Mark Abernethy - Double back

‘I’m going to give it another half-hour, Robbo,’ said Mac into his mouthpiece, as they sweated in the bushes. ‘Then we’ll take some pics and move on.’

‘Check that, Macca,’ came Robbo’s voice on the radio. ‘We’ve got activity up here – helos coming in from the east.’

‘Fuck,’ muttered Mac, deciding they would not be going into the hangars today. ‘Okay – we’ll see you in five. We’re pulling the pin.’

Taking the long way around the western end of the dusty old runway, the three of them stealthed through the jungle. As they rounded the end of the runway, they heard the thromp of incoming helicopters and watched the first of them land on the apron in front of the admin block. Setting on their way again, they jogged through the jungle in the thirty-seven-degree heat as Robbo gave them updates on the aircraft.

Arriving back at the observation post, Mac collapsed to his knees beside Robbo, who was lying on his stomach, field-glasses to his eyes.

‘Take a look at this, Macca,’ he said after a while, rolling to his side and offering the binos.

Lying down beside the soldiers, Mac rested the glasses on his elbows and looked at the site from the reverse of where he’d been trying to enter. Along the bright lime runway were scattered years’ worth of broken planes, hoists, trucks and an old Euclid road grader with its cables snapped, long abandoned to the weeds. It felt like a Cold War-era facility, built with American money back when the CIA wanted Soekarno out, and Soeharto running the show.

Parked on the main apron in front of the airfield admin block, Mac counted seven Black Hawk helicopters, flight crews wandering towards the admin block in grey overalls. Mac focused the lenses of the field-glasses, looking closer.

‘Robbo, what’s the Indonesian Army helicopter of choice?’ he asked, scanning each aircraft and verifying they were all Black Hawks.

‘Hueys, made under licence,’ said Robbo.

‘So what do you make of this little squadron?’

‘Contractors?’ said Robbo, more of a question than an answer. ‘UN?’

‘Not UN,’ said Mac.

Pulling the Nikon digital camera from his bag, Mac fired it up and checked the settings. The hangars he’d wanted to investigate were directly across from where he lay, and bringing the viewfinder to his eye, Mac increased the zoom of the camera into the gloom of the buildings. There were twenty large spray booms of the type he’d seen used in agricultural projects, lined up in rows. Refilling tanks sat behind them. It explained to Mac the presence of the non-Indonesian helicopters – spraying contractors, probably for a mosquito-eradication program. He’d seen this occur many times in Asia – a foreign organisation would put up the money for a public works project and the local military commanders would win the contract to carry out the work through their own regimental corporations. At least Haryono was using contracted helicopters, thought Mac; in the Philippines the commanders would use military helicopters but pocket the fee themselves.

Taking a few shots of the helicopters, Mac was frustrated with the angle they’d been parked at, since the sun’s reflection meant he couldn’t get a proper shot of their registrations. There was something familiar about them, even given their anonymity.

A new sound grew from the south and a small dark helicopter appeared on the horizon, its Indonesian Army markings evident. A cloud of lime dust flew into the still air as the helo touched down and then military people from the admin building were surrounding it.

‘Wonder who the VIP is?’ asked Mac.

‘Dunno,’ said Robbo, ‘but he must be important.’

‘Sorry?’ said Mac as a large Javanese man in a white trop shirt and black slacks stepped out of the helo with two young men following, and shook hands with a wearer of fruit salad.

‘Last week the boys followed one of those mule lines that cross the river,’ whispered Robbo. ‘It led here.’

‘That so?’ asked Mac, as the VIP in the trop shirt looked around, his hand resting on the lower back of one of the young men.

‘You’d like to see what’s in those packs?’ said Robbo.

‘It’s about time,’ agreed Mac, as the VIP turned and Mac released the shutter on the camera. He was looking at Ishy Haryono.

The photographs were transmitted inside of three minutes. Mac had heard about the joys of digital imaging but he had no idea it would be so easy. All he’d done was plug the camera into the sat phone, dial the number Jim had preprogrammed into the phone, and the contents were downloading into DIA’s computers.

‘So, you want to have a look into this VIP?’ asked Robbo, nodding at the helos in front of the airfield’s admin building.

‘Ideally, yes,’ said Mac, annoyed with himself for having already spent so much time at this airfield. ‘But we’ve got the Lombok recon and then we have to be out of Dodge, with the girl, by Sunday – I think we’ll push on.’

Mac didn’t want to become sidetracked by the sighting of Haryono. If Operasi Boa was a part of a deportation program, then it wasn’t being hatched from this airfield. He had no doubt that Haryono was a potential drug lord and that he used this airfield for taking money and distributing his product – but that was a matter for the police.

‘You said those boys with their packs come here?’ said Mac. ‘And based on the pattern, we’re expecting the full mule line to be here tomorrow?’ asked Mac.

‘Sure are,’ said Robbo.

‘Let’s keep that in mind,’ said Mac. ‘If we cross paths it’d be good to have a nosey-poke.’

As he shifted to leave, Robbo put a hand out. ‘Actually, Macca, we have a situation.’

‘Yeah?’ asked Mac.

‘We’ve detained a local,’ Robbo said, embarrassed. ‘Well, two actually.’

‘Shit, Robbo!’ barked Mac, too many pressures to juggle already.

‘Yeah – Didge was taking a pee and someone walked into him.’

‘Jesus wept!’ said Mac, adrenaline rising. ‘Where? Where’s Didge?’

‘Back there.’ Robbo gestured with his thumb.

Thirty metres into the jungle, Mac and Robbo came into a copse where the 63 Recon Troop stood around two boys in their early teens. Mac and Robbo edged into the circle and listened to Johnno talking Bahasa Indonesia with them.

‘Johnno?’ said Robbo, and indicated for him to let Mac closer to the kids.

‘Found this,’ said Toolie, handing Robbo one of the boy’s packs.

Robbo looked inside, pulled out a plastic bag, and threw it to Mac, who knew what it was before he even caught it. The clear plastic was filled with US greenbacks and the Cambodian stamp would translate as ‘Vacation Palace’.

Mac didn’t ask too many questions before the boy wearing the San Francisco 49ers T-shirt started crying.

‘Rodrigo says he never wanted to do it. He says his brother talked him into carrying these packs for the Koreans,’ said Johnno. ‘Apparently the Koreans give the packs to the mules, then they are paid at the airfield base, one dollar US per run.’

Ruffling Rodrigo’s hair, Mac switched his attention to Yohannnes, who looked cockier than his friend.

‘How’s your English, Yohannes?’ asked Mac.

‘Okay, mister,’ said the boy, scared but showing more front than his companion.

‘Where you come from today?’ asked Mac.

‘Atambua, last night,’ said the boy.

‘Who gave you the bag?’ asked Mac, bending down for his rucksack.

‘Korea,’ said Yohannes. ‘Always Korea.’

‘What does Korea say?’ said Mac, opening his rucksack and putting his hand inside.

‘He say, Take this to there, ’ said Yohannes, eyes lighting up as Mac pulled the pack of Hershey bars out of his rucksack.