Trident's First Gleaming

by Stephen Templin

  Chris wanted to curse, but he held back.

  No one else ventured into the kill zone. Initially Chris experienced disappointment that there were no more opponents to waste. There should be no joy in killing. They’d already stayed longer than they should in the same location. Even though it seemed as if no more challengers would come, it would only take one talented shooter, someone who knew the environment better than Chris, to put an end to his evening, or an end to one of his teammates—forever. Tall Man had escaped, but he could be the one to bring back that talented shooter. Chris told Sonny he was coming in off the ledge. They closed the shooting shop and eased out of the building.

  Patrolling through the streets, Chris’s rifle and backpack weighed heavier, and he was unsteady on his feet—the extended firefight had drained him. He turned around to make sure Hannah and Sonny were still with him. They dragged their steps a bit. All three of them were tired. Even so, they had to get out of there.

  23

  _______

  Before sunrise, they returned to their hotel room and cleaned their gear and topped off their ammo and water—ready to go again. Hannah excused herself to make a quick phone call.

  When she returned, she put away her phone and turned to Chris. “You remember when we were in Iraq and my Syrian asset helped track down Mordet?”

  Chris took the bullets from a nearly empty magazine and inserted them in a partially used magazine, so he’d have one whole. “Yes, his code name was Viper.”

  “Well, I just talked to him, and he said he has some information. He agreed to see what more he can find out before meeting with us for dinner tonight at 1800,” she said.

  “Just like that?”

  “For the usual price,” Hannah said.

  Chris finished loading his magazine. “Sounds a little too good to be true, but what other choice do we have?”

  “He found Mordet once before,” she reminded him.

  “Viper is known for being ideologically promiscuous.”

  “But he’s loyal to money.”

  “Anyone with money,” Chris said. “When you go to this meeting, he might already have sold you to Mordet.”

  Hannah shrugged. “Anything is possible. You and Sonny can tag along in case things go south. Unless you have a better idea.”

  He didn’t have a better idea, so he nodded.

  During the morning and afternoon, they took turns: one resting on the bed and two standing watch and analyzing the intelligence gathered at Professor Mordet’s plantation. They were unable to figure out the password on his laptop to access his information, and the rest of the materials they’d gathered yielded little information. Chris sighed. What a waste.

  As the time of their meeting approached, all three holstered concealed pistols. They departed the hotel room and drove to a nearby town, where they located the restaurant—the Mesopotamia. On the outside of the building, rows of large limestone blocks in white, tan, light orange, and basalt black alternated like good, evil, and in-between. Indoors, tall arched windows filled the Mesopotamia with light. The restaurant might not seem to be a likely target for a suicide bomber, but Chris chose a table farthest from the windows just in case someone decided to make boom-boom. And in case trouble started inside the restaurant, he noted where his escape routes were, including through a window and the back through the kitchen. He looked at customers’ hands first and then their faces—searching for danger—but no one showed any signs of malice.

  Sonny pointed to a table in the corner. “I’ll take the table over there and cover you two,” Sonny whispered before veering off.

  They sat at their tables, and Chris glanced at his watch—1730. Better to be early before someone had time to set up an ambush than to be on time and discover that an ambush has been sprung.

  At 1745, Viper strolled through the front door and casually looked around. He was in his thirties with thick, wavy jet-black hair, like some kind of Syrian playboy. He spotted Hannah first and then Chris. Viper’s lips shifted between a smile and a frown. He stopped at their table. “Our dinner wasn’t until six o’clock. You’re early,” he said in fluent English.

  Hannah stood and grinned. “You’re early, too.”

  “Who is this?”

  “He’s with me.” Hannah hugged Viper loosely, and his lips settled into a smile.

  Chris smiled as genuinely as he could fake.

  “Please, sit down,” she said.

  Viper took a seat across from Hannah. “The steak here is to die for.”

  “I haven’t come all the way to Syria for steak,” Hannah said.

