Blue Warrior

29

The village of Anou

Kidal Region, Northwest Mali

^{7 May}

Pearce’s truck skidded to a halt by the well. Mossa knelt in the dirt, his men circled around him, the other Toyotas parked nearby. Early climbed down from the truck bed as Pearce and Cella opened their doors.

Mossa stood. “Mr. Pearce? Why aren’t you on the plane?”

“Heard you were shorthanded. Mind if I hang around?”

“It’s your life. Spend it as you will.”

“What’s the plan?” Pearce stepped closer to the group.

Mossa kneeled back down. He’d drawn a crude sketch of the village. Pearce had caught a glimpse of it from the air before they landed earlier. Anou was roughly a square, a ragged three hundred yards on each side, bordered by a low sand-brick wall. A one-lane hard-packed road led into the town from the southwest, linking it to Gao. The land on either side of the road was mostly loose sand and scrub juniper. Vehicles would have to stay on that road if they needed sure footing. On the western and northern sides of the wall there were clumps of jagged rock thrusting up through the harder-packed sand and loose rock, and even a few trees, twisted and barren. There were also remnants of older houses that had long since been broken down by years of wind and neglect. Soldiers on foot could easily traverse the area, but wheeled vehicles would have a harder time of it.

“There is an old Soviet BTR-60 armored personnel carrier at the head of a convoy of five trucks,” Mossa said. He drew a road in the dust with a long finger. “As you can see, there is only one road coming into the village. They will advance as far as the wall but no further, then dismount, the BTR leading the way. The commander will be in the BTR. We have an RPG that can take out the BTR, then—”

“Permission to speak?” Pearce asked.

Mossa glanced at Early, asking an unspoken question.

“I heard you once say that a piece of salt doesn’t call itself salty. Troy here is the best warfighter I know.”

“Speak, then, Mr. Pearce.”

“You need fuel if you want to get out of here. That BTR carries at least seventy, eighty gallons of diesel. You need to capture it, not blow it up.”

“What do you propose?”

“Depends. What else do you have in your inventory?”

Mossa gave him the rundown. It wasn’t much, but it had possibilities.

Pearce had a few toys, too. They made a plan.

“You think like an Imohar,” Mossa said. “You may not live long, but at least you will die well.” Cella translated. The other Tuaregs chuckled in agreement.

The eight-wheeled BTR slowed to a crawl one hundred meters out from the entrance to the village. The front and side hatches were shut against gunfire, but the top ones were left open because the heat was unbearable even at this early hour in the morning. It rolled along for another thirty meters, but still there was no firing from the village. The commander signaled a halt to the convoy and the BTR braked. The five trucks a hundred meters behind him did the same.

The side hatches popped open and eight Red Beret soldiers in camouflage spilled out and ran in a low crouch toward the wall. They hit the wall and hunkered down on either side of the road, out of breath and sweating, and surprised that they hadn’t been fired upon. The squad leader glanced back, taking comfort in the big 14.5mm KPV heavy machine gun on top of the BTR keeping watch over them. It would pour out liquid lead at the first sign of trouble.

The squad leader, a sergeant, gave the hand signal to his men and then rushed through the gate, guns up, building to building, up the narrow road toward the town square—old-school “cover and maneuver.” The old buildings were mostly one and two stories tall. No sounds, no movement in the windows, so they pushed on toward the well in the center of the village.

And that’s when he saw the girl. She was Tuareg and beautiful. She stood at the well with a clay water pot. She sensed something and glanced up. Saw the squad leader, dropped her pot, and ran for a darkened doorway.

The squad leader signaled his team and advanced for the house. His men followed. Four men circled around back, but the squad leader and three others stayed out front, backs pressed against the wall.

“Tuareg! Come out!” he shouted in French.

“Non!” the girl shrieked.

His corporal pulled a grenade.

“No. Wait,” the squad leader said in Songhai, and pushed the grenade back down.

“Come out! We won’t hurt you. We’re only looking for bandits, not little girls.”

A moment passed, and the girl appeared in the doorway, trembling. Her pale brown eyes were wet with fear, but it didn’t diminish the beauty of her long, angular face.

“Who else is in there?”

She shook her head. “No one. Only my sisters.”

“How many?” he asked.

“Two. Both younger.”

“No one else?”

She shook her head. “All dead, or gone. We’re the last. We had nowhere else to go.”

The squad leader couldn’t believe his good fortune. He turned to his corporal with a feral grin and said in Songhai, “See?”

The corporal grinned back. “Such a beauty.”

“We have time, if we’re quick about it.”

The sergeant lowered his weapon. He towered over the trembling girl. “Show us,” he said, nodding at the house. He pulled out a chocolate-flavored PowerBar from a pocket and held it up to her. She snatched it out of his hand. He laughed. “If you are telling the truth, there will be more.”

“I am telling the truth,” she said, leading the way in.

True to her word, two other teenage girls were in the room, both sitting on the bed, clutching each other in fear. The sergeant, the corporal, and another soldier stepped into the cool of the house.

“Look around. There is only one other room,” the girl said, pointing at the doorway. “My bedroom. I’m the oldest now.”

“Show me,” he said, barely able to contain himself.

She nodded and stepped into her bedroom. She turned around. “See? I—”

The sergeant clapped a heavy hand on her mouth and wrapped his other arm around her back, forcing her onto the bed. He heard a commotion in the other room. His men, no doubt, having their way with the younger ones.

The sergeant’s broad nose nearly touched the girl’s face. Her eyes flared with fear.

“I’m gentle, I promise. I don’t like to hurt girls. Don’t scream, don’t bite. I’ll be quick, and then we’ll be on our way. Okay?”

She nodded yes beneath his hand, and he felt her body relax a little.

“Good. Quick and gentle. I promise,” he said again with a brotherly smile. He stood back up and unbuckled his belt, dropping his trousers. She saw the hardness of his manhood beneath his boxers. He pulled them down, then fell back on top of her, grabbing her shoulders.

“Here, let me help you,” she said, reaching one hand to the back of his neck as if to kiss him.

“Yes, good,” he grunted as she guided him toward her face.

The knife blade in her other hand plunged straight into his ear. His scream lasted until the tip of the thin steel blade plowed through his ear canal and into his brain stem. His body flew up and away from her in a violent spasm, then crashed to the floor.

Mossa stood in the doorway, his eyes smiling beneath the veil. He wiped his own bloody dagger on his trouser leg.

“You did well, little sister.”

“My sisters?”

“Untouched. We killed the others before they could harm them.” He sheathed his blade.

The girl leaped out of bed and kicked the sergeant’s corpse in the head, then spat on it.

“Bring me a hundred more of them, Mossa, I beg you!”

30

The village of Anou

Kidal Region, Northwest Mali

^{7 May}

Early and Pearce scrambled up to the third floor of the only three-story building in the village. It was fifty meters back from the wall, but it had the best view. Pearce and Early shouldered their rifles and muscled the big Pelican cases up the narrow stairs.

Inside the house was a horror show, not unlike the many poor houses Pearce had cleared out in Iraqi and Afghan villages after the hajis had been inside. Blood, bullet holes, busted furniture. And the requisite pile of human feces in the corner. Predators marking their territory. They climbed a rickety wooden ladder through the hole in the roof and took up their position.

Pearce lay flat as possible on the roof to keep out of sight of the army troops who would be scanning the rooflines for trouble. He couldn’t see the street below him from his position, but the roar of the BTR’s big diesel in the road near his building told him it was almost showtime. A two-foot-long firing tube lay by his side, extracted from an opened Pelican case.

The BTR slammed to a stop at the well, as expected. The hatches were still open. Mossa was sorely tempted to toss the grenades inside, but Pearce had authority in his voice when he spoke, the kind of authority that comes only from men who have commanded in battle and lived to tell about it. So Mossa kept to the plan, and he and Moctar rolled four grenades beneath the BTR just as it skidded to a stop. Even the thin bottom-plate armor was too thick for the grenades to penetrate. But that was the point. They didn’t want to take any chances and destroy the vehicle.

Moments later, the grenades exploded, shredding all eight tires.

The exploding grenades were Pearce’s signal. He stood with the tube launcher and fired, throwing a Switchblade UAV into the sky. The electric-motored aircraft carried a high-definition video camera, laser target designator, and Wi-Fi transmitter.

Red Berets piled out of the trucks as fast as they could dismount, NCOs shouting orders in their ears. The soldiers fanned out and raced for the sand-brick wall for cover. Out on the road, they were completely exposed. The wall was their only protection outside of the village. Without it, they’d be sitting ducks.

The big transport trucks revved their diesels, belching black smoke out of the exhaust pipes as they raced backward out of harm’s way.

Pearce was still standing on the roof. The BTR’s machine gun opened up, pulverizing the mud-brick buildings in the square. The building shuddered under the soles of his boots, as the BTR had turned its massive gun in his direction.

Moctar and Mossa charged the BTR. The side hatches slammed shut as the two Free Men clambered up the back of the vehicle and onto the top, emptying their AK-47s into the open roof hatches. The 14.5mm gun silenced. Mossa listened. Nothing. He peered in. Blood and brains were splattered all over the compartment filled with gun smoke.

I haven’t flown one of these for a while,” Early said. “You should let me work that thing.” He nodded at the weapon at Pearce’s feet, a specially modified M-25 grenade launcher with a high-capacity magazine.

“No worries. The Switchblade’s on autopilot. You’re just the backup.”

Pearce pulled on a pair of what looked like old-school mountaineering sunglasses. They were actually a mil-spec version of MetaPro holographic glasses loaded with Pearce Systems proprietary targeting software. The MetaPro glasses were mirrored to the Switchblade’s onboard camera that broadcast a 3-D stereoscopic image of the battlefield inside the MetaPro’s HD lenses, giving Pearce a holographic bird’s-eye view of the Red Berets crouching behind the wall.

Early watched incredulously as Pearce’s fingers danced in the empty air in front of his face, swiping, sizing, and tapping a giant invisible touchscreen.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Selecting targets.”

Once the targets were selected, the Switchblade’s computer transmitted data to the programmable “smart” laser-guided 25mm grenades in the M-25 launcher for a firing solution.

