The Will Slater Series Books 1-3

by Matt Rogers

  And they were fast.

  The commotion in the exterior hallway amplified. Slater heard the bodies rushing along the corridor, heading straight for the door he had his back against.

  A thunderous crash jolted him on his rear — a body running straight into the door. There was a sharp pause as the man on the other side of the door understood what the resistance meant.

  Someone was holding it shut.

  They had their man.

  Slater heard sharp commands resonate through the building, and the activity heightened. Another impact against the flimsy frame sent him skittering across the floor again. He scrambled to his feet and threw a shoulder against his own side, keeping it shut.

  For now.

  It wouldn’t be long before they fired straight through the wood, gunning him down where he stood. Panicked breathing and grunts of exertion trickled underneath the door frame. There were at least five men in the corridor now.

  More would follow suit.

  Slater had nowhere to go. He heard the racking of a slide — it spelled certain death if he stayed where he was. His options exhausted, his brain aching, he longed for rest.

  Briefly, for a shadow of a moment, he started to succumb to his wounds and slid tentatively down the door frame.

  Waiting for it to crash down on top of him.

  Waiting for the end.

  Then raging hot fire ignited inside his chest, charging him with a fight-or-flight assault of sensory overload. He felt the lightning crackle on his fingertips, invisible yet overwhelming. He ignored the pounding headache, the mangled lower leg, the bleeding palms, the battered torso, the bullet wound in his shoulder.

  None of that mattered.

  Because he was Will Slater, and Will Slater didn’t fucking quit.

  Gnashing his teeth together like a bat out of hell, he charged forward, yanked the door open, and launched himself into the corridor with nothing but his bare hands and a decade of experience as a black-operations warrior to rely on.

  55

  The Situation Room

  Washington D.C.

  Russell Williams sat on one side of the sweeping oak desk that filled the majority of the room. Various official military personnel were powering their way in, awaiting the arrival of the President of the United States. Williams bore no official insignia on his neatly-pressed uniform — in fact, he had no idea what his rank was in the first place. Over the last few weeks he had been thrust from position to position like it was nothing. A career in black operations had muddied his official status, and now it had been entirely thrown out the window.

  The chaos that had unfolded in the wake of Will Slater’s departure had shaken up the ranks significantly.

  Now, things had escalated considerably more.

  The President barged into the Situation Room, his composure faltering. It was one-thirty in the afternoon in Washington D.C., and the man had been torn from a lunch meeting to deal with one of the more volatile situations the White House had ever seen.

  ‘How long since you got the call?’ the President said, dumping himself down at the head of the table.

  ‘Just over two minutes,’ Williams said.

  ‘You sure it was Slater?’

  ‘Certain.’

  ‘Brook Street. Kingston. London.’

  Williams nodded. One of the underlings must have informed him of the details on the way over.

  ‘When is this set to happen?’ the President said.

  ‘Right now.’

  The man paused for a single moment, mulling over the options. ‘What’s the likelihood Slater’s messing with us?’

  ‘He wouldn’t. I know when he’s serious.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Yemen.’

  ‘Why is—?’

  ‘No time,’ Williams said. ‘Do we make the call or not?’

  ‘Do it,’ the President said. ‘Right now. Marburg … my God.’

  Military personnel scrambled for phones, carrying out procedures that had been run through time and time again in preparation drills. Amidst the chaos, Williams sat rigid, staring blankly across the table at the opposite wall.

  The President noticed.

  ‘Russell.’

  Williams looked up. ‘If this thing is already out there … it’s going to spread faster than we can quarantine it. We can’t lock down a city. It’s dusk in London, too. It’ll spread like wildfire.’

  The President nodded. It was the first time Williams had seen the man vulnerable — the usual icy glare that he sported in volatile situations had given way to something close to panic.

  ‘Do you know what Marburg does to its victims?’ Williams said.

  ‘Not fully.’

  ‘You don’t want to.’

  ‘Before I forget,’ the President said, ‘tell me. Did you trace Slater’s call?’

  Williams nodded. ‘He’s in a village in Yemen. In the Hadhramaut Valley.’

  ‘Send a team in,’ the President said. ‘I want him extracted. Whatever it takes. We’ve been looking for him for too long.’

  ‘What about the other guy?’ Williams said.

  Jason King.

  The President shook his head. ‘He’s smarter. He left a United States military officer dead in Dubai. He won’t show his face ever again. Slater’s more reckless. He’ll keep getting wrapped up in situations like these until we catch him.’

  ‘Who do you want me to send into Yemen? Who can detain him?’

  ‘Did he sound hurt?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Send in a SEAL team. I want him back.’

  Williams nodded. ‘Understood.’

  The conversation faded out, replaced by the urgent babbling of a cluster of military personnel, all barking orders and instructions into receivers at once. Williams stayed motionless amidst the carnage and pressed two fingers into his eyelids, riding out a sudden wave of nausea.

  His mind turned to images of the Marburg virus in the streets of London.