  “Of course not. Do you have the money?”

  “Yes, but you know what I need first.”

  “Of course,” he said as if it were a game.

  A waitress came to their table with menus, but Chris, Hannah, and Viper already knew what they wanted and ordered. The waitress brought Viper and Hannah Al-Shark, malt beers. Chris had ayran, a salty yogurt beverage.

  Hannah’s eyes focused on Viper like lasers. “What did you find out about Professor Mordet?”

  “After you first captured him in Syria and interrogated him, he was transferred to another facility, where he escaped within a few weeks.”

  Hannah sipped her beer. “Just recently, we saw him in Turkey. Do you know where he is now?”

  “America,” Viper said.

  Her jaw dropped slightly, but she covered it up quickly. “How’d he get into America?”

  “A year ago, he set up a dummy film production in France and ordered a silicone mask from Hollywood. He paid ten thousand American dollars for it—it came with silicone arms, too.” Viper chuckled. “Some Chinese guy used a cheaper version to fool airport authorities in Hong Kong once. The one Professor Mordet ordered makes him look like an elderly white man. Iranian intelligence is always helping out Syrian intelligence, and Iran made him one fake Canadian passport to go with the mask identity and another one that matches his picture without the mask. He didn’t know when or where he’d use it, but he wanted to be prepared when the opportunity arose. I don’t know which passport he would’ve entered America on. Maybe he snuck across the border from Mexico or used some other method.”

  “Where was he headed to in America?” she asked.

  Viper took a sip of his beer. “I don’t know.”

  “This information is hardly worth our drinks,” she said.

  “He flew off on some jihad against the US.”

  Hannah rolled her eyes at the man. “I could’ve figured that much.”

  “Professor Mordet works with a guy named Little Kale.”

  Chris anxiously fingered the lighter in his pocket, but he tried not to show any feelings on his face.

  It couldn’t be the same guy. No way.

  The waitress brought their food. “Now we’re talking,” Hannah said.

  After days living almost exclusively on energy gel, Chris could hardly wait for a warm meal. The waitress placed his plate before him: kibbeh, minced balls made of lamb, pine nuts, onion and bulgur wheat. The kibbeh waded with herb-roasted tomatoes and citrus in warm yogurt sauce. His mouth watered. Using his fork, he stabbed into a ball, splitting it and releasing a wisp of steam. Despite how hungry he was for a warm meal and how heady it looked, he couldn’t eat—not while something more important burned inside him.

  Chris put down his fork. “Can I ask a question?”

  Viper looked at Hannah, and she nodded.

  Chris’s heart raced like a Formula One race car. Breathe. He tried to slow it down before he spoke. “What do you know about Little Kale?”

  “He’s a thick-witted thug in the shabiha,” Viper said. “Shabiha are the ‘ghosts,’ an armed militia that work for the Al-Assad family. Little Kale started out as a smuggler for the shabiha, sneaking food and cigarettes into Lebanon to sell on the black market for insane amounts of money. The shabiha would pay a cut to the Assads. Coming back the other way, he smuggled drugs, guns, and expensive cars from Lebanon into Syria—a
ll sanctioned by the Assad family, who, again, received a cut.”

  “And then?”

  Viper took another drink. “Over the years, Little Kale tried to score bigger deals, but he lacked charisma and political savvy. His talent lay elsewhere—kidnapping and killing. As he racked up more and more snatches and hits, his reputation spread, but his inability to gain followers, connect with peers, and impress superiors hurt his career. He was frequently passed over for promotion. He stayed in the shabiha like a beast harnessed to a plow.”

  “Did he have a family?” Chris asked.

  “His home life was worse. His only child committed suicide, and his wife wanted a divorce. He wouldn’t give it to her, so she left to live with her parents.”

  Chris took a sip, trying to remember anything he could about the man. “How’d he come to work for Professor Mordet?”