Pearce snatched up the bull-pup-styled grenade launcher, pulling the M-25 buttstock tightly into his shoulder.

He fired, putting all twenty rounds in the air.

The Mali soldiers hugging the wall had nowhere to hide. Airbursting grenade rounds exploded just a meter above their heads. Pure carnage. It was as if Pearce jammed a twelve-gauge shotgun against the back of each man’s skull and pulled the trigger.

The Tuareg Hiluxes leaped across the sandy moonscape. Two raced for the fleeing trucks, stuck running backward in a single line of retreat along the hard-packed road. The three other Toyotas flew across the sand and rounded the wall, firing in enfilade at the few surviving soldiers, limping away as fast as their wounded bodies could manage or cowering by the wall clutching their unfired weapons. A half-dozen Red Berets who screwed up enough courage to race through the gate toward the well before the grenade attack were cut down by the 14.5mm gun in the immobilized BTR. Mossa had turned the gun around and stood in the turret firing the big weapon, his feet slipping in blood.

The first two Toyotas quickly caught up with the trucks. Like ships o’ the line in the age of sail, the pickups came along broadside the five trucks, brandishing their 7.62 machine guns. The trucks didn’t stop. The first Toyota fired short bursts and blew out the tires of the rearmost truck, the first in the line of retreat. The tires shredded, wrapping around the rear axles and flipping the big truck over. The next truck in line slammed its brakes, slowing its crash into the toppled vehicle. The remaining three trucks slammed their brakes in time, avoiding a crash altogether. As tempting as it was to open fire on the vehicles, Mossa gave strict orders to capture the fuel in their tanks. Of course, he gave no orders when it came to the surrender of the drivers. None was needed.

In the desert, the Free Men took no prisoners.

31

The village of Anou

Kidal Region, Northwest Mali

^{7 May}

Another gunshot beyond the wall ended someone’s misery. It was a kind of mercy, Pearce knew. If a wounded man were left out here beneath the blazing sun, his death would come eventually, but only after insufferable pain over many hours—if he was lucky. Wild dogs might finish the job, too. War was a bloody business, and suddenly he was up to his neck in the crimson tide all over again. But today was different. It wasn’t cold-blooded revenge. He’d picked up a gun again to protect his friends. That was different from butchering a ruthless foe to even a score. His soul was still reeling from Johnny’s death, but he needed to keep that dark memory locked up inside for now.

The Tuareg fighters were draining the army trucks and the BTR of their last drops of fuel so they could fill their Hilux fuel tanks to the brim. Jerry cans were recovered from the trucks, too, and a few more rounded up in the village. Those would get filled with diesel next and loaded into the pickups for transport. Fuel was harder to come by than water in the desert.

Pearce repacked the Switchblade UAV into the firing tube. The spring-loaded wings, tail, and ailerons folded up easily. There were two more compressed-air firing chargers left in case Pearce needed to relaunch in the near future. The rest of the South African UAV combat system was already packed up in separate smaller storage cases and all of them placed back in the big Pelican, a completely self-contained unit. Unfortunately, Pearce had fired all of the programmable X-25 grenades, but at least the little UAV’s camera could still be of use. And there was still his M4 carbine with the 40mm grenade launcher, and Early’s vicious SCAR-H.

“Never even got a shot off, thanks to you and your model airplane. Speaking of which, that new rig of yours is something else. Love the modification.” The M-25 grenade launcher was designed for line-of-sight operation, meaning that the operator had to see the enemy location in order to aim it. With the aerial surveillance modification, not only was there almost nowhere for a bogey to hide, but the operator could “fire and forget” since the UAV remained locked on each target.

“You would’ve been more impressed if you’d seen anybody get inside a building. When the bad guys play hide-and-go-seek, the M-25 always wins.”

“Can I keep this?” Early asked, tapping the M4.

“I have to give it back to the owner, otherwise I lose my five-dollar deposit. So tell me about this Mossa guy.”

“He’s a pretty big deal.”

“Then what’s he doing out here?” Pearce waved a hand at the tiny village.

“The Tuaregs are like the Kurds. Big enough to be located in several countries, but not strong enough to carve out their own nation for themselves. Well, maybe until now. Tribes and clans from Algeria, Niger, Libya, and Mali are gathering around him, or at least the idea of him.”

“What’s so special about him?”

Early shook his head. “Hard to explain. But he has the same effect on his people that Richard the Lion-Hearted had on the English when they were waiting for him to come home.”

“Sounds like you’ve gone native. Dreams of Lawrence of Arabia?”

“No, nothing like that. I’m only here as long as Cella’s here, and now that her daughter’s out, I’m hoping she’ll follow soon.”

Pearce set the firing tube into its molded slot inside the case. “Last I heard, you were grouse hunting in Argentina, living the life of a retired country gentleman.”

“Grouse hunting gets boring after a while. They don’t shoot back.”

“I’d consider that an advantage myself.” Pearce shut the lid of the Pelican case and snapped the throw latches.

“I’m not exactly crazy about it either, but for the money Cella’s father is paying me, I can put up with it a while longer.”

“How much is getting killed worth these days?”

“It was a one-off. Ten thousand a week, tax-free. But it was only supposed to be for three weeks, not three months.”

“Why’d you step back into it? I mean, really?”

Another gunshot rang in the distance.

“You know how it is,” Early said. He glanced over the village. “I know there’s something wrong with me, but I love this shit.”

Pearce frowned. “Killing poor stupid bastards in uniforms?”

“No. That’s the worst part of it. But you know as well as I do there are bad guys out there. Someone has to stop them.”

“We did. About fifty of them. And every one of those dead mutts out there thought we were the bad guys.”

“So who’s gone native?”

“Not me, Mikey. I hate the bad guys, too. I’m just saying, let the Tuaregs and the Kurds and all the others fight their own damn battles and get your ass back to that beautiful wife of yours and those two gorgeous kids.”

“That’s the plan, brother,” Early said with a groan as he stood. “And it may even happen, thanks to you.”

Pearce and Early made their way back to the well, looking for Mossa. Early called ahead on his shoulder mic. Mossa was in Ibrahim’s little storefront, studying the ancient French military map still hanging on the wall.

“I’m going to check on Cella. Holler if you need me,” Early said to Pearce. He left for another house. That left Pearce alone with Mossa.

“What is your plan now?” Pearce asked.

“How well do you know the history of the Sahara, Mr. Pearce?” Mossa still stared at the map.

“It’s a big pile of sand. I hear armies get lost in it pretty often.”

“Yes, they do, since at least the ancient Romans who crossed over here two millennia ago. The bones of many invaders are covered in the shifting sands. But it wasn’t always desert. There are cave paintings in the Tassili N’Ajjer that date to 6000 B.C. Do you know what they depict?”

Pearce shrugged. “No idea.”

“Grass, rivers, antelope, buffalo, cattle, elephants, giraffes. Even hippos. But so much has changed, has it not?”

“The world is always changing.”

Mossa ran his fingers over the expanse of paper desert. “And men must change with it. Even my people. But the Sahara is still our home, the land Allah himself has given us.” He turned to face Pearce, his own face still hidden by the indigo tagelmust.

“So you want to defend this place?” Pearce asked.

“Why not?”

“Because it’s a shit hole, if you’ll pardon the expression.”

“But it’s our shit hole.”

“It’s not defensible, especially if the government decides to bring in any kind of long-range ordnance or aircraft. They’ll pound this place to dust.”

Mossa nodded. “I agree. But letting go of things is becoming harder in my advancing years. If we leave, then the Ganda Koy win.”

“And if you stay, you die.”

Mossa stepped to the doorway and watched his men prepping their vehicles. “The way you fight is not our way. But it was… impressive.”

“War is changing, too.”

“You stayed to fight for your friend?”

“Yes.”

“And Cella?” Mossa turned to face Pearce again.

“No.” But Pearce thought about it. “And yes.”

“You knew her before?”

“She was a doctor. Saved the life of a friend. But that was a long time ago, in a different war.”

“I understand.”

“Dorotea is your granddaughter. Cella must have been with one of your sons.”

“She was the woman of my oldest son, Rassoul. He was also a doctor. He entered Paradise three years ago.” Mossa’s eyes bored into Pearce’s. “If we stay, you will stay?”

“If Mike stays, yes. He is my friend.”

“Mr. Early is a good man. A good fighter.”

“Better than you know, on both counts. Don’t waste him.”

Mossa laughed. “I have no intention of wasting him. Or you. No, you are correct. This place is indefensible. Let the sand have it.” Mossa crossed back over to the map and jabbed a finger into it. “We’ll retreat to here, in the mountains.”

“Do you have other men who can join us?”

“Not yet. The Malians have struck here, here, and here.” Mossa touched the map at each battle site. “And there is trouble throughout the region. The chiefs and elders asked permission to defend themselves as they see best, which is the best strategy now. We are like grains of sand in the wind. The best we can hope to do is keep stinging the eyes of the lions. We are still not yet strong enough to offer a pitched battle to a standing army.”

“Will the Mali army follow us into the mountains?”

“They will follow wherever I go. It seems that I am the prize. But we can hold them off quite well there.”

“Then we’re off to the mountains.”

“And soon. There are no survivors today, but perhaps one of their officers was able to get off an emergency message during the attack, quick as it was.”

“Even if they didn’t get off a message, the fact that none of them will be calling in a report will alert their command. Are there other army units in the area?”

“None more than a day’s journey away.”

“Then you’re right. We need to get rolling.”

“Any word from your pilot?”

“Not yet.” Pearce checked his watch. “She won’t be landing for another twenty minutes. I told her to maintain radio silence for security.”

“That is wise. Please be sure to inform me when you have news of my granddaughter.”

“Of course. But don’t worry, Judy is a great pilot.”

Pearce smiled to comfort the old man. He was telling the truth. Judy was a great pilot, but he was still worried. Murphy’s Law FUBAR’d more ops than he cared to remember. He wouldn’t relax until Judy and the girl were safe on the ground.

32

In the air

Mali–Niger border

^{7 May}

Judy was still five minutes from the Niger border when the alarm blared. An air-to-air missile had locked onto the Aviocar. Her scope indicated the attack plane was some thirty miles behind her and closing fast. A military aircraft, no doubt.

