by Roger Weston
He lay there, barely holding onto consciousness when the assassin stood over him and pulled off his mask. It was tall white-haired man with a lean face.
“Who are you?” Leonard said.
“Since you’re dying, call me Robert.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Why was Brandt here?” Robert said. He put the gun against the bridge of Leonard’s nose, between his eyes.
“That leech stole my ho.”
“Why?”
“Die asshole. I hope the whole world dies.”
“We’ll start with you.” Robert pulled the trigger.
CHAPTER 70
Idaho State Prison
Ethan Buhl was led to a conference room where a man in a suit waited for him. The man was tall and lean and wore an expensive suit. He had white hair and hands that had never done real work. A pampered house cat. He smiled warmly and stood.
“Hello, Ethan,” the man said. “My name is Robert. Why don’t you have a seat? This is your lucky day.”
Ethan blinked his eyes, wondering what he meant by that. Then it came to him. The warden had failed to enlist Ethan as a snitch against the other prisoners, so now he was using this slick cat to put it to him a new way.
“You’re wasting your time,” Ethan said, crossing his arms. “I ain’t interested in snitching on nobody.”
“That’s not what this is about. Sit down. Enjoy a little freedom. You might get used to it.”
Ethan eased into the chair. Why not? He was here, and it was a nice change from his cell. He’d relax and find out what the warden’s latest scam was.
“You’ve been in here a long time,” Robert said, brushing his perfectly-manicured fingers through his white hair. “I understand you’ve been in for twelve years. That’s a long time.”
Ethan shrugged.
“A real long time for a man like you. I read your file, Ethan. Way I see it, you got burned by the system. All you wanted to was live off the land, to live as you pleased without interference. But the game wardens tried to end your way of life, so you killed a couple of them.”
“I’m innocent,” Ethan said, looking out the glass wall toward the guard who stood by a doorway.
“For a man who wants nothing but freedom, it must be hard to rot away in this graveyard for the living dead.”
Ethan’s big biceps flinched. He leaned forward menacingly. “So what’s it to you?”
“Real simple. You’re forty years old. If you were to walk out of here today, you could return to your former life in the woods. On the other hand, I could leave without you, and you can wait until you’re seventy-five before you’re eligible for parole. You’ll have spent your whole life in a cage and why—just because you wanted to live more freely than other men. As I see it, that’s your crime.”
“What do you mean about me walking out of here? That can’t happen.”
“Then why do you think I’m here?”
Ethan stared at him for a few moments of oppressive silence. “What’s the catch?”
“There you go. You’re going to like it, my friend. This is the best deal you’ve ever heard of. I know you had a visitor yesterday, didn’t you?”
Ethan shrugged. “Just a priest.”
Robert smiled. “Yeah, right. He was a fraud, and he played you for a fool. You’ve been had.”
Ethan thought about his daughter. He narrowed his eyes at the tall stranger. “What’s your deal?”
“Real simple. You tell me where you sent the fraud, and then you take me there. If you can lead me to him, you walk. Not only that, I’ll get you an unrestricted hunting and fishing permit so that you can return to the forest and live off the land year round. Now how do you like that?”
Ethan glared at him for a moment, then felt himself almost smile, something he hadn’t done in a long time.
CHAPTER 71
Boise National Forest
The scent of pine trees filled Chuck’s nostrils as he hiked through the forest. Eagles soared and cried out. Layers of pine needles gave the ground a springy feel under his shoes. Pine cones lay scattered all around. Chipmunks scurried up tree bark. He followed no trail, but kept a direct course toward the location Ethan had given him. He passed clear brooks that exposed mineralized quartz, streaks of crimson in the white rock. The hike through the woods took an hour, and he spooked a herd of elk.
Finally, he came to Dean Harris’s secret valley.
“Harris,” Chuck said loudly. He waited, but heard no sound. “Harris—”
A burst of gunfire shred a patch of leaves a few inches above Chuck’s head. The second burst would have cut him in half if he hadn’t dove to the ground.
“Ethan Buhl sent me. Don’t shoot.”
There was an extended pause in the gunfire.
“You a friend of Ethan’s?” the voice said.
“He said I could count on you.”
“Well, how did I know who you were?”
“I’m coming down. I’m a friend, so just don’t shoot.”
Chuck hiked down into the canyon and saw a log cabin in the trees. That was when he heard the voice again.
“What do you want?”
“Ethan sent me.”
“You already said that.”
“I need your help. Ethan said you owe him a favor and this is payback.”
“Ethan has a short memory.”
Chuck’s chin fell to his chest. He waited.
“Okay,” Dean said. “Come on in. I’ll shoot you later if I don’t like you.”
The cabin was small and Spartan. By some feat, Dean had lugged a woodstove all the way back here. Other than that, all his possessions consisted of camping gear and bird traps and several coils of cable and rope. He had two cages with live bald eagles in them. Dean was a thin, gangly guy with big hands and feet that reminded Chuck of a gecko. From the side, Chuck saw a half-inch streak running around the back and side of his neck, up across his jaw bone, and across his mouth. Along the edges of the streak the skin was red. Chuck could smell him from four feet, a mixture of old sweat and fresh campfire smoke. His long arms hung like rags out of his hammock, an M-16 across his chest.
