Oath of Honor

by Matthew Betley

  The man he chased had a head start, but an extra minute wouldn’t matter since his quarry would’ve used a light to guide his way through the tunnel. As the pursuer, John didn’t have that luxury unless he wanted to broadcast his presence. He knew that meant that his target was already at the end of the tunnel and likely waiting to ambush him. All I have to do is just walk right into it. Awesome.

  The walls’ gray outlines were visible, but only when he peered straight into the darkness.

  A slight, cold breeze wafted through the tunnel, and the faint roar of waves crashing into the rocky cliffs reached him. Fortunately, the sounds of the environment masked the soft thwap thwap thwap of his Oakley hiking boots, a pair similar to those he’d worn in Force Reconnaissance.

  The tunnel gradually lightened. Almost there . . .

  He rounded a curve and heard two voices speaking Russian in quick, short phrases. It was a distinctive language, and a trip to train the military in the former Soviet republic of Georgia had ingrained it in his mind.

  Directly in front of him, the tunnel curved again to the right. The sounds of the ocean had grown louder, and John knew the bunker’s entrance lay beyond the last turn.

  He pressed himself against the gnarled and jagged wall and moved cautiously toward the bend in the tunnel, preparing himself for what came next—he’d stick his head around the corner to assess the situation and hope he didn’t get it blown off.

  John never got the chance. A loud thwack shattered the relative silence of the bunker facility. The sound was distinct, as if a heavy book had landed on a wooden table. It was immediately followed by a brief shout of surprised pain and then a softer, duller thud.

  Oh no, John thought as his brain processed the sounds.

  Unlike in the movies, a silenced weapon didn’t make a soft hss or pfoot. As he knew from experience, it was much louder due to the explosion of the round in the chamber and the ejection of the shell casing. But it was the second sound that had chilled him. It was the sound of a body hitting the floor.

  Someone had just been executed.

  And then a second thwack followed by another thud echoed through the dark.

  All thoughts for his personal safety vanished. Whatever ideas he’d had about this team of mercenaries were gone. They weren’t soldiers. They were cold-blooded killers, executioners masquerading as professionals.

  He didn’t know who was dying, but he thought it was likely the Arctic Glide crew members the killers had captured. Unlike the times in Iraq when their Force Reconnaissance platoon had been too late, he was here now when the killing was starting. And he’d do everything he could to stop it.

  The ice in his blood turned to fire as a familiar emotion took control. The battle rage he’d experienced several times in his life fell over him like a protective cloak and sharpened his senses to a scalpel’s edge.

  Without wasting another moment, he dashed around the last corner with his Colt .45 in front of him, seeking blood and vengeance.

  ———

  Logan’s blow dropped the Russian to his knees, but instead of falling fully to the floor, the man delivered a punch to the inside of Logan’s right knee. Logan’s leg buckled from the pain, and he started to slump to the deck.

  As Logan fell, he had the presence of mind to reach under his enemy’s head and secure it in a tight guillotine choke hold. His right hand applied strangling pressure, and he pulled upward with all his strength.

  The Russian struggled violently, striking Logan on both sides of his rib cage as he flailed for air. Logan glanced over his shoulder and tightened his grip. He squeezed harder.

  The jagged rocks now filled the entire view. There were only seconds left for Logan to avoid a disastrous collision.

  The man’s struggles quickly subsided, and he pawed at Logan’s waist. Finally, Logan thought. He redoubled his efforts, and the Russian’s arms went limp. Logan released the man’s neck and turned around.

  The boat was twenty yards from the rocks. He slammed the throttle into reverse and yanked the steering wheel to the left. The impact was imminent, and he dropped to the deck of the bridge. He braced himself against the console for support. We’re not going to make it.

  The 130-foot vessel’s speed and momentum propelled it forward with lethal intent. And then the big boat began a gradual turn to the left . . . but not enough to avoid the rocks.