She had no information at all about the Mali air force, but Ian had mentioned something about the Soviets earlier so she hoped that the jet behind her was just as antiquated, even if it was lethal. But even old, the jet behind her was still a heck of a lot faster than her two turboprops. She wondered how much time she’d have before it would launch its missiles. She guessed the military pilot probably required a visual confirmation. In her mind, that gave her thirty seconds, max.

Judy glanced over at the girl in the copilot seat. She was still out cold, which was good. Judy didn’t want the child awake, especially if things went sideways.

Judy stomped on the right rudder control and slammed the yoke into the firewall, banking the plane hard into a steep turning dive, hoping beyond hope that she could shake the radar lock. The negative g’s tingled in her gut and her rear end lifted out of the chair, pressing her small torso against the seat harness. Three seconds later, she reversed, stomping on the left rudder control and yanking the yoke as hard as she could toward her chest, lifting the plane in a steep left climb, pressing her hard against the chair at the same time her body rolled against the belts. She was riding the roller coaster from hell. Judy glanced over at the sleeping girl, her head pressed against the bulkhead. The alarm kept blaring. Not good. Maybe she deserved it, but the girl didn’t.

One last shot.

The Aviocar was a flying truck, nothing more. No weapons, and slow as molasses. Electronic countermeasures and chaff would be a waste. Any jet jock worth his salt would get a look at the old girl, flip on his gun switch, and have some target practice. A flying fish in a barrel. But Ian had devised a trick. He removed the active homing radar unit from a decommissioned AIM-54 Phoenix antiaircraft missile and installed it in the Aviocar. Maybe the old transport plane couldn’t carry a long-range antiaircraft missile like the Phoenix, but it had the wherewithal to carry a small, secondary radar, didn’t it?

Here goes nothing, Lord, was the best Judy could pray under the circumstances. She punched a button on her console, painting the jet behind her with her own air-to-air missile radar signal, just like the one she was experiencing. Now, as far as the pilot behind her was concerned, a U.S. Navy Hornet just locked on him with a Phoenix missile. There was only one thing he could do if he wanted to survive the engagement.

Run.

And that’s just what he did. The radar blip on Judy’s scope angled hard off her tail and reversed course, dropping altitude and picking up speed, racing away like a scalded cat, silencing the shrieking missile alarm in her cockpit ten seconds later.

Thanks, Ian, I owe you one, she thought. It had been a long time since she’d last seen him. Time to fix that. Maybe she’d even buy him a beer.

The village of Anou

Kidal Region, Northwest Mali

Pearce, Early, Mossa, and his fighters gathered up several cans of ammo and five machine guns from the dead Malian troops and loaded them into the Toyotas. But there were too many AK-47s to haul, so they spiked the barrels by bending them into right angles. Any pistols they didn’t take they disassembled, ruining the firing springs and tossing the rest of the gun parts in all directions. Anything else lethal or of use to the Mali army was loaded into the trucks and the trucks set on fire. The BTR was left intact, but Moctar rigged a booby-trap grenade beneath the driver’s seat. The first man who sat in it would trigger the spring-loaded mechanism.

Mossa dismissed Early and Pearce for the last bit of business. As non-Muslims, they were forbidden to touch Muslim corpses, and Mossa assumed that most or all of the dead Red Berets were Muslim. Besides, Westerners already had a grim view of his people, perhaps especially of Tuaregs, so he didn’t want the two Americans around to watch. Mossa and his men gathered up each of the Red Berets and sat them up against the wall, facing away from the city. Then they placed the spiked AK-47s in each of their laps. Now the Red Berets formed a gruesome palace guard for the massacred village. If nothing else, Mossa hoped the image would strike dread into the next column of Mali soldiers who dared approach.

Pearce and Early found Cella in one of the houses tending to one of the raped girls lying on a bed. Cella rung out a wet cloth and set it on the girl’s forehead, then motioned for the two men to follow her.

“How is she doing?” Early asked.

“Not well. She lost a lot of blood.” Cella pulled out a pack of cigarettes and offered them. Early took one, and Pearce passed. Cella flicked a Zippo and lit Early’s, then hers.

“Judy called in. They landed fine, no problems. Holliday will be picking up your daughter soon.”

“Who is Holliday?”

“A friend. The chargé d’affaires at the American embassy in Niamey. He’s making all of the legal arrangements, and he’s already contacted your father.”

“Please thank him for me.” Cella took another drag.

“Why don’t you thank him yourself? Let’s get out of here.”

Cella shook her head. Her thick honey brown hair was shiny with oil. Pearce could only imagine the last time she’d bathed. “I’m needed here. These are my people now.”

Pearce glanced at Early. Help me out here.

“Don’t look at me. I came here to bring her home. That was three months ago.”

“You’re running around in the middle of a civil war. You’ve got no business being here, especially now that your daughter is gone.”

“My husband is dead, but Mossa remains my father-in-law. He is good to me and good to his people. But they have no access to medical care, and that is what I can give them. You of all people should know this.”

“And your daughter? Doesn’t she deserve a mother?”

Cella’s blue eyes flared. “She deserves a father, too.” She took a last drag, dropped the cigarette, and crushed it under her boot. “Look what happened to him.”

Thirty minutes later, Mossa, Cella, Early, and Pearce gathered at Ibrahim’s store. The boy was carefully folding his grandfather’s map into a square for safekeeping.

“We’ll leave very soon. It will be crowded in the jeeps with you two new men, and the five women—”

“Four. We just lost one,” Cella said. She turned to Pearce. “The one you asked about.”

“Daughter, you decide where the women ride. It will be a long journey and with few stops.”

“What about me?” the boy asked. He kept folding the yellowed paper.

“You will ride with Humaydi. He has two sons your age.”

The boy shook his head. “I will ride with you.” His fingertips carefully pressed the ancient map creases.

Mossa stared at the boy, unused to such defiance. He gave orders in battle, men obeyed, men died. But this child?

The boy looked up at him, his eyes wounds.

Mossa nodded. “You will ride with me.”

The boy made the last fold, forming a neat square, not saying a word. It was settled, then.

Pearce’s phone rang. It was Judy. They chatted briefly, but his phone died. No charge.

“My daughter?” Cella asked.

“She’s fine. With the ambassador now, heading back to the American embassy.”

“Thank God,” Mossa said, shutting his eyes briefly.

“Your father is scheduled to arrive late tonight on a chartered flight. If everything goes well, he’ll depart again with her back to Italy in the morning. Judy will only call back if there’s a problem. That is, if I can get this charged up.”

“They’ve got universals in the trucks. You can charge it up on the way out,” Early said.

Mossa turned to Pearce. “Thank you, Mr. Pearce. For everything.” He extended his hand.

“Glad it all worked out.” They shook. “Now we need to get you to your mountain.”

33

Tamanghasset Province

Southern Algeria

^{7 May}

The French Foreign Legion patrolled the barren stretch of desert with the permission of a reluctant Algerian national government. Cocaine shipments from Bolivia had been making their way into Europe through the porous sands of the Algerian Sahara, an ironic twist to the Americans’ War on Drugs. The Algerians appeared helpless to stop it, though the French government suspected that certain corrupt officials in Algiers profited by the venture. The French decided to take matters into their own hands.

The French government generally, and the French army in particular, had been stretched beyond the breaking point since the Great Recession began in 2008. But the French Foreign Legion had a long history in this desert and, despite their limited resources, volunteered a section of their best. Working from incomplete Interpol reports and questionable intelligence from Algeria’s security service, the Département du Renseignement et de la Sécurité, today’s patrol was heading for a stretch of remote highway that was reportedly used as a temporary airfield for drug shipments.

First Lieutenant Pyotr Krasnov rode at the head of his small column of five Renault Sherpa 3As, low-profile trucks that looked like aerodynamic Humvees. A Russian national, he previously served with distinction in the 98th Guard Airborne Division as a sergeant in the South Ossetian War, but he was put under house arrest pending a court-martial after assaulting an officer he considered cowardly. He avoided prosecution only by escaping the camp and fleeing the country.

Now Krasnov proudly wore the kepi of the French Foreign Legion. A tattoo of huge block letters ran the length of his muscular right forearm that read LEGIO PATRIA NOSTRA—“the Legion is my Fatherland.” He was willing to fight and die for France because the Legion had given him a home, no questions asked. Bald and thick like a power lifter, the two-meter-tall ex-paratrooper was as tough as they came in one of the world’s toughest fighting units. He was one of the few foreign nationals to fight his way up into the officer corps, making him an even rarer breed of elite warrior.

Lieutenant Krasnov hated the jihadists. He had had a bellyful of them on his tour in southern Afghanistan, and he’d seen the carnage they wrought over the years in suicide bombings in his former country, particularly the fanatical Chechens and their murderous assaults against hospitals, theaters, and even schools. He was happy to be chasing the scum today, but if the intel wasn’t any better than what he’d received over the last several weeks, he expected this to be a another waste of time and fuel. His column raced along the flat paved road at 120 kph just in case any IEDs were deployed and his Sherpas blasted out electronic jamming signals to prevent remote IED detonations. A large IED could tear even armored vehicles like his in half like a soft baguette.

“Lieutenant, do you see that?” His driver, a lanky American kid, pointed at a man in the road far up ahead waving a white cloth vigorously over his head.

Krasnov pulled up a pair of field glasses. The man in the road was obviously an American or European. His long blond hair was matted with sweat and tucked under a salt-stained ball cap. His big, bushy beard made him look like a Viking, even from this distance, and he wore a civilian uniform of some sort, but Krasnov couldn’t quite make out the logo. A Nissan pickup was parked near him on the side of the road in the sand, its hood up.

Krasnov radioed the rest of the convoy to prepare to stop. His driver tapped the brakes and began to slow, downshifting as the tachometer drifted toward zero. The driver eventually stopped, pulling even with the broken-down truck. Krasnov radioed to the other troopers to remain in their Sherpas, but he dismounted along with the two privates riding in his command vehicle, a dour blue-eyed Pole and a hawk-faced Spaniard. The American driver remained seated, engine idling.

“Hey! Thank God! You speak English?” the man said. His white teeth smiled through his wild beard. His name was stitched on the sweat-soaked shirt of the faded British Petroleum uniform: “Magnus Karlsen.” The accent sounded Nordic to Krasnov. The man certainly looked the part.

