The Iscariot Agenda (Vatican Knights)

by Jones, Rick

  Hawk turned back to view the landscape, his chin raised; something about him stoic in the way he sat. “Then I will ask you once again: Why are you here?”

  Kimball reached for the files sitting on the table between them and grabbed the top folder. “I’m here,” he said, “because we’re being hunted.”

  “Hunted?”

  Kimball opened the folder and grabbed the top photo. It was of the Pieces of Eight. The faces of those on the top row were circled with letters etched over the faces, I-S-C-A. Hawk was the first one kneeling on the left side of the bottom row, a machete in one hand and an assault weapon in the other.

  Kimball handed Hawk the photo and grabbed the next photo in the folder. “A few days ago,” he began, “Walker was hit in the Philippines.” He handed the Indian the second photo, that of Walker lying on the table, an ‘I’ cut into his back.

  “He has no legs,” the Indian said simply.

  “He lost them in an attack while serving as a mercenary. In fact, he worked for a militant group that was seated on top by Arruti and Grenier.”

  Hawk accepted the third and forth photos, that of Arruti and Grenier lying face down with the letters ‘S’ and a ‘C’ notched into their backs.

  “Both dead obviously?”

  “Within a day of Walker’s murder.”

  “They were in the Philippines. It can be a dangerous place.”

  “You know as well as I do that Arruti and Grenier were at the top of their game. Yet someone had the military sophistication to take them out.” He pointed to the first photo in Hawk’s hand—that of the Pieces of Eight lined up in pose. “Whoever is doing this is choosing their targets sequentially from left to right, top row first, and presumably the bottom row next. And you, Hawk, are next in line.”

  “But why now?”

  “I’m not sure. But it’s somebody who obviously has the connections to send forward an elite military unit as a disposal team. Politicians, a government insurgency group, anyone who believes that we can be a detriment because of the things we know.”

  “Then my guess would be the powers that be who applied our skills to better promote their rankings. But that was so long ago. So why now?”

  Kimball shrugged before falling back into his seat.

  The Indian examined the photos for a long moment before setting them aside. And then he looked over the landscape with a keen eye, nodding every once in awhile as if communing with his inner self. “He’s here,” he finally said.

  Kimball looked out at the desert, seeing nothing but the shadows of distant mountains and the darkened shapes of cacti and saguaros. In the far distance to the west, thunderheads were gathering and the sky grumbled. “How do you know?”

  “I know with this,” he said, pointing to his nose. “And also with this.” He then patted his chest over his heart with the flat of his palm. “I was ‘The Ghost’ because I know the skills of a hunter. I know stealth. And I know every hunter watches his prey before he strikes. Even prey is wary of what he cannot see.”

  Kimball chalked it up to Apache instinct, the man simply spouting off since it was truly impossible to tell if anyone was out there or not. But Kimball also knew that Hawk was truly amazing with his skills of intuiting what others could not.

  “He’ll watch, and then he’ll strike when it’s opportune.”

  “Are you prepared for a defense?”

  The Indian looked at him quizzically. “Are you kidding? What I miss, Dog will pick up. And if he—or they—should break the first line of defense, then I’ll be there waiting for them. I may be old, Kimball, but I haven’t lost my skills.”

  “I have no weapons.”

  “I’ve plenty. Wait here a sec.”

  The Indian got to his feet and went into the house, the hinges of the screen door whining in his wake as Kimball was left to view the desert wondering if he was caught in the crosshairs of an NV scope.

  When Hawk returned he did so with a minor arsenal. Strapped to his leg was his Bowie, a knife he cherished due to its size, always saying that a sizeable blade provided a psychological edge; bigger was always bad, he would say. Seated on his head was a pair of night vision goggles with a monocular lens. And in one hand he carried an assault weapon with an attached suppressor that was as long as the weapon’s barrel, an MP-5, and in the other hand was a top-of-the-line rifle used by snipers, the CheyTac M200, which was effective for up to 2000 meters.

