David Leadbeater - Weapons of the Gods

“You haven’t heard it yet.”

“I know, but when you said you had a plan, I knew we were in deep shit.”

“Am I the only one wondering why this guy’s here?” Drake asked.

“Deserters end up all over the world,” Alicia responded. “And so do war heroes that can’t cope.”

“Two opposite ends of the spectrum right there,” Drake said.

“Don’t judge anyone, Drake,” Mai said. “You should know that, my friend. Smile and accept how people are, even if you don’t like it, because there could be a pain lying behind their eyes that you could never imagine.”

Drake inclined his head, acknowledging the small reprimand. In truth, this situation was different, but many people kept their own demons barely leashed and there were far worse things than being shot at.

“Not happy,” he said grumpily.

“Well, that’s because Dahl chose you to be the decoy.”

“Yeah, and why’s that? I think he’s been secretly scoffing down on the sausage sarnies.”

Alicia glared. “Don’t be mean. If Dahl’s comfort eating it’s because of that Kenzie bitch.”

“You two still not getting along?” Mai asked sweetly. “Funny that you see every other female as a challenge, Taz.”

“Not you, Little Sprite. You’re less of a challenge, more of an experiment.”

Mai stiffened, fists clenching. Drake got between them. “Stop it,” he said. “Get used to our situation being awkward, and move on. And besides, I’m more worried about being in the middle of you two than I am being a decoy.”

“Good to hear that,” Dahl said over the comms. “Because it’s time to go.”

Drake stared at the women, then shook his head. “Bloody comms.”

Alicia looked like she didn’t care, and Mai was already getting down to business. The trio waited inside the hide, waiting for the moment to leave. It came quick, with Dahl and Luther peppering the valley rim with bullets. Drake raced out and to the right, head down and keeping his center of gravity low. The sniper only had time to squeeze one wild shot off, the bullet flashing past Drake’s left, before Molokai and Kinimaka opened fire from elsewhere, using the cache they had found in the hidden cave.

Bullets snarled up the hillside near where the sniper lay, huge gouts of grass and clods of dirt erupting several feet into the air. Drake gained the far slope and raced upward, leaping from mound to mound. Molokai and Luther kept firing and then Hayden’s voice barked loudly in their ears.

“Out of the cave! Out of the hide! Get away now.”

It was expected. They couldn’t be sure that the sniper hadn’t booby-trapped his belongings, so they played it safe and got clear. They hauled ass around the valley rim, heading for Drake. The Yorkshireman gained the top of the slope, finding level ground — the sniper could be anywhere from thirty steps ahead of him to a hundred. So far, he had seen nothing.

Tricky.

Alicia and Mai jumped out of the hide and made their way to the valley floor, one spotting and the other firing. They were Drake’s best hope of staying alive.

He continued at speed, handgun drawn in case he needed to adjust quickly. From left to right, the terrain looked the same. It was a surprise then when the flat earth itself shifted ten meters in front of him, and he understood what he had to do.

Dug himself a hide, and then a small tunnel to the edge of the valley from where he sees all. Ingenious.

It would be the man’s downfall. And this was no capture mission. They didn’t have the time; other weapons were out there and the murdered souls of the Enlargo sure as hell wouldn’t mind. Drake plucked two grenades from his webbing and launched them into the air.

“Heads up,” he told the team and rolled to the ground.

Two explosions and a large displacement of earth followed. Drake saw a figure caught in the wave of soil that spilled down the slope. He was on his feet before the upwelling had even reached its zenith, racing toward the valley rim, showered by falling dirt. Others stood at the edge and in the lee of the valley. Alicia and Mai dashed toward the explosion.

Drake scrambled down. Upturned earth lay everywhere, in piles and in pouring rivulets. A figure was struggling amongst it, a figure covered in earth and wearing camo fatigues. Drake grabbed him, spied his weapon, and threw it aside before hauling the man upright.

A fist connected with his nose, staggering him. He hadn’t expected a man who’d just been blown up and fallen over five meters to be quite so spry. He brandished his handgun but the man ignored it, too far gone to care. Drake saw only the whites of his eyes as he leapt, but heard the report of Alicia’s gun. The bullet struck the man in the ribs, sending him to the ground. Drake took aim between the eyes.

“Stay down, pal. You have any friends out there?”

A heavy wheeze was all he got in return. Everything pointed to this man being a loner, though — from the single size and style of clothes, the utensils and old photographs they had found in the cave to the solitary weapon that had been firing at them. Alicia and Mai arrived and stared down at him.

“What’s your name?” the Englishwoman asked.

Mai bent down and held her hand over the bullet wound, trying to staunch the flow. Her face betrayed the knowledge in her brain. When Hayden and the others ran up she shook her head.

“I… I am…” The sniper seemed to be trying to make an effort to sit up.

“What is it?” Mai supported him with her body.

“George… Mclean…” he said, in pain. “SBS. I’m glad you came.”

Drake felt surprise. “How the hell did you end up here?”

But Mclean was fading. Mai held him as life drained from his body but he did manage a few more words. “The things I saw… I had to get away. It… changed me. No help. Sailed here… and stayed.”

The body slumped; Mai let him fall to the floor. The team stared at him and away from him, thinking of all the crimes of war and the sins of the war makers. It was hard to feel sorry for a killer, but maybe they could feel sorry for the man he’d been before being ordered to a distant battlefield.

“Let’s go,” Hayden said. “Back to the chopper.”

“What about the bodies?” Mai asked, meaning the Enlargo crew.

“We’ll call it in, of course,” Hayden said. “But right now, we have to get the key back to Cambridge.”

The network they had set up involved a hand-picked SAS team and several contacts placed around the world. SPEAR would hand off the artifact to the SAS who would then dispatch one man to place it in the hands of a facilitator, someone with the resources to get it sent back to the UK, where Cambridge would store it at a secret location. The network were very hands on — and known to each other, friends from way back. As Cambridge said — a small net of trusted individuals, some relationships stretching back to school years, was the most appropriate and beneficial thing he could offer them.

The pilot fired up the helicopter as the team climbed aboard. Drake saw the stress carved into everyone’s face. Yes, they had taken the prize today but were left with conflicting emotions around what they had seen and heard. As the chopper took flight and the island began to recede, Luther walked over to his pack and pulled out a bottle of rum.

“I think we all need this.”

As they headed for the rendezvous with the SAS team, Hayden sought to distract her colleagues with talk of the weapons of the gods, and what, if any, significance they might have. She pulled out the Key of Hades and turned it around and around in her hands.

“You know what gets me?” Alicia said briefly. “Clearly, that thing is a key and fashioned to fit into something. I mean, what could it be?”