Z

by Bob Mayer

  “That’s not—”

  Quinn drew his knife and slashed, the blade cutting across Bentley’s right cheek, a thin line of blood following the slit.

  “What did you do?” Bentley screamed, scrambling backward and falling down.

  Quinn stepped forward and slammed a knee into Bentley’s chest, pinning him to the ground. He pressed the point into the skin under Bentley’s right eye. “What crashed over there?”

  “I can’t—”

  The point of the knife edged forward until it was a scant millimeter from Bentley’s eye. “I’ll take one eye, then the other. Nothing in Skeleton’s orders about you keeping your eyes,” Quinn said. “Just get you and your cargo back. What crashed?”

  “It was a satellite. Well, sort of a satellite,” Bentley said.

  “A satellite?” Quinn frowned. “What did you get out of it?”

  “Film,” Bentley said.

  “Film of what?”

  “The mine areas,” Bentley said. “The satellite wasn’t supposed to come down so soon.”

  “That’s worth four million?” Quinn didn’t wait for an answer. “Bullshit. Skeleton could get photos of the mines anytime he wants.”

  “Not this type of photo.” Bentley spoke quickly, eye still focused on the knife so close by. The camera used special imaging. The Angolan mines were never fully exploited. With thermal and spectral imaging, the specialists can determine areas that haven’t been dug up yet that have a high likelihood of holding diamonds, particularly alluvial flood areas.”

  “Why the fuck does Skeleton care? He’s going to take over anything he wants once UNITA is destroyed.”

  Bentley started to shake his head, then thought better of it. “No. Not with the Americans there. And the UN charter calls for the mines to be privatized and turned over to Angolans. Well, Skeleton’s got enough Angolan natives on his payroll prepared to take over, but he has to have them come in quick and stake claims. This way he can prevent what happened in Canada.”

  Quinn slowly pulled the knife away. He knew about the fiasco in Canada three years ago. A prospector had discovered a rich field of diamonds. The rush had been on, and as usual, the Van Wyks cartel had rumbled in with the best equipment and a big bankroll determined to keep their monopoly. Unfortunately, the prospector had joined forces with a local company, and they’d staked claims using the same type of imaging Bentley had just talked about, while Van Wyks had relied on its tried-and-true but slower methods. The result: forty percent of the diamonds mined in Canada now came out of non-Van Wyks mines.

  “It’s set,” Trent reported.

  Quinn sheathed his knife and pulled out his one-time pad. He quickly began transcribing. He finished the message and punched it into the SATCOM and burst it out.

  “Where did you say for the transportation to meet us?” Bentley asked.

  Quinn laughed. “I don’t think that’s information you need. You just stick with us. We’ll get you there.”

  * * *

  Five thousand meters to the south, Riley looked around, weapon at the ready. The Black Hawk was sitting a short distance away, blades slowly turning.

  “What do you think?” Lome asked, looking about in the dark at the rolling terrain around them.

  “They were here,” Riley said, pointing at where the grass was pressed down. “Someone slept here. Maybe three, four men.”

  “So where’d they go?” Lome asked.

  “I’m not a fucking Indian,” Riley snapped. “They could have gone in any direction. We need help. Let’s get back on the bird.”

  National Security Agency, Fort Meade, Maryland, 17 June

  “Okay, Okay,” Waker said as he read the intelligence request. He was pumped. He was hooked in to his electronic network, everything coming in and dancing in front of his eyes in letters and symbols his brain automatically translated.

  “Perfect timing,” Waker muttered. The KH-12 had picked up the SATCOM transmission as it was being made. Within thirty seconds it had come up on Waker’s screen. And now, three minutes later, someone on the ground in Angola wanted the location of the transmitter.

  This time, though, he was talking direct back to the man in the field, and that gave Waker a rush. It was as close as he was ever going to get.

  He typed, each finger slamming down on the key with authority.