  “The shabiha had become too powerful,” Viper continued, “and in the 1990s, the Assad family shut them down. Professor Mordet was a mercenary who needed a thug, so he hired Little Kale to work for him. Little Kale bristled at answering to someone younger than him and detested Professor Mordet’s … culinary choices.”

  “Culinary choices?” Chris already knew something about Mordet’s cannibalism, of course, but he wanted to know what intel Viper had.

  “When Professor Mordet was a kid, he was in a plane wreck and ate his sister. Since then, he has continued to eat people.”

  “Years ago, when I spoke to him, he told me he ate human flesh, but he said his sister left to find help and froze to death. As if he didn’t actually eat his sister. Are you sure?”

  “Positive. Her name was Ha’la.”

  Maybe Mordet was embarrassed that he’d eaten his sister. Such a seemingly insignificant detail could be a key to a weakness of Mordet, but they would have to find him first in order to exploit it. Chris sat forward on the edge of his seat. “Did Little Kale go to the US with Professor Mordet?

  “I don’t know.”

  “You got an address for him?”

  Viper seemed hesitant.

  “Address,” Hannah repeated sternly.

  Viper tapped his cell phone screen, as if searching, before reading off the address.

  The three ate their meal in virtual silence, and when they finished, Viper left the table first. After he was out of sight, Chris looked Hannah straight in the eyes. “While we’re in the neighborhood, I’d like to visit an old acquaintance.”

  24

  _______

  Hannah drove as they went on a vehicular recon of the two blocks surrounding Little Kale’s house. There seemed to be no danger spots in the outer area, so they drove in for a closer observation. The lights were out. “Doesn’t look like anyone is home,” Hannah said.

  She parked nearby before the three of them un-assed the vehicle and walked to Little Kale’s house. Chris picked the lock on the back door, and they slipped inside. He lived like a slob with food crumbs and wrappers on the floor and a pungent odor in the air. Chris’s skin itched as if little bugs were crawling all over him.

  They cleared each room and found no sign of him, so for the next ten minutes, they searched for information. They confiscated a laptop, papers, and other materials.

  Back at their motel room, Hannah handed Little Kale’s laptop to Chris and said, “You’re the most fluent in Arabic.”

  Chris powered up Little Kale’s laptop, but he needed a password to proceed. He typed numbers in order: 1, 2, 3… Nothing. Next he used the Arabic word for password. After trying more combinations, names, and other words and phrases, he typed killer. The image on the monitor changed from the security screen to the desktop.

  Next, he clicked open the email and searched through messages. He also checked the email trash folder, where he found a user name for a jihad website: kalil9/11. Chris launched the web browser and checked the history of websites visited. There he found a travel webpage. He clicked on the login button and typed in kalil9/11 for the username and killer for the password. The screen paused while the laptop processed something. A new page appeared on the screen. “Maybe Little Kale didn’t stick around to fight us because he had a plane to catch this morning,” Chris said.

  “You found his itinerary?” Hannah asked.

  “He used a local agent to book his tickets online.”

  Hannah peered over Chris’s shoulder. “Viper was right. This Little Kale isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer.”

  Chris translated the Arabic on the monitor. “Final destination—Washington, DC.” Although Americans might get a sense of security from the government’s no-fly list, for experienced terrorists like Professor Mordet and Little Kale, the no-fly list was something they wiped their asses with.

  “I’ve got to call someone,” Hannah said.

  Chris and Sonny made sure they were ready to go at a moment’s notice.

  Hannah used her cell phone to make her call. “This is Hannah Andrade. I need to speak to the chief about an attack on the US.” She hit the speaker button, so Chris and Sonny could hear their conversation, and they waited. A man with a baritone voice wasted no time in telling her what was on his mind: “Hannah, you and Christopher Paladin were captured in Turkey for selling the Switchblade Whisper to the Chinese, the attempted murder of Jim Bob Louve, and the murder of Victor Shivlin and Maximilian Wolfeschlegelaltona. Then you instigated an assault on the embassy to free yourselves. A lot of good people died.”

