“Keep going.”
“Seems there’s another valley like it, same rock formations and satellite indicators or whatever it is, and they suspect this field is even bigger. Maybe two or three times as big. Enough of the stuff to last twenty years. Only when they’ve tried to drill core samples…”
Hatcher glanced around the jungle, then tilted his head to search the sky. “Their engineers have disappeared.”
“Something like that.”
“That’s just great.”
“Hey, it wasn’t my goddamn idea. The way they explained it, this was important stuff. Medical devices, lab equipment, all kinds of crap that requires it to function. The world needs an ample supply. Without one, people all over the globe will be fucked.”
“By ‘they’, you mean, Keegan. And you believed him. Still believe him.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“How about because if this were actually about saving the world, you think he’d send a team of five contractors? Guys he had to blackmail? For Christ’s sake, wake the hell up. Did he ever show you credentials? I never saw any. Nothing with his name on it. Nothing with anyone’s name on it. Just clandestine meetings in government basements. Off the books. No paper trail. Jesus, Woodley, this is the same asshole who made up some BS story about the vice-president’s daughter to explain all the secrecy, why it all had to be off the books, untraceable, when you have to know by now it was just some poor aid worker in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just some good woman trying to help albinos, or whatever. But who do you think orchestrated that? Hell, who do you think arranged for her to be taken in the first place? This was planned from the beginning, right down to the tiniest detail. It had to look real. Real people, real news stories.”
“I don’t understand…” Woodley blinked. “You’re saying there’s no helium?”
“No, I’m sure there is. I’m sure there are a gazillion metric shit-tons of the stuff, or however they measure it, just like he said. And I’m also sure the rights to it are worth a few metric shit-tons of money.”
“Money? Wait, you’re telling me…”
“Yes. That guy cut a deal. Whoever the hell he is. A big, fat gild-your-toilet deal that will make him millions. Maybe hundreds of millions. No wonder he told me he was retiring, that this was his last gig. Jesus.”
“But, he must have thought we could do it, then, right?”
“No. He probably thought all of you would die.” All except me, Hatcher thought. Me, he needed to keep alive. He didn’t know how he knew, just that he did. “Open your eyes, Woodley. Why the hell do you think they asked for me… by name?”
“He said there was a vendetta of some sort. Didn’t get into the details. All I was told was, they’d take you somewhere, and we were supposed to retrieve you and terminate the target.”
“There’s a vendetta, all right. But not with some guerrilla clan.” Hatcher turned to look at Zorn. “Think he can move now?”
Ivy hitched a shoulder. “I guess we’re gonna find out.”
The two of them helped Zorn to his feet. His eyes were glazed, lids half closed. He had a dreamy smile on his face, even as he winced a few times.
“Keep your eyes on the sky,” Hatcher said, looking at Woodley. “You have those NVDs?”
Woodley nodded, reaching into a pack.
“You see it, let us know. If it sees us, open fire on it. Three round bursts. How’re you set on ammo?”
He detached the curved magazine from his rifle and replaced it. “Four mags. A couple dozen more in the Hummer.”
Zorn had a few magazines of the same caliber, so did Ivy. But it didn’t matter. If they needed more cover than that to make it to the vehicles, they never were going to reach them, anyway.
“It’ll have to do. Let’s move.” Hatcher picked up Zorn’s rifle and replaced the magazine before shouldering it. He looked through the trees. Little diamond-shaped sparkles between the leaves. “The sun will be completely gone in a few minutes.”
He let Ivy point the way, each of them with one of Zorn’s arms around their necks and over their shoulders. Zorn, for his part, helped more than Hatcher expected, so it wasn’t quite dead weight. He alternated between laughing and grunting. Like he could feel the pain, but would have a hard time caring less.
“How is it looking back there, Woodley?”
“Nothing, and lots of it.”
The jungle was thick. The path they were following was recently slashed, broken stems of rubbery plants dangled in places on each side, partially sliced, other parts lay flat from being pressed with boots, various leafy shapes of deep green and purplish red padded the ground underfoot. An occasional caw from what Hatcher supposed was a bird, the call of what may have been a monkey. The trill of insects rose and fell in waves.
To Hatcher’s left, those jeweled twinkles of light flashed and then disappeared. Hatcher looked up. Darkness was creeping across the twilight like a weeping wound.
Hatcher tapped Ivy and stopped. “Now might be a good time to break out those NVDs.”
Ivy nodded. Hatcher took Zorn’s weight and pivoted to look at Woodley, who was a few yards behind. Woodley’s rifle dropped from its sling as he got the message and fit the goggles over his head. He made some adjustments along the sides, staring first at the ground, then the sky, then leveling his gaze at Hatcher.
Something wasn’t right.
“Listen,” Ivy said, pausing, goggles near his face, ready to be slipped over his head gear. “You hear that?”
Woodley shrugged his rifle higher and leaned his head back, scanning the heavens. “I don’t hear anything. Don’t see anything, either.”
“That’s what he means,” Hatcher said. “Everything’s gone quiet.”
Darkness seemed to fall like a blanket. The surrounding jungle became a jumble of strange shadows with shapes suddenly both closer and farther than before. Woodley was still visible, but hard to see. It was gray beyond him, a dark background populated by deep shadows. Something even darker moved. Fast.
“Look out!”
Woodley started to turn, but there was no time to act. Hatcher felt a buffet of air against his face as he raised his weapon, could make out the ink-black shape as it swooped through. The slashing sound of movement whipping through the air, a wet, popping crunch. Something loose bounced off Hatcher’s M4 a split second before a large curve of hair and skin and bone slapped his abdomen. In the dying light, he could make out a nose and eyeless lid as the piece of skull slid like a broken saucer off his boot. By the time he raised his eyes, he couldn’t make out anything else but shades of ebony beneath a slate sky.
Ivy scrambled to take aim. The air swirled and something cut and fanned just feet above them.
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Ivy said. “It’s like, it’s like… Hatcher! You gotta see this thing! Oh my God!”
Hatcher wasn’t sure what the man could be seeing that they hadn’t already got an eyeful of, but he didn’t have time to ponder it. He could make out Woodley’s NVDs on the ground in front of him from the glow and picked them up. A dull, greenish light shone in the view side of the lens. He pulled them over his head, groping the sides with his fingers and fiddling with the sliding controls until the area around him seemed in focus. These were high quality. Not the best he’d ever tried, but good enough.