  TO: EAGLE

  FROM: NSA ANGOLA ALPHA ONE ONE

  TRANSMISSION SENT DTG 17JUNE0307ZULU BY SAME

  SATCOM LOCATION UTM GRID 29583578

  Waker looked at the message, his finger poised above the send key, then made a decision. He typed a couple of extra lines.

  TERMINUS OF TRANSMISSION LOCATED ALONG

  SKELETON COAST, VICINITY LUDERITZ

  END OF MESSAGE

  Waker hit the send.

  Northeast Angola, 17 June

  In the front of the helicopter, Lieutenant Vickers’s voice was in Riley’s ears as soon as he put the headset on. “We’ve got something coming from the AWACS.”

  Riley put his hands over the headset and listened in.

  “Army helicopter, this is Eagle. Over.”

  Vickers replied. “Eagle, this is army helicopter. Go ahead. Over.”

  Circling two hundred miles to the southwest, Colonel Harris frowned. The woman’s voice sounded familiar. Since the quarantine rule his and his crew’s job had been simply one of making sure that no one tried to get out of Angola by air.

  So far there had been only one incident. In the first hour of the quarantine, a Marine helicopter had tried to fly back out to its assault vessel offshore. Harris still wasn’t sure whether the pilot had not received the order or had tried to bolt. Regardless, the aircraft had turned around when he’d ordered it.

  Harris checked the message he’d just received from the NSA. “I’ve got new coordinates for you.”

  The point man stumbled and fell. Trent was quickly at his side. The man reached up, grabbing Trent’s arm.

  Quinn came up and looked at the man. He was a mercenary who had served with Quinn for the last two years. “Can you go on?”

  The man groaned and rolled on the ground. Trent stood, flicking his arm to shake off the black vomit.

  Quinn rubbed his forehead. He brought up the Sterling. The man raised an arm weakly. Quinn fired twice, then let his arms slump to his sides, the Sterling hanging by its sling.

  “Let’s go,” Bentley said.

  Quinn thought of the two dead rebels in their poncho stretchers. A million dollars. Would he make it out of here in time to buy help? “Let’s move.” As they went forward in the darkness, he noted that for the first time Trent had not added up their suddenly higher shares.

  “Lock and load,” Lome yelled. The Black Hawk came in fast, the pilot flaring them at the last minute to prevent a crash. They jumped off, weapons at the ready, fanning across the open ground. The aircraft lifted and hovered overhead.

  “They’re gone again!” Lome said as he looked around in all directions. He kicked dirt in frustration.

  “What’s up there?” Conner asked, looking up the ridge at a twisted tree. They ran up the slope and crested it. A pile of twisted metal lay at the end of a trail of torn-up earth.

  “What’s that?” Comsky asked as the party gathered around the wreckage.

  “Helicopter?” Conner guessed.

  “I don’t see any rotor blades,” Riley noted.

  “It’s burned, whatever it is,” Conner said, touching the metal.

  “There’s Cyrillic writing here,” Riley said, peering at a flat piece.

  “Cyrillic?” Comsky asked.

  “Russian,” Riley said.

  “They’re gone,” Lome repeated. “That’s the important thing. I don’t even know what we’re doing here, chasing after ghosts in the dark. What does it have to do with this thing we’ve got? We’re fucking dying here!”

  “You got a better idea?” Conner demanded. The scene was lit by a bolt of lightning. Thunder rumbled a few seconds later.
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  “We get somewhere where we can find medical help,” Lome said. “Go back to the AOB.”

  “Go back and wait to die, you mean,” Comsky said. “Top,” he added, touching Lome on the arm, “there isn’t any medical help for this other than killing the pain in the later stages.”

  “Ah, fuck,” Lome muttered, and walked off toward the top of the ridge, back toward the helicopter.

  “This thing,” Riley said, plunking the burnt metal with his finger. “It came from out of the sky. We know that. If it’s an aircraft, we can get the AWACS to check records. Whoever sent that SATCOM message was here. This was what they were after. Let’s find out what we can about it.” He looked about. “And we know they were here less than an hour ago. We need help looking.”

