Том Клэнси - The Teeth of the Tiger

“Tallyho, Aldo,” Dominic said, putting cash down on the table to cover the bill. Both stood and walked away from the target at first. At the corner, both stopped and turned as though looking around for something. There was Sali. . .

. . . and there was Sali’s tail. Dressed as a working man, expensively. He’d also appeared out of a pub, Dominic saw. He was indeed a rookie. His eyes were too obviously fixed on the subject, though he did stay back, fifty yards or so, clearly unconcerned about being spotted by his target. Sali was probably not the most alert of subjects, unschooled in counter surveillance. He doubtless thought himself perfectly safe. Probably thought himself pretty clever, too. All men had their illusions. This one’s would prove to be more serious than normal.

The brothers scanned the street. Hundreds of people were in direct view. Lots of cars moving on the street. Visibility was good – a little too good – but Sali was presenting himself to them as though it were deliberate, and it was just too good to pass up . . .

“Plan A, Enzo?” Brian asked quickly. They had three plans thought out, plus the wave-off signal.

“Roger that, Aldo. Let’s do it.” They split up, heading in opposite directions in the hope that Sali would turn toward the pub where they’d endured the bad coffee. Both wore sunglasses to hide the direction of their gaze. In Aldo’s case, this meant the spook who was tailing Sali. It was probably routine as hell for him, something he’d been doing for a few weeks, and you couldn’t do anything that long without settling into a routine, anticipating what your subject was going to do, fixing on him and not scanning the street as you were supposed to do. But he was working in London, maybe his home turf, a place where he figured he knew all that was knowable and had nothing to fear. More dangerous illusions. His only job was to watch a not very intriguing subject in whom Thames House had some unexplained interest. The subject’s habits were well established, and he was not a danger to anyone, at least not on this turf. A spoiled rich kid, that was all. Now he was turning left after crossing the street. Shopping today, it looked like. Shoes for one of his ladies, the Security Service officer surmised. Better presents than he could afford for his significant other, and he was engaged, the spook groused within his own mind.

THEY HADa nice pair of shoes in the window, Sali saw, black leather and gold hardware. He hopped boyishly up onto the curb, then turned left toward the store entrance, smiling in anticipation of the look Rosalie would have in her eyes when she opened the box.

Dominic took out his Chichester map of central London, a small red book that he opened as he walked past the subject, without taking so much as a glance, letting his peripheral vision do the work. His eyes were fixed on the tail. Looked even younger than he and his brother were, probably his first job out of whatever academy the Security Service conducted, assigned to an easy target for that very reason. He’d probably be a little nervous, hence his fixed eyes and balled-fist hands. Dominic hadn’t been all that different only a year or so before, in Newark, young and earnest. Dominic stopped and turned quickly, gauging the distance from Brian to Sali. Brian would be doing exactly the same thing, of course, and his job was to synchronize movement with his brother, who had the lead. Okay. Again his peripheral vision took over, until the last few steps.

Then his eyes fixed on the tail. The Brit’s eyes noted this, and his gaze shifted as well. He stopped almost automatically and heard the Yank tourist ask stupidly: “Excuse me, could you tell me where . . .” He held up his map book to illustrate how lost he was.

BRIAN REACHEDinto his coat pocket and pulled out the gold pen. He twisted the nib and the black point changed to an iridium tip when he pressed down on the obsidian clip. His eyes locked on the subject. At a range of three feet, he took half a step right as though to avoid someone who wasn’t there at all, and bumped into Sali.

“THE TOWERof London. Why, you go right there,” the MI5 guy said, turning to point.

Perfect.

“EXCUSE ME,”Brian said, and let the man pass with a half step to his left, and the pen came down in a backward stabbing motion, and caught the subject square in the right ass cheek. The hollow syringe point penetrated perhaps as much as three millimeters. The CO 2charge fired, injecting its seven milligrams of succinylcholine into the tissue of the largest muscle on Sali’s anatomy. And Brian Caruso kept right on walking.

“OH, THANKS,buddy,” Dominic said, tucking the Chichester’s back into his pocket and taking a step in the proper direction. When he was clear of the tail, he stopped and turned – this was bad tradecraft, and he knew it – to see Brian putting the pen back into his coat pocket. His brother then rubbed his nose in the prearranged signal of MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.

SALI WINCEDever so slightly at the bump or stick – whatever it was – on his ass, but it was nothing serious. His right hand reached back to rub the spot, but the pain faded immediately, and he shrugged it off and kept heading for the shoe store. He took perhaps ten more steps and then he realized–

–his right hand was trembling ever so slightly. He stopped to look at it, reaching over with his left hand–

–that was trembling, too. Why was–

–his legs collapsed under him, and his body fell vertically down to the cement sidewalk. His kneecaps positively bounced on the surface, and they hurt, rather a lot in fact. He tried to take in a deep breath to ward off the pain and the embarrassment–

–but he didn’t breathe. The succinylcholine had fully infused his body now, and had neutralized every nerve muscle interface that existed in his body. The last to go were his eyelids, and Sali, his face now rapidly approaching the sidewalk, didn’t see himself hit. Instead, he was enveloped by blackness – actually, redness from the low-frequency light that penetrated the thin tissue of his eyelids. Very rapidly, his brain was overwhelmed first by the confusion that had to come before panic.

What is this? his mind demanded of itself. He could feel what was happening. His forehead was against the rough surface of semi-finished cement. He could hear the footsteps of people to his left and right. He tried to turn his head – no, first he had to open his eyes–

–but they did not open. What is this?!!! –

–he wasn’t breathing–

–he commanded himself to breathe. As though in a swimming pool underwater, and coming to the surface after holding his breath for an uncomfortably long time, he told his mouth to open and his diaphragm to expand–

– but nothing happened! –

– What is this? his mind shouted at itself.

His body operated on its own programming. As carbon dioxide built up in his lungs, automatic commands went from there to his diaphragm to expand his lungs to take in more air to replace the poison in his lungs. But nothing happened, and, with that bit of information, his body went into panic all by itself. Adrenal glands flooded the bloodstream – the heart was still pumping – with adrenaline, and, with that natural stimulant, his awareness increased and his brain went into overdrive . . .

What is this? Sali asked himself urgently yet again, for now the panic was beginning to take over. His body was betraying him in ways that surpassed imagination. He was suffocating in the dark on a sidewalk in the middle of central London in broad daylight. The overload of CO 2in his lungs did not really cause pain, but his body reported the fact to his mind as such. Something was going very wrong, and it made no sense, like being hit in the street by a lorry – no, like being run over by a lorry in his living room. It was happening too fast for him to grasp it all. It made no sense, and it was so – surprising, astonishing, astounding.