by Tom Clancy
While he stumbled along he kept an eye out for any surveillance, but he didn’t really expect anyone on him for a day or two. He planned on walking a couple blocks through these back streets to the Kenh Doi, one of several brackish canals that ran through the city, tying his money belt around a loose brick, and then dropping the five sets of dirty documents into the water. From there he’d head to the airport, he’d be on the first plane back to the United States in the morning, and he’d wait to get fired by phone, no doubt by Duke himself.
He’d go back to flying planes for a living. At his age and with his lack of recent flying time he might be able to scrounge some work flying beat-up cargo props in the Third World. He’d die before he paid off his debt, but at least he wouldn’t be a bag man for the Asian Dr. Evil and his murdering minions.
Hazelton walked on. There had been a flurry of activity in the streets—this was District 8, full of French colonial architecture and active nightlife—but now he passed through the darkness in a commercial area near the canal. A restaurant worker carried garbage by him, and an old woman on a scooter putted through the alley.
As he made a left toward the water a pair of men on whisper-quiet black Ducati Diavel motorcycles rolled into the alleyway he just vacated, but he neither heard nor saw them, nor did he have any idea two more similar bikes were already positioned ahead of his route, and waiting for him to walk into their trap.
2
Jack Ryan, Jr., moved in the darkness, east on Pham The Hien. In front of him he saw Colin Hazelton appear from an alleyway across the street. Jack had expected him to turn to his left and head back to his hotel, but to his surprise the American in the white button-down shirt and loose necktie stepped into the road and began heading over toward Ryan’s side of the street.
Shit, thought Jack. He kept walking, looking away from Hazelton and taking care not to alter his gait. He wondered for a moment if he might have been burned, but Hazelton didn’t seem to pay any attention to him.
To Jack’s surprise Hazelton stepped onto the pavement forty yards in front of him, then entered another narrow, dark alleyway. This would lead him directly to the Kenh Doi, an east-west canal that served as the northern border for District 8, and from Jack’s study of the map of this district, there was nothing there but docks and houseboats and ramshackle apartment buildings.
Confused as to why the man wasn’t going back to his hotel, Jack decided he would walk on a few blocks and then try to move up a parallel alley.
Jack picked up the pace, took a second to orient himself with the map on his phone, and then he spoke over the net. “This is Ryan. I’ve got the subject. He’s moving north. Two blocks south of the water. Unless he’s got himself a dinghy tied up somewhere, then he’s going to run out of road here in a minute. I’m going to try to get ahead and see what he’s up to. I’ll move parallel to his—”
Jack stopped transmitting when, directly in front of him, two black Ducati bikes rolled out of the alley ahead and crossed the street. They were just a couple hundred feet behind Hazelton. Here in the quiet sector near the river they couldn’t hope to remain covert from a trained CIA veteran.
Nothing about this looked like a surveillance exercise by the men on the bikes.
“Ryan?” Ding called over the network. “Did you lose comms?”
“Negative, I’m here. But a pair of Ducatis are here, too, and they are definitely following Hazelton. Not sure where the others are. This looks too aggressive for surveillance. I think they are going to confront him.”
Driscoll spoke over the net now. “Unless they’ve got cars involved in the pursuit that we haven’t spotted yet, they aren’t planning on an abduction. This might be something worse.”
Jack confirmed, astonished that the stakes of this operation seemed to be rising with each moment. “Holy shit, this could be a hit.”
Ding broke into the conversation. “Hang on a second. Hazelton is supposed to be over here on a corporate intelligence job. His last op was for Microsoft. Nothing we’ve seen indicates he has any concerns about a lethal adversary. A hit would be one hell of an escalation.”
Jack saw the two other bikes now, entering Pham The Hien from the east and then racing past Ryan and separating. One turned into the alley that ran parallel to the east of Hazelton’s path; the other turned into the alley to the west, the one Ryan had planned on taking.
Jack passed the road Hazelton took. He just caught a glimpse of the first two bikers as they turned between a pair of long two-story warehouses that ran all the way to the water’s edge. He picked up the pace, thinking any confrontation would have to be soon, because Hazelton was running out of alley before the canal, and then he would have to retrace his steps back in this direction.
As he jogged to the corner to get a look between the buildings, he said, “I agree, Ding, but now four guys have him boxed in with nowhere to run. Something is about to go down.”
Now John Clark came over the line. “I’m getting the car in case we need to make a hasty exfil with Hazelton. Traffic is tight, though. It’s going to take me some time. Ding and Sam, get to Ryan’s poz on the double. Jack, you do not intervene, no matter what. You are unarmed.”
Jack replied softly now. He’d reached the corner and he was about to lean around to take a peek at what was going on. “Understood.”
—
Hazelton approached the Kenh Doi, a dense blackness fifty yards in front of him. There were a few twinkling lights of District 5 on the far bank, but there was also a group of warehouses there, without much going on at this time of the evening. And this stretch of canal, though nearly in the center of the city, had next to no boat traffic at night.