“Yes, I speak English. What are you doing out here?” Krasnov smiled behind his dark wraparound sunglasses, but his suspicious eyes darted all around the scene.

The Pole and the Spaniard kept their automatic rifles slung low as they casually circled around the truck, checking for weapons and drugs.

“Stupid GPS! It sent me the wrong way. And then this piece of shit”—Karlsen kicked the Nissan’s fender hard—“decided to run out of petrol on me.”

“Swedish?” Krasnov asked.

“Norwegian. I think we are both far away from home.”

“You think so?” Krasnov pulled his glasses off and wiped the sweat off his face with his gloved hand. He glanced up at the Spaniard, who shook his head no, indicating nothing unusual about the truck.

“You need some water, Mr. Karlsen?”

“Yes, please. I ran out.” He pointed at half a dozen small empty bottles littering the sand around him.

Krasnov reached into the Sherpa cab and pulled out an unopened liter bottle of water. He tossed it to the big Norwegian.

“Thank you.” He cracked it open and drained it in one long chug, the water dribbling down the sides of his mouth onto his beard and shirt. He finished and grunted like a sated Viking would, then crushed the bottle in his thick fist and tossed it. “How about some petrol? Can you spare any?”

Krasnov nodded. “A little. Ten liters should be enough to get you back to town.”

“Perfect. Thank you.”

Krasnov nodded wordlessly to the Pole, who crossed to the Sherpa and reached for the jerry can.

“You want me to call you in?” Krasnov asked. “Your bosses must be worried.”

Karlsen grinned again. He pulled out an old cell phone from his pocket and waved it at Krasnov. “Called in two hours ago, before the battery died. They should have been here by now. You didn’t pass them on the way here?”

Krasnov shook his head and said, “No,” still scanning the horizon. In the far distance, high in the hazing blue sky, a plane. The Russian shielded his eyes with his gloved hand but couldn’t make it out. Too high up. Probably nothing. The windless air stank of diesel fuel now.

The Pole set the jerry can down after filling the Nissan’s tank. “Finished, Lieutenant,” he muttered.

“Secure that can, and the two of you load back in.”

“Yes, sir.”

The Norwegian folded himself into the cramped pickup cab and turned the key. The engine coughed for a couple of revolutions and then sputtered to life. “Excellent!” The bearded man threw a big thumbs-up at Krasnov.

“Better get going,” Krasnov said. He shut the Nissan’s door, leaving his hands on the sill.

Karlsen held out a big, sweaty hand. “You saved my life. I can’t thank you enough.”

Krasnov hesitated, then shook his hand.

Karlsen nodded his thanks again, slammed the truck into first gear, and sped away past the convoy of Sherpas. Krasnov watched him for a few moments, then keyed the radio mic on his shoulder. “Time to get back to work, gentlemen. And keep the music off. I want everybody on high alert.”

The big Russian tapped on the driver’s window. It rolled down. “I want you to call that guy in. Have someone run a check on those plates, too.”

“Already did, Lieutenant.”

Seven hundred meters away, Karlsen slammed the brakes. The rubber squealed on the asphalt.

Krasnov glanced toward the noise. He raised himself up on the Sherpa’s step to get a better vantage. Saw Karlsen’s truck parked on the road, driver’s door open. Where did he go?

Krasnov glanced down at the road beneath his feet, then the sand by the side of the road. He saw it. There.

Too late.

One hundred feet of C4 erupted. Even half a mile away, Karlsen felt the pressure wave. It rocked his truck and spattered sand in his face like buckshot. The earplugs hardly helped, but he covered his ears with his hands, too, and opened his mouth. The air sucked out of his lungs so hard he thought they’d come up through his mouth. But a second passed and he gasped for air and knew he’d survived. His nose was runny. He pinched it with his fingers. Blood. His ears rang and his head ached. His pagan forefathers would have said that Ragnarök had begun—the end of the world. But, inshallah, not yet. At least not for him. Not for Al Rus. Not for the Viking.

The big Norwegian muttered a prayer of thanksgiving to Allah, then stood and brushed himself off. He crawled back into his Nissan and sped back to the scene. Smoke and dust boiled over the explosion site like a fog of doom. On the far side of the road, the Sherpas were gone. A debris field of twisted steel littered the sand. Clearly, no one had survived.

He stopped the truck where the MICLIC had been planted. The mine-clearing line charge was a hundred feet of C4 block assemblies strung together by nylon rope. The deadly charge was given to him by brothers from Fallujah who had retaken that city in 2014. The city was full of U.S. Marine Corps ordnance left behind for the worthless Iraqi army and police—tons of it. Guns, grenades, radios, claymore mines, and even MCLC.

Al Rus knew that the French would use electronic jammers—that was standard operating procedure against wireless remote IED detonators. But the jammers couldn’t stop an old-fashioned hand-cranked generator connected to copper wire. Primitive, but effective, especially in the hands of a trained engineer like Al Rus. The former BP employee had converted to the true Islamic faith, Salafism, when he was stationed in Saudi Arabia. Before he joined AQS, white German jihadi brothers in a Waziristan village taught him how to handle weapons and explosives and took him on their raids into Afghanistan against NATO forces, where he killed his first European infidels. He had a talent for it.

Al Rus stepped back over to his truck and dug around under the seat. He pulled out a radio and called his second-in-command, informing him it was now safe for the plane on the far horizon to land on the road ahead. In an hour, the cocaine would be loaded onto Algerian trucks and shipped north, making its way to the heart of the land of the Crusaders. If depraved Europeans wanted to pay good money for the poison he sold to them, so much the better. That money was used to wage jihad and help the poor and widows, and so it was blessed.

34

CIOS Corporate Offices

Rockville, Maryland

^{7 May}

Jasmine Bath’s paranoia knew no bounds. She was determined to live long enough to enjoy the wealth she had accumulated over the last few years, and even more determined to enjoy a long and happy retirement, which, according to her schedule, would begin in precisely seven months, given current revenue streams.

It was probably time to get out by then anyway. Computer security was about to make a great leap forward with DARPA’s PROCEED initiative, exploring methods that would allow data computation of encrypted data without first decrypting it, even in the cloud, making it virtually impossible for hackers like her to write malware code to break it. Worse, security operations themselves would become automated, just like future combat. Advanced machine learning algorithms would soon become the security gatekeepers, not only preventing but even anticipating human-designed attacks.

Bath’s first line of defense was to remain hidden from the NSA. The easiest trick was to leak NSA training documents to various media outlets under the names of known whistle-blowers. That kept the NSA in a constant state of paranoia and self-limiting defenses as media and congressional inquiries escalated. The NSA simply didn’t have time to look for someone like Jasmine, especially not even knowing she was there to begin with.

The most effective tool in Bath’s defense arsenal was the alliances she created with other unwitting players in the field. Posing as an anonymous member of various hacktivist groups, Jasmine would empower them with resources that both distracted the NSA and created new targets of national interest. In the last few years, the anarchist hacker group ALGO.RYTHM had made frequent headlines by breaking into DoD computer bases, stealing embarrassing State Department cables, and disabling the LANs of the big national laboratories, then publishing their exploits. Of course, ALGO.RYTHM hackers managed to complete these missions only by following the guided maps through agency software defenses fed to them by Jasmine Bath. If ALGO.RYTHM hackers got sloppy with their opsec, CIOS would dispatch a specialized field operative to pinch off the potential leak, usually with a small-caliber bullet to the brain.

The closest anyone had ever come to identifying Jasmine occurred just weeks after the Utah Data Center at Bluffdale had gone online. She still wasn’t quite sure how he’d picked up her digital scent, but he did, and his abilities were far superior to those of anyone else she’d ever encountered at the Q Group, the NSA’s security and counterintelligence directorate. She finally evaded him by destroying his career, falsely linking him to the most recent Utah Data Center catastrophe. It was one of her best ops.

Jasmine knew the security protocols at the UDC because she’d designed half of them while in the NSA’s employ. The UDC was NSA’s vast, multibillion-dollar server farm, and the crown jewel in its burgeoning intelligence-gathering empire. It was deemed impossible to infect the computers there with any kind of virus thanks to the external firewalls, which suffered tens of thousands of automated attempted hacks daily.

But the internal security procedures were equally important. Those protocols kept any devices from being smuggled in that might carry infectious malware. The NSA knew that it was a USB thumb drive infected with the Stuxnet virus smuggled into the Natanz nuclear facility that wiped out over a thousand Iranian centrifuges. The NSA took every precaution to avoid a similar attack on the UDC.

Every precaution but one, Jasmine determined.

A search of UDC employees uncovered the medical records of a senior programmer at the facility. The fifty-eight-year-old woman had recently had one of the new wirelessly programmed heart pacemakers implanted. The wireless pacemaker was monitored and updated via a cell phone call. All Bath did was hack into the poorly secured mainframe of the medical device manufacturer and install a Stuxnet-like worm on the woman’s pacemaker via the cell phone. Once the infected programmer was at her computer station, the self-propogating worm used the pacemaker’s wireless capabilities to infect the SCADA system Wi-Fi routers. Those SCADA computers, in turn, controlled the air handler units that cooled the 1.2 million square feet of the vast server farm. Once the air handler units failed—along with the warning alarms and software monitoring the failure, disabled by the same worm—acres of servers overheated and eventually caught fire, destroying 400 terabytes of collected foreign intelligence. While this represented only a small fraction of the total amount of data stored at the UDC, it was an amount of data equal to all of the books ever written in the history of the world.

Internal security inspections investigating the multimillion-dollar catastrophe located the worm, and it was traced back to the home computer of the Q Group investigator who had nearly uncovered CIOS and its operations. His hard drive also contained encrypted links to offshore bank accounts affiliated with the anarchist hacker group ALGO.RYTHM.

The innocent Q Group investigator was swiftly arrested, tried, and convicted. A life ruined, a family bankrupted, all thanks to falsified evidence created and planted by Jasmine Bath.

