His scream was high and insanely comical. His gun spiralled away. The man disappeared in less time than it takes to blink, leaving behind him the ghost of a scream and only a hint of spilled blood.
Nothing compared to the nightmare he was now enduring as he was dragged to the bottom of the river.
Violence saturated the air.
Hayden brought every ounce of her will to bear and collected herself. It took every memory of every good thing her father had taught her. Every hard lesson and proud moment. She focused on the moment when she learned of his death, his cold murder, and remembered the life changing vows she had made right then and there.
It was all she had to spur herself on, to forget the carnage and advance. One step at a time. She reached the bank. She dug her fingers into the earth and pulled. She climbed. Then her stomach clutched with dread as she heard another enormous detonation of water behind her and out of her peripheral vision saw the nightmarish shape of the gator as it twisted and lunged for her.
In that moment of utter hell she witnessed a massive blur shooting past. It was Mano Kinimaka, roaring like a man possessed and tackling the gator around the exposed belly with a crunch they probably heard in Disneyland. The gator, no doubt in shock at being tackled by anything, let alone this man-mountain, was tipped over and thrown, back-first, into the shallows. Kinimaka landed atop it, arms encircling its body, gripping tight as if his life and the life of his boss depended on it.
And now, as Hayden balanced and rose to her feet, the men from the other two airboats began to open fire. Bullets thwacked and thudded the greenery around her, and kicked up sprays of water. Kinimaka thrashed with the gator. Hayden fell back against the muddy bank, exposed.
Brought her machine-gun around and opened fire.
And that was their last stand. Hayden, half buried in mud and muck and dripping wet, firing from the hip and felling the bad guys with every bullet. Kinimaka subduing the gator that writhed at her feet, screaming with the effort it took to hold on, eyes wild as he searched for a way to let go in relative safety.
The bad guys were advancing slowly. Boudreau was partially hidden behind his men, alternately shouting instructions and then laughing maniacally when a man right in front of him pirouetted bloodily and fell off the boat.
At that moment there was a scrambling sound behind her. Before she could turn, someone encircled her throat with a grip of iron. A cheer went up from the airboats. Hayden felt herself hauled to her feet.
The man’s grip was death. Kinimaka was in dire straits below. He saw what was happening but daren’t loosen his grip. Hayden fired down and back, turned the man’s foot to bloody mush. He fell away, screaming soundlessly. Hayden turned and fired a burst through his chest.
Then, under fire and dead on her feet, she dragged the dead man down into the churning shallows.
“Do it!” She screamed at Kinimaka. The huge Hawaiian let go and the gator surged. Its tail whipped, sending sheets of bloody water high into the air. Its questing jaws locked on to the dead man and tasted blood. With another flick of its giant tail it was off.
Kinimaka sat in the water, strength sapped to the last ounce. Hayden put an arm around his shoulders. Together they ignored the enemy for a few seconds.
Then, Hayden lifted her machine-gun again. The bad guys were about to disembark, leaving them fully exposed. Click. The weapon was empty.
Her head went down. For one second she felt utter despair and rage that she had not been able to live up to her father’s dreams. That she hadn’t excelled his marvellous legacy.
But no one could say they hadn’t given it their all.
Boudreau was gesticulating. The knife he had used to kill her team reappeared in his hands and chopped at the testosterone-charged air.
Then came the sound of hope, of potential reprieve. The thud, thud, thud of heavy machinery. Choppers, fast approaching.
Big, black, and unmistakably military, they came swinging around a bend in the channel like a motorcyclist takes the last bend in a race.
Boudreau screamed, and suddenly his voice was high-pitched with fear. “Move out! Move out! Now, you assholes! Now we’ll have to go into hiding!”
Yes, Hayden thought. You failed, you bastard. Try explaining that to the goddamn Blood King.
CHAPTER EIGHT
When Matt Drake first clapped eyes on Hayden Jaye he thought she was already dead. His heart froze in fear, throat tightening as he envisaged what Ben’s reaction would be, and then she moved. There was a huge mass beside her and it too was moving. Drake could hardly believe it was a man; its size dwarfed Hayden, but she appeared to be happy sat right next to him.
