim finality in her voice made it seem as though it had already happened.
‘Two hundred yards,’ Keegan called down from his makeshift lookout position. ‘They’re splitting up, moving to outflank us.’
Drake gripped McKnight by the shoulders, staring right into her eyes. ‘We’re not dying here. Not now, not after all this. I’m getting us out. Understand?’
Before she could say anything further, Crawford stumbled through from the cockpit. The look in his eyes told them everything they needed to know. ‘Both pilots are history,’ he confirmed, unwilling to go into more detail.
Drake nodded. He had expected as much. A high-speed impact like that would have crumpled the cockpit like cardboard.
‘If it’s not too much trouble, I sure could use a weapon,’ Keegan called down.
Drake looked around. ‘Where’s the weapons bin?’
Choppers like this always kept a stash of weapons on board in case they came down in hostile territory. The problem was, he had no idea where they were on Black Hawks.
Crawford pointed to a storage locker fixed into the wall on the port
side. ‘There!’
Sliding down to it, Drake grabbed the release handle and pulled. It wouldn’t budge. The crash must have buckled the hinges, but a couple of hard kicks were enough to dislodge it. Wrenching it open, he was met with a rack of four P90 sub-machine guns.
The P90 was a compact, lightweight weapon; two characteristics that made it ideal for use in cramped spaces like vehicle interiors. They looked futuristic and intimidating, but like most 9mm sub-machine guns they were basically useless beyond 100 metres. An AK-47 was still lethal at more than four times that range.
‘John, heads up,’ he called, tossing one up to him, followed by a couple of spare magazines.
‘Thanks, pal,’ the older man replied, then added in a more urgent tone, ‘Better hurry. They’re closing in.’
Sure enough, Drake could see headlight beams reflecting off the ground outside. Rather than flickering up and down as the vehicle bumped over uneven terrain, the beams were burning steadily. At least one of the vehicles had stopped while the others circled around behind their position.
‘Any cover nearby?’
The sniper craned his neck around, doing his best to survey the landscape from his limited vantage point. ‘We’re pitched into a wadi or something. Can’t tell how far it runs, but it should give pretty good—’
He was interrupted when a burst of automatic fire tore through the night air, and instinctively dropped down inside the chopper just as several high-powered rounds slammed into the airframe. Most ricocheted off the armoured skin, but one or two punched right through to bury themselves in the rotor column.
Drake recognised the distinctive bark of AK-47s. The Russian-made weapons were ubiquitous in countries like Afghanistan, which made them a perfect weapon of choice for the Horizon strike team. Anyone finding dead bodies riddled with AK rounds would assume they had been killed by insurgents.
‘Shit! Sons of bitches must have snuck in behind me,’ Keegan said, visibly angered at having missed their approach.
Taking a breath, he rose up from the listing deck with the P90 up at his shoulder and capped off several rounds before ducking back down again.