  Sonny’s face and muscles tensed as if he were about to crawl through the phone and punch the guy. Lucky for the chief this wasn’t a face-to-face or Chris might have beaten Sonny to it.

  “Jim Bob and Victor tried to kill us before they sold the Switchblade Whisper,” she said. “Then Chris and I recovered it—”

  The chief cut her off. “You have to come in and straighten this out personally.”

  “I went into our embassy in Turkey to straighten this out personally,” Hannah shouted, “and Professor Mordet razed the embassy and stole the Switchblade Whisper! Now he’s in the US, and soon he’s going to use the black box to figure out how to hack into the nation’s critical infrastructure. The Secret Service is worried about a possible attack on the White House, and I’m concerned about how many Americans this madman is going to kill! And who’s going to stop Mordet if I’m in some embassy rotting under custody again or dead?”

  “I’ll send your message upstairs,” the chief said.

  Hannah took a deep breath. “You have to do more than that. You have to make them listen.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “I hope so. America depends on it,” she said.

  “I understand.”

  “Is there anything else I should know?”

  “Jim Bob sent your alias and Paladin’s along with your real identities to the Department of Homeland Security. If you try to use those at a US airport or other port of entry, they’ll flag you.”

  “Can you get us new passports then?” she asked.

  Chief was quiet for a moment. “I’m sorry, I can’t help you there. People are very emotional right now, and Jim Bob is fanning the flames. But I’ll talk to some people upstairs and tell your side of the story.”

  “Straighten it out with me! Right here, right now, damn it!”

  “Where are you?”

  Hannah shrank and, in a rare moment, seemed fragile. “You’d rather believe Jim Bob, wouldn’t you? Anything that would mean you aren’t in danger.”

  “Hannah?”

  “You’re tracing the call right now, aren’t you?”

  “I can help you,” the chief said.

  She hung up. She dragged her feet to the chair and sat. Tears shone in her eyes, and the Hannah Andrade whose spirit once filled the room now looked small.

  Chris gently put his hand on her shoulder. “If we can infiltrate a foreign country, we sure as hell can infiltrate our own.”

  Sonny nodded in agreement, adjusting his rifle and puffing out his chest, trying to look macho. “We just need so
meone in the DC area who is good with computers—a tier one hacker.”

  Chris’s mind raced to figure out the next step. “Young Park is a tier one hacker.”

  “Is that the Agency tech you rescued?”

  Chris nodded.

  “I heard stories about that,” Sonny said.

  “Still works for the Agency as a contractor,” Chris said. “He’ll help us analyze intel from Jim Bob, Little Kale and Professor Mordet.”

  “Do you know where he is now?”

  “In Virginia, not too far from Langley, just across the Potomac from DC,” Chris said. “Still sends me Christmas cards.”

  Hannah wiped her eyes. “Then let’s get out of here.”

  25

  _______

  Over nine hours later, the sun brightened the horizon as the trio docked a stolen boat at Larnaca Marina in Cyprus, where they were fortunate enough to find an open berth at a crowded dock. After tying up their vessel, they passed through customs and immigration. Although they wouldn’t be able to use their passports in the US because American authorities were looking for them, their passports were still good overseas. Even if the US contacted Interpol to be on the lookout for the three, it would take time before other countries received the information—and then not all of them would enter the data into their system and not all would check.

  They caught a taxi that took them down a palm-tree-lined promenade that marked the beginning of a fifteen-minute trip to Larnaca International Airport. They’d ditched their weapons in the ocean rather than try to smuggle them, and Chris was keenly aware that they were unarmed.

  “Well, we made it this far,” Hannah said after they passed through security.

  “You two need passports with new aliases for the US,” Sonny said, “and I should probably get a new one, too. Know anyone who can help us out in that department?”

  “We’ll have better luck in Italy,” Chris said. “Lots of US travelers we can pickpocket.”