‘I’ll get Daniel Brooks up to speed immediately,’ Miles announced. ‘We’ll have the CIA and every other intelligence agency begin the search. We’ll—’
‘Whoa, whoa, whoa.’ Jaeger held up his hands for silence. ‘Just a second.’ He shook his head, trying to clear it. He’d just been struck by an ultimate moment of clarity, and he had to capture it; to crystallise it fully.
He glanced around at his team, his gaze burning with an impossible excitement. ‘We already have it. The cure. Or the source of the cure.’
Brows furrowed. What the hell was Jaeger talking about?
‘The kid. The slum kid. Simon Chucks Bello. He survived. He survived because Kammler’s people inoculated him. He’s immune. He has that immunity in his blood. We have the kid, or rather Dale does. Through him we can isolate the source of the immunity. Culture it. Mass-produce it. The kid is the answer.’
As he saw the realisation – the blinding flash of understanding – firing off in the eyes of his team, Jaeger felt a new-found burst of energy burning through his system.
He locked eyes with Miles. ‘We need to get the Wildcat airborne again. Contact Dale. Get him to move the kid somewhere we can fly in and pick them up. Get them away from any crowded beaches, on to a stretch of easily accessible sand.’
‘Understood. You’ll be bringing them back here directly, I take it?’
‘We will. But tell them to stay under cover, in case Kammler’s watching. He’s been one step ahead of us all the way. We can’t allow him to be this time.’
‘I’ll launch both Taranis. Get them orbiting over Dale’s location. That way you’ll have cover.’
‘Do that. Radio us their pickup coordinates once you have them. Just give us a distance due north or south along the beach from Amani itself, and we’ll know where to put down. Tell Dale not to show himself until he can see the whites of our eyes.’
‘Understood. Leave it to me.’
Jaeger led his team in a rush for the Airlander’s hold. He grabbed the Wildcat’s pilot. ‘We need you to turn your ship around. Make for an area called Ras Kutani. Should be pretty much due west of here. We’re going to do a pickup from a resort called Amani Beach.’
‘Give me five,’ the pilot replied, ‘and we’re good to go.’
86
The three Nissan Patrol 4x4s tore southwards, their massive tyres juddering like machine guns as they ripped across the ridged surface of the rough, unmade dirt road. Behind them they threw up a huge plume of dust, which would be visible from miles around – that was if anyone was watching.
In the passenger seat of the lead vehicle sat the hulking form of Steve Jones, his shaven head gleaming in the early-morning light. He felt his cell phone vibrate. They were barely thirty kilometres out from the airport, and thankfully they still had a good mobile signal.
‘Jones.’
‘You’re how long to Amani?’ a voice demanded. Kammler.
‘Twenty minutes, at the most.’
‘Too long,’ he snapped. ‘It can’t wait.’
‘What can’t wait?’
‘I’ve got a Reaper drone overhead, and it’s picked up a Wildcat chopper inbound. Fast. Maybe five minutes out. It might be nothing, but I can’t risk it.’
‘What’re you suggesting?’
‘I’m going to hit the resort. Amani. And I’ll earmark a first Hellfire for the Wildcat.’
Steve Jones paused for an instant. Even he was shocked by what he’d just heard. ‘But we’re almost there. Fifteen minutes if we really push it. Just hit the helo.’
‘Can’t risk it.’
‘But you can’t just take out a beach resort. It’ll be full of tourists.’
‘I’m not seeking your advice,’ Kammler snarled. ‘I’m warning you what’s about to happen.’
‘You’ll bring seven tons of shit down on our heads.’
‘Then get in and out fast. Kill the kid and anyone who gets in your way. This is Africa, remember. And in Africa the cavalry takes a long time to arrive, if ever. Do it right and you’ll get your biggest ever payday. Do it wrong, and I’ll deal with it by Reaper alone.’
The call went dead. Jones glanced around, somewhat apprehensively. He was starting to get the sense that he was working for some kind of power-crazed lunatic. Deputy director of the CIA or not, Kammler was a law unto himself.
But the money was good. Too good to complain.
He’d never earned so much for doing so little. Plus Kammler had offered him a double-pay bonus on proof of death; proof that the kid had been terminated.
Jones was determined to earn it all.
Anyway, Kammler was probably right. Who was going to rush to investigate, this far out in the African bush? By the time anyone bothered, he and his crew would be long gone.
He turned to his driver. ‘That was the boss. Get a move on. We need to be there like bastard yesterday.’
The driver floored the accelerator. The needle crept up to 60 m.p.h. The big Nissan felt as if it were about to tear itself apart on the uneven surface of the dirt road.
Jones didn’t give a damn. It wasn’t his problem.
They were hire vehicles.
87
Kicking up a wind-whipped plume of ocean spray, the Wildcat put down on the damp sand. The tide was receding, and the beach was at its firmest where it was soaked with water.
The pilot kept the rotors turning as Jaeger, Narov, Raff, James, Kamishi and Alonzo piled off. They’d landed amongst the most stunning of landscapes. Dale had led the kid south, until they’d rounded a rocky headland taking them out of sight of Amani resort itself. Here, the low cliffs dropped abruptly into the sea, the red rock being cut into a series of dramatic wave-sculpted forms.
They fanned out into defensive positions, taking cover behind the rocky outcrops. Jaeger dashed forward. A figure came running out to meet him. It was Dale, and beside him was the distinctive form of the kid.
Simon Chucks Bello: the most wanted person in the world right now.
After a few days at Amani, the kid’s hair looked even wilder, stiffened by exposure to salt, sand and sun. He was wearing faded shorts that were two sizes too big for him, plus a pair of shades that Jaeger figured he’d borrowed off Dale.
Simon Chucks Bello was one cool dude. And he didn’t have a clue how important he was to all of humankind right now.
Jaeger was about to scoop him up and run him the fifty metres to the waiting chopper, when a chill froze him to the bone. With zero warning, something tore apart the mist of sea spray swirling above the Wildcat’s rotors, the scream of its descent ripping into Jaeger’s consciousness.
The missile ploughed into the roof of the Wildcat, ripping open the thin skin like a tin-opener. It detonated in a blinding flash, a storm of red-hot shrapnel slicing through the helo’s hold and piercing the twin fuel tanks. They ignited, punching a dragon’s breath of fiery death through the disintegrating fuselage.
Jaeger stared, transfixed, as the plume of destruction tore upwards and outwards, the noise of its eruption pounding into his ears and echoing back and forth across the seashore.
It was all over in less than a second.
He’d called in enough Hellfire strikes to recognise the high-pitched, tortured wolf-howl of the missile. He and his team – and Simon Chucks Bello – were the target of one right now, which meant there had to be a Reaper overhead.
‘HELLFIRE!’ he screamed. ‘Get back! Get under the trees!’
He dived into some thick vegetation, dragging the kid and Dale with him. Unsurprisingly, Simon Chucks Bello was wide-eyed and frozen with fear, his pupils dilated to an impossible size.
‘Keep hold of the kid!’ Jaeger yelled at Dale. ‘Calm him. And whatever you do, do not lose him.’