“The fuck’s that?” One of the SEAL team guys said. “A hippo? In the Everglades?”
“That’ll be Mano,” Ben spoke up for the first time, his eyes and heart alight. “She mentioned he was pretty huge.”
“Huge, yeah,” came the reply. “Pretty? Nah.”
The chopper hovered low whilst men leapt out. Their mission was to reclaim Hayden Jaye, not pursue the enemy, so they showed no interest in the fleeing band of murderers. Ben jumped out too, landing face-first and spluttering and thrashing in the shallow water whilst everyone watched in amusement.
But he wasn’t fazed. As soon as he’d planted his feet he used them to forge a path to Hayden’s side. Drake was a step behind and heard the words they said to each other.
As did Mano Kinimaka.
Drake and the outsize Hawaiian shared a brief smile and then Hayden was back to business.
“We need to get back to that HQ of theirs. And fast. They cleared out so fast they probably left something behind.”
Drake eyed her torn and muddy clothes, the blood that still soaked her hair, the wounds on her face. “Don’t take this wrong, Hayden. I know you’ve just been in a bloody battle. But, are you sure? You look like you’re gonna collapse.”
“Probably will, Drake. Probably will. But those sadists killed four CIA agents and, believe me, they’re after something much bigger. And they work for a guy who’s, possibly, the most evil man in history. And that’s just his reputation. So, yeah, I’m damn sure.”
Slowly, they helped Hayden and Kinimaka towards the thundering chopper. The SEAL team were stationed around the perimeter, keeping watch, but not even the crazy gator showed its head. Within five minutes they were airborne again.
Ben was squeezed as close to Hayden as he could get; his own clothes now wet and dirty. “I feel like I haven’t breathed since I last spoke to you,” he said in a low voice that everyone pretended they hadn’t heard.
Hayden didn’t move. “In a different way,” she said, “so do I. Look, Ben, I can’t do this now. Not yet. They killed my men, murdered them right in . . . in front of me. I won’t rest until I’ve done my best to make sense of their deaths.”
The chopper landed back at Boudreau’s HQ. Drake let Hayden get off first and let her have her head. He motioned to Ben and Kennedy. “Just let this happen,” he told them. “Don’t interfere. Even if she collapses on her feet. She needs to exhaust herself.”
Kennedy nodded. “Clearly.” Ben looked less sure, but agreed when Drake winked. “Best way mate,” Drake assured him. “Give her space.”
They trooped into the shambolic HQ.
Screams echoed from her cell, hitting her with a peculiar déjà vu.
“What-”
One of the SEAL guys came over to her. “Miss Jaye. We captured one of their operators. He’s back there.” The man inclined his head. “We’re talking to him.”
“Let me-”
“It’s not Boudreau,” Drake stepped up beside her. “Just a geek. A computer guy. Let them work, Hayden.”
“They sent him back to destroy evidence and information,” the SEAL guy was saying. “So something’s here. It would help us, Miss Jaye, if we knew what we were looking for.”
Hayden took a moment to catch the man’s eyes. “No offence. I can’t tell you. It . . . it goes so far up the ch
ain you wouldn’t believe.”
“Fair enough.”
Another rough scream rent the air. Despite herself, Hayden shivered. She turned to Ben. “You’re good at this, Blakey. Take a look.”
Ben wandered off amongst the destroyed terminals, kicking debris as he went. Drake and Kennedy stayed with her, silent.
“I’ll be ok,” she said without looking at them. “Not yet. Never the same, probably. But I’ll be ok.”
Drake nodded, saying nothing. Of them all, the ex-SAS man would know best what she was feeling.
“I’ve never seen Ben so worried. Never. You mean a lot to him, Hayden.”
“I know.”
“Might shock you but he’s even taken his Taylor poster down off the wall.”
Hayden smiled reflexively. “Swift? Or Momsen?”
“Need you ask? In the spirit of Dinorock I’ll just quote Motley Crue: Girls, girls, girls. I think one of those is you.”