  The sheer trauma that would result…

  He didn’t want to think about it. He leant back in his chair, ran a hand through his hair, and wondered if Slater had managed to make the call in time.

  56

  London

  England

  At almost six in the evening in Kingston upon Thames, the streets had begun to fill with shift workers heading home from their offices. The sun had melted into the horizon, casting a tinged orange glow across the narrow laneways, adding a translucent quality to the hordes of civilians flocking back to their residences.

  Hussein stood idly on the busiest corner of Brook Street, watching the passers-by with a curious gaze. He had pulled to a stop on the pavement seconds earlier, opting to glance intermittently down the road as if waiting for a bus.

  He had been told to behave that way.

  He judged the distance between himself and the swarming crowd of pedestrians to his rear. The foot traffic didn’t cease, almost amplifying as he paused to ascertain the level of damage he would cause. From this position, he estimated that the initial blast would kill close to a dozen of the closest civilians.

  Panic would erupt. Pedestrians would scatter.

  And then, influenced by the anguished cries of those who were wounded, they would return in flocks to either lend assistance or simply gawk at what had unfolded.

  Hundreds of people would inhale the spores before the police cordoned off the scene.

  The authorities themselves would contract the virus, returning home to their families before they displayed any symptoms.

  Hussein decided to cause as many casualties as he possibly could in the initial blast. The more collateral damage he could cause, the greater the interest amongst the general population.

  He wanted all the eyes in the country on this location come tomorrow.

  You never know, he thought. Maybe residents of other cities would venture to London in a naive attempt to lend a helping hand to those affected by the blast.

  Littl
e did they know…

  With that thought in the back of his mind, he opted to get closer to the twin channels of pedestrians heading in different directions on the jam-packed sidewalk. He shuffled his way through the crowd, leaving the edge of the gutter, coming to rest with his back against a wrought-iron fence bordering a park.

  This is it.

  He would turn his back, slip his hand into his pocket, extract the detonator, and depress the small grey button on the side of the device.

  Just as he had been instructed.

  The uncontrollable sweating had started up again. Despite the evening chill, it was unavoidable. Hussein recognised that he was coming to the final stages of his short existence. He struggled to control his breathing, but decided that it didn’t matter.

  Who cares if they see me panicking?

  They’ll all be dead before they can do anything about it.

  Fingers slick with perspiration, he slipped his hand into the pocket of his trousers and came out with the tiny device that would spell suffering for hundreds of thousands of lives.

  Perhaps millions.

  The thought charged him with nervous energy.

  He whispered a silent prayer, closed his eyes, turned his back to the crowd…

  …and pressed down.

  His grip slipped, the thin coat of perspiration between his skin and the button enough to slide his index finger off it. Frustrated, thrown into disarray, Hussein swore at himself under his breath and wiped his palm on the side of his trousers.

  He caught a few dirty looks, as passers-by noticed the agitated man with the backpack in their midst, but no-one cared enough to do anything about it. No-one gave him a second look. No-one wanted to appear overly paranoid. They went about their business, carrying on with their lives.

  Hussein reached for the button again.

  A small prodding sensation against his leg startled him, freezing him in his tracks. He looked down and noticed the girl from the block of flats standing there, directly alongside him, peering up at him with eyes brimming with tears.

  He faltered, just for a moment.

  ‘Excuse me, mister,’ the girl said. ‘What are you doing?’

  She had no idea. Hussein realised that the incident was an almighty coincidence — the girl must have been suffering at home and latched onto whoever passed her by. She had no knowledge of the contraption strapped to his back. He breathed a sigh of relief.

  Hussein didn’t answer her.

  He couldn’t.

  He could understand a few key phrases in English, but he couldn’t speak the language itself. He babbled, unsure of what to do.

  What are you waiting for? a voice hissed in his head.

  He composed himself. Maybe he’d considered the girl a bad omen back in the hallway, or maybe he hadn’t anticipated seeing a familiar face in the crowd, or maybe he had to briefly grapple with the idea that she would be killed in the blast, her tiny body torn to shreds by the force of the plastic explosive. In the end, he concluded that it was inconsequential — if the girl wasn’t killed by the initial explosion, choosing to remain in her flat, she would have succumbed to the Marburg virus anyway.

  A fate worse than death itself.

  Whatever the case, the sudden interruption made him hesitate.

  And that was what did it.

  By the time he reached for the detonator, watching the little girl’s face twist into a grotesque mask of abject horror as she realised what was about to happen, he had allowed the plain-clothed police officer to sprint into range.

  He never saw the man coming.

  The officer — a fifty-something man hardened by decades of experience in the force — came tearing across the road, weaving between traffic, his gaze fixed on Hussein. Hussein noticed a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye, but his gaze in turn was affixed to the little girl. He knew he was about to kill her, but it didn’t bother him anymore. Something far worse was in store for everyone who survived the initial blast.

  The short, stocky officer hit him so hard that for a moment he blacked out on his feet, utterly stunned by the force of the impact. The man had opted to dive across the sidewalk, covering the last couple of feet in a single instant, crashing shoulder-first into Hussein with enough momentum to send the two sprawling back across the sidewalk.