  The boat’s starboard side struck the rocks with a tremendous, metallic crunch. A long, painful screeeeeeech followed as the hull was torn open under the waterline, even as alarms began to blare throughout the ship.

  The impact knocked the breath out of Logan’s lungs.

  Logan struggled to stand, knowing he needed to assess the damage, but he was flung off his feet as the boat surged forward, suddenly free of the jagged boulders that had torn a gaping wound in the hull.

  He scrambled for balance, and the boat finally slowed, the speed quickly dropping as water poured into the underwater compartments.

  The boat was now less than thirty yards from the cliff and sinking quickly, even as it slowly drifted toward the rock-face wall. There was a rock shelf visible just above the waterline. Logan calculated he had less than two minutes to escape the sinking boat.

  He inspected the prone figure of the team commander—his only remaining suspect—and turned the man over. Vacant eyes stared up at him. The man’s unconscious body had been thrown into the base of the bridge’s instrument panel. His head had struck the console, breaking his neck and killing him.

  “Not good,” Logan muttered to himself, not out of sympathy for the dead man but for the fact that he’d lost his last source of actionable intelligence.

  The boat tilted dramatically to the starboard side as the weight of the assaulting water forced it under. Less than ninety seconds. Time to get the hell off this floating tomb.

  He ran toward the stairwell with one last item to attend to before he abandoned the sinking ship.

  ———

  The only thing that saved John Quick’s life was the sound of a tremendous crash and the subsequent roar of metal bending against its will. He didn’t know what had happened in the waters below, and he didn’t care. It was the scene in front of him that held his attention.

  Old and worn concrete blocks fortified a large rectangular entrance, which shook and crumbled in unison with the explosions below. Beyond the opening was an enormous space at least thirty yards across and twenty yards deep. The entire back wall was curved and contained a concrete opening at least three feet tall at shoulder height that ran the entire length of the wall.

  Two bodies lay on the ground in the center of the room. Fresh blood mixed with the dirt and dust of the bunker. A man in black apparel stood next to the bodies and held a pistol aimed directly at John’s head.

  I’m done, he thought. I knew it was suicide, but at least I tried. But to his surprise, the man’s head was turned toward the sea. He’d been distracted by the cacophony below.

  Behind the combatant with the pistol, John spotted another man in the far right corner at the base of the opening, also clad in black tactical gear. He stood over a pile of smashed computer equipment and held a round object in his right hand, appearing to pull on it with his left.

  With precious seconds at stake, John dropped to his right knee and dealt with the most immediate threat first. The man with the pistol started to turn back toward the bunker’s opening, but the Colt .45 thundered in the confined space.

  Bam!

  The first round struck the man in the left side of his jaw, which exploded into chunks of bone and flesh. Grimly satisfied with the gruesome wound he’d inflicted, John fired again and mercifully ended his opponent’s agony. The killer’s body collapsed, his legs bending to the left as his upper body fell to the right.

  The second man reacted too slowly. Even as he tried to release the round object—John now realized it was some kind of incendiary device—John aimed and fired three shots in quick succession.

  Ba
m-bam-bam!

  All three bullets struck the man’s chest as he dropped the grenade, and he crumpled to the ground in a sitting position. The grenade plummeted in synchronicity with his fall and landed squarely between his legs. It wobbled for a moment as the dying suspect stared at it in amazement, as if mesmerized by the languid motion.

  Suddenly, a brilliant light engulfed the dying man, and John felt a rush of heat assault him as he looked away from the temporary sun he’d created inside the bunker. The man had pulled the pin too soon. Too bad for you.

  The man screamed in agony as the thermite grenade produced a stream of molten iron and aluminum oxide that burned through his clothes and consumed his body. Seconds later, the screams stopped as the four-thousand-degree Fahrenheit fire melted flesh and bone. All that remained was a melded pile of human debris.

  Acrid smoke poured out through the opening as the blinding white light devoured the natural darkness of the bunker. John’s eyes burned from the intensity, and then the light vanished just as quickly as it had appeared.