  “This only scratches the surface,” he said. “In the back is a hidden room holding all the toys I covet.”

  He handed Kimball the CheyTac, which had heft to it but was extremely manageable.

  “And with these,” Hawk lowered the monocular lens over his eyes and switched the unit on, the goggles powering up as the batteries whirled the apparatus to life, “I’ll be able to see him coming no matter what point he wishes to attack from. The CheyTac will then take him down the moment he steps out into the moonlight.”

  “I know I’ve lost credibility in your eyes, Hawk, but I need to fight by your side on this one.”

  The Indian smiled. “Like old times?”

  “Like old times.”

  Hawk nodded in approval. “But right now you need rest. How long has it been since you slept?”

  “Over thirty hours,” he said.

  “You’re no good to me unless you’re sharp. Get some sleep. Dog and I will watch the compound.”

  “But if you’re right about him—”

  “I’ll be fine, Kimball. I’m ‘The Ghost,’ remember? I know what to look for in a predator since I am one myself. If he comes, I’ll know it. And once I know he is here, then I’ll make sure that you’re fighting by my side.”

  “We’ll need him alive, Hawk. Or them. I’m not sure how many there are since I find it hard to believe that one man is capable of taking out Arruti and Grenier.”

  “We’ll soon find out, won’t we?”

  “I just need a couple of hours, maybe three.”

  Hawk smiled, a wide grin, the wage of pride. “I’m ‘The Ghost,’” he said. “At first you would see nothing but jungle, then the flicker of a shape, and then you were dead by my hand. That’s me, ‘The Ghost.’”

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  “Then don’t worry and get some sleep. I’ll need you at the top of your game.”

  Kimball lay the folders down and got to his feet. His face was beginning to hang with fatigue and his eyes were growing glassy and red.

  “Take my bed,” said Hawk. “It’s comfortable.”

  “Thanks, man. And, Hawk?”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s good to see you again.”

  Hawk turned toward the landscape while resting the CheyTac across his lap. “Yeah. You too, brother.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  The assassin wore a Ghillie Desert suit. At nighttime the color didn’t matter much since the darkness was his camouflage and the suit looking as much as the surrounding desert sage. From a hilltop overlooking Hawk’s ranch, the assassin spied down on them through a night vision monocular.

  Sitting on the porch were two men, talking, the Native American keeping a vigil eye over the landscape with night vision goggles of his own and a rifle across his lap, a CheyTac M200.

  So, you were expecting me.

  The large man sitting beside him he couldn’t quite make out, so he dialed the lens and zoomed in, first catching the pristine white collar and then the man’s face.

  The assassin’s breath hitched. Well, if it isn’t the priest who is not a priest.

  The level of the assassin’s jeopardy had just risen tenfold.

  Moving slowly across the terrain on his belly, the fabric of his Ghillie suit swaying like grass in a soft breeze, the assassin moved to gain a different vantage point. When he reached a row of thick sage, the assassin had a solid blind that granted him a complete frontal view of the entire ranch. The question was, how was he to encroach with Kimball and Hawk working in tandem? He was sure that he could take down on
e, but not both. Not when they were members of the Pieces of Eight no matter how far removed they were from active duty. Kimball Hayden was testament to that.

  But killing Hayden now was not in the assassin’s scheme of things, as he wanted Hayden to die in the sequential manner of the way the warriors were posing in the photo: First Hawk, then the brothers, and then Kimball.

  But if it was one thing the assassin learned in life was that plans rarely came together due to the unpredictability of the human element. And Kimball Hayden had become that element.

  In the west where thunderheads gathered, celestial rumbles sounded off like aged cannons of the Colonial period—something distant with the deep grumble that shook the earth miles away.

  Patiently, the assassin waited for the opportune moment, always believing that there was a solution to everything. And twenty minutes later a solution presented itself.

