Беар Гриллс - The Hunt [=The Devil's Sanctuary]

A thought struck him, as horrific as it was dark. If Narov was about to get captured, would he shoot her himself? He just didn’t know. All he could do was live the mission with one hundred per cent focus.

Finding this shitty drainage ditch was crucial.

By rights, it should lie just a few feet in front of them. Jaeger went down on one knee, turning to Narov. Their eyes met across the darkness. They didn’t need to speak. Her expression echoed what he felt. This is hellish, but it’s what we came here for. Just do it.

They turned to face Dodge Central, settling down to observe. Being watchful was everything. They squatted shoulder to shoulder, rock still and utterly focused.

Jaeger’s legs and back were soaked with perspiration, but worse were the mosquitoes. He was being eaten alive. There was nothing he could do about that. Sudden movement would be a dead giveaway. Swatting at a cloud of buzzing, biting insects was likely to invite a hail of bullets.

‘Two o’clock,’ Narov hissed. ‘Car. Hazards on.’

‘Seen.’

Hammering down the main drag was a pickup truck, lights blaring. It had to mean something. But what? Was that code to get the narco gunmen on standby when a hostile force had been spotted? Or was the driver signalling that more bales of cocaine were needed at the airstrip?

No way of knowing.

Keep watchful.

Silent.

The preep-preep of cicadas echoed deafeningly in Jaeger’s ears. It provided the bass track to the heartbeat of Dodge: the pulse of the Latino dance tracks that were being pumped out with increasing gusto from the nearest of the bars.

‘Eleven o’clock,’ Narov hissed. ‘Airstrip. Movement.’

Jaeger swung his eyes around. Sure enough, a group of males were milling about on one side of the dirt strip. He counted around three dozen, all armed. Question was, what were they there for? To usher in a narco flight, or to mount up the gun trucks and come racing after Jaeger and his team?

He couldn’t believe that they’d been detected, but it was crucial to be ready. Fail to prepare, prepare to fail.

Jaeger signalled to Narov that they should move. In a low crouch, and hugging the earth, he turned north, creeping towards the dark heart of Dodge. The nearest buildings were no more than fifty feet away. His every sense was projected forward, focused on the potential threat.

As a result, he almost tumbled into the ditch.

He regained his balance at the last moment, then tentatively eased his leading foot forward, advancing with the slow, calculated movements of a predator. Ahead of him yawned a dark pit maybe five feet wide. He flicked his eyes down its length: it stretched dead straight right into the heart of Dodge.

As Raff had suggested, perfect cover for executing a CTR.

Two things struck Jaeger. First, the smell. He twitched his nostrils: something distinctly chemical, mixed with the rank scent of stagnant water and human faeces. Second, the lack of any noticeable reflection. A patch of still water normally mirrored the moon, stars or street lighting. Here, there was nothing. The ditch had to be coated in a thick scum.

Jaeger pulled out a scarf made of a light khaki cotton, brought with him for this very purpose. On an Afghan mission in 2001, his SAS squadron had been tasked to snatch an HVT – high-value target – from a heavily defended compound. A veritable fortress.

They’d needed a way in that would take the defenders by utter surprise. As a captain commanding D Squadron’s mountain troop, Jaeger had chosen what he deemed was the best option: a sewer of sorts; an open ditch that ran beneath one of the walls, emptying into a river. The lads hadn’t thanked him for that one.

Before entering, they had wrapped their faces in shemags; traditional Arab headscarves. It had helped filter out the stench. He and Narov did the same now. When they were done, only their eyes showed above the swathe of cloth.

Without a word, Jaeger turned, placed his hands on the side of the ditch and lowered himself in.

The crawl through the ditch had been grim, even by Jaeger’s standards.

For the most part he’d been fighting back the gag reflex, as unidentified things bobbed and hissed on the rank surface. There was one upside: this place had to be so toxic that nothing else would surely venture into its putrid depths.

Jaeger dreaded to think what prolonged immersion was doing to him and Narov. They were probably going to grow an extra head. But there had been no other way.

He figured the ditch served a dual purpose: it was Dodge City’s main sewer and drain, plus the coca refineries dumped their used chemicals here. Though it was largely stagnant, he figured there had to be a net outflow at the far end, where the toxic crap drained into the jungle.

But right now his senses were focused very much elsewhere.

Inch by inch he raised his head towards the lip of the ditch. The noise here was deafening: to his right, the bars were cranking out the Latino beat. He could feel the sound waves pulsing through the shitty water.

As he slipped above the lip, he sensed Narov right beside him. Two heads emerged into the open, two sets of eyes behind gaping gun barrels. Each chose a 180-degree arc to scan.

No doubt about it: they had penetrated into the very heart of El Padre’s narco fortress. All around them were the sounds, sights and smells of the place.

It had taken almost an hour to reach this point; it was approaching midnight, and Dodge was busy. Loud drunken laughter rang across the water. Crowds surged back and forth from bar to bar. Neon signs flashed their gaudy glare. Engines revved and horns blared as a pickup forced its way through.

Jaeger and Narov kept up a whispered commentary to each other.

‘Warehouse, nine o’clock, one hundred yards,’ Narov noted. To her left lay one of the massive buildings they figured were the cocaine refineries. ‘I see a gun truck pulling up. Six guys in the rear.’

‘Weapons?’

‘Longs. All of them.’

Jaeger swivelled his eyes around his 180-degree arc. Where the hell should he start? Narov had the easy bit: she was checking south, over the warehouse district and airstrip. He was gazing north, into Dodge’s chaotic drink- and drug-fuelled heart of darkness.

The nearest bar was maybe thirty yards away. It was made of galvanised iron, and Jaeger could see where a set of speakers were bolted to the roof, belting out the party beat. The neon beer-bottle sign pulsed with the throb of a generator, the strength of the current matching the thud of the engine.

Out front, a crowd swayed to the music. It was almost exclusively male, and all were clutching beer bottles; most also sported a sidearm. From the steps, a woman in a very short skirt yelled taunts at them. Jaeger figured she was trying to drum up custom.

He was about to start relating all of this to Narov when a series of shots rang out. Jaeger forced his head into the dirt, his mind processing the sound: low-velocity rounds, 9mm for sure. Pistol shots. Which more than likely spelled trouble at the bar. Sure enough, a series of hollow thuds and angry yells rang out as the narcos started beating the crap out of each other.

Jaeger raised his head again and eyed the scene. ‘Bar brawl. Four o’clock. I figured you got that. Plus I got a pickup incoming, with what look like enforcers. I got—’

More gunshots. Jaeger hit the dirt again and froze, face scrunched into the mud. Those had been high-velocity rounds from an assault rifle. Most likely an AK-47. They’d sounded up close and personal. The only thing he could do now was keep utterly still, and use his sense of hearing to try to work out what the hell was going on.

Yelled orders drifted across from the direction of the bar, punctuated by the crunch of rifle butts on human flesh. From the sound of things, the brawling had come to an abrupt halt.