He untied the rear flap, slid his legs over the edge and lowered himself down. As he turned sideways to fit between the two trucks, an odd sensation came over him, like dizziness or vertigo. Perhaps he’d been sitting too long. Perhaps the lack of water had begun to affect his balance.
He put a hand on the hood of the second truck, steadied himself and let go. He edged out into the space between the two rows of vehicles. The rigs were parked so tightly, they’d had to fold in their mirrors to stop them from breaking off.
With just enough room to walk between the rows, Joe headed toward the end of the rows of trucks and what he assumed was the door through which they’d come in.
The vertigo hit him again and he felt his knees almost buckle. He began to fear some of the microbots had gotten out of the barrels and into his ears. That was the problem with things too small to see: one never knew where they were.
“A Q-Tip,” he mumbled, rubbing his ear, “my kingdom for a Q-Tip.”
His balance came back and he moved another step. This time the sensation came quicker, more pronounced and smoother somehow. Joe felt it in his legs and felt it in his neck as if he was being pushed back and forth. He heard a creaking sound.
He held as still as possible. The sensation repeated itself yet again. It wasn’t his imagination. It wasn’t vertigo. It wasn’t even the bots, throwing off his balance. The feeling was real and extremely familiar.
His heart began to pump. He moved faster, slipping between the trucks, his feet sliding across the metal floor. By the time he reached the steel door at the end of the rows he could feel the floor moving beneath his feet in a slowly repeating pattern, smooth and steady, up and down.
The sound of a foghorn far above confirmed what Joe already knew.
He was on a ship of some kind, not parked in a warehouse. The odd sensation beneath his feet was the deck moving on what he could only assume to be a freighter of some kind riding out past a breakwater and into the swells at an angle.
The deck rose and fell and also pitched and twisted. The movements weren’t pronounced, just enough to throw him off in the darkness, but they were unmistakable now.
Joe found the latch to the rear door. It was bolted heavy and tight.
He recalled his boast to Kurt. There are only so many roads and so many places a truck can go from here.
Yeah, he thought. Unless you put the truck on a ship. Then it can pretty much go anywhere.
CHAPTER 33
KURT AUSTIN WAS TRAPPED IN THE LAVATORY. HE’D SNUCK aboard the plane with the most equipment and the fewest of Jinn’s men milling around and had hidden himself in the small facility near the front of the cargo compartment. After drinking a dozen cupped handfuls of water from the small faucet, he’d stepped up on the toilet so no one could see his feet.
With the curtain drawn, he waited and listened. Crates and big stacks of equipment were loaded aboard and lashed down. He heard swearing as something heavy was dropped and then the voices of the pilots as they climbed up a small ladder and entered the flight deck.
Eventually he’d heard the sound of harsher voices ordering someone around. In response, a woman’s voice said in American English; “Okay, okay. Stop pushing me.”
Kurt felt certain it was the woman from the hall, who he believed to be Kimo’s sister. At least he’d chosen the right plane.
A few minutes later the aircraft had sprung to life. With Kurt holding on and trying desperately not to slip from his perch, the Russian transport/flying boat taxied onto the runway, ran its engines up to full power and accelerated down the surprisingly rough lake bed. The takeoff seemed to last forever, and Kurt was glad when the plane finally clawed its way into the air.
Based on the slow pace of the climb and the length of the roll out, they had to be fully loaded and heavy with fuel. That meant a long journey.
In a way, that played into his hands. Sooner or later someone would have to go to the bathroom. If it was Leilani, he would get a chance to talk with her. If it was one of the pilots, he would stick the pistol in the man’s face and take over the plane. If it was one of Leilani’s guards, it would be the last thing the man ever did.
As it turned out, one of Jinn’s guards was the first to feel the call.
Two hours into the flight, Kurt heard the man’s boots clunking toward him from the rear of the aircraft. He put the pistol away, pulled out the knife and pressed himself as far to the side as possible in the closet-sized space.
The man grabbed the curtain, yanked it aside but didn’t step in.
Kurt had the knife out ready to strike, but the guy was looking back down the aisle of the plane, shouting some joke to his comrade and laughing at his own words even as he spoke.
Finally he turned and stepped in. Kurt grabbed him, wrapped a hand around his face, clamping it over his mouth, as he drove the knife into his back just below the nape of his neck.
With the spinal column severed, the man went limp. Kurt held him up and turned him, keeping his mouth covered until he sensed no breath coming forth. Gently, he sat the man down on the toilet seat and stared into his eyes. The light was gone from them.
He pulled the knife out. No reaction.
Kurt hated killing, but there was no grounds for mercy here. Only one side would get off the plane alive: either Jinn’s men or he and Leilani.
Recognizing the thug as the one who’d driven the truck that dragged him and Joe across the desert, Kurt felt a little less remorse. The next stage in the plan was more complicated. To begin with, blood was everywhere. Kurt used the man’s head covering to staunch the flow and eased him back against the bulkhead, wedging him into the space.
He gauged the man as roughly similar to him in size and shape, and they wore similar uniforms, but there was one glaring difference: the thug had thin black hair, Kurt’s hair was thick and steel gray.
With few other options, Kurt chose to wet his hair down and press it flat to his head. It was dark and cold and tremendously noisy in the plane. And who would suspect trouble at thirty thousand feet anyway?
He figured the other guy had seen his friend walk to the head. He would have to look really closely notto see his friend coming back a few minutes later.
Kurt pulled the curtain and prepared to play his gambit. Just in case, he held the knife concealed in his hand.
He stepped out of the lavatory and marched confidently back toward Leilani and the remaining guard. It was easier than he thought. The hold was filled with equipment. At least two of the rigid inflatable boats he’d seen and, more ominously, racks of what looked like handheld ground-to-air missiles.
But the clutter left only a small space for the passengers. Leilani and the guard were sitting across from each other in foldout seats that attached to the aircraft’s walls.
The most cursory of glances was all the guard gave him. He then leaned his head back against the headrest on the side of the plane and shut his eyes.
Even Leilani had her eyes closed.
After all, it was the middle of the night, and even with the pressurization of the cargo hold the air was still thin and dry, most likely set to an altitude nine thousand feet or so. That kind of air had a way of making people drowsy even if it was all but impossible to really sleep in such conditions.
Kurt sat down a foot from the guard, right across from Leilani. He switched from the knife to the gun once again and stretched his foot out to tap her.
She opened her eyes and saw him with a finger to his lips.
The one thing Kurt had remembered Kimo saying about his sister was that she worked with deaf kids. Kurt knew American sign language. Or at least he once did.
With great effort he signed I … am … a … friend, hoping he hadn’t misspelled the last word and told her he was a fiend.
She seemed puzzled but her eyes were hopeful. On the chance he’d messed up the whole sentence, he signed something she would have to understand: N … U … M … A …