by Rob Jones
Across the aisle, Lexi Zhang’s mind had also turned to family, not that she had much. Raised in a good home in Chaoyang Park by elderly parents who sacrificed everything to send her to Oxford, she was an only child. When her parents died she would be alone in the world and it was not a thought she liked to dwell on.
She knew she owed them everything, but she didn’t even know when she would be able to see either of them again. Since she crossed over to ECHO she had made a grave and permanent enemy of the Chinese security services and she knew better than anyone what that could mean if she ever let her guard down. They would be crawling in the shadows – in her shadow – until they had their revenge.
And they would send their best after her, because until her defection she had been their best. That meant someone from the Zodiac Syndicate, the most elite department in the Ministry. Without emotion, she calmly sifted through her possible hunters’ codenames – Tiger, Rat, Monkey or Pig – all named after animals from the Chinese Zodiac calendar. They were the best but there were others. Were they already after her – out asking questions in the seediest bars of the world? Would Hawke and the rest of the team help her if she lost her touch?
She hoped so.
“Any of that left?” she asked Scarlet.
“You betcha, darling,” Scarlet said, and tossed the half bottle across the aisle.
Lexi caught it and took a swig. She and Scarlet had gotten closer recently, but there was always a mutual mistrust hanging in the air like smoke. Lexi had betrayed the Chinese State to join the ECHO unit and hoped that gesture might extend her credit with the others. Hawke was good, as long as Zambia stayed in the shadows, and Lea was the sort to give everyone the same length of rope, but Scarlet and the Russian were different – harder to read.
She sighed and then spoke up. “Do you hate me, Cairo?”
Scarlet turned away and closed her eyes.
“We’re landing soon so get some rest. And no one calls me Cairo anymore.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Hawke and the others pushed north with the men from the Firearms Command, passing the Shaftesbury Theater and moving up Bloomsbury Street until they were at the British Museum. There, the police split into two teams and made their way into the museum to evacuate the visitors. Lea took a moment to call Richard Eden.
“Hey, Rich.”
“Lea, hello. Anything useful from Barton?”
“Yes and no.”
“I don’t understand.”
“He was telling the truth. He wanted to give us something about Wade and the cult for sure, but they got to him first.”
“He’s dead?”
“Yeah, but he gave us a lead about a raid on the British Museum. We’re there now. You?”
“Scarlet’s leading a team into Mexico and Alex has spoken with her father. The Americans are sending a small team down to work with us.”
“That’s something, at least.”
“Follow Barton’s lead wherever it goes but be careful, Lea. This cult is dangerous. We think the man leading the assault in London is Silvio Mendoza – a notorious gangster who’s now working for Wade. He’s one of the most wanted drug cartel lords in Mexico, feared by everyone who crosses his path. The Mexican Government has offered a fifty million peso reward for information leading to his capture. That’s over one and a half million dollars. He’s one dangerous man – you’ll recognize him by his scar.”
“His scar?”
“You’ll know it when you see it, believe me.”
“Okay – got it. We’re going in.”
“Wait… I wasn’t going to tell you this in the field but you need to know something. Ben Ridgeley was murdered in the jungle a few hours ago, and so were Alfie Mills and Sasha Harding.”
“Oh my God…” Lea stopped walking and froze to the spot.
“As I say, these are dangerous people. I’m sending you a still from the video Ben sent before his murder. It contains the artefact fragment Wade pulled out of the ruins. In the meantime, watch your backs.”
Lea cut the call and turned to Hawke.
“They killed them all… Ben, Alfie and Sasha – Wade murdered them all.”
“What?” Hawke was stunned.
Maria and Ryan walked over to her. “Is Rich sure?”
Lea nodded. “Yeah – murdered in the jungle…”
“Bastards,” Hawke said, clenching his jaw, but they were interrupted by the SFC chief. After a brief liaison with him it was decided the ECHO team would not be armed and would remain outside the museum, so after a brief liaison between themselves, Hawke and the others decided to go into the north entrance away from the police. Moments later they were skipping up the rain-slick steps and entering the museum.
