Volcanic.
Eons ago, this rock had been liquid.
He felt for the next rock, for new and better cover from the approaching vehicles.
But what Parker touched next didn’t feel volcanic. It felt like the smooth, man-made fabric of a tent.
The lights from the truck suddenly went dark.
Thank God!
Parker felt for the tent’s zipper, found it, and slid inside. Darkness, complete. Parker moved his hands in the darkness along the inside edge of the tent. The wind continued to buffet the shelter, causing it to rock slightly back and forth. He came to the cold steel of the Windrunner rifle with a scope on top. Parker pulled the bolt back and used his finger to feel the brass cartridge in the chamber. It was ready to fire. He slid his hand down the length of the weapon, feeling the round cylinder of a silencer at the end. He put the AK-47 to the side, going with the better weapon, and left the device box on the far side of the tent.
Parker kept moving his hands along the base of the tent.
“There it is.”
A small plastic ice chest tucked in the corner.
“I don’t have much time,” he whispered to himself as he opened the chest and felt inside. A plastic zip-lock bag held a tube and a long needle. He put his hand back into the chest full of the liquid and ice and felt a second plastic bag.
“All right, let’s get this going.”
Parker turned around, putting his feet to the opening of the tent. As he did, he sat on a small metal object. His hand felt a .45-caliber automatic pistol with a long silencer attached to the barrel. He quietly chambered a round and cocked the hammer.
He pulled off his shawl and pulled up the sleeve to his shirt. Every second mattered. He hung the IV bag, hooked up the tube, and took the needle. He had discussed this with Dr. Stewart at the CDC. It was best to put it in a vein on the back of his hand.
Parker stuck his hand back into the ice chest and halfheartedly washed it off. It wasn’t sterile, but would have to do. He felt for that small bulge just to the outside of the back of his hand. He tied a rubber strip that came with the bag and made a fist. A distended vein stuck out on the back of his hand.
He stuck the needle in the vein and then slid it slowly deeper. He released the valve to the IV bag and almost instantly felt the cold liquid enter his body.
The wind rocked the tent, moving it back and forth as the gusts changed directions.
Parker leaned back with his hand on his chest, in the dark, holding the pistol in the other.
All he needed now was time.
A shadow crossed over the tent.
Parker tried to focus his eyes in the dark.
A shadow?
A shadow meant a source of light. It had to have been from the headlights of Yousef’s truck.
God, I’m thirsty.
Parker’s mouth felt as if it had been stuffed with cotton. His tongue seemed welded in place. He felt the IV bag. Still half full. But at least the vancomycin cocktail was passing into his body.
The shadow passed again over the tent.
Parker pulled the pistol up to his chest. The wind kept rocking the tent. He listened for a sound other than the howl of sand blasting against the rocks and tent.
Finally his thirst became overwhelming. Parker reached for the small cooler and stuck his hand back into the icy water. It became irresistible. He pulled the cooler over, putting his hand into the cold liquid and bringing a handful up to his mouth. He swallowed the water with a small piece of ice. So good. He lifted the cooler and drank the cold water.
More time; just need a little more time.
He reclined again with the pistol on his chest. Lights flickered above, bouncing up and down, in silhouette against the roof of the tent. And then a shadow passed over again.
“Allah!”
Umarov’s blade sliced through the tent, narrowly missing Parker’s head. Parker grabbed Umarov’s wrist as it came through the opening in the fabric; as he did so, the IV ripped out of his hand. Umarov’s body fell on Parker’s other arm, with his weight on the pistol, but as it did a silenced round fired from the gun.
Whish.
The silent bullet tore through the tent and ricocheted off the larger boulder nearby.
“Srati!” Umarov growled at Parker. He swung again with the knife.
Parker caught his hand again, holding the knife just above his head.
“Srati!” Umarov screamed, shifting his weight to his right arm and the knife. The blade was just above Parker’s throat, the steel point pressing into his flesh.
Parker pushed up with his body and, as he did, for a flash of a moment his other hand came free.
Whish.
An animal cry as a second silenced bullet from Parker’s pistol tore through the flesh of Umarov’s right forearm. He pulled the knife away from Parker’s throat but then came back down, sticking the blade into the upper part of Parker’s right arm.
Umarov kicked the pistol away into the rocks. The tent was now shredded around the two men as they struggled.
Umarov pulled back up against the rocks, lifted the IV bag, and looked at its label, recognizing not only what it was but also what it was for. He used the knife to cut the tube from the needle.
Parker crouched, looking for an opening. But he had no gun he could reach and no knife to match Umarov’s.
“Yousef!” Umarov yelled out.
“Umarov?” A voice came from well behind the rocks.
“They have infected us.”
“Umarov! Where are you?”
The sand came in gusts, stopping for a second and then bearing down again.
“Here! I am here! I have their medicine.” Umarov stood up, holding his side with the one hand and the IV bag with the other. He looked at Parker, a growing pool of blood at his feet, and smiled.
“Maybe you should die like this.”
Umarov turned and then stopped, seeing the pistol lying nearby.
“And then, maybe not.”
He reached down to the .45-caliber automatic and picked it up, with the intent of putting a final round into Parker’s face.
Just as he turned, Parker hefted a large stone that he’d managed to palm and struck.
Umarov fell in a heap.
“Maybe not.” William Parker, on his knees, cradled his injured arm across his chest, panting for breath, and realized that he had survived.
CHAPTER 69
“Umarov? Umarov?”
No answer. Yousef assumed the worst and fired his AK-47 blindly into the howling wind, aiming toward what he thought was the last echo of a sound.
In the past Yousef had seen the Chechen kill, be severely wounded, and then kill again. It was an impossible thought that any man could put out the life of this Crni Labudovi.
“Umarov?”
Yousef yelled the name once more as he scrambled to the passenger side of the SUV and knelt down between the open door and the body of his truck. The SUV’s lights still shined up the valley.
“I need more ammunition.”
Mahmud also crouched outside the truck, in the back, behind the second door.
“Mahmud, ammunition. Now!”
Mahmud stood up briefly to hand Yousef a loaded clip over the open door.