Ben shouted them over. He was kneeling amidst a pile of discarded paper. “I’ve got some random stuff right here. One of these guys must have been a Johnny Depp fan. Look - a history of Blackbeard the pirate. Grrarrgh! Some bumf about a ship called the Queen Anne’s Revenge. Entire reams of shit on the Bermuda Triangle,” he said, winking at Drake. “Know what I mean?”
Hayden looked perplexed. “A device was recently salvaged from the wreck of the Queen Anne’s Revenge, Blackbeard’s ship, which they have in reality been salvaging for what seems like twenty years. It was broadcast on T.V. We think this so-called Blood King saw the broadcast and knew immediately what the device could do, and, more importantly, how it can do what it does.” She paused for a moment.
“We don’t.”
Drake waved a hand around. “And I’m just guessing, but after seeing the amount of firepower around here - and the CIA’s reaction to your abduction - that it’s a pretty big thing . . . what it does.”
Hayden was quiet for one long moment. “The answer to the Bermuda Triangle phenomenon.” She said quietly. “But the damn thing’s ancient. Truly ancient. It may predate the dinosaurs.”
Drake frowned at her. “Eh?”
Kennedy grabbed a sheaf of papers off the floor, now tying her long hair back as she straightened. “Wasn’t Blackbeard called the Blood King?”
“I don’t know,” Hayden looked startled. “Was he?”
“Maybe I got it from a movie,” Kennedy said, waving her flippant comment away. “Who knows?”
“Well, hopefully the Blood King ain’t Blackbeard.” Drake tried a chuckle which came out sounding more like a duck arguing with a frog.
“The problem is,” Hayden continued, “there may be a second part to the device. A more important piece. And no one knows where that is.”
Ben looked up from the litter. “Sounds like a challenge to me.”
CHAPTER NINE
The CIA jet skimmed across the purple clouds, flying away from the dark and chasing the light. In a happy mood, Drake likened the allusion to himself and his friend, Ben - two good guys always chasing the light.
They were well on their way to Atlantic Beach, the small U.S. town close to where the decade-long salvage operation had been continuing on the Queen Anne’s Revenge, Blackbeard’s flagship. Sometime during the flight Ben and Hayden had taken themselves a few rows back for a little privacy, leaving Kennedy and Drake alone.
Drake was feeling a little tense. It wasn’t easy even for an ex-soldier to be so close to the action and not get involved. The mood wasn’t helped by Justin Harrison, who had placed himself at the front of the plane and was trying to lecture them.
Trouble was, the information he was imparting was imperative. The way he delivered it was somewhat shoddy.
“ . . . ship lies in twenty-three feet of water and took over two hundred and fifty years to find. Of course, it wasn’t being searched for all that time. Quite the opposite. The North Carolinan . . . ”
Drake zoned out. Harrison walked and talked faster than girls used to drop their pants at a Rolling Stones’ concert. And still probably do, Drake thought. Jagger still had it. He leaned in to Kennedy and nodded at Harrison. “Sympathy for the devil?”
Kennedy sighed. “He’s not a man of taste and means, that’s for sure.”
They both tried to listen carefully, aware that amidst the blather there might be a gold nugget or two.
“ . . . Blackbeard surrendered and accepted a royal pardon for himself and his men. What we don’t understand is why, for that brief period, because he soon returned to his pirating ways. It’s even more bizarre when you consider he purposely ran aground his flagship – QAR - to surrender in the first place. Act of a madman?” Harrison paused for a millisecond to breathe.
“Blackbeard’s various travels are well catalogued, as well as most of his routes. Early assumptions are that he traded the device and its controller along the way. At least once. Maybe many times.”
“How so?” Drake shot out the question just to get a break.
“Blackbeard’s Claw.” Harrison looked please with himself.
“He had a claw?” Mano Kinimaka, situated at the back of the plane, rumbled. “A bit like Captain Hook?”
“Errm, no. Blackbeard’s Claw was a man, so called because he was a fierce fighter who led all of Blackbeard’s boarding parties. He terrified all men. Blackbeard most likely sold the device for a pretty penny and then sent his second-in-command to take it back.”