His plan had been to tear up the documents to the best of his ability and then drop them in the Kenh Doi. They would separate as they flowed downstream, and they would be rendered useless to the North Koreans.
But he knew that plan was shot now, because of the sound of finely tuned motorcycle engines behind him.
He understood the bikers were here for him. They made no secret of their presence. And they weren’t alone. He hadn’t seen any more followers, but the slow approach from the men behind him gave the distinct impression they were waiting for someone else to get into position.
Colin Hazelton was drunk, but he was still perceptive; after all, he had been doing this sort of thing for a very long time.
And just like that, his suspicions were confirmed. A pair of headlights appeared in front of him, one coming up the riverside path along the docks from the east, the other from the west. They turned in his direction and approached at a steady pace.
They had him and he felt he knew who they were. They were more of Duke Sharps’s men. That French bitch had had confederates here in town, and they’d swooped down on him not in days, as he’d anticipated, but in mere minutes.
The two bikes in front of him pulled up to within feet, and then they turned off their engines. The men kept their helmets on and their mirrored visors down. The pair behind had stopped twenty yards back, their soft motors reverberating confidently, announcing to Hazelton that he had nowhere to go.
He knew he was going to have to talk his way out of this.
Hazelton looked to the closest biker, taking him for the leader. He managed a little laugh. “Figured you wouldn’t be in position till tomorrow. I underestimated the hell out of you guys.”
None of the bikers spoke.
Hazelton continued. “Well done. New York sent you in early, I guess? They expected me to waver? I’m impressed. That’s what we used to call ‘anticipating surprise.’” He chuckled again, and repeated, “Well done.”
The closest biker climbed off his motorcycle, and he stepped to within arm’s reach. His mirrored visor gave the man the appearance of a robot.
Hazelton shrugged. “Had to make a stand. You get it, right? The client this time is the DPRK. I don’t k
now if you knew it, but Duke is in bed with the worst people in the world.”
The biker reached to his helmet and lifted his visor now. Hazelton was surprised by this a little—the man initially seemed content to keep himself masked—but Hazelton thought it possible the man was showing his face because they were acquainted. He knew Sharps hired a lot of ex-Agency assets, after all.
Colin Hazelton leaned forward a little to get a look at the man in the light, but as soon as he saw the face, he recoiled back.
He did not know the man. It was an Asian face. Hard. Cold.
North Korean.
“Oh,” he said. “I see.” Then he faked another little laugh. “You ever had one of those days?”
“Give me the documents,” the North Korean said.
Hazelton felt around on his body. He shrugged. “Would you look at that? I left them in a briefcase back at the—”
“The case was empty!” An automatic pistol appeared in the North Korean’s right hand. Hazelton knew little about weapons, but he had no doubt it was real. The pair behind him began revving their engines, and the other man in front of him stood up taller on his bike.
—
After watching the entire confrontation, Jack Ryan, Jr., pulled his head back around the corner of the warehouse. He dropped down on one knee, and he tapped his PTT button. “This is Ryan with eyes on. All four followers are around the subject, and they have him at gunpoint.”
Ding replied; it was clear from his breathing he was running. “So much for this being an easy corporate gig. Stay covert. We are on Tran Xuan Soan, about ninety seconds from you.”
Jack said, “If this is a hit, Hazelton doesn’t have ninety seconds.”
Clark barked over the net now. “And if that’s a hit you aren’t stopping it unarmed. I’m en route with the car. Three to five minutes back.” Through the transmission Jack could hear Clark honking his car horn at traffic ahead of him.
Ryan’s impulse was to run headlong into the alley, but he knew Clark was right about his chances if this turned into a real fight.
But Jack had an idea. “I don’t have to engage, John. I can try a diversion.”
Clark replied quickly. “You are on your own, son. Use extreme discretion.”
Ryan did not acknowledge the instructions; he was already looking at the map on his phone, formulating a hasty plan of action. He pulled his camera from his backpack and took a few breaths to ready himself.
—
The North Korean biker leveled the gun at the American’s chest. He did not say a word.
Hazelton raised his hands slowly, panic welling within. “There is absolutely no need for that. I’m no threat to you. Let’s keep this civilized, at the very least.” The American looked around him. Through the fear coursing through his body he realized he’d put himself in a terrible situation. Had he not been three sheets to the wind he knew he never would have wandered down a dark street like this, especially while harboring concerns someone was after him.
Of course, had he known DPRK agents were on his tail, no amount of alcohol would have caused this breach of tradecraft.
The North Korean pulled the hammer back on his pistol. Hazelton stared into the black hole of the muzzle, not quite past the disbelief of what was happening. He’d never faced a gun, he’d never faced any real danger in his career other than an incident once when he was roughed up by street hooligans in Denmark, hardly comparable to his present circumstance. His mind was overcome with the terror of the moment, but he did retain the presence of mind to know he was beaten. With a cracking voice he said, “Money belt. Around my waist.”