  John opened his eyes and surveyed the carnage he’d created. He looked around the bunker as the smoke slowly dissipated, and walked over to his first victim, kicking the pistol away for good measure.

  Several small Pelican cases were stacked along the back wall under the opening. The right corner now contained a burning hulk, a grotesque statue shaped from the second dead killer and a pile of melted computer parts that had been too close to the thermite grenade. What a mess.

  A groan emanated from one of the two captives who’d been shot point-blank.

  John hurried over to the man and knelt down. He’d been shot in the chest, and blood slowly leaked from a hole in his dark blue parka. His face was ashen, and sweat poured down his forehead. His eyes danced wildly with a fierce determination and awareness.

  I can’t believe he’s still alive. John crushed the thought and said, “My name is John Quick, and I’m with the FBI. I’ve got you now. You’re going to be okay, but I need to check this wound.”

  He started to open the man’s coat, but the man suddenly grabbed John’s hands and squeezed tightly, forcing John to look into his face. He stared intensely into John’s eyes and pulled him closer.

  An unsettling feeling of déjà vu washed over John—he’d watched this scene play out before. The man knew he was dying but clung to life through sheer will. Whatever this man had to tell him—a confession, an explanation, a prayer—he’d listen. John hadn’t been able to save him—he’d been seconds too late—but he’d listen to his final words and provide whatever comfort he could in these last moments.

  John let himself be pulled to within inches of the man’s face. He could feel the man’s life force blazing away beneath him. “I’m here with you until the end.” He squeezed his hands tightly to emphasize the point. “I won’t let go.”

  The man nodded, and an unspoken bond formed between them. He inhaled a deep breath, and John heard it catch in his chest. It’s close now.

  “Do you want me to say a prayer?” John asked. Some men sought religious comfort in their final seconds. John often wondered why. He thought it might be some last-ditch effort to seek forgiveness for lives filled with sin, final hopes for salvation and entrance into whatever version of heaven they yearned to reach.

  The man smiled and shook his head slightly. John smiled back at him, completely focused on the dying stranger.

  “Fair enough.” He paused. “I promise you this, my friend. We’ll find whoever’s responsible for all of this, and we’ll stop them. I assure you. You won’t be forgotten. I will avenge you.”

  The man’s eyes widened. Here it comes. And then he spoke his final words, whispering them into John Quick’s face.

  “You . . . need to . . . talk . . . to DARPA,” he said, and died holding John’s hands.

  John laid the man’s head on the ground and closed his eyes. He folded the stranger’s hands over his chest and stood up.

  The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency? What the hell do they have to do with this?

  A scraping noise from the far left corner of the bunker snatched his attention, and his training took control once again. He whirled on his heels as the Colt .45 searched for another target.

  In a nook carved into the wall stood a shadow-shrouded Logan West. He was soaked from head to toe and held his Kimber pistol in one hand and a black backpack in the other.

  John lowered the weapon. “I see you’re still alive. What did you do? Blow up the boat? I assumed that was your mess that shook the mountain. You never knew how to make a silent entrance.” He paused, and added as he looked back down at the dead man, “Thanks, by the way. It distracted them just long enough to save my ass and end theirs.”

  Logan processed the aftermath, and his eyes were drawn to the two dead men at John’s feet. “They killed the hostages.” It was a statement, not a question. “Motherfuckers . . . I hope you made them pay before you sent them on their way.” And then he saw the burning pile of smoldering bone and plastic on the other side of the bunker. “I guess you did.” He saw the somber look on John’s face. “Hey, you okay?”

  John nodded. “This man just died in my arms. Not the first time, probably not the last . . . I held him through his final moments. Hell, he should’ve been dead already.” He shook his head slowly. “He said something at the end, and it’s throwing me for a loop.”

  “What’s that?”

  “He said we need to talk to DARPA, and then he died. Didn’t want to pray. No ‘Tell my wife I love her’—nothing like that. Instead, he told us to talk to DARPA.” John looked at him. “What the fuck, Logan?”