35

Adrar des Ifoghas

Kidal Region, Northeastern Mali

^{7 May}

The convoy of five Toyota pickups sped through the desert toward the mountains in a long, steady line, spread out enough that the sand kicked up by the truck in front didn’t spatter the windshield of the one behind. Overladen with extra ammo, weapons, gear, and people, they couldn’t do top speed for fear of hitting the soft patches of sand and either busting shocks or, worse, spilling the trucks over and tossing their human cargo onto the ground. The ride was hardly smooth, though. The extra weight caused the trucks to rise and fall like a ship on a heavy ocean swell, especially in back where Pearce and Early rode in Mossa’s truck. They’d suffered far worse in years gone by, but hours of sweltering heat and stinging sand in an open truck bed wasn’t exactly a Disneyland ride, either.

“I’m getting too old for this shit,” Early complained through his shemagh and aviator glasses. “Bring any Dramamine with you?” Early was on the verge of puking from motion sickness.

“Beats working for a living, doesn’t it?” Pearce shouted back.

As they neared the mountains, the sand began to give way to small rocks, then hundreds of larger rounded stones as large as soccer balls as they approached the mountain range. They slowed. The steep hills in front of them were covered with piles of eroded granite blocks, some over five meters tall, like broken teeth thrusting out of a sandy jaw. Impassable by vehicles.

At the first steep incline Mossa signaled a stop and the convoy halted. Early and Pearce jumped out. It felt good to stretch their limbs after hours of riding folded up in the back, crowded in with two other fighters and Pearce’s gear. Pearce was the only man without a tagelmust. He pulled off his boonie hat and glasses and shook the sand out of his long hair and shaggy beard.

“Didn’t exactly come prepared, did you?” Early asked.

“It was supposed to be an extraction, not an insertion,” Pearce said.

“There’s a dirty joke in there somewhere, but my brain is too rattled to find it.”

Mossa had stepped out of the cab and was calling on a handheld walkie-talkie. The boy stood close by him. Pearce didn’t understand the lingo. It certainly wasn’t Arabic or Pashto.

“What’s he saying?” Pearce asked Early.

Early shrugged. “Beats me. I never picked up on the patois.”

“He’s calling ahead to his men, though they surely have watched us all the way here. He wants to be sure they don’t fire on us on the way up,” Cella said. She took a drink out of her canteen and held it out to Early.

“Thanks.” Early took a swallow as Pearce glanced up the rising chain of ragged mountains. The tallest peaks in the far distance rose some eight hundred meters.

“On the maps they call this the Adrar des Ifoghas—the mountains of the Ifogha clan,” Cella said. “The Imohar have fought many battles here. Algerians, Chadians, the French, and, lately, al-Qaeda Sahara. And yet they still remain.”

“How do they survive?” Pearce asked. “There’s nothing but rock and sand here.”

“The massif has many shallow valleys and wadis, and villages are scattered here and there.” She rolled away one of the larger stones with the toe of her boot. A yellow scorpion flared its stinging tail, then fled for the cover of another. “And a few surprises.”

Pearce nodded at the top of the hill in front of them. “The welcoming committee.”

A dozen Tuareg fighters stood on top of the big granite blocks, faces shrouded in indigo, rifles perched on their hips.

“Now we climb,” Mossa said.

“What about those?” Early asked, pointing at the Toyotas.

“They have another purpose,” Mossa said. “Grab your boxes, Mr. Pearce.”

Pearce pulled the two big Pelican cases out and shouldered his rifle. Early slung his SCAR over his good shoulder.

Mossa barked orders and the trucks sped away back toward Anou, each with a driver and gunner. The rest of his men and everybody else remained, including the four women and the boy.

“Follow my path exactly,” Mossa called over his shoulder. Mossa led the way up, snaking his way through the field of stones.

They climbed the mountain in silence, never following a straight line. Sand and rocks crunched beneath Pearce’s boots. Some of Mossa’s men wore sandals. The women and the boy did, too. Pearce assumed the mountain must be mined. He kept looking for trip wires or other triggers but never spotted any, so they must have all been buried. His practiced eye couldn’t spot any of those, either. Every now and then he saw a spent shell casing, the brass sometimes gleaming, sometimes tarnished. Depending on how long ago they’d been fired, he assumed. He counted five different calibers he recognized, and a couple more he wasn’t sure of.

The sun was kneeling down toward the far horizon behind them, but the heat was still miserable, though perceptibly less miserable than before. Pearce felt like the slacker in the group, struggling to keep up the pace on the rising grade. His thighs burned and his clothes were drenched. He realized how badly he’d let himself go. It had been six months since he’d done any serious running or any other kind of regular workout. The Tuaregs moved easily through the stony field and the heat. Even Early seemed immune to it. Halfway up they picked their way through a steep trench, whether natural or man-made Pearce wasn’t sure. The entire approach up the mountain was a natural barrier to all kinds of vehicles, wheeled or tracked. A great defensive position. No wonder the Tuaregs had been able to stand their ground here.

A few minutes later they were close to the summit of granite boulders. Mossa’s fighters dropped down from the rocks and came down to greet them. Pearce couldn’t understand a word of what they said, but the laughter, backslapping, and hand gestures were universal. Comrades greeting comrades after a harrowing, successful mission, recounting the action, moment by moment. Pearce knew when they reached the part about the Switchblade UAV and grenade launcher, because the entire group turned nearly in unison toward him in stunned silence.

“Mr. Pearce, come meet my commanders,” Mossa said, gesturing with his hand.

Pearce ambled over to the knot of indigo turbans and combat fatigues. Pearce felt strong hands clapping his back now, too, as he pressed in closer. Strange that the men still didn’t uncover their faces, he thought.

Mossa introduced him to the local commanders, each the head of his own small clan, and a fighting leader in his own right. Fierce, sharp eyes shined beneath the headdresses as Mossa named each man and listed his particular prowess in battle or recent victory. Many had fought for Gaddafi in the Libyan army. The old dictator had recruited hundreds of Tuareg fighters over the years and were considered some of the best soldiers under his command. When the regime fell, most Tuaregs fled back to their native homelands with as many weapons as they could carry. Too closely identified with the murderous Gaddafi regime and hated by ethnic Libyans, the Tuaregs knew the wrath of the foreign rebels leading the Libyan revolution—many of whom were radical Islamic jihadists—would soon turn on them as well.

Pearce nodded his head slightly to each in deference, and nodded further as he acknowledged each man’s honorific.

“And what of you, Mr. Pearce? I know nothing of you, except that you are friends with Mr. Early and my daughter-in-law. But first, explain to my men the nature of the weapon you unleashed on the dogs in Anou.”

Pearce hesitated. Since he was a kid growing up in the wilds of Wyoming he’d been a loner. The only son of a drunken, angry father, he took solace fishing and hunting in the mountains by himself, or lost himself in books by the fire at night. Even when he served with the CIA he’d mostly been alone behind enemy lines or in very small groups of fighters. Both his nature and his training drove him to stay in the background, unseen, unnoticed—until he struck. He hated being the center of attention of anything, whether it was a toast at a wedding or a sales pitch to a group of potential clients. He was uncomfortable even now, though it only involved explaining to a curious group of Tuareg warriors the technical aspects of a new weapons system. But Pearce knew the cultures of the East. He dared not embarrass or shame Mossa by refusing his invitation to share his exploits.

So Pearce relented, explaining the basics of the modified M-25 system. But he didn’t break open the Pelican case and pull out the gear to show them.

“And you are American military?” Mossa asked. He was translating for one of his men.

“No.”

“CIA?” Mossa asked. A wave of murmuring swept through the group. None of them apparently spoke any English, but the dreaded three-letter word was universally recognized.

“No.” Technically, true. Pearce had been out of the service for a decade.

“Then how do you come by such weapons?” another man asked through Mossa.

“I own a company that develops these weapons. We train others for money, and sometimes we sell the drones, too.”

Drones! The Tuaregs muttered the hated word to themselves over and over. Another American word understood and feared the world over. Some of them were clearly agitated. Pearce knew that the American government had sent drones to help the Libyan rebels. Tuareg soldiers in the Libyan army must have died because of that decision.

“You’ve come to fight for us?” a man called out in Tamasheq. Mossa translated.

“No. I came to help my friend.” He patted Early on the back. “Now he is safe. Now I must leave,” Pearce said.

Pearce saw the disappointment in their eyes. A few even glared at him. Did they think he was a coward?

“Come. We need to make plans for your departure,” Mossa said. He clapped an arm around Pearce’s shoulder, a sign of his favor to the dissemblers, and led the way.

“Mossa!” A man high up on the rocks pointed just moments before Pearce heard the whump-whump-whump of rotor blades hammering the air.

An attack helicopter roared in the distance, a thousand feet off the deck, barreling straight for their position. Pearce had to shield his eyes to see it. The chopper was framed by the blinding circle of the sun, but its huge, ugly frame was familiar. He’d seen them before, up close and personal, but he also knew their history. In the 1980s, the Soviets hunted Afghan mujahideen with the big armored Hinds to great effect until the CIA smuggled Stinger missiles into the country. The mujahideen feared and hated the big ugly air machines. Ironically, the modern Afghan air force flew them, too. It pissed Pearce off that Afghans were allowed to buy military equipment from their former enemies instead of from the allies who saved their asses. And they bought them with U.S. taxpayer dollars, too.

Down on the plain, four of Mossa’s trucks sped four abreast, bouncing and slewing in the sand, racing back for the mountain.

“Where’s the fifth truck?” Early asked, then cursed himself. In the far distance he saw a black, oily smudge.

“The Devil’s Chariot,” Mossa said, binoculars to his eyes. “Mali air force.”

That’s what the mujahideen had called them, too, Pearce remembered. At least when the Hinds were hunting them.

Mossa kept his eyes glued to his binoculars. Spoke an order to Balla. His lieutenant turned and disappeared behind the towering rocks behind them.

The trucks were three, maybe four miles from the mountain, the big chopper half that distance behind them. Didn’t have to be an air force general to figure out the math wasn’t good for the slower-running Toyotas. Sparks flashed from the nose of the Hind, and a second later, the air cracked with echoes of machine-gun fire from the Russian four-barrel Gatling gun.

Geysers of sand spit up around the trucks.

“They’re fucked,” Early whispered.

“Not yet, Mr. Early,” Mossa said, eyes still glued to his binoculars.

