“Please, no! Not my baby. Please, not my baby!”
“Shut up!” His voice cracked with confusion and distress. “Just shut up!”
Farrah yanked her hair, twisting her body so that it completely covered his own. Marcus tightened his stance, waiting for an opening. Mike did the same. Farrah kept moving, shaky, leaving them no good shot.
Radios crackled with the voices of snipers declaring they had no shot, couldn’t get repositioned quick enough. Each heartbeat lasted an eternity. Marcus watched the sight post at the end of his pistol wave in tight sideways figure eight. Farrah’s eyes squeezed shut then slowly opened, pupils so wide the brown of his irises had nearly vanished. He scanned the crowed with the manic snap of a cornered animal, confusion and terror equally balanced with tightly wound violence. He blinked a second time then his eyes stretched even larger until they seemed as if they’d pop out of their sockets.
Farrah’s body and all but a portion of his eye and forehead were tucked behind Lonnie. The smell of her shampoo filled his sinus, sweet and pretty. He had a sudden memory of a young woman he had once dated. Her father had forbade him from seeing the girl after learning he was a Muslim. A deep sadness crept up his throat, tightening around his Adam’s Apple like the grip of the reaper, threatening to choke off his life.
His gaze swept over the park. Columns of thick black smoke continued to rise from beneath the lawn and through a manhole that had its cover blown off during the explosion. He watched a Paramedic kneel to a screaming child half way across the park. A woman held a teen boy’s head to her chest, his arms hanging at his sides, body limp. Part of him wanted to stop the madness, to lay down the gun and surrender, to take it all back and wish away this evil he’d wrought. But then, superimposed of the destruction before him, he saw the image of his parents flaming death which in spite of not having actually seen it was nonetheless burned into his imagination as if it were a memory.
A brown skinned man with a pistol was shouting something at him that he could not understand. A white man in civilian clothes said something as well, a word he recognized — Shaheed.
Yes, I am shaheed I will be a martyr now.
His finger tightened around the trigger, the muscles in his forearm tensing. Squeezing the trigger seemed harder than it should have, the simple mechanical parts resisting too much. He felt it start to give just as he saw a bright flash of light explode in the distance behind the rows of police and soldiers. A small gold-colored metal object grew in size like an approaching sun. He registered the oncoming bullet for what it was a fraction of a second before it hit his skull. The tiny oblong metal ball hit him, a force like a ten-ton hammer slamming his forehead. He never heard the sound of the shot before his brain ceased to know anything.
Mike flinched as the back of Farrah's skull disintegrated, a cloud of pink erupting behind him. Eyes wide, mouth dropping open in shock, Steven Farrah fell straight back onto the street, still grasping Lonnie. Someone in the crowd let out a high pitched scream.
Marcus rushed to his wife, pulling her off Farrah’s twitching body. She released the tight hold she’d had on her breath and started panting, quickly dissolving into sobs. She sucked in a deep breath, and her eyes darted toward the park.
“Kharzai,” she raised her arm pointing weakly to the crowd. “He's getting away. Go.”
Marcus followed the direction of her finger and caught a fleeting image of Kharzai's curls flopping above the crowd as he jogged nonchalantly across the park. Marcus jumped up and sprinted toward him, Mike close on his heels. They caught a full view of him just as he hopped into Farrah's Audi parked beside the road nearly a block away, an excited dog jumped in to the car behind him and settled on the passenger seat tail wagging. Marcus’s truck waited in a park side slot parked nearby. They rushed to it and climbed in. Marcus started the engine, glancing up and seeing Kharzai slip calmly onto 10th Avenue moving away from the scene. An officer at a police check point stopped him and an officer leaned toward the window. Whatever Kharzai said, the officer bought it and signaled for the barricade to be moved. The Audi slipped through and Kharzai sped up 10th to Gambell Road and turned left.
Marcus followed parallel on 9th Avenue. A National Guard soldier signaled them to stop. Marcus slowed and rolled down his windows. Mike leaned across the seat flashing his FBI credentials toward the soldier.
“Open the barrier! We’re in pursuit of a suspect,” Mike shouted.
“I’m sorry sir, but…”
Mike exploded with the command voice of a Marine officer, “Open the gate sergeant! Right now!”
The sergeant reacted, more out of instinct to the sound of command than to the logic of the order. The whole squad instantly snapped to and opened the barrier allowing Marcus’s truck through.
Marcus jammed the accelerator to the floor and rocketed through two blocks, pressing their bodies hard into the seats as the 5.4 liter V8 pounded into turbo. Kharzai crossed an intersection in front of them. As he came around the corner, the Persian saw Marcus, recognition sparked in his eyes. The glimmer of his trademark toothy grin stretched wide, baring his white teeth. He floored the accelerator. The high-performance sedan shot off like a bullet. Marcus floored his truck's gas pedal too, but F250 was designed with towing power in mind, not zero-to-sixty performance like the Audi.
The smaller car quickly stretched the space between them as Kharzai rocketed down the Glenn Highway toward Eagle River. Marcus followed as fast as his truck would take him. His engine was powerful truck and capable of high speeds, but the massive beast took time to get there. By the time Marcus reached eighty miles per hour, the Audi was a white speck more than a mile ahead. Marcus kept the pedal to the floor until the speedometer peaked at 110 mph. The Audi bounded out of sight around a long bend in the highway.
“Where are the cops?” Mike asked.
“Probably all busy back at the park,” Marcus said.
Marcus was surprised when he rounded a bend and saw the Audi still within sight. He knew the car was capable of nearly 200 mph, yet he remained in sight as if Kharzai wanted the chase to continue, wanted Marcus to catch up.
More than a mile ahead the Audi veered onto the ramp that turned right onto the Arctic Valley Road exit. Marcus followed and turned just in time to see the white car accelerate past the Moose Run Military Golf Course, then turn onto Ski Bowl Road.
“What’s he doing?” Marcus squinted as he watched Kharzai disappear around a bend in the road.
“What’s back here?” Mike asked.
“Nothing,” Marcus replied. “Just a ski lodge that’s closed for the summer. Beyond that, there’s a military radar site manned by about a hundred armed and highly security-conscious soldiers who don’t play nice with people who show up uninvited. There is no exit from this area other than the trails of the Chugach National Forest, which can only be taken on foot.”
The Chugach National Forest consists of thousands of square miles of trees, mountains, and lakes. Marcus was confused. Unless Kharzai had a helicopter waiting to whisk him away to some safe haven, there was nothing back here but bear infested wilderness.
Ahead, the Audi accelerated continuously up the mountain road, veering in and out of sight several hundred yards ahead, Kharzai whipping violently into hairpin turns like a Formula One racer. Marcus turned a blind bend on a steep stretch of road and his breath caught in his chest. He braked hard, skidded along the dirt and gravel and barely avoiding the Audi which sat still in the middle of the road. Once he got the truck under control Marcus pulled as close to the soft shoulder as he dared. Mike got out, Marcus right after, both with guns drawn, eyes scanning the car and the nearby brush. The Audi’s driver's side door hung open, keys on the seat. Ahead of the car, crushed and trampled foliage signaled Kharzai's entry point as plain as a sign post. Marcus moved, pistol up, pointing into the space between thickets of alder. Mike covered him, watching for shadows of movement, listening. It was too easy. Kharzai had left clear tracks in the underbrush.