  * * *

  Colonel Harris considered the dual requests. The first he gave to one of his analysts with the order to check the AWACS records and also relay it back to the NSA. The second he had to ponder for a few moments, before he came up with a solution.

  Quinn had heard the helicopter set down to their rear. That confirmed to him that the SATCOM transmissions were being picked up. He checked out the sky. He’d seen this before. Heat lightning, soon to be followed by a torrential rain. Perfect. There was no way they would be found, no matter how close their pursuers were.

  “Here!” Comsky called out.

  Riley ran over, the others following. A body lay in the grass. Comsky shone a light down and they immediately saw the blood splattered all about and the bullet holes. But there was also the sign of the disease. A red welt across the man’s neck.

  Riley looked out into the dark. The wind was picking up and he could feel dampness being carried with it. “Weather’s changing,” he called out. “Back to the chopper.”

  Chapter 16

  Tshibomba, Zaire, 17 June

  The pilot checked his map one last time, then carefully folded it so that the portion he needed was face up. He used a band of elastic to attach it to his kneeboard. He had no electronic devices on board other than the engine, windshield wipers, and the rudimentary instrument panel, so this truly was going to be a seat-of-the-pants navigation job. He did have a small FM radio to be used to contact the people on the ground when he got close. The pilot was used to such missions and felt confident he could find the target runway.

  He’d been waiting here for five days, the aircraft—a specially designed, top secret prototype named the Gull—under camouflage nets, the entire area guarded by a platoon of Skeleton’s men. A generous payoff to certain officials in the Zairean army ensured they would not be bothered by any officials.

  He flicked the on switch and the engine coughed once, then smoothly started. It was a specially designed rotary engine; quieter than a conventional piston engine and mounted directly behind the cockpit in a large bubble. The propeller shaft extended forward from the engine, over the pilot’s head to the high-mounted propeller, supported by a four-foot pylon mounted on the nose. The long shaft allowed a high reduction ratio for the prop, and the very large blades—over eight feet long—turned very slowly. The resulting sound was no louder than a moderate wind blowing through the trees.

  The Gull was made by a South African company, from designs stolen from Lockheed’s Q-Star (Quiet Star) program. The entire aircraft was designed with two factors in mind: reduced noise and radar signature. It wasn’t built for speed or endurance, but with the target only eighty miles away across the border, the pilot knew he would be there in less than forty minutes.

  The runway was dirt and the rain had further complicated what was going to be a difficult takeoff with no lights. The pilot released the brakes and the plane began rolling. Peering through the Plexiglas with his night vision goggles, the pilot ignored the sweep of the wipers and concentrated on staying straight. In two hundred feet he had sufficient speed and pulled back on the yoke, lifting off. As soon as he cleared the trees, he turned due west and headed for Angola.

  Northeast Angola, 17 June

  Colonel Harris had moved the AWACS until it was now centered over Cacolo. The Black Hawk was waiting on the ground at the last site they had gone to. The only other aircraft on his screens was moving in this direction because he had ordered it to.

  He keyed his mike. “Spectre One One, this is Eagle. Over.”

  “This is One One. Over.”

  Harris quickly relayed to the pilot of the Spectre gunship what he wanted. The AC-130 didn’t look like a bloodhound, but it was the best Harris could come up with in the inventory. Using its LLTV, Harris wanted the Spectre to head to the Black Hawk’s location, then begin a circular search pattern, literally looking for the people they were after.

  “Roger that,” the pilot of the Spectre acknowledged when Harris was done with his instructions. “ETA at target site, fifteen minutes. Out.”

  On the ground waiting, Riley was thinking about the last message they had received giving them this location. The second part—about the other end of the SATCOM communications—was what interested him.

  “What’s the Skeleton Coast?” he asked Conner.

  The helicopter’s engine was still on, producing a low whine, but the blades were disengaged so they could talk without the intercom.

  “The Van Wyks,” Conner answered. “Actually, the Skeleton Coast stretches almost fifteen hundred miles. Pretty much the entire coastline of Namibia with the south Atlantic. It was named during the sailing days because there was no place along that stretch that ships could stop and get water. If a ship didn’t make good time down to the Cape of Good Hope, it could get stranded—and all that was there was desert and rock right up to the water.”