The four trucks suddenly split up, the two on the far ends turning at forty-five-degree angles, the middle two at twenty-seven degrees. Now the pilot had to focus, pick a target.

Balla thundered up with a shoulder-fired SA-24 missile launcher, pulling it onto his shoulder, putting his eye to the scope. He asked Mossa a question with a single word. Pearce could guess the meaning.

“Five kilometers and closing,” Mossa said in English, for the Americans’ sake.

Early and Pearce exchanged a glance. That missile launcher was a Soviet weapon, nicknamed Grinch in military circles. It was the functional equivalent of the American Stinger missile.

The Hind banked hard left to chase one of the trucks on the far end. The gimbaled machine gun roared again. Sand sprayed around the truck. The other Toyotas turned, chasing the Hind, firing their machine guns. Bullets sparked on the helicopter’s heavy armor. No effect.

“Now,” Mossa said.

The Grinch puffed, blowing the missile out of the tube, then the missile engine kicked in with a roar. It raced toward the turning Hind, a trail of crooked white smoke marking its path.

The Hind knew a missile had locked on it. The pilot juked hard just as the Grinch missile launched, and dropped antimissile flares.

Too late.

The Hind erupted in a fireball as the finger of smoke slammed into the hull. The top rotor separated from the chopper, pinwheeling away as the rest of the wreckage rained toward the sand.

The Tuaregs cheered and clapped Balla on the back.

“Built in Russia, killed by Russians,” Early joked.

“Serves them right,” Pearce said.

Mossa turned to Pearce. “That should buy us some time.”

36

Adrar des Ifoghas

Kidal Region, Northeastern Mali

^{7 May}

Mossa lead the way.

The boy hovered close to the Tuareg chief. Cella was next, shepherding the four women. Pearce and Early were behind them. Moctar, Balla, and the rest of the fighters took up positions among the rocks, hidden from view. Pearce assumed they were left behind to watch for signs of Mali troops.

Mossa wended his way between two tall pillars of granite split like a V, opening a dark chasm in the mountain. He stepped over the inverted apex of the V and disappeared. The others followed suit. Pearce found himself in a broad, low-ceilinged passageway. He had to duck several inches in order to avoid hitting his head, but the dark air felt like a cool water bath compared to the heat outside. Mossa’s LED flashlight washed on the path in front of him. Enough light bounced off the ground that Pearce could make out dim scratchings on the rock walls. An alphabet he didn’t recognize. Pearce couldn’t tell if they were a hundred years old or a hundred thousand. Didn’t care. His pulse was quickening and his legs ached. He was grateful that Moctar and Balla had volunteered to carry his cases.

Pearce wasn’t part of the 2001 assault on Tora Bora or Operation Anaconda in 2002, but he’d seen some of the classified after-action photos when he was at The Farm. Al-Qaeda made great use of natural caves like this one in Afghanistan. The Russians had bombed the hell out of the underground sanctuaries but never did the damage that American B-52s were able to inflict. The idea of being buried under tons of rock had never appealed to him, especially after the stories his dad told him about the North Vietnamese and their tunnel complexes. His dad had volunteered a few times to crawl down those holes with nothing but a Smith & Wesson revolver and a flashlight. And those tunnels were made only of dirt. His dad was a helluva storyteller, even when he was drunk, which was most of the time. But the way he’d describe slithering on his belly through the dark underground, twisting around ninety-degree bends, waiting for bayonets or grenades or poisonous snakes to strike out at him from the dark, had made him cry as a child. As a small boy, they sounded like monster stories, but they were true—and they had happened to his father. Crying, of course, meant an ugly sneer from his old man and the back of his thick, gnarly hand, but young Troy was as scared for his father inside of those tunnels as if he had been there himself.

And now he was. Or so it seemed. His heart raced.

No, he reminded himself, you’re not under the dirt and on your belly and there aren’t any Charlies just around the corner waiting to shoot you in the pitch-black.

A few steps later he emerged out of the short passageway into a tall, spacious cave big enough to fit a house in, and light poured in from a kind of natural chimney that led up to the surface. The light would be dimming any minute when the sun finally set, but for now it was a relief, like when the movie projector finally kicked on inside of a dark theater. Beneath the open chimney hole was a fire pit, smoldering with coals that filled the room with a smoky haze.

Circling the fire pit were several small woven rugs. In a far corner, another collection of rugs. But what really caught Pearce’s attention was the collection of ammo boxes, stenciled crates, and stacks of bottled water. Moctar and Balla set Pearce’s cases next to them.

Mossa gestured for Pearce to take the rug next to him on his right. The boy immediately plopped down on the rug to Mossa’s left. Moctar and Balla headed for the supplies while Cella took the women to the far corner.

Pearce sat down, glad to finally take a load off of his weary legs. It had been a long day. What began as a short flight across the border to pick up Early had turned into an all-day gunfight. He hadn’t eaten all day and was on the verge of dehydration.

“You look tired, Mr. Pearce,” Mossa said.

“You’re not?”

“Exhausted!” Mossa laughed. “It has been a long day, but a good day. A day of days.” He glanced at Early. “How is your arm?”

Early held up his salt-stained arm sling. “Who wants to arm wrestle?”

Mossa chuckled beneath the folds of his tagelmust. “We should rest. We have much to talk about later.” Mossa clapped Pearce on the knee, then reached up to the end of the indigo cloth and unwrapped his headdress, exposing his face for the first time.

Pearce sensed something in Mossa’s gesture. He had imagined what might be underneath all of that cloth. But that was the point, wasn’t it? The Tuareg’s handsome face was long, with a narrow jaw and medium lips, and his light brown skin was mottled with blue indigo, no doubt sweated off of his garment. His nose was narrow and high-bridged, almost aquiline—maybe Pearce imagined a Roman general somewhere far back in his bloodline. His dark hair was long and straight, but shot through with gray, as was his thick mustache, the only hint of his true age. He had to be at least sixty years old, maybe seventy, Pearce reasoned, if his son was the same age as Cella.

Pearce stole a glance at Early. The big former Army Ranger winked at him. What did the unveiling mean?

Mossa lay down on his side, his head resting on the ten meters of indigo cloth bunched up like a pillow. The boy lay down, too. He wouldn’t get his own tagelmust until he reached adulthood. With the Mali army on its way, Pearce wasn’t sure the boy would get to live that long.

Pearce dreamed of curry stew. Dreamed he was scooping up giant spoonfuls of it into his mouth, tangy and sweet. The dream was so vivid he could smell it. His eyes fluttered open. Battered aluminum pots steamed on bright orange coals, burn marks etched on their sides. A blue metal teapot, too. Clearly, the fire had been built up while he was asleep. The warmth of it actually felt good here in the cave.

Pearce sat up, groggy. He didn’t remember falling asleep. He rubbed his eyes, yawned.

“Just in time for chow,” Early said. He nodded at the plastic bottle near Pearce’s knee. “Drink up.”

The cave was black now, illuminated by a half-dozen solar-powered lanterns.

Cella and two of the women arrived with small aluminum bowls and spoons. Cella ladled up the contents in the pots into the bowls and the women passed them out. After the men were served, the women got their own food and returned to their corner of the cave to eat.

It was strange for Pearce to see Cella like this, so quiet and unassuming, but yet not subservient. More like an actor playing a role, earnestly. Yes, she was definitely playing a role, he decided, obeying the rules of the clan that had adopted her. But she was also their doctor, and Mossa’s daughter-in-law, which gave her an exalted status. She seemed happy, straddling two worlds.

Pearce took a bite. It was hot. Chicken and curry. Not bad.

“Where did this come from?”

“Turkish rations, courtesy of Colonel Gaddafi,” Mossa said.

“The curry’s good,” Early said with his mouth full.

Pearce checked his watch. It was just past nine. He looked at the boy. He was greedily spooning food into his mouth as fast as he could. Mossa rubbed the boy’s head with his hand and said something. The boy smiled, and curry dripped down his chin. It was good to see the kid finally smile.

Balla and Moctar were slurping their curry and chatting with each other between hot bites.

Early leaned in close. Whispered. “These guys, taking off the veil? That’s a big deal. Means they trust you. It was a month before I ever saw their faces.”

“He’s righteous?” Pearce whispered, nodding at Mossa.

“Yeah. Good leader, out on point. His people love him. So does she.” Early nodded over at Cella, not wanting to mention her name.

“What’s the story there?”

“Have to ask her.”

Cella approached with a tarnished silver tray with small, thick glasses and a box of sugar cubes. She set it down in front of Mossa. She turned to leave.

“Stay, daughter, and drink tea with us.”

She nodded her thanks. The boy scooted over, and Cella kneeled next to Mossa.

Steam flumed out of the blue teapot’s long open spout. Mossa leaned over with a rag and picked it up by the handle.

“Black Chinese tea is first brought to a boil,” Cella explained.

Mossa lifted the teapot and set the spout near the first glass, then raised the pot dramatically into the air. A long stream of steaming tea poured into the small glass, frothing it up from that height. He lowered the pot just as dramatically, perfectly timing the fall with the filling of the glass, tipping the pot up at the last second, not spilling a drop. He repeated the practiced ritual, one glass after another.

The boy’s eyes were wide with excitement. He said something in French.

“What did he say?” Early asked.

“He said, ‘Just like my grandfather used to do,’” Cella answered.

Pearce fidgeted, impatient.

Cella laughed. “He’s only getting started.”

Early nudged Pearce. “You’re on Tuareg time now, buddy. Sit back and relax. This will take a while.”

Early was right. When Mossa had filled the last glass he set the blue pot down, opened the lid, poured each frothy glass back into the pot, and repeated the process all over again. The old chieftain was completely absorbed in the ritual.

“Guess he never heard of K cups,” Pearce said.

“It’s their way of processing the tea, blending it and cooling it, until it’s just right,” Cella said. “But it’s really about something more than tea, isn’t it?”

“And this is just the first round. There’s two more afterwards,” Early added.

Mossa spoke as he continued to pour and process with flourish. “The first glass we drink is strong and bitter, like life. The second glass is mixed with sugar, and so is sweeter. Like love.”

Mossa lowered the pouring pot, frothing the last glass. He set the pot down, finished with pouring. He picked up the tray and held it toward Pearce. Pearce picked up a glass. It was, indeed, cool to the touch. Mossa passed the tray around and everyone but Cella took one.