  Logan stared back at him even as his mind raced through countless possibilities, none of them good. “Do you have my phone?”

  “As a matter of fact, I do. But it’s back in the truck, probably with Chief Phoenix and his men, if they’ve shown up.” He paused. “Why?”

  Logan never hesitated. “Because we need to call Mike right now. Let’s go.” He ran toward the tunnel entrance, a wet apparition disappearing into darkness.

  John followed. A Russian special ops team, oil researchers, and now the DOD’s DARPA? Wherever this one goes, it’s not going to be good.

  CHAPTER 7

  Hangar 7, Unalaska Airport

  The images were grainy and shaky, taken from the main road, but the video clearly captured the significant events of the gunfight on the pier. The cameraman had remained surprisingly silent as he filmed the unfolding battle.

  After John had pursued the fleeing pickup truck, the cameraman had chosen to follow the fleeing Arctic Glide. From his angle ashore, he’d had a direct line of sight into the rear of the boat, albeit at a distance.

  “Here comes my favorite part,” John said to Logan as they watched the video on a large-screen TV in the middle of the constant activity of the airport’s makeshift command center. The camera zoomed in just in time to film the yellow submersible crash to the deck and crush the remaining gunman. “Ouch. That had to hurt,” he added.

  Logan just shook his head at his friend’s morbid joke as the boat disappeared around the peninsula toward the north point of the island, moments before Logan had put a bullet in the wounded shooter’s head. Thank God he didn’t get our faces. After the events of two years ago, that’s the last thing any of us needs.

  The cameraman was a producer for a popular TV show filmed during crab season. His boat had returned for a repair that morning, and he’d happened to be leaving one of the local stores when the gun battle occurred.

  To his credit, as soon as the State Police and FBI had descended on the isolated island within hours of the incident and set up operations at the airport, he’d brought them the video.

  After confirming the legal fact that Logan and John had engaged in a justifiable use of force, the FBI technicians had copied it and continued to examine it for any evidence. The FBI requested that the cameraman wait twenty-four hours to release it publicly—which he had—but now he
re they were, watching it for what to Logan felt like the hundredth time in less than forty-eight hours.

  “Fuck him,” John said. “He would’ve gladly killed you and fed you to the killer whales up here.”

  “Agreed,” Logan said. “They all got what they deserved, although it would’ve been nice to question one of them.” He paused. “Regardless, the world’s definitely better off without this team in it.”

  One of the classified phones on a communications table suddenly rang, and a digital chirp was heard throughout the command center. All heads turned, including Logan’s and John’s.

  DC—must be Mike. Hopefully he’s got some good news, Logan thought. He stood up as a young FBI agent answered the phone.

  “Roger, sir. I’ll put him on,” Logan heard the agent say. The young man turned toward Logan and said, “It’s Deputy Director Benson for you, sir.”

  In the last twenty-four hours, FBI and US Coast Guard divers had recovered all the bodies of the assault team and the Arctic Glide’s real crew. The Russian team had killed the men and stored their bodies below deck in one of the staterooms.

  Logan accepted the handset and raised it to his ear. “Mike, please tell me you’ve got something back there. What about Colin Davies’s last words about DARPA? There has to be something. We’re running out of evidence up here.”

  The nationality of the assault team had indeed been confirmed as Russian. The CIA had even identified one of the team members, a former FSB operator who had supposedly retired several years ago, but those facts were being kept under wraps at this point in the investigation. Their weapons linked directly to a black-market arms dealer in South America who was now dead, and their communications gear was state-of-the-art but available off the shelf.

  “As a matter of fact, we do, but it’s too sensitive to discuss over the phone, even a secure one. I need you and John back here as soon as possible,” Mike stated.

  “As in do-not-pass-go-do-not-collect-two-hundred-dollars soon?” Logan joked. “Sarah’s going to be pissed,” he added, thinking about his wife and his futile hope to join her back in Aspen.