He headed toward the clearing to the south and then into the deep forest on the other side, toward the spot he had chosen earlier. Position One. Charlie got behind the wheel of the Honda, eased the door closed.
Their targets weren’t people; they were cameras. Five security cameras mounted on towers facing the north and east sides of the complex, the nearest about two hundred meters away, the farthest about five hundred and fifty meters away. Wells would take out the first two, Mallory the other three.
Without touching the brakes, he turned the car around by reversing, downshifting, and slipping it into neutral, scraping against trees and running through shrubbery. Then he began to drive the way they had come, keeping the lights off. At the fork, he downshifted and went left, the direction Nadra had gone, but only for about twenty yards, into a thick forested stretch where he let the car ease to a stop on its own. He looked at his watch: 11:08.
He removed the rifle from the back of the car and started walking until he found the spot that gave him a clear view of the northernmost cameras. Position Two. At 11:19, his cell phone vibrated. He saw that it was Nadra’s number. She would have called Wells, too. She was near the northeast corner of the complex. Mallory waited. Showtime.
Jason Wells fired first. Mallory heard the quick, sharp sound of the medium-weight bullet thudding into the first camera, and then the second. Followed by silence. He waited another four minutes, until Wells set off his diversion: a slow fuse gasoline bomb triggered with a small plastic explosive.
Mallory crouched then, and he aimed. Dialed an elevation into the 10-power scope of his rifle to correct for the arc at four hundred meters.
Sighted. Adjusted.
Fired.
He saw the bullet smash into the camera, the glass lens shattering, and felt a quick rush. Then he sighted the second camera, farther north. Adjusted his rifle. Dialed in a new elevation. Fired. Missed.
He looked south and saw the glow of flames beginning to light the trees where the dry shrubbery had caught fire on the ground below the pine and eucalyptus trees. He aimed the gun at the camera again as it moved slowly to its right, toward his position. Checked his adjustment, fired. This time, the bullet took out the front of the lens. Yes. He turned his rifle to the northeastern edge of the enclosure next. The longest shot, some five hundred fifty meters. Mallory dialed in the new elevation. Aimed. Fired. His bullet nicked the side of the camera, knocking it slightly off kilter but not disabling it. Mallory set up to try again. Checked his setting. Aimed. Fired. Hit it this time, the lens shattering. Bingo. All of the cameras were disabled now on the east and the northeast perimeter of the field. Mallory stood and began walking back to the car, feeling pumped with adrenaline.
Nadra should be north of the airfield now, in the woods near the northeast corner of the fence. By the gas tank, waiting for a response. Position Three.
Jason would be moving north through the trees, toward Nadra’s location.
A minute passed as Charlie walked back through the woods. Two minutes. Nothing. They had estimated it would take ninety seconds from the firebomb detonation for a response, but four minutes passed and nothing happened.
Charlie felt an apprehension after the brief euphoria. He reached the car and got in. Reversed direction, easing back into the thick shrubbery, snapping down plants and weeds and small trees. He shifted to neutral, then to drive, steering his way back toward the fork in the road.
Then suddenly the silence was shattered with bursts of automatic rifle fire—bullets slamming into the trees, thudding into the trunks. A row of stadium lights lit up the southern corner of the compound and the burning woods.
Mallory shifted to neutral as he rounded the turn, letting the car drift to a stop, then shifting to drive and pressing hard on the accelerator. The trip to the main road would take another ten minutes. Then fifteen minutes more to reach the northern loop. There was more commotion behind him, lights and gunfire. And then the rotors of a helicopter. But he also saw the fire spreading through the forest in his rear-view mirror.
Mallory thought about Nadra, lying in the woods north of him, waiting for Jason. Waiting to go inside the fence.
As he came back to the road, Charlie saw a procession of headlights in the distance and downshifted again. A dozen or so Jeeps, speeding his direction, toward the southern loop road and the south entrance to the airfield. Armed security, probably. He assumed the first phalanx of security people had already entered the complex from the western entrance.