  Kimball rose from the chair, spoke to Hawk, then disappeared into the house.

  Divide the team, and then conquer. Always level the playing field before engagement.

  The moment Kimball left, the assassin moved away from the blind careful not the catch the eye of Hawk through the NVG he was wearing, fully aware that he was time restricted and needed to act quickly now that the team was separated.

  So inch-by-inch and foot-by-foot, the assassin made his way toward Hawk in a hastened belly crawl with murder as his sole intent.

  #

  Hawk sat on the porch with all the ease and content of a retired layman with the CheyTac M200 resting across his lap, and rocked leisurely on the curved skids of his chair while looking through his NVG.

  The landscape before him was lit up in luminescent green. Everything that was once steeped in shadow was now clearly defined; the saguaros, the brush, the sage—even the outlines of the sandstone escarpments were obvious to where he could see every curvature or indentation of any particular rock or boulder.

  Night had become day.

  Slowly, moving back and forth on the skids of his rocker with his eyes forward and focused, nothing moved other than the occasional sway of sage branches that moved with the course of a soft breeze.

  But because something could not be seen did not mean that it did not exist. Predators often waited for hours for the opportune moment to strike; the reward always the relish of the kill. And no one knew this better than ‘The Ghost,’ who once waited as long as seven hours to run the blade of his knife across an unsuspecting throat.

  A cool breeze came in from the west, along with the soft soughing of the desert wind that sounded like a drawn and distant sigh, almost pleasurable in its tone. In the sky lightning flashed. Most likely the coming of a storm, he considered; the slight wind an obvious precursor.

  On most nights he would delight in such cool weather, but not tonight. Not when strobes of lightning would render the optics of his NVG inoperable.

  Not with the assassin a click or two away from his ranch.

  Are you out there? he thought.

  At the trailing edge of Hawk’s thought, Dog responded symbiotically to his master by craning his head off the floor and staring off into the darkness, centering on something only he could see. A deep growl rumbled in the back of his throat, the red flag that Hawk had become accustomed to when they were not alone.

  Reaching over, Hawk scratched the dog behind the ears. “He’s out there, boy, isn’t he?”

  The dog remained as still as a Grecian statue, focusing, sensing, the growl abating little.

  Hawk then placed both hands on the rifle, then carefully popped off the caps covering the front and rear lenses of the weapon’s hi-tech scope.

  All he needed was one shot.

  In the not too distant skyline lightning flashes were becoming more pronounced, the wind rising to more than just the soft soughing.

  Damn!

  The brush began to sway and roll with the direction of the growing breeze, the landscape coming alive from all directions.

  Hawk stopped rocking.

  But Dog continued his growl at a leveled measure as he slowly got to his feet. The hackles on the back of his neck rose the same time the folds of his muzzle lifted to show off canines that were polished and keen.

  “Oh, yeah,” whispered Hawk. “You’re out there all right.”

  Hawk then spoke in a manner Dog had heard many times before, giving that one order geared to attack an opponent with the intent to kill.

  “Get him.”

  And Dog bounded off into the darkness with his jaws snapping.

  #

  The assassin lay quietly in wait. Behind him, coming from the west, a wind began to surge. The brush swayed all around him, the earth coming alive with movement that gave him aid, his Ghillie suit just another part of the living landscape.

  Through his NV scope he could see the Indian sitting serenely on the porch with his dog next to him, the Native American seemingly at ease but obviously suspect that he was not alone. Odd, though, that he would sit openly like that knowing he could be in the crosshairs.

  And then the dog lifted its head, staring, the creature looking uncannily his way and drawing a bead.

  The Indian stopped rocking.

  And the dog got to its feet.

  What a truly amazing sense of instinct and intuition, he thought.

  Reaching beneath the folds of the Ghillie suit, the assassin worked his way to the hilt of a KA-BAR knife and slowly retracted it from its sheath, turning the weapon over in his hand in order to get a better feel, and then a better grip.