“What happened to you?” Chuck said.
“Some bad hombres—” Dean winced. Evidently talking stretched the wounded skin on his cheek and caused him pain. “They put a rope around my neck and tried to drag me to death behind an ATV. Thought you were them.”
“Out here?”
He nodded.
“How’d you survive?”
“Cut the rope with a pocket knife and slid down a steep bank. Have a seat.”
Chuck looked around but the only seat was a section of log with a chainsaw and a can of gas next to it. He sat on the round and leaned against the wall.
“What did Ethan say?” Dean cleared his throat.
“I’m looking for a place called Jin Mountain. He said you’d take me there.” Chuck tensed as he found the M-16 aimed at him.
“What your connection to them?” Dean said calmly.
“Maybe I should ask you the same question.”
“I’m the one holding the gun. You go first.”
Chuck nodded. “They have my woman.”
“They what?”
Chuck frowned.
“So what do you plan to do about it?” Dean said, putting the gun on his chest again.
“Get her back.”
Dean blew out air between his teeth. “Mister, you have no idea what kind of people you’re dealing with.” The rope burn around his neck and cheek moved as he talked.
“You’d be surprised,” Chuck said.
“Why don’t you call the police?”
Chuck explained about RUMAN. As he did, he watched Dean closely, and the man barely moved, his lips apart. His arms hung motionless from the hammock like strips of moss. He never said a word.
“You have nothing to worry about,” Chuck said. “I won’t involve you.”
“The hell you won’t.”
/> “Why?”
“Look what they did to me. I’ve been having nightmares. I’m too scared to leave my cabin. Well, I didn’t come out here to live in fear. It’s lonely out here. I was thinking of suicide when you showed up. Those bastards robbed me of the only thing I had left in the world, reducing me to a shivering coward, panicked every time a bird flutters in the bushes.” His arm slowly came to life. “It ain’t no accident I have this M-16 automatic. I always knew the government would close in on me just like they done to Ethan. I knew one day I’d have to fight the big fight.” He peered straight into Chuck’s eyes and nodded toward the floor. “Take a look under there.”
Chuck followed his gaze to the floor, and he saw a trap door to beneath the cabin. “Open that up,” Dean said.
Chuck did so. In a large pit under the cabin, he saw weapons. It was too dark to say how many, but it looked like a lot.
“Use the lantern,” Dean said.
Chuck took the lantern down from the hook and draped it down through the trap door. There were three assault rifles, hundreds of boxes of ammo, two MP5s; a Soviet rocket-propelled grenade launcher, a US Army M110 7.62 mm sniper rifle, and a British 9mm Sterling silenced sub-machine gun. There was C4, coilers, and detonators. There was a pile of ropes and other rock climbing equipment.
Chuck slowly looked back at Dean. “What’s all this for?”
“Like I said, I don’t have no use for the government when they try to lock me up.”
“Why would they do that?”
“Armed robbery. I did ten years, but got out early on good behavior.”
Chuck nodded. He wondered why they ever let this guy out of prison.
“I knew this day would eventually come,” Dean said. “The government is too oppressive, always trying to victimize the little guy. Look at Ethan. All he wanted was to mind his own business and live off the land. But the government wanted to starve him out. He fought for his freedom and now he’s rotting away in an eight-by-ten cell. You see what they done to me. I’d be dead right now if I hadn’t escaped. Well, fine. They wanna victimize me, I’ll make ‘em sorry.”
“This is about RUMAN. I’m not bringing a pissed-off redneck along.”
“No problem there, mister. Was those scum that nearly killed me. That’s the only score I got to settle, but I go or I ain’t helping you.”
CHAPTER 72
The military troop-transport truck slowed as it came to a stop at the Idaho City airfield. Robert got out and walked around to the driver’s side. Ethan Buhl followed him. The dirt parking lot was empty, and beyond the airfield, nothing but trees could be seen in any direction.
“Move,” Robert said. He heard the tailgate open and six Special Forces soldiers poured out and walked over to the wooden fence along the edge of the airfield. Robert looked them over and smiled. They were all veterans of foreign wars, recently brought to America. There was the Sudanese, the Somali, the Afghan, the Iraqi, the Burmese and the Turkish Russian. While they were all from different countries, they all shared something in common. They had all survived the game and been molded by it, had come out stronger for their torment. They were the adaptable ones who would do anything to avoid pain and step through gates of glory and personal enrichment. They had been persecuted and were now eager to fight on the side of the mighty. Better to join the strong than suffer with the weak. Now it was their turn to create chaos and to play key parts in missions that would alter the course of the world. They were indoctrinated fanatics. Their current mission was to eliminate a rogue assassin who was a threat to national security. They had suffered greatly in cruel little corners of the world and so their patriotism for their adopted country eclipsed that of most native-born Americans. They had orders to kill on sight. This pleased them, though they had tried to conceal their pleasure. America was their dream, personal glory their God. It was time to worship.