“By the third glass, the tea is thin, almost like water, and more sugar is added, and so it is very, very sweet, like candy. And do you know what we call this third glass, Mr. Pearce?”

Pearce shook his head.

Mossa lifted his small glass as he would for a toast, and grinned. “We call that last, sweet glass ‘Death.’”

After the last glass of tea, Mossa, Moctar, and Balla rolled cigarettes with fine Egyptian tobacco, filling the room with thick, oily smoke. Pearce declined the generous offer to join them but was surprised to see Early indulge. “When in Rome” was his response, but he seemed to really enjoy it. Confessed he’d taken up the habit again after joining Cella out here in the desert.

“You going native, Mikey?”

“This place grows on you, that’s for sure,” he said. “Sand, sun, stars. Nice to get off the carousel.”

Pearce looked up through the vent hole. A veil of stars and a waning crescent moon. He imagined a band of cavemen sitting in this very spot ten thousand years ago when the ground outside was lush with grass and the hunting was good. He understood what Early was saying. Wondered about Early’s wife and kids back in the States, though. He’d get the story later.

Mossa finished his cigarette, savoring the last tendrils of smoke curling up out of his mouth and into his mustache before stabbing it out in the sand. “Time to walk the perimeter. Join me,” he said, motioning to Pearce and Early. Balla stayed behind to clean up. Moctar, Mossa’s most devout commander, had already left for evening prayers.

The trip back through the low tunnel still bothered Pearce, but it didn’t seem as long as the first time, and they soon emerged into the warm night air. More stars. Mossa relieved himself against a rock. Pearce and Early joined him.

The towering stones formed shadows of jagged teeth in the thin moonlight. Pearce felt like he’d been swallowed. Mossa led them station to station, checking on the men at their posts. Three of them had night-vision binoculars—Russian, German, and French.

“Nothing,” they each reported. All quiet.

“The Malians hate night fighting, despite all of the training you Americans have given them over the years,” Mossa said.

Mossa led them to a perch overlooking the desert floor below.

“What are your plans now, Mr. Pearce?”

“I need to contact my people. Arrange for a flight out of here. I’m guessing I can’t leave from the same place I arrived.”

“The army will be here in the morning at the latest. There won’t be any place for that plane of yours to land.”

Pearce turned around. Pinpoints of campfires and firelight all across the mountains. In the distance, a small valley.

“What about over there?”

“The army is like a tide. It can’t wash away this rock, but it will crash against it. They will bring in their jets, also. Shoot down any plane they see.”

“Any suggestions?”

Mossa thought about that. “The army won’t cross into Algeria, not even for me. There is an airfield not far from here on the other side of the border. It should be safe to land your plane there.”

“Can you show me on a map?”

“Of course,” Mossa said. “But who needs a map?”

“I do. Better yet, GPS coordinates.”

“As you wish.”

Mossa showed Pearce the journey they would take. Turned out, “not far” meant a six-day journey. Distance, like time, had a different meaning out here. He wondered how many bones were buried in the sand.

37

Adrar des Ifoghas

Kidal Region, Northeastern Mali

^{8 May}

A megaphone barked in French in his dream. Distant, echoing. Strong mint tea made his mouth water. He woke. Pearce was on his feet before his eyes were fully open. It was dark in the cave, save for the fire pit and one lantern. He glanced up at the chimney hole. Still dark outside. Checked his watch. An hour until sunrise.

“No worries, Mr. Pearce. Just our friends announcing their arrival,” Mossa said. He was pouring tea. “Still time to eat.”

“What is he saying?”

“An invitation to surrender peacefully. If I refuse, he will come and seize me by force.”

Early was rummaging through the food crate. “How in the hell am I supposed to know what’s in these things?” He pulled out a black plastic bag. “It’s all in Turkish.”

“Think of it as a box of Cracker Jack.” Mossa laughed. “Take what you can get.”

Early grabbed three bags and hustled back over to the fire. “How do you know about Cracker Jack?”

Mossa feigned personal injury. “I may be a desert brigand and a feared terrorist, but I am not uncivilized.”

Pearce scanned the darkened corners of the cave. “Where are the others?”

The electronic voice echoed again. Pearce didn’t need to know French to hear the anger and fear.

“Balla and Moctar are out there, preparing to greet our friends. The women were moved to another cave further back for safety, along with the boy. When this is all over, there is a village that will take them in until they can return to their families.”

“How did you convince the boy to go with the women?”

“I gave him my pistol and told him to guard the women with his life. The best way to cure a young boy’s fears is to give him a man’s duty. Even at his age he feels the power of caring for those he loves.” Mossa nodded, agreeing with himself. “Yes. He will be a fine warrior someday.”

“And Cella?”

“Worried about your ‘friend,’ Mr. Pearce? Don’t. Early has his eye on her. So do I.”

“She’s doing one last check on the women before we haul out of here,” Early said. “Then she’ll come with us.”

“Us? It’s just me, remember?” Pearce had called Judy earlier with the map coordinates for the Algerian airstrip.

“It’s a dangerous journey alone,” Mossa said. “I will take you myself.”

An explosion in the distance.

Pearce knew the sound all too well. “Mortars.”

“And so it begins.” Mossa smiled, holding out a glass of tea to Pearce.

“And where he goes, I go,” Cella said, dashing into the cave, breathless. She dropped down next to Mossa, threw an arm around him in a brief hug. He patted her hand, handed her a tea.

Another explosion.

Pearce felt the earth tremble slightly under his ass. Medium mortar round, a hundred yards downslope. Closer. Still finding the range.

Early cut open the pouches. “Bingo. Looks like crackers, a bag of apricots… and chocolate.”

Three more explosions walked up the mountain, each closer than the last.

Mossa laughed. “You see? Just like Cracker Jack.”

The mortar rounds fell like hailstones on a tin roof. Lots of noise, little effect. Sheltered by tons of granite, most of Mossa’s people were hidden in mountain caves or natural spider holes. Heavy weapons opened up below. Diesel engines raced. The symphony of death. Pearce knew the tune well.

“What about aircraft?” Pearce asked. His stolen M4 was slung over his shoulder.

“They know we have missiles, so they will stay above twenty thousand feet. If they drop bombs from that height, they are more likely to hit their own troops. Useless.” Mossa burped, checked his watch. “They will begin their advance any minute now.” He glanced up at the cave ceiling, listening. The mortars stopped. So did the machine guns. The last echo of gunfire faded into silence.

“This won’t take long,” Mossa said. “You are welcome to remain in here and have some more tea.”

Pearce held out a hand. “After you.”

Mossa snatched up his automatic rifle and dashed through the low-ceilinged entrance, Pearce close behind and Early in the rear. They had all helped themselves to ammo and hand grenade stores in the caves. For the first time since he had arrived in Mali, Pearce felt ready to go.

Mossa led them to a covered lookout nestled in tall stones and pointed out the battlefield, then the sky. Vultures circled overhead in the early-morning light. He pointed them out. “They always know, even before the first shots.” Three lines of black Malian soldiers in camo threaded their way up the hill behind three BTRs just like the one back in Anou, each line about a hundred yards apart. They met no resistance.

The southernmost APC was the first to broach the deep trench, taking a steep angle of attack to minimize the downward slope. When the front wheels crested the far end of the trench, the nose of the vehicle pointed nearly skyward, like a whale breaching the surface of the ocean.

Shhhhttt—BOOM! An RPG slammed into the bottom deck of the personnel carrier, easily penetrating the thin armor. The vehicle erupted in flames. Even up here, Pearce could hear the screams. The soldiers who followed too closely behind were killed by the explosion or burned, too, and the others farther back driven away from the intense heat. A few still had their wits and fired in the direction of the RPG smoke trail. The other two columns fired wildly at the rocks in front of them, too, hoping to hit something.

The big 14.5mm machines guns on the surviving BTRs opened fire. They stopped short of the trench line, waiting for their accompanying troops to clear the way of other RPG teams hiding up ahead. Officers and sergeants shouted at the cowering troops, who finally pressed on, pushing through the trench first, then up into the steeper inclines, throwing grenades, firing rifles.

Meeting no resistance, they advanced more confidently up the hill, but the BTRs stayed put, offering covering fire with their heavy weapons.

Mossa let the soldiers climb farther up the hill. Towering piles of granite and basketball-sized stones broke up the neat columns, and the geologic formation of the mountain face gradually funneled the Malians into a centralized mass in the middle.

When they reached the halfway mark, Mossa called in to Balla and Moctar on his radio as he activated a remote-control switch.

The ridgeline opened up in a volley of machine-gun fire, tearing into the front rank of troops, dropping them. The others hit the deck or stepped back.

The ground erupted behind them as an electronically activated land mine exploded, mowing down a half-dozen men in the rear. The mass of soldiers instinctively surged forward. Another explosion tore into the squad in front.

They were trapped.

Panicked shouts as bullets tore into their ranks. The big diesels on the BTRs roared to life, belching smoke as drivers threw them into reverse.

A Mali soldier jumped up and ran back down the hill with long, determined strides, bullets spanging on the rocks around him. Miraculously, he didn’t hit a mine. Another soldier leaped up without his rifle and followed suit, but bullets stitched across his back and he tumbled into the sand, triggering an explosion.

Mindless panic erupted as the soldiers leaped up and scattered, mines exploding, bullets flying. One by one they dropped as they fled, or were ripped apart by the explosions at their feet. Shards of granite swept their ranks like shrapnel.

Mossa watched the carnage unfold, emotionless. Like killing a goat for supper.

CRACK! A bullet exploded against the rock just above his head.

Pearce knocked the Tuareg down and covered him with his body.

“Where?” Pearce asked Early.

“Eight o’clock, about five hundred yards up on the ledge.” Early hunkered down behind a boulder, signaling the direction with a stab of his finger.

“You all right?” Pearce asked Mossa.

“Still alive.”

Now Tuareg mortars opened up. Sand geysered on either side of the fleeing BTRs. Gunfire raked the sand and rocks around the few remaining soldiers still able to run, fleeing for their lives. Corpses littered the mountainside along with the wounded.

Another sniper round smashed into the stone above their heads. They were out of his sights now, but he was still on the hunt, hoping for a random strike.

