…34
Dr. Davis looked up from the gas chromatograph’s screen, searching for the source of the annoying little buzzing sound. There it was… a mosquito had just landed on the tile-covered lab table. He slammed his palm hard, killing it, and making some test tubes rattle in their stands. He also gave Dr. Chevalier a start. She was sitting at the microscope just a few feet away and looked at him disapprovingly.
“I apologize, Marie-Elise, it was just reflex,” he said in a gentle tone of voice.
Instantly, her eyes welled up, and a silent tear started rolling on her cheek.
He pushed his chair closer to her.
“What’s going on, huh? Would you like to tell me about it? Maybe I can help…”
She sniffled, a little embarrassed, keeping her eyes pinned to the floor and her shoulders forward, seeming small and vulnerable. She hugged herself tightly.
“It’s — it’s my husband. He had a heart attack just a month ago,” she said, her voice strangled by tears. “I don’t even know if he’s still alive. We might never get out of here, you know?”
“Marie-Elise,” Gary whispered, “you have to hold on to hope. You have to—”
The sound of the massive door springing open silenced him. Everyone watched silently as an enraged Bogdanov walked through the door, followed closely by Death and One-Eye, both carrying their automatic weapons.
Without any provocation, One-Eye grabbed Dr. Mallory, who was closest to the door, and shoved him hard on the floor at Bogdanov’s feet. Declan Mallory fell hard and stayed down, probably dazed, too shocked to react. The quiet, composed Brit didn’t have an aggressive bone in his body.
Gary gasped, then covered his mouth. He grabbed Marie-Elise’s hand and squeezed it tightly. Like threatened animals in the wild when predators are near, they all huddled closely together, finding some comfort in one another’s presence.
He heard Wu Shen Teng’s stifled sobs somewhere behind him. He turned and looked at him, trying to offer an encouraging look. For some reason, what he’d intended as comfort had the opposite effect on Wu Shen Teng, who covered his mouth with both his hands to silence the sound of his renewed sobbing.
Bogdanov reached down and grabbed a fistful of Mallory’s hair, forcing him to his knees.
“If I don’t have a successful test in 48 hours, he will die,” Bogdanov said in a quiet voice, a threatening, growling whisper. He looked at them with eyes filled with hate, then spat on the floor.
They all stood quietly, huddled together closely, holding their breaths. Gary felt the urge to step forward and do something; he wasn’t sure what. He took half a step forward, but Marie-Elise clutched his hand tightly and whispered, “No!”
Then Bogdanov spoke again.
“You’ve been sabotaging this from the first day,” he said, surprising Gary, and probably the rest of the doctors.
How the hell did they know? They’d been careful, keeping their voices down whenever they spoke, and taking turns keeping their guards busy and discreetly supervised. They thought they had a way to buy themselves some time. They’d been wrong all this time. Fuck!
“You think you’re smart, da?” Bogdanov continued, his voice filling with contempt. “You think you can stall us, and we’re just dumb Russians and we won’t know? We know everything!” he shouted, punctuating his statement with a boot kick to Declan Mallory’s stomach.
Declan curled up on the floor, groaning and writhing with pain, trying to breathe, gasping for air.
Marie-Elise’s grasp on Gary’s hand tightened, as anticipating what he was thinking of doing. But he didn’t have time to act.
“You do that again and you will die, one by one,” Bogdanov added, drilling his eyes into theirs. “From shock,” he continued, his menacing voice dropping to a whisper again. “I will break every bone in your body, one by one, slowly, until your body gives up on you. That’s my promise to all of you lying cunts.”
Bogdanov nodded toward One-Eye, who brought the stock of his Kalashnikov brutally down on Mallory’s rib cage. They all stood there, paralyzed, hearing the bones cracking and Declan scream. Gary felt a wave of nausea hit him.
“This is your final warning,” Bogdanov added, then left briskly, followed by his men.
…35
The early morning air pushed through the open window, helped by a scented breeze heavy with spring blooms. The aroma of freshly brewed coffee almost covered that, as one after another, cups filled at the machine, and the team members took their seats around the small table, steaming cups in front of them.
“OK, so we find the plane,” Alex said, jumping right to the heart of things, “then what? Call the feds?”
“I don’t think that would be an option, even if we find it,” Blake replied. “I’d still rather have us continue on our own. They’d have to go through channels; it would take a long time.”
“Sam?” Alex prompted.
“I tend to agree with Blake. We’re looking at getting the feds, or maybe the CIA in this case, more likely, to orchestrate an op in a foreign country, based on some disputable satellite imagery and our stories. I don’t think they’re gonna do it. Not fast enough, anyway.”
She stood and started pacing the little space she had available, between the table and the wall where the map was pinned. She rubbed the back of her neck nervously, grinding her teeth.
“OK, let’s talk extraction scenarios, then,” she conceded, silencing the self-doubt she was feeling. She wasn’t special ops material; she felt overwhelmed at the immense responsibility hanging on her decisions, her actions, and her judgment. “Lou? You’re the closest thing we have to a special ops expert; I think you should lead the extraction discussions.”
“Sure, boss, I’d be happy to,” he replied, then went to the whiteboard with a marker in his hand. “We have two tactical issues,” he continued, writing as he spoke. “One, we’re assuming that the people are still with the plane, and they might not be. In fact, why would they be? Whoever holds them needs to feed them and house them, no matter how precariously. That takes space and resources.”
“Oh, God…” Blake said, “you’re right. We might find the plane, but they could be long gone from there.”
“Long gone, but not very far, I’d think it’s safe to assume,” Alex intervened.
“Why?” Lou asked.
“This is not some random hijacking under the spur of the moment. This was a well-planned op, and, most likely, if they’re housing the people at a certain location, they would have taken them by plane there, or as close as possible—441 people are a lot of individuals to be moving from point A to point B.”
“Agreed,” Lou said, “sounds reasonable. But that means once we find the plane, we’ll have to go there and find them. This is our first tactical issue,” he specified, writing the number one in a circle on the whiteboard, under the phrase, “Unknown hostage location.”
“And second?” Blake asked.
“Having 441 people means a lot of exfiltration,” Lou replied, “a lot of exfil to handle from behind enemy lines, under potential fire. Some might be hurt, weak, or sick. I think the best bet remains the plane. Get them out of there exactly as they came in.”