The cars whipped past, not noticing him tucked into the edge of the forest. 11:33. Behind him, fire trucks and helicopters were responding, trying to put out the fire. The diversion had worked, but maybe not well enough. They needed a second, larger diversion. The gas tank. He pictured Nadra again, emerging from the woods with the explosives in her arms, running toward the fence.
Driving with his lights out, Charlie came to the northern loop road, an old trucking route, and turned left. He was traveling west now, parallel to the northern border of the airport complex. To the right of the road was barren scrub land that had once been soybean and maize farms. To the left were fields of tall weeds. Here’s where it gets tricky, he thought.
Twice, truck headlights came at him from the other direction, and Mallory pulled off to the left, finding a spot among the weeds and tree clusters to hide the car. Once, a chopper flew overhead, the beam of its spotlight combing the forest, sweeping across the scrubland and the road. Missing him. At last, he came to the spot on the left that Jason had chosen for him to wait. It was marked by a distinctive v-shaped tree top. Mallory turned toward it and shifted to first gear. Position Four.
He let the car idle. Scanning the woods to the south through his night-vision rifle scope.
Charlie looked at his watch: 11:47. Nadra should have already planted the explosives by the fuel tanks. No, they should have detonated by now. She should have dialed his phone to let them know she was finished.
Where are they?
He watched the fire spreading from the southern corner of the airport. Helicopter searchlights probing the woods. Another truck approached from the west, whooshed past.
11:51. Charlie kept scanning the forest, left to right, for signs of anything moving. Nothing. 11:53. Suddenly, what sounded like a deep peal of thunder jolted him, rumbling the earth, shaking the car. The initial explosion was followed by another. The ground shook once again as the gas tank blew up and a fireball spread across the sky like a mad fireworks display, shooting plumes of flame high into the air, turning to clouds of thick, dark smoke over the forest. Charlie felt the heat as the flames lit up the woods. The main diversion. Jason Wells had placed a cell phone in each of the explosive devices. When he dialed the numbers, the ringing of the phone created a vibration in the bombs, activating a circuit to the blasting cap that detonated the explosive.
He heard three smaller explosions then, in succession, two diversions, one blowing the door off the hangar.
And then another, more distant sound. He saw headlights on the road behind him. Not a truck this time. Something else. He waited, holding his breath. A procession of smaller lights, lower to the ground, seemed to bounce off the pavement, coming toward him from the east. Another caravan of Jeeps.
11:59.
Mallory squinted into the trees, coughing now, as low clouds of smoke spread dark and acrid through the woods.
Where are they? Would they be able to make it through this?
Behind him the Jeeps passed, heading west, maybe fifty yards away.
New sirens sounded in the distance. The smoke had turned thicker. He lifted the rifle again and scanned the forest through the scope. Left to right, right to left. And after a moment, he thought he saw something: a dark shape, moving through the smoke among the trees. Or maybe not. Shifting, going side to side, back up the hillside. Running, back toward Position Four.
Nadra!
12:08.
For a moment, he lost her in the smoke and the darkness and the sh
adows—and then he saw her emerge, running out into the clearing, ducking down, slipping, regaining her footing. Yes! Nadra was safe.
But where was Jason Wells?
Nadra ducked down beside the car. Grabbed the passenger door handle, pulled it open, slid in.
“Jesus,” she said.
“Are you okay?
“I lost my fucking cell phone.”
“Where’s Jason?”
“He should be right behind me.”
They sat and stared into the forest, coughing.
Nothing.
“Come on, Jason!” Nadra hit her hand on the dashboard. “God dammit, come on, Jason! Come on!”
It was 12:12 when they saw him, running through the smoke, coughing violently. He looked disoriented. But when he saw them he changed course, heading straight for the back passenger door and getting in.
“Motherfucking smoke!”
