Nick Carter: The Omega Terror

We were crouched behind a rock outcropping about three hundred yards from the lab, the Cit-roen parked close behind us. A dusty, rocky road curved in a wide arch to the gate. A single vulture could be seen flying in a large circle off in the high, cloudless sky to the east.

“Well, we’ll drive back to the clump of trees, where I’ll wait for the barber. If he comes early…”

A sound behind us stopped me. I whirled around, and Gabrielle followed my stare. There, not more than fifty yards away, moving toward us on the road, was a three-man patrol. The small breeze that had come up, had carried the sound of their approach away from us. Now it was too late. The leader of the patrol had spotted us. He was ex-claiming in Arabic and pointing at us.

Gabrielle started a panicky move toward the car, but I grabbed her arm in a hard grip and held her motionless.

“They’ve seen us!” she whispered harshly.

“I know. Sit down and act as calm as you possibly can.” I forced her back to the rock. Then I waved casually toward the small knot of uniformed men as the leader drew a pistol from a belt holster and the other two unslung long rifles.

Then moved toward us warily, looking at the Citrõen with malice. I called out a greeting to them in Arabic as they approached. “Asalaam ‘alaykum!”

They made no response. As they arrived beside the car, I rose to my feet. Gabrielle remained seated. She was hiding the binoculars under her full skirt.

“What are you doing in this place?” the leader of the squad asked in thick-accented English, his broad face full of hostility.

This was a very bad development and rotten luck. I tried to keep the disappointment out of my face. “We were just out for a drive in the country,” I said. The two other soldiers were already peering suspiciously into the Citrõen. “I hope we’re not on private property.”

The man with the pistol looked over at Gabrielle without answering me, while the soldiers with the rifles moved closer, forming a semicircle around us. In a moment the stocky one in charge turned back to me arrogantly.

“You choose a bad place, I think.” He waved the pistol toward the facility. “It is prohibited to be here.”

I glanced casually toward the building. “Oh, really? We had no idea. We’ll leave immediately.” I extended my hand to Gabrielle to pull her to her feet and saw her move the binoculars under some dry brush as she rose.

“Let me see I.D.,” the stocky soldier said to me.

“I.D.?” I said. “What the devil for? I told you we’re just out for a ride.” I was tensing inside. This man had been told to be suspicion of everybody found on his patrol, and looked as if he’d make trouble.

He raised the muzzle of the pistol until it pointed to a spot just over my heart. The other two tightened their grips on their rifles. “I.D., please,” he repeated.

I reached into my pocket and withdrew my wallet with phony identification in it. I offered the wallet to him, and he examined the cards while the other two men continued to hold the rifles on us. My mind was working overtime. There was Gabrielle to worry about. I would not have brought her even this far, but I wanted her to know where the laboratory was located. Also, if one of these guns went off, even if we were not killed, everybody at the facility would be alerted.

“Interesting,” the broad man was saying now. He looked up at me suspiciously, then pocketed my wallet. “You will come with us.”

“Where?” I asked.

He pointed to the lab. “They will want to ask you questions.”

I wanted in, but not this way. And certainly not with Gabrielle along. I looked at the pistol pointed at my chest. “This is an outrage,” I said. “I have friends in Tangier.”

The smug look was offensive. “Nevertheless,” he said. He turned to one of the soldiers and spoke in swift Arabic. He was telling the man to go back down the road to see if there was anyone else about. The soldier turned and moved off in the opposite direction from the lab. “Now, come,” the stocky one said.

I sighed and motioned for Gabrielle to follow his orders. This was tricky. If we moved more than ten yards down the dusty road toward the lab, we would be in clear view of the gate, where there were armed guards.

As Gabrielle started to walk toward the buildings, I stopped her with a hand on her arm and turned back to the stocky, leathery-faced soldier.

“Are you familiar with General Djenina?” I said to him, knowing that Djenina had been his commander.

“Yes,” he said in a surly tone.

“The general is a good friend of mine,” I lied, watching the third soldier disappear slowly around the bend in the road. “If you insist on taking us to this place for questioning, I will speak to him personally. It will not go well with you, I assure you.”

That made him think a moment. I saw the soldier beside him look questioningly into his face. Then the stocky man made up his mind.

“It is the general’s specific orders that we are following,” he said. His hand waved toward the facility. “Please.”

I made a movement as if to step past him to the road. When I was close beside him, I suddenly slammed the heel of my hand down onto his arm.

He uttered a small cry of surprise, and his pistol thumped to the sand at our feet. I jammed an elbow into his chest and he gasped loudly. He went stumbling backward and sat down hard on the ground, his jaw working as he struggled to pull air into his lungs.

The other soldier, a tall, thin young man, raised his rifle so that it almost touched my chest. He was going to blow a hole through my middle. I heard a small gasp from Gabrielle behind me. I grabbed at the muzzle end of the rifle, and before the young Arab could squeeze the trigger I pulled hard on the barrel of the gun. The soldier came flying off his feet past me, hitting the ground on his face and losing the rifle. He was just struggling to rise when I brought the stock end of the gun down onto the back of his skull. There was an audible cracking of bone as the fellow slumped back to the ground, motionless.

I was about to turn around when the stocky leader came at me, crashing into my chest with his head down. He was a tough one. I lost the rifle as we went down together. We rolled in the dust and sand, his thick fingers gouging at my face and eyes. I smashed a right fist into his face, and he lost his grip on me and fell to the ground. I got to my knees and looked around for the rifle to use as a club, but he was on me in a second.

I struggled up with him on my back, punching and tearing at me. I spun around in a tight circle and threw him against the rock outcropping near us. He thumped hard against the stone, and an involuntary grunt came from his throat his grip on me loosened as I threw my arm around into his face.

He slumped heavily against the rock, his broad face bloody. But he was not finished. He swung a fist at my head, and it glanced off at the temple. I moved a muscle in my right forearm, and Hugo slid into my hand. As the man flailed another fist at me, I thrust the stiletto into his chest.

He stared at me in surprise, then looked down at the handle of the knife. He tried to say something nasty in Arabic, but not much came out. I withdrew the stiletto as ho slumped to the ground— very dead.

I pulled the two Arabs behind the rocks, hiding the bodies. “Get in the car, Gabrielle. I want you to follow me,” I said. “Wait ten minutes, then drive slowly along the road till you spot me. Okay?”

She nodded.

I left her and went after the third soldier. I jogged along the road in the brightening sun, watching ahead of me. In just a few minutes I found him. He had checked the road as far as he thought was necessary and had just turned back toward the lab. I flattened myself behind a rise of ground to the left of the road and caught him as he passed. I grabbed him from behind and drew the stiletto across his throat in one quick movement It was all over. By the time I had hidden this body, Gabrielle was there with the Citrõen.