Now, they were hurrying through the labyrinthine corridors of the British Museum, each leading to yet another exhibition room lined with cases full of the world’s most sought after antiquities. All around them members of the public were being evacuated by museum staff.
“I have a bad feeling about this,” Maria said. “Sun-worshipping cults, weapons of mass destruction, and Ben and the others being murdered…”
“I know how you feel,” Lea said.
It didn’t take long to find their targets, moving quickly along a corridor. There were three of them and they stopped briefly in front of a large poster advertising a special exhibition on the Ming Dynasty somewhere upstairs.
“They don’t look like the sort of people with an interest in Chinese ceramics,” Lea said as the men vanished from sight.
“Don’t be so judgemental,” Hawke said. “The one with the number thirteen tattooed on his face might really enjoy pottery.”
“And check out that scar,” Lea said.
Across the lead man’s face was a strange lattice of scars that criss-crossed up his neck and over his cheek and temple, covering more than half his face.
“I see what Rich meant – that one’s Silvio Mendoza for sure.”
“It’s a Lichtenberg Figure,” Ryan said.
Hawke glanced at him. “A what?”
“A type of scarring sometimes left behind on a person after being struck by lightning. This one is deeper and larger than any of the pictures I’ve ever seen before.”
The men grabbed a man in a suit who was wearing an official name badge and seconds later they had a knife at his throat.
“Looks like they’ve found another way to find the special Aztec Exhibition,” Ryan said, pointing at the terrified man. “Some kind of museum official.”
Lea gave him a look. “Whatever they want, we can’t lose them so let’s get a move on.”
They walked along the corridor, hanging back in the shadows of one of the columns just in time to see a security guard approach the men and confront them. There was a brief exchange, during which the old man showed the guard some kind of pass but when the guard saw the knife he went to make a call on his radio.
Mendoza raised a silenced pistol and shot the guard in the head. They had moved on before he had even hit the floor. A handful of remaining visitors screamed and ran from the area, and somewhere in the distance they all heard the sound of the police barking evacuation orders through megaphones. The official looked over his shoulder at the dead guard with a bleak, ashen face full of terror but they yanked him roughly forward again.
“They mean business all right,” Hawke said. “That’s the fourth person they’ve killed so far, at least.”
Now the men turned left into the North America Gallery. In here, the artefacts were drawn from the indigenous tribes of the whole continent and were startling in their range and quality – smoking pipes, tapestries, carvings, deerskin maps. On any normal day, people would meander around in here among the display cases and appreciate the large paintings on the walls but right now the place had the feel of a mausoleum.
After more twists and turns they stopped in an impressive room dedicated to an exhibition of Mesoamerican culture.
“Looks like their thing is definitely
more wigwams than Chinese pots,” Hawke said. “The stuff they’re walking toward is purely Aztec. That makes sense given their activities in Mexico.”
There was another brief altercation between them when the old man haughtily protested that a curator of the museum shouldn’t be treated like this. Mendoza looked him up and down with thinly disguised contempt and slapped him hard across the face. The official fell to the floor and looked up in shock, his cheek now glowing red in the low lighting of the exhibition room.
“Get up!”
“What do you want with me?” The official sounded exasperated. The sound of the police sweeping the museum got louder. “I’ve brought you to where you wanted.”
Mendoza and the two men shared a sly glance and began to chuckle. “Let’s just say I represent a private collector.” He lit a cigarette and flicked the lit match across the room. Blew a thick cloud of pungent smoke out of his nostrils. Yawned and swivelled his eyes to the frightened old man at his side.