No one laughed at the pirate half-reference. Drake was regressing and starting to wonder if the jet came equipped with parachutes, when Ben finally spoke up.
“So where did Blackbeard get it?”
Harrison shrugged faster than bolt lightning. “Who knows? Probably robbed it from another pirate. Maybe even from old Hornigold himself - the man who first made Blackbeard captain and gave him a ship called La Concorde, later to be renamed the Queen Anne’s Revenge.”
“So this device,” Ben continued, “you have no idea where it comes from? What exactly does it do?”
“Well, it’s a technology far beyond what we possess today,” Harrison told them, breathing deeply for a change. “And its origin predates the dinosaurs.”
Kinimaka gasped. “Is that possible?”
Drake was growing fond of the lovable jester. “Not unless you believe in aliens,” he paused. “Do not tell me this is another bloody alien theory, Harrison.”
“No. No. No. There’s only one theory-”
At that moment the TV screen behind the secretary’s aid switched itself on. “Ah,” the man went on, undeterred, “this is the ship as it looks today.”
Underwater scenes flashed past - undetermined objects covered in crustaceans, caressed and embraced by the jealous seas for hundreds of years. The scene then switched to what could only be a museum, jam-packed with artefacts.
“Thousands,” Harrison said to their surprised faces. “Anything from glass window shards to cannons and the great anchor.”
Drake coughed. “So you’ve figured out the Blackbeard angle. We get that. How about this Blood King? You got anything on him yet?”
Harrison’s face revealed the truth before his lips. “We don’t know who that is.”
Drake gave him a fake look of amazement. “But you’re the U.S. government.”
“The Blood King is a mythical figure. Doesn’t exist.”
Kinimaka sounded shocked. “What? Like the dodo?”
“No! Like the damn clitoris!” Ben shouted without thinking, and then sank down in his seat when everyone turned round. Even Hayden forgot her recent trauma for a moment to smirk.
Drake turned the topic back around. “So you’re saying this guy’s a myth? After all that Hayden’s learned for you?”
“We’re actively searching for him and, believe me, that’s a major understatement. Information on Ed Boudreau, however, is flooding in. We’ll get updated when we reach the ship.”
The TV screen behind Harrison changed picture and suddenly Secretary of Defence, Jona
than Gates, was sat there, staring at them all.
“Can you hear me on the plane? Hello?”
Harrison died and went to heaven. “Ah, Jonathan. Good to see you. So to speak . . . haha. Well, yes, we hear you, umm . . . loud and clear!”
Gates addressed the team. “Miss Jaye and Mr Kinimaka? Just wanted to say - job well done - under the harshest of conditions. My thoughts are with you, and your lost men, and their families.”
“Thank you, sir,” Hayden whispered. Kinimaka offered a grunt.
“That being said we now know the kind of enemy we are up against. The notion of an actual Blood King is being looked at very carefully. You guys know the saying - ‘the Devil’s greatest trick was in convincing the human race that he didn’t exist?’ Well, I guess we’re treating this guy as the devil.”
“Wise move,” Drake said. “From all I’ve heard.”
“I want your input,” Gates said. “I do. Not the United States government, me. There are too many bureaucrats clinging on to this Blackbeard thing right now, and not enough real men. I’ll authorise your access and give you what you need to investigate where you see fit. We . . . we all owe you a huge debt of gratitude for the ‘Odin thing’.”
Drake was fascinated how even a United States senator referred to their previous world-saving quest as the ‘Odin thing’. He also concealed a large slice of respect for this man. “We’ll start as soon as we land, sir.”
The aeroplane started to lose altitude. Drake felt his ears pop.
Jonathan Gates said: “Take a look around the salvage area. Then, we’ll transport you to the highly secure area where the device is being overhauled. Let’s see what you can do.”
Gates smiled. Harrison’s return smile would have scared off a T-Rex. Drake sat there, wishing he could answer Wells’ most recent call but wary of American ears until he reached the safety of solid ground. A soldier’s obstinate principle - and not easily overcome.
The Blood King Conspiracy (Matt Drake 2) Page 4
