If the jihadis were smart, they’d send half their guys up the cliff and keep the other half in position below. If he tried to make the last fifty yards, they would pick him off. And if he stayed where he was, they’d cover and advance for one another until one of them could kill him at close range.
Gideon peered over the ledge. The pursuers were smart. Two men were already working their way up along the narrow path while the remaining four stayed behind, their weapons pointed right at him. Seeing this, Gideon ducked just as a volley of gunfire smacked against the downslope side of the outcropping.
He made a quick assessment of his worsening situation. The rock behind which he had found cover was no more than three feet wide and ten feet long. Enough to protect him as he lay on it, but not enough to shield him once he started climbing. The rubble on top of the outcropping consisted of two boulders as large around as his body and several smaller rocks that were roughly the size of bowling balls.
An idea came to him, born of that purest and most primitive animal instinct—survival.
He shifted his weight behind one of the bowling ball-size rocks and pushed it toward the edge. It rolled with a grinding noise until its own weight carried it down the slope. Gideon heard some warning cries as he peered over the edge and watched one of the men below dodging the boulder, which narrowly missed him as it crashed at the base of the cliff.
Gideon pulled his head back, registering a strange disappointment that he hadn’t hit at least one of them. But at least he’d confirmed his theory: his attackers had been so concerned with the falling rock that they hadn’t shot at him.
He looked up at the cliff again. The next fifty yards weren’t too bad. He couldn’t exactly sprint up. But he figured he could make it in twenty or thirty seconds.
He set to work on the other rocks, pushing them all to the edge. As he was pushing the largest one, he noticed a large rust-colored smear on its surface. Blood. He held up his hand, turned it around. A jagged wound ran across his palm. He must have cut himself during his near fall. It wasn’t until he saw it that he noticed how much it hurt. Blood ran down his arm, dripping off his elbow in fat drops onto the limestone. Realizing that he couldn’t afford to think about it right now, he tore a strip from his shirttail and wrapped his bleeding hand, then finished moving the rocks.
It took him only a few minutes to line up the remaining rocks along the ledge. His plan was to push them over the edge in fast sequence, from smallest to largest. His foot lingered on the rock for a suspended moment. Now, he realized. It had to be now. And he pushed the rocks over the edge—one, two, three, four, five—one after the other.
A volley of frantic shouts echoed from below, as he launched himself up the cliff.
The last of the rocks were still clattering down the hill as he scaled the rock face. It was steeper than he’d thought, and his legs were weak. Up and up he climbed, realizing halfway that he’d underestimated the time it would take him to reach the summit.
He would need at least another twenty seconds. And twenty seconds may as well have been a year in this exposed position. He wanted to look back but knew he couldn’t. He waited for the gunfire to start. But it didn’t come. His pursuers were shouting. He could make out their voices now.
“Run!” one of them yelled.
And then there was a sound, like the crack of thunder.
He charged upward, from handhold to foothold, his legs shaking violently from the buildup of lactic acid. Faster, he scolded himself. Go faster.
The thunder grew louder, building on itself. Gideon pounded upward, waiting for the gunfire, which still didn’t come, as he threw himself over the lip and collapsed onto the ground, his body heaving as he tried to fill his lungs.
Below him, the thunder subsided until the only sound Gideon heard was his own ragged breathing. The air was thinner up here. A soft breeze cooled his face.
Finally he peeked over the side, just a quick glance, to see where his pursuers were.
No one was there. Only a massive, roiling cloud of dust. For a moment, he couldn’t make sense of what he was looking at, but then he realized what had happened. He’d started a landslide. And not a small one. The boulders he dropped had caused some kind of seismic chain reaction that had sheared off a large part of the mountainside. Tons and tons of rock had cascaded down and buried the six men who had been trying to kill him.
He found himself remembering every detail of the pursuit up the cliff, every feeling, every thought—none of which, he realized, included a moment of moral equivocation. All the pacifist ideals he had invoked only yesterday during his speech at the UN? Not one of them had even crossed his mind. In fact, he felt the same exhilaration now as he had felt on the river, when he had confronted and beaten the men who’d been pursuing him by boat. He held his hands in front of his face, stretching his fingers. They weren’t shaking. A sense of well-being settled over him like a warm blanket, which he quickly shrugged off. This was not the time to reflect. It was time to act. If he had any moral reckoning to do, he would do it later.
As he surveyed the scene below, he reflected that the rock slide hadn’t just wiped away his would-be killers. It had wiped away the trail.
He had passed the point of no return. Either he would make it to Kampung Naga or he would die trying.
Beyond the rubble, the river wound into the distance, a brilliant red serpent, glowing with the reflected light of the setting sun. He only had another hour of daylight before he’d need to find a place to sleep. He stood, dusted himself off, and turned to enter the jungle. But something was nagging at him, tugging at the back of his brain. ItဠWhatever it was, he couldn’t put his finger on it. And he stopped trying to figure it out when he entered the jungle and found that he wasn’t alone.
A group of men stood before him in a half circle. Their complexions were darker than the Mohanese he’d seen before, and their hair was curlier and thicker. One of the men, the oldest, wore a pair of battered tennis shoes. The others wore only nylon soccer shorts, their feet bare. They all carried spears, which they pointed at his chest.
The man with the shoes screamed something at him.
“It’s okay, guys,” Gideon said evenly, slowly holding up his hands. “I’m not armed.”
Gideon's War and Hard Target
The man kept barking at him and was soon joined by several...
One of the men who had tried to kill him had spoken English.
But the men who were now surrounding Gideon and brandishing their spears couldn’t have cared less about his epiphany.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
KATE SAT ON THE floor, her hands tied behind her. The hostages had been thrust into the guest cabin on B Deck, the one that had been assigned to Cole Ransom. In the corner sat a bag and a notebook computer. Both wore scuffed aluminum nameplates with Cole Ransom’s name etched onto them. Kate realized, with a sinking feeling, that if they were the real Cole Ransom’s belongings, then something bad had happened to Ransom.
Ambassador Stearns was sitting stiffly on the floor next to Big Al Prejean. They hadn’t been in the room for more than ten minutes when the door opened and Earl Parker was thrust into the room.
After the door slammed shut, Kate said, “Are you okay? We were worried.”
Parker sat heavily on the bed and said, “I’m fine. He just stunned me for a minute.”
“Did you see any of my crew?”
Parker nodded. “They were herding them into the mess hall. A couple of your people tried to resist.” His lips curled. “They shot them like dogs.”
Kate swallowed. “How many?”
“Five, maybe six. Everybody else settled down. I think they’ll be okay for now.” He shook his head sadly. “I know that’s not much consolation.”
“You’re right,” she said. “It’s not.”
Parker didn’t reply.
“The guy who’s in charge says he’s Abu Nasir,” Kate said. “It seemed like you knew him.”