‘And now,’ Quraishi began in his perfect English, his lilting voice pleasantly melodious, ‘how may I help you?’
5
The crematorium was located at the rear of the compound, close to Jake Navarone’s position.
It had been no use; he had just had to know what was going on here, and with time pressing, he had announced his intentions to his colleagues and then proceeded to slip down the forested bank which protected the valley.
The rear wasn’t guarded, and as Navarone approached the barbed wire fence, close to the ground, he was pleased to see that there were no motion sensors either. Probably nobody expected anyone to ever find the camp in the first place.
The fence was electrified though, which made things more difficult; cutting his way through the fence would cause a burnout, and get the immediate attention of the guards. But he didn’t really want to cut the fence anyway, as he didn’t want to leave any telltale signs of his visit. His plan was to quickly scout the place out and report back.
This left climbing the eight-foot fence, which was risky in itself; during daylight hours, he could easily be seen. But the weather was overcast and visibility was poor with the unaided eye; overall, it was unlikely the guards would spot him. He would rely on the two men behind him, and the other SEALs on the far side of the valley, to warn him if anyone was watching. On this side of the compound though, he couldn’t even be seen by the guards in their watchtowers.
He checked in with his teammates for the last time and was given the all-clear. And so, insulated gloves and boots protecting against the electric charge, he scuttled up the fence in seconds, pulling himself up and over the barbed wire as if it wasn’t even there, his Nomex bodysuit protecting him from the sharp barbs.
He landed on the grass on the other side, just a few yards away from the dark brick of the crematorium, which continued to belch thick smoke out of its tall chimney. Keeping close to the ground, he shuffled his way towards the building, until he was touching the rough brickwork.
He edged down the wall slowly, inch by tortuous inch, until Devine gave him the word that he was right below the small window which was the only thing on this side of the building except the brickwork.
Out of a utility pouch, he retrieved a fiber optic wire, with a camera mounted on one end. He bent the wire into a right angle and slowly — ever so slowly — pushed it up until it rested just above the window frame.
Navarone checked the miniature monitor that displayed the images from the camera, and saw a large unfurnished room, the walls bare brick. There was a large door over on the right hand side, and Navarone moved the camera around, panning across to the other side of the room.
What he saw on the monitor stopped him dead, the breath caught in his throat.
There was a gigantic cast-iron oven over the other side, its cavernous mouth wide open, flames flickering inside as a team of people — dressed in what looked like white biohazard suits — unloaded bodies from carts and dumped them unceremoniously into the furnace.
But it was the sight of the bodies themselves that had caused Navarone’s nauseated reaction.
There were a variety of shapes and sizes — men, women and even children — but they all looked the same in one way.
They were all hideously deformed, their flesh literally eaten away from their bones. On some of the bodies, Navarone could see gaping blisters on the skin, on others there was actual bone protruding through the withered skin and fat tissue; eyes were gone, melted away; noses and ears were also nowhere in evidence; and all looked as if they had undergone horrific mutation of some kind.
Navarone had never seen anything like it before in his life, and wondered just what the hell could have happened to those people.
He had been right about this place, at least; it wasn’t just a political prison camp. There was something very wrong going on here, experiments of some kind or another.
But what?
Had the prisoners been victims of radiation poisoning? Were the after-effects of a nuclear blast somehow being recreated and analyzed?
Or did the damage to the bodies indicate that some sort of horrifying new weapon was being developed here?
As he thought about those poor children being thrown into the furnace, his mind flipped for just an instant to his sisters, the twins; Jodie and Bobbi, so young and innocent. He cut the thought off immediately.
What had these people done to deserve this?
With gritted teeth, his mind flashed back to the prisoners who had been summoned forward that very morning; they were next, weren’t they?
Slowly, Navarone pulled the fiber optic camera back down and edged away from the wall.
Not if I can help it, he thought with an anger he had never before experienced.
Not if I can help it.
‘So you can see,’ Quraishi summed up with a confident smile, ‘there is really nothing for you to worry about. Your money will be quite safe, and your business with Saudi National Oil can proceed as planned.’
Cole nodded his head in thought. ‘Well, you do seem to have all bases covered,’ he said in his affected Texas Drawl. ‘And the Mabahith must really make people careful huh?’
Quraishi just raised an eyebrow and let his smile widen ever so slightly.
‘But I do have one concern,’ Cole said carefully, pausing as he heard a knock on the office door. He waited as Quraishi admitted an assistant, who cleared away the water jugs and glasses, and replaced them with fresh ones. Once the man had left, Cole continued. ‘We’ve been hearing reports about a new group operating right here on Saudi soil, Arabian Islamic Jihad. Now, we don’t know much about them in the US, but what’s your take on them? Are they dangerous?’
Cole watched Quraishi’s face for any hint of undue emotion at the mention of the AIJ; a twitch of the eye, a turning of the mouth, anything at all. But there was no reaction whatsoever.
‘Any terrorist group is potentially dangerous,’ Quraishi admitted, ‘but the fact is that the AIJ has yet to prove itself; it has been around for years, but has achieved nothing. The Ministry of Interior is confident that it will fizzle out like all the others.’ He smiled again. ‘I was just telling Mr. Richards, your Secretary of Homeland Security, exactly the same thing.’
Cole wondered if that was true. Was that why Richards had been here? Had he been checking up on what the Ministry of Interior knew about Arabian Islamic Jihad? It would certainly make sense.
Cole smiled at Quraishi. ‘That’s good to know,’ he said. ‘But word around the campfire is that they’re saving themselves for something big. You heard anything about that?’
‘Word around the campfire?’ Quraishi repeated with a good-natured laugh. ‘That’s a saying I’ve not heard in a long time. Since I was in your country as a young man, in fact.’ The smile on his face as he remembered seemed genuine enough. ‘Those were good days,’ Quraishi continued. ‘I met some fine people there. The United States is a great country.’
Cole watched the man’s face as he spoke, senses attuned for the slightest hint that he wasn’t telling the truth, that he really despised America and everything she stood for. But there was nothing to see; Quraishi’s face was a mask. Cole knew this meant one of two things — either al-Zayani had been lying to him, and Quraishi was exactly as he appeared to be; or else the man was completely sociopathic, and far more dangerous than Cole had feared.
There was a knock on the door again, and the same assistant popped his head through into the office, speaking in Arabic to Quraishi, who nodded his head and rose from the desk.