  “So why are the Van Wyks there?” Riley asked.

  “Diamonds. That’s where the diamond fields are,” Conner said. “They own a large section of southwest Namibia that is totally restricted. It’s the Van Wyks’ own private country. They have a security force to control the workers. One of the articles I read said that they even rigged the barracks of workers with video cameras and remote-controlled tear-gas-canister dispensers.” Conner paused and wiped her forehead with a rag.

  “So we know for sure now that these people are connected to the Van Wyks,” Riley said.

  “Yes. And I think I’m beginning to see a bigger picture here,” Conner said.

  “Which is?”

  “Right-wingers in South Africa have been proposing a new homeland for whites, and Namibia is high on their list of choices.”

  “What’s that got to do with this?” Riley asked.

  “I’m not sure,” Conner said, “but if there’s a connection between Van Wyks and this disease, then there might be a connection between Van Wyks and the right-wingers.”

  “You’re reaching,” Riley said.

  “I know, but it’s my job.” Conner said, leaning back against the seat back.

  “You all right?” Riley asked,

  “Stupid question, Dave.” Conner tried to smile, but she suddenly had to lean forward and throw up.

  “Another kilometer,” Quinn said. He pulled his canteen out and drank deeply while still walking, trying to replace some of the fluid he was losing and keep his temperature down.

  He looked over. Trent and the other man weren’t doing too well, either, but Bentley seemed all right. Of course, Bentley hadn’t been with them at the ambush.

  He had not heard the rev of power indicating the chopper behind them had lifted. What was it waiting for?

  National Security Agency, Fort Meade, Maryland, 17 June

  Running through the computer records forwarded to him from the AWACS and the records already in the computer, Waker had come up with a big fat zero as to the identity of the wreckage that had been found in northeast Angola. There was no sign of any aircraft flying over—or crashing in—that exact spot. The Cyrillic writing didn’t mean much, because much of the equipment both sides used in Angola had been supplied by the Russians.

  Waker sipped his tea and thought about it. Wreckage from the
sky? He put the tea down and began typing. Two thousand miles to the west another large computer began scanning, and within thirty seconds, he had an answer. On the twenty-first of May, at 0959 Greenwich Mean Time, a piece of space debris had come down with a plotted impact within five kilometers of the indicated place.

  “Give me more,” Waker whispered as the screen cleared and new letters and numbers appeared, outlining the object that had come down.

  RG14: Proton final stage booster. Orbit: Free, plotted, and logged. Launch: 18 May 1997 Launch Site: Kazakhstan

  Comments: Final stage booster for Proton launch of communications satellite contracted out to SINCOM, European Communications. Payload is listed as EG36.

  A booster? Waker frowned. He could understand if they had the payload, but just the booster? Shaking his head, he forwarded the information to the Pentagon with a copy for the AWACS in Angola.

  Pentagon, 17 June

  It was good news. Or at least a lighter lining to a very dark cloud, General Cummings thought. Z seemed confined to the eastern part of the country. Two companies at remote bases reported men sick. Otherwise the division seemed safe, for the time being. Perhaps they had enforced the quarantine in time, Cummings hoped.

  But this other stuff that his G-2—intelligence officer—had put together. Add it all up and it didn’t make any sense. The message to the Pan-African forces ordering General Nystroom to halt prior to Cummings’s own halt. The follow-on plan to seize the diamond areas.

  And now this information on a Russian booster rocket coming down in Angola back in May, connected with SATCOM traffic in the same place now.

  “All right.” Cummings raised his voice and everyone in the War Room ceased his or her activity. “I need a total reevaluation on the situation in Angola. Drop your preconceptions about the strategic scenario. Look at all this new information and give me some possibilities. If this disease is man-made I want to know who made it. Who stands to gain by it. And I want options to bring some hurt down on the heads of the sons of bitches if we can pinpoint them!”