“But our acquisition process is very complex, gentlemen.” The silver-haired official looked at the men nervously and took an involuntary step back. “We purchase many of our exhibition items at auction, but much of what you see is held here on long-term loans. Other pieces were donated to us by benevolent people in their wills. While we loan things out to other institutions around the world, we don’t really sell items as such.” It sounded like he wanted to pick up the word sell with a pair of tweezers and drop it in a bin. “Not long ago we had to politely refuse an offer by a king who wanted one of our items. I sincerely doubt your private collector would have greater means or influence than that.”
“You still don’t understand.” Mendoza took a step toward a fragment of a large stone disc which was fastened to the wall by two heavy-duty steel brackets. He put his hands in his pockets before letting out a long, low sigh. “We’re taking this artefact now.”
“No, you cannot!”
“Silence!” As the men pulled the artefact off the wall Mendoza nodded with satisfaction. “Todo lo que necesitamos ahora es el manuscrito... el códice Yoalli Ehécatl.”
Hawke heard the Spanish words as he watched the men unhook the artefact from the wall – it was compact with a diameter of less than three feet, but the intricate carvings were exquisite. It looked like it was once a perfect stone disk, but today half of it was lost to history, with only half remaining.
He studied the artefact with interest as they manhandled it into an old hessian sack. “What are we looking at, mate?”
Ryan pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose and lowered his voice to a whisper. “It’s called the Lacandon Sunstone, and it’s similar to the famous Aztec calendar stone in the National Anthropology Museum in Mexico City, but much smaller – plus there’s only half of it. Lea – let me see that picture Rich sent you.”
Lea handed him her phone and Ryan nodded in recognition. “Looks like the artefact Wade got in the jungle is the other half of this one here, which is a worry. Up till now the missing half was lost to history, so something’s up. The deity in the center is Huitzilopochtli, the god of the sun, among other things.”
“Which makes sense,” Maria said. “They are a sun-worshipping cult, after all.”
“Not if Barton is to be believed,” Hawke said. “He was of the opinion that they were taking a different direction, and the cult seemed pretty serious about killing him for jumping ship.”
“Plus the cult is fairly well-established, so why does he want that thing now?” Lea said. “He could have swiped it weeks ago.”
The goons manhandled the heavy stone into a canvas back pack. Its smooth, carved basalt surface reflected the soft lights of the museum.
“And then there was Barton’s reference to the god of the dead,” Hawke said.
Without warning, Mendoza pulled a revolver from inside his jacket and aimed it at the official. A mask of fear spread on the old man’s face but before half a second passed the Mexican fired twice into his chest. The man flew back and crashed into a case of Aztec idols before sliding to the floor in a dead heap, his shirt now colored a dark crimson by the blood seeping from the wounds.
In reaction to the shooting, Ryan gasped involuntarily, causing Mendoza and his men to spin around and see them for the first time.
“Mátalos!” Mendoza screamed, pointing at them. His scarred face was red with rage.
“Fantastic, Ryan,” Lea said.
The men pulled their guns and released a fierce volley of fire at the four of them, but Hawke reacted in a heartbeat. He dived to the floor, pulling Lea down as he went and the two of them crashed arm in arm behind a large cabinet of obsidian sacrifice knives. Maria and Ryan scrambled behind a large case of arrowheads.
“I’m touched, Joe,” Lea said, glancing at his arms around her waist. “But now’s hardly the time.”
He gave her a look of despair before rolling off of her and searching for a way out. It didn’t take a sixth sense to work out what was coming next, and Hawke and the others dodged the hail of bullets as they punched dozens of holes into the floor and walls surrounding them.
“They’re out of ammo,” Hawke yelled at last, and leaped to his feet to confront the men.
One of the goons loomed forward with his fists raised. Hawke wrenched a fire extinguisher from the wall and fired off the cylinder in the goon’s face. The man let out a cry and staggered backwards, but Hawke gave no quarter. Using the smoke for cover he lifted the fire extinguisher to shoulder height and rammed it into the man’s head with all his might. The curved base smashed into his face and dropped him like a dead dog.
“Looks like Joe has a new favorite weapon,” Ryan said sarcastically.