  As he was falling, Hussein stabbed with a sweaty finger at the detonator, which had already begun to slip from his grasp.

  He missed.

  The last thing he saw — reeling off-balance in the air — was the little girl standing frozen in the midst of the foot traffic, mouth agape, shocked by what she was seeing.

  Hussein couldn’t believe it either.

  A single moment of hesitation had cost him and his commanders three months of painstaking preparation.

  And it was all because she had poked him inquisitively.

  Unbeknownst to the little girl, she had inadvertently prevented an apocalypse.

  Fuck, was the last thing Hussein thought.

  He came down awkwardly against the wrought-iron fence, his temple cracking against one of the rusting posts with enough weight and momentum behind it to cave his skull in. He experienced a horrifying explosion of seared nerve endings, a blinding flash of white light as his senses shut down…

  …and then nothing at all.

  57

  Russell Williams had devolved into a nervous wreck by the time the call came through.

  He sat in near-silence within the Situation Room for the entire duration of the wait, surrounded by the most important men and women on the planet, each of them battling their own emotions as to what a weaponised virus in central London might spawn.

  He couldn’t quite grasp the consequences.

  When the President was informed that the British Prime Minister was waiting for him on the line, the silence in the soundproof room became deafening. The conversation was brief, and perhaps the most important in human history.

  It would either spell relief, a reprise from a full hour of horrific worry and trepidation, or disaster. Williams baulked at the ramifications of failure — they would do their best to contain the spores to a certain section of the city, yet it would be near-impossible. It would take expertise and a plan that they didn’t have the framework for.

  It would fail.

  When the President let out the breath that had caught in his throat and dropped his head gratefully to the table in front of him, a collective sigh of relief spread through the Situation Room.

  ‘Fuck me,’ Williams whispered, wiping his forehead with a shirt sleeve. ‘You did it, Slater.’

  Nobody spoke for what felt like forever. Details would come through later, but the present moment was reserved for letting the tension of what might have transpired dissipate, fade away into nothingness.

  Finally, Williams spoke. ‘What did they say?’

  ‘The call went out to every officer in the city at the same time,’ the President said. ‘Fifty seconds later the bomber was tackled. A plain-clothed cop got him on a street corner. He was talking to a young girl.’

  ‘Jesus…’ Williams said. ‘Was it close?’

  ‘Down to the second.’

  ‘And the girl?’

  ‘Nothing to do with him. She appeared to be distracting him, although it seems she was just curious. Whatever the case, she’s been brought in. She’ll be labelled a national hero, I assume. Prevented a suicide bombing.’

  ‘That’s all this is being treated as?’

  ‘Anything more and the world would lose its collective mind,’ the President said. ‘Best we keep it under wraps. For obvious reasons.’

  Williams sighed and leant back in his seat. He stared up at the ceiling, his heart still racing. He didn’t think the adrenalin in his system would fade for quite some time.

  ‘Where do we go from here?’ he said.

  One of the Army officers piped up. ‘At this level, the fallout is going to be grim. We’ll be dealing with this for months. But the thr
eat’s over. Now we can pick up the pieces and work out what the hell happened.’

  ‘Something tells me you’ll find what you’re looking for in Yemen,’ Williams said.

  ‘The SEAL team…?’ the President said.

  ‘En route,’ Williams said. ‘It’s a volatile place, but they should be in and out before the day’s over.’

  ‘Slater knows about this. I want him brought in as fast as possible.’

  ‘I don’t know…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The way he was talking,’ Williams said, staring at the table in front of him, tugging intermittently at the short beard he’d begun to grow out. ‘I don’t know if we’ll find him in one piece.’

  ‘Well, let’s hope we do,’ the President said. ‘Otherwise this will be one confusing mess for quite some time.’

  The man rose out of his chair, ushered to the doorway by an aide.

  Williams stayed where he was, thinking hard.

  No-one would ever know the gravity of what had been prevented.

  Except a select handful in the upper echelons of government…

  …and an exiled Special Forces operative in war-torn Yemen.

  * * *

  Hours later, resting in one of the unused offices buried in the depths of the White House, Williams was startled into action by a knock at the door.

  He shifted from his position on the broad leather couch, adjusting his suit and straightening his posture as a military official stepped into the room. He had sunk into a state of shock as the time ticked by, awaiting news from Yemen. Outside, the sky had begun to darken.

  Soon, night would fall.

  ‘Sir,’ the man said. ‘We’ve heard from the SEALs.’

  ‘What did they say?’

  ‘They entered a small village named Qasam quietly, at four in the morning, Yemen time. They found bodies.’

  Williams bowed his head. ‘Fuck. Slater was a good man.’

  ‘Not Slater.’

  Williams widened his gaze. ‘What?’

  ‘Five men in official military uniform. We believe they were soldiers under the command of Brigadier-General Abdel al-Mansur. And four more bodies, covered in traditional dress. These are just preliminary estimates, but we believe them to be members of the northern highland tribes.’