  If the assassin understood one thing, he knew that dogs were full of incredible fight with courage as stout as their loyalty. And that self-preservation was secondary to the welfare of their masters.

  He gripped the knife tighter.

  And then the dog launched itself in his direction, a straight line—the shortest distance between two points. But most noticeably to the assassin, its jaws were snapping in a manner to rent and tear.

  But all he could do was to lay in wait as the beast drew near.

  #

  Hawk loved the animal more than he loved most people, its loyalty immeasurable and its companionship always an unwavering joy. From the moment Dog took off from the stoop, Hawk recalled the entire moments of the dog’s life from a puppy with a penchant to play to the moment it ran off into the darkness. It was a quick collage of wonderful snippets filled with good remembrances.

  A horrible sadness crept over him, but Hawk remained stoic, his face betraying little as his emotions warred for the release of pent up sorrows in the form of tears.

  While Dog served as a distraction, Hawk bolted from the porch and ran into the darkness to set himself up with a vantage point. The strategy was for Dog to locate the assassin so that he could find them through the scope, hone in, draw a bead with the CheyTac, and pull the trigger.

  Pressing himself against a sandstone block wall, Hawk quickly established himself by mounting the rifle on the ledge, removed his NVG, and placed an eye over the eyepiece of the weapon’s scope, searching.

  Through the lens the world became of planet of lime green light as he tried to center his site on Dog and his target.

  And then he saw him, a man in a Ghillie suit waiting as Dog approached him.

  Hawk began to draw a bead. “I got you,” he whispered, and put his finger on the trigger.

  #

  The assassin could feel his temples throbbing as adrenaline coursed through every minute fiber of his body and being. His position had been compromised—his mission, his life, everything he worked for now in jeopardy as the dog raced toward him with the intent to do nothing less than to rip his throat free and clear from his body.

  The problem was that he needed to focus on the animal knowing that the Indian was maneuvering into position to make the kill. It was a simple choreographic device of distraction in order to provide oneself enough time for a tactical advantage.

  And it was working. The assassin knew he could not keep an eye on the
beast and an eye on Hawk at the same time. And no doubt the Indian was already on the move as Dog closed the distance between them with his teeth gnashing and eyes gleaming like silver dollars in the faint moonlight.

  With his mind and heart racing with the speed of a passing cheetah, the assassin realized that the Indian now had the advantage.

  One of the oldest moves ever created, he thought. And it was still effective.

  With the knife held firmly within his grasp, Dog approached him with incredible velocity, and then propelled himself toward the assassin by leaping through the air like a projectile.

  #

  Hawk watched Dog run straight toward the man wearing the Ghillie suit, the assassin standing to meet his attacker, a knife in his hand.

  Beautiful!

  Hawk wrapped the crook of his finger across the CheyTac’s trigger, the assassin’s head dead center of the crosshairs.

  And he began to squeeze, slowly, his breath coming in shallow pulls.

  Behind the assassin, on the sandy rise where the western sky served as the backdrop, a staircase of lightning crossed the night sky turning darkness into day for the briefest moment, the burst of white-hot light rendering the CheyTac’s NV scope inoperable, as the illumination turned the landscape from a marshy green glow to snow-blind white. Everything in Hawk’s vision was immediately washed away, the sudden flash sending intense pain to his optic nerves as he errantly pulled the trigger, the bullet going wide.

  Dropping the barrel of the CheyTac toward the ground, Hawk quickly began to rub the sting from his eye with his forefinger.

  In the distance he could hear Dog engaged in battle, the animal growling, barking, his jaws snapping.

  A shot at this point would be difficult, thought Hawk, with Dog and the assassin fighting each other on the mound in a drunken tango, the masses becoming one.

  In the distance, coming closer, thunder rumbled.

  Hawk took a quick look through the scope, searching for Dog and zooming in, the land once again a marshy and luminescent green where everything was once again pronounced, the sage, the brush, the saguaros.