Robert listened carefully, and he heard the sounds of the Huey and another chopper. Another minute and he could see them. The two birds came in low and hovered for a moment, then set down on the paved section of the runway.
“Go,” Robert said. Ethan Buhl and the fighters jogged toward the Huey and climbed in. The two birds lifted off and swooped off over the trees.
A minute later, a third chopper landed. Looking over his shoulder, Robert saw the truck leaving the parking lot. In a couple of minutes, he was airborne. He looked at his watch. With any luck, by the time Robert got to Jin Mountain, Brandt would be dead.
CHAPTER 73
Boise National Forest
Chuck spread a terrain map on the cabin table and studied it carefully. He heard Dean’s voice coming from under the trap door to the pit under his cabin.
“I hope you can rock climb,” Dean said.
Chuck felt his abs tighten. “I can.”
Dean’s head appeared through the trap door. “Good.” He heaved several coils of rope onto the floor. Then came more climbing gear. Dean kept ducking down and emerging with more gear—assault rifles, cross-bows, ammunition, hunting knives, grenades, smoke bombs.
“You’re well prepared,” Chuck said.
“They’re a lot to go up against. We stroll in there with a pistol and a smile, they’ll cut us down to size.” Dean climbed back up through the hole and shut the trap door.
“Show me where it is,” Chuck said.
Dean stepped over to the table and put his finger on the map. That mountain there. They’ve been tunneling and excavating it for years. I don’t know what they’re up to, but they’ve got a twenty-four hour operation. I’ve seen big dirt loaders going in and out all night long. There’s a complex in a valley on the north side where they have a dozen small military-type buildings surrounding a large Quonset hut.”
“Why don’t we approach from that angle?”
“We’d never pull it off. They have electric fences, video cameras, and six man teams that patrol the area day and night.”
“Do they have security at the rock face?”
“They go over there sometimes, too, but mostly they stay on the north side. I guess they figure nobody would try to make the ascent.”
“Why’s that?”
Dean smiled.
CHAPTER 74
Like a wasp from the depths of hell, the Apache helicopter swooped down over the cabin and opened up with machine guns. Waves of bullets raked the ground, shredded the roof, and chewed up practically every square inch of the cabin’s interior, leaving no possibility of survivors inside. A fireball engulfed the cabin, evaporating it. The concussion flattened several trees nearby. As quickly as it came, the gunship turned and skimmed the treetops in victorious retreat.
The second helicopter, the Huey set down in a clearing a quarter mile to the east. The six-man hunter-killer team poured out and ran for the tree-line as if this was hostile enemy territory.
The team leader was named Ibrahim. Three years ago, he’d had to be taught how to turn on a light switch because he’d grown up in the jungle in a hut where there was no electricity. If you’d have tried to explain to him what a refrigerator was, he would have laughed. He was a small man with skin as black and pure as night, lean with muscles taut from a vigorous tribal life in the jungle. His tribe had been persecuted by a government that found their presence inconvenient despite their having been there for generations. A relief organization called Exodus offered a solution. They would send Ibrahim to America where there would be no more persecution. Ibrahim would have to get a job. The relief worker had struggled to explain this concept to him, because there were no jobs in the jungle. There was hunting and collecting, and there was a tribal chief. Ibrahim had laughed when the relief worker tried to explain that he would have to be at work at a certain time and eat at a certain time and go home at a certain time.
When he got to America, Exodus paid his rent for six months and they sent him money for food. They’d gotten him a construction labor job that paid minimum wage. For this he spent eight-hour days building retaining walls out of t
wo-hundred pound cement blocks. Ibrahim was a strong young man, but he knew that he would get old fast that way. If this was what it meant to be an immigrant in America, he wished they would send him back to his village in the jungle. They had persecuted him there, but life was hard here. It was exhausting work and for unknown reasons his roommate ran out on him, never to be seen again. This left him with a rent payment that he could not make. For the first time in his life, he learned that money was evil and caused unhappiness. He tried to work harder, moving three cement blocks for every one that his lazy fellow workers moved. But the money shortage, the harassment, and the threats from the foreman made him miserable.
The apartment manager had introduced him to a man with a solution. Ibrahim eagerly signed up to be a fighter and proved that he was better than the others. He was a natural soldier and a natural killer. He loathed his new country, but money helped, and hunting men was more fun than hunting animals. The man who a few years ago needed help to turn on a light switch was now a weapons expert. He also used computers and a variety of other electronic devices. But most of all he killed with passion.
He led his team through the woods.
CHAPTER 75
Jin Mountain, Boise National Forest
Robert climbed out of a Hummer and leaned against it. He answered his Sat Phone. It was Ibrahim.
“They are dead, sir.”
“Are you sure?”
“The gunship hit the cabin hard. There were secondary explosions. They must have had an armory in there.”
“You’ve confirmed it?”
“Nobody could have survived it. They were blown to pieces.”
“The Huey will bring you back here.” Robert hung up. He shoved the phone into his pocket and hurried into a large Quonset hut.