Just then the door to an apartment building opened twenty-five feet from Colin Hazelton’s left shoulder. Two women stepped out carrying large bags, and they immediately glanced up at the men in the middle of the little street in front of them. The North Korean turned his pistol in their direction, and they screamed, leaping back inside the building.
The North Korean heard a shout behind him, his man there alerting him. He looked up and saw the burly American running past them up the street, lumbering toward the water.
He fired up his bike, preparing to take off after the American; the other bikers revved their engines as well.
“Hey! Hey!” someone shouted in English a half-block behind at the corner of a corrugated tin warehouse. All four bikers turned to look and they saw a young white man with dark hair and a beard. He held a camera up in their direction. “Everybody smile!” The camera flashed a dozen times, strobing the men in the dim alley.
The two bikers closest to the cameraman throttled their engines and burned rubber as they turned around on the street, then began racing toward the white man with the camera. The leader and the man with him went off in pursuit of Hazelton and his money belt.
As he accelerated, the lead North Korean stuck his pistol back into his jacket, then reached to his waistband and pulled a long stiletto from a sheath.
3
Colin Hazelton hadn’t broken into anything more than a light jog in nearly thirty years, but the adrenaline in his body put enough spring in his step to get him down to the river in twenty seconds. Here he made a right on the path, the two bikers close on his heels. He thought about running across the dock and diving into the water, but he knew nothing about the current and he felt sure the younger men after him would just fish him out soaking wet, or else drown him there and take his money belt. So he raced along the path for a block, then made a right up into another dark and narrow street.
The bikes approached confidently; he could hear that the throttles weren’t having to work very hard at all.
“Help!” he shouted to the apartment buildings around, his eyes scanning balconies and windows, desperate to find anyone who could save him. He thought about the gun behind him and wondered at any minute if he was going to take a bullet in the back of the neck. He knew he just had to get into a public space, but he also knew the area. He had several blocks to go before finding any sanctuary of community.
—
Domingo Chavez and Sam Driscoll sprinted through the darkened streets of District 8, closing on the gray GPS beacon on their map that represented Jack Ryan. Ding glanced down at the electronic map for the first time in thirty seconds, making sure they made the correct turn off the two-lane street, when Ryan’s voice came over his earpiece.
“Ding, you guys have me on GPS?”
Chavez responded, still looking at the dot on the map. “Affirmative. Looks like you’re running.”
“Damn right I am! Two armed bikers on my six.” Chavez could hear the roaring engines through the warren of apartment buildings off his left shoulder.
“We’ll catch up with you.”
“I need one of you to go for Hazelton. He took off to the water. He’s not over here to the west, so try to the east.”
Ding called to Sam as he ran on. “You go for Ryan! I’ll grab Hazelton!”
—
Colin Hazelton never stood a chance. The lead North Korean biker raced up behind the big, aging American, positioned his flat stiletto down by his side, and then thrust his arm out, stabbing the man from behind, once under the left shoulder blade, then quickly on the right side in the same place.
Both of Hazelton’s heaving lungs began deflating almost instantly, and blood pumped into the damaged organs. He ran on a few feet, no reaction in his stride to what he thought were just punches into his back, but soon he toppled over in the middle of the dark street, gasping. The bikers slowed and stopped, then both men dropped the kickstands on their Ducatis and climbed off, quickly but still casually. They stepped over to the wounded man, who was now trying to crawl away, and they knelt over him.
The leader began feeling through Hazelton’s pockets and then his shirt, finally laying his hand on the money belt hiding there. He yanked the hem up over the man’s corpulent midsection, used h
is stiletto to cut free the sweaty and bloody white Velcro money belt, and he quickly checked it to make sure the documents were inside. There was blood on one of the passports, but everything was there.
Hazelton lay on his side now, and he reached up for the documents weakly, his right arm extending fully and the whistling wheezes out of both his mouth and the holes in his back changing in pitch as he tried to yell.
The North Korean biker knocked the American’s feeble grasp away and stood up, then he turned back to his motorcycle. His partner joined him, his handgun low by his side and his helmet turning in all directions as he scanned, making certain no threats appeared in the street.
They started their engines and turned back in the other direction to join the hunt for the white photographer.
—
Ryan was five blocks away now, still in the warren of darkened streets and parking lots around the apartment buildings here by the Kenh Doi. He wondered what had happened to Hazelton. He had done all he could for the man, but he feared it hadn’t been enough. He’d seen the two women step outside the apartment building and in so doing distract the bikers. To his shock Hazelton took off toward the water. Jack thought this to be a terrible idea, unless of course Hazelton had seen something that gave him no hope he’d survive the encounter with the armed men.
Or else he was just drunk and he freaked out and he went for it, decided he was smarter, stronger, and faster than he actually was.
Ryan was betting on the latter.
To give the American ex–CIA man a fighting chance, Ryan had darted into the alley, demanded the attention of the bikers, and flashed his camera as a distraction, then he turned and ran for his life, hoping to draw at least some of the men off the older, slower Hazelton.