Nadra slammed his palm. Charlie slipped the car into reverse, turned, then drove. The sky was bright with stars and moonlight, but there were no other lights visible to the east for maybe half a mile. He found the road and followed it, lights out, pushing the accelerator hard now, narrowing all of his attention on staying within the edges of the road. It was a while before anyone thought about talking.
“Shit!” Nadra said. Her face was covered in soot.
Jason said nothing.
“What happened?” Charlie finally asked.
“It didn’t work.”
“What didn’t?”
“The DPG. It didn’t work. It wouldn’t go in the tank.”
“Jesus,” Jason said.
He took out his cell phone. Covered the light with the palm of his hand and pushed a speed dial number. Moments later, the ground shook again. Mallory felt the car rattle violently, a tremble down his spine. An orange-black fireball shot into the sky behind them. Another gas tank fire. Maybe they would be too busy now containing the damage to worry about giving chase. Maybe. Charlie pressed the accelerator to the floor, driving sixty, then seventy, on the dark highway, lights out, following the course Jason had mapped. They tasted the odor of burning gasoline and spent explosives in the breeze all the way in. The fire in the woods was burning wildly now.
As the city came into view again, to their right, Charlie turned on the headlights.
He took a series of random turns, becoming lost in the maze of dirt roads that bordered the shanty towns. Everywhere people were gathered outside in groups, staring in the direction of the fire.
He finally found a way into downtown and parked on a residential street. The three of them got out and began walking, past the gawking clusters of curious people. They came to a park and found an open bench among the homeless men. Charlie and Nadra kept watch. Jason Wells sat and took out his phone again. Pushed one number. Then a second. Then a third. Then a fourth. Then he slipped the phone back in his jacket. Mallory turned to the northeast and waited. He saw the first explosion above the roofs of mud-brick houses, followed by a second one at almost the same spot. The ground shook momentarily as if by an earthquake. In the distance, women screamed. The train tracks. He turned to the east, saw two explosions light up the sky almost simultaneously. Felt the ground shake. The communications tower. Then he looked west. Moments later another blast flared up amid the fires outside the airfield. Nadra’s car, parked in the woods. People were running out into the street now, screaming. The breeze tasted of gasoline and acrid smoke. The pavement was littered with ash.
Mallory sat on one end of the bench, Nadra on the other.
“It didn’t work!” Jason said.
“Why?”
“The dart, the propellants, wouldn’t go in the tanks. There was no way. We were given bad information, maybe. I don’t know. I just know we failed. The tanks are still out there. All we have are these diversions.”
“Crap!” Nadra said.
They sat in silence for a long time, thinking about it, breathing smoke, until eventually they had nothing to do but return to their apartments. Nadra asked to meet Charlie in the morning. Then all of them would meet at eleven, to try to come up with a new plan.
The night was alive with the sounds of sirens and surprised voices. Charlie walked back by himself, coughing through the drifting smoke, breathing the acrid taste of failure in the early morning air. He felt weighted down but unable to give in. It was going up tomorrow. Eight million people. They couldn’t allow failure to be an option. It wouldn’t be. It wasn’t.
ISAAK PRIEST WATCHED the spreading fire on the satellite monitors at his home base along the Green Monkey River. The cameras at the airfield were no longer operational. Now the northeastern cell phone tower was out, as well. It didn’t affect him operationally. But it shouldn’t have happened. It couldn’t have, according to the Administrator.
So Charles Mallory was here, after all. That was very interesting. Maybe it was a good thing that he was here. Maybe he wasn’t really the enemy at all. Who had really sent him? It was a very interesting question.
Priest speed-dialed John Ramesh again. It took nine rings this time for him to answer.
“What’s happening?” Priest said.
“We’re containing it. No losses. Greatest damage was an airport fuel tank. Looks worse than it is.”
“The product.”
“It’s all safe.”
“How did you let this happen?”
Ramesh didn’t respond.
“Can you get them?”
“We will.”
“How?”
“We’re pursuing.”
“Not good enough,” Priest said, and hung up.