Hawke stormed toward Mendoza and the other man. On his way he saw a small cabinet filled with Aztec weapons. He kicked it over, and it triggered a loud alarm which sounded throughout their floor of the museum. With the ear-piercing racket shrieking all around them he snatched up a strange-looking weapon.
The leader, Silvio Mendoza saw him approach and grinned as he wrenched another of the strange weapons from the smashed case. He threw it at the surviving goon who caught it with one hand.
“Jesus,” Ryan said in disbelief. “That’s a sodding macuahuitl!”
“A what now?” Lea said.
“It’s an ancient Aztec weapon, half-sword, half-club. Those black blades sticking out of it are razor-sharp shards of obsidian. They’re lethal. Legend had it the Aztecs could decapitate a horse in one blow with them.”
They watched as the goon effortlessly tossed the weapon from one hand to the other and then slashed the blade through the air in a vicious x-pattern.
“How’s Joe with a sword, then?” Ryan asked. “Cause that other guy looks like he might know a few moves.”
Lea swallowed hard and frowned. “We’re about to find out.”
As her words trailed off, Mendoza screamed at his man to kill Hawke. He obeyed, and lunged forward without warning, slashing the blade at the Englishman as hard as he could.
CHAPTER NINE
Hawke leaped back from the arc of the weapon and it ripped through the air an inch from his stomach. Up close the weapon looked even more lethal, and he could see for the first time that the sides of the macuahuitl were covered in savage little fragments of the volcanic obsidian. One mistake and they would rip through his flesh like a hot knife through butter.
Mendoza’s goon snatched up a tepoztli in his other hand – a bronze axe similar to a tomahawk – and charged at Hawke with both weapons raised.
“By the way, Joe!” Lea shouted. “Those things you’re screwing with can cut a horse’s head off in one blow.”
He stared over his shoulder at her for a second. “Yeah… thanks for that.”
The goon thrust the macuahuitl at Hawke’s chest. The lethal weapon whistled as its savage blades cut through the dehumidified air of the exhibition room, missing the Englishman’s throat by an inch. But it gave Hawke the chance he was looking for.
Before the goon could retract the blade Hawke brought his weapon up and blocked the advance with a hard beat parry, forcing the other man’s macuahuitl downward and giving him just enough time to launch a counter-attack. He brought his weapon up hard with a view to slashing open the man’s stomach but his opponent was too quick and executed a perfect forward recovery, pulling his back leg up into the en garde position. A second later and he was now making a renewed attack on Hawke, but the former SBS man was ready.
Hawke stepped aside, dodging the new attack and responded with a devastating patinando lunge, striking the macuahuitl hard at his chest. The Mexican tried to dodge the attack but was too slow and Hawke’s macuahuitl ripped across his face and tore a deep gouge across his cheek and over the bridge of his nose.
The goon dropped the tepoztli and screamed out in agony as the blood pumped from his face, but Hawke showed no mercy, padding forward and swinging the macuahuitl a second time, tearing a shallow groove across his stomach and opening the flesh along the slash mark. More blood poured from the man’s stomach and he screamed again in renewed pain as he staggered backwards, trying to beat back the searing spasms of pain and keep a grip on his weapon.
The man took a breath and after realizing the wound on his stomach wasn’t lethal, he took a fresh grip on his macuahuitl and returned to the fight, padding toward Hawke, his eyes full of bitter hatred and blood.
Hawke slashed his macuahuitl at him, but the Mexican was so full of adrenalin and hate that he was faster than ever and he responded with a brutal downward cut which tore through Hawke’s jacket and gouged a chunk of flesh from the front of his shoulder.
Hawke recoiled as the pain of the attack coursed through him. He felt the wild throbbing in his shoulder as blood seeped from the wound and ran down his forearm.
The man saw he had wounded his prey and gave a grim smile as he tossed the macuahuitl from one hand to the other. Hawke saw he was enjoying the fight and had used the wounds he had inflicted on him to power himself up for more.