He had been told that this wasn’t possible. It can’t be stopped now. Gardner had assured him he was protected. Maybe he already knew what Priest had done, what was really going to happen on October 5. Or maybe he suspected.
CHARLIE WOKE IN an unfamiliar apartment before sunrise, fully dressed except for his shoes. He felt grimy, smelled of smoke. He showered and shaved, then pulled on a new set of cheap clothing. Another day.
Except it wasn’t another day.
It was October 5. The World Series day. The day when Isaak Priest was supposed to take the planes up. To depopulate a nation.
As he walked toward downtown, Charlie smelled smoke and felt ash in the air, saw it all over the streets. He still heard Nadra’s and Jason’s voices in his head: It didn’t work. We failed. Crap! He felt the changed mood in town—there were armed contractors everywhere, patrolling alongside the eateries and shops, looking in, watching everyone. Mallory kept his head down, tried to stay out of sight. He had slept fitfully, thinking all night about contingencies.
He was looking forward to his 7:50 meeting with Nadra. To learning something about the Palace and how they might infiltrate it. How they might get to Isaak Priest before nightfall. That was his alternate plan.
He ordered a cup of coffee, black, and watched the street traffic—the armed security details, the bicycle taxis and rickshaws. Finally, he walked to the corner of Lester Avenue. Checked his watch. 7:49. Moments later, an old Camry stopped beside him. Charlie opened the front passenger door.
Nadra was wearing combat fatigues, sneakers, and her tight black T-shirt—but also something new, a camouflage ball cap. She drove them north, into the suburbs, leaning forward against the steering wheel, moving it with her elbows.
“Everything’s different today, isn’t it?” she said.
“Is it?”
“Yeah. I just keep thinking how we blew it.”
“Don’t,” he said. “We didn’t.”
She shot him a look. “No?”
“No. Don’t think that.”
“What can we do, though? The device didn’t work.”
“Different strategy,” Charlie said.
“How? What else can we do? We don’t have any other way of neutralizing it.”
“How about if we go after something else? Priest instead of the poison.”
Nadra didn’t say anything right away. S
he drove slowly through a neighborhood of sun-bleached, mud-brick homes, making seemingly haphazard turns, her eyes scanning the scenery attentively. Charlie liked being with her one on one. Sometimes she treated him like an older brother, opening up and showing him vulnerabilities that the other members of the team never saw, particularly Okoro, who rarely spoke with her.
“Besides,” Charlie said. “We may be able to buy a day or two with the weather. It’s supposed to rain tonight.”
“I just know we can’t let this happen.” Nadra tugged down on her hat brim. “I mean, crap! When I was crawling through the woods last night, I just realized this is my home, man. I mean, I’ve been everywhere in the world, but this is my home. All night, I thought what I should be doing. How I should be helping the people here.”
“What would you do?”
“What would I do? Teach them. Show them how to use what they have. How to irrigate, for one thing. Most of the farmland to the west of the capital is ruined. For miles and miles.”
“Why doesn’t the government teach them?”
“The government? Crap, the government shuts down any program like that when it starts to succeed.”
This was what Mallory had been wondering: why her country had been chosen for this. “Why would they do that?”
“They’re paid to. Contractors pay them to keep the problems the way they are. Progress interferes with their plans. Huge amounts of money are coming in, promoting a different agenda.”
The road northwest from the Green Monkey River was muddy from the night rains, winding through patchy sodden fields and past volcanic gorges.
“So Priest is down in the Palace, we think,” Charlie said. “Tell me about that. Can we get there this afternoon?”
“We could try. There’s really thick forest surrounding it. Supposedly it’s mined with booby traps. It used to be there were lots of trails in there, but it’s all overgrown now. I used to play in the river down there when I was a girl.”
“Why do they call it the Palace?”
“Just because it looks like one. It was built by a British businessman who owned mines here early in the last century. Then an American corporation bought it. Wanted to turn it into a hunting lodge or something.”
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