Malian soldiers down the hill who had found enough cover feebly fired back up at the rocks. Enough fire, though, to keep everyone’s head down.

Pearce had only one 40mm grenade for the M4 in his hand, but it had only a four-hundred-meter range. And there was no way he was going to get into a pissing match with a trained sniper, swapping five-hundred-yard shots with a gun ill-suited for the purpose.

“Sit tight,” Pearce told Early, then dashed back into the cave where he’d spent the night. A minute later, he emerged with the unopened Pelican case he’d been hauling around since he’d arrived in Anou. He popped open the lid.

More rounds cracked into the rocks above Early and Mossa.

“What new toy do you have now?” Mossa called out.

Pearce uncrated an electrically powered Hybrid Quadrotor, modified for the South African Recces. With four rotors for vertical lift and one for pushing like a plane propeller, the HQ didn’t need a runway. Pearce pulled out the controller tablet and hit the auto-launch button. The vertical rotors fired up, kicking up sand like a leaf blower, blasting the drone into the sky. It hit the preprogrammed altitude of five hundred feet in seconds. The onboard camera automatically activated and streamed a live image onto the controller tablet. Pearce quickly found the sniper on the ridge and tapped his image. A red box overlay indicated that the target had been acquired.

“Here goes nothing,” Pearce muttered, and tapped the strike button.

The HQ didn’t hesitate. It raced another thousand feet higher, paused at the apex, then dove headlong toward the clueless sniper, exploding on impact. Five pounds of ultra-high-explosive material vaporized the shooter. The “suicide” drone had worked perfectly.

Pearce scooted back over to Mossa and Early. “All clear, but keep covered up. There might be another one.”

“Not likely,” Mossa said. “Look.”

The three men surveyed the battlefield. The two BTRs were long gone, while the third still roared with flames, black smoke boiling into the morning sky. The few survivors on the mountainside were badly wounded, clutching their guts, moaning, bleeding, dying.

Another goddamned killing floor, Pearce thought, and there he stood in the middle of it. Again.

Pearce glanced up into the sky. Those birds circling high up on the thermals had seen it all before, too. Thrived on it. He’d seen them everywhere he’d ever been in a fight. Maybe they were following him, like gulls after a fishing boat.

Pearce had no idea how right he was.

38

Adrar des Ifoghas

Kidal Region, Northeastern Mali

^{9 May}

What Pearce failed to notice was that not all of those birds circling overhead were the same.

One of them belonged to Guo. It was a hawk drone, covered in lifelike plastic feathers. An amazing example of bio-mimicry at its best. The hawk drone’s high-resolution cameras had captured the entire battle, as well as the men who had fought it. The Tuaregs, of course, had their faces covered by their distinctive indigo tagelmusts, but the hawk’s cameras had captured parts of the faces of two guılaos. The images were being fed into JANUS, DARPA’s latest facial-recognition software, recently stolen from the Americans. JANUS focused on facial and skull morphology—pieces of faces, or faces contorted by smiles, shadows, frowns, et cetera—rather than on perfect full-face captures. It took only a few moments for the software in Weng’s computer to identify Troy Pearce and Mike Early.

Suddenly, Guo’s mission had become exceptionally interesting. He called in the failed battle and the discovery of the two Americans to Zhao, still in Bamako.

Zhao residence

Bamako, Mali

Zhao thanked Guo for his report and the two formulated a revised plan. With any luck, it just might work.

Unfortunately, Zhao didn’t believe in luck and he couldn’t afford to take any more chances. Failure was not an option. An avid martial artist, Zhao studied the greats. One of his favorite fighters, Mike Tyson, once said, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.” Zhao felt like he’d been punched by Mossa in the face now. Twice.

He picked up his secure phone and called an old friend in the United States, a very well-connected man who could help him solve his problem—for a price. A man who was in desperate need of something Zhao could offer him. A man who preferred to be called The Angel.

L’Argent Bar

Washington, D.C.

Jasmine Bath played dumb. Funny how easy it was to do. A change of tone, a furrowed brow. A lie becomes the truth. And the truthfulness of the liar, once established, never questioned. People wanted to trust her, to believe she was on their side always. She was happy to oblige.

No, of course I will never monitor your calls. Your privacy is important to me. Trust is important in this business. You know that. Without it, we’re both dead.

That’s how the first meeting always went with a new client, even one as powerful and savvy as The Angel. But that had been a while ago. They hadn’t had a face-to-face since then, so when he called and asked for a meeting, she obliged. It would go one of two ways, and one of them might prove fatal to her.

The Georgetown bar he picked was one of the oldest in town, and one of her favorites. Low light, high-backed leather chairs, wood walls, and superb yet unobtrusive service. It was a public meeting in an intimate, exclusive setting. That was a good sign.

Jasmine sipped her WhistlePig straight rye on the rocks, listening attentively. She pretended she hadn’t parsed every syllable of Zhao’s recorded phone call to him demanding to know why Americans were protecting the Tuareg terrorist Mossa. Pretended that she hadn’t recorded his postcoital bedroom chat with his wife, asking her who Troy Pearce was, what Pearce Systems was all about, and why Pearce was in Mali. Bath just smiled and nodded and sipped and listened. Waited before asking the obvious questions.

“And what did your wife say about Pearce? I mean, who is he, really?”

“She pled ignorance because she really doesn’t know anything about him. She tried to explain Pearce’s connection to Myers, which, frankly, I never fully understood.”

Neither did Jasmine. Pearce was an open secret, hiding in plain sight. The few times she tried to access data on him, she was either shut down or sidetracked. At the time, it was interesting but not important.

“It’s a damn shame we never got to those impeachment hearings on Myers. Probably a lot of things got swept under that rug,” he said.

“No doubt.”

“Do we know if Myers has any interests or concerns in Mali?”

“Part of my contract with you is to monitor all of President Myers’s communications—”

“Just ‘Myers.’” The Angel visibly stiffened, took another sip of his Old Fashioned. “She’s a former president who quit the office. She doesn’t deserve the title.”

“It’s funny you should ask me about Myers and Mali. She made a recent phone call that seemed harmless enough.” Bath had run a search of all of Myers’s e-mails, calls, and texts, sniffing out references to Pearce and Mali after The Angel’s little bedroom chat with his powerful wife. It paid to be on top of these things, to appear omniscient when really one needed only to be proficient. Only one reference popped up a few days ago.

“A call to whom?” he asked.

“Pearce. He was in Mozambique when he took it. Sounded like he was in the cockpit of a plane when he spoke with her. Myers was sending him to exfil Mike Early out of Mali. That’s quite a coincidence, don’t you think?”

“Nothing about Mossa?”

“No.”

The Angel jiggled the ice in his glass, thinking. “The call makes sense. Myers would send Pearce to Mali to fetch Early, because Early worked for Myers, too. One of her security advisors, as I recall. But Pearce never left Mali.”

“How do you know he’s still there?” Bath knew the answer was Zhao. She had to feign ignorance; otherwise, The Angel might suspect she’d listened in on his call.

The Angel smiled. “I have my sources.”

Bath frowned, thinking. “Maybe Myers was speaking in code. Maybe she wasn’t really sending Pearce in to rescue Early, but was really sending him in to help Early.”

“Help Early with what?”

“Mossa.”

“If that’s the case, then they’re both in Mali at Myers’s behest and now they’ve both been seen helping Mossa. That means she must have ties to Mossa, too. When you find out what those ties are, let me know. But for now, at least, I’ve got Myers connected to Mali and to Mossa. That’s all the ammunition I need. One more thing: I want you to begin seeding the blogosphere with stories and pictures about Mossa, the Tuaregs, terrorism, Africa—you get it. I want to push the themes the senator raised on Finch’s gawd-awful show last Sunday. In fact, here—”

The Angel forwarded a video from his phone sent by Zhao. It was an edited version of the video shot by Guo’s hawk drone, showing Tuaregs shooting helpless, wounded Mali soldiers.

Bath pulled it up. “Oh my God. This is terrible.” Of course, she didn’t tell him she had already seen it, having captured it from his phone earlier.

“Use it. Turn it viral.”

“No problem.” Bath wasn’t kidding. She ran one of the world’s largest virtual click farms. Her operation could generate up to three million fake “likes” per day on any given YouTube or Facebook page by deploying malware that hijacked legitimate IP addresses and using them to “like” the page, thus making the fake “likes” look real to the site managers. She justified her actions, in part, because she didn’t resort to the click-farm “sweatshops” in Third World countries like Bangladesh, where human drones pounded away for hours at keyboards registering thousands of “likes” per night for a dollar or two. Thanks to The Angel, the Department of State recently paid her $630,000 to get over two million automated fake “likes” on its Facebook pages.

For a hefty fee, Bath could turn almost anything into a viral hit. It was well known that Twitter and Facebook had millions of fake users, so she clearly wasn’t the only one doing this kind of thing, but nobody did it better. Her malware programs could also boost the “star” ratings of products offered by online vendors like Amazon or iTunes, blasting her clients’ sales through the roof and tanking their competition with equally bad reviews. Two best-selling authors and one Grammy-nominated musician had hired her in just the last year. For wary consumers of all stripes, it was becoming increasingly difficult to trust the ratings systems.

“You saw my e-mail about Myers?” Bath asked. “That she’s still sniffing around the Tanner issue?” Bath saw Myers’s pursuit of Tanner’s suicide as a far greater threat to both of them than the sideshow in far-flung Mali.

“Yes. That’s a problem.”

“What do you want to do about it?”

Bath wanted Myers dealt with, soon. She wondered if The Angel had the guts to pull the trigger if it came to that. If killing an ex-president had to be done, she preferred his fingerprints be on the corpse, not hers. But then again, it might provide CIOS with a very lucrative billing opportunity.

“I want you to dirty the water,” he said. “Let’s roll out a campaign against Myers and her lapdog Pearce. Link them to Mossa and AQS, but discreetly. That should keep her distracted, and keep her away from Tanner.”

“Audience?”

“The national security establishment, of course. The usual suspects. CIA, NSA, FBI. But do that thing you do. Make it look like legitimate chatter from the bad guys.”

Bath hid her rage. She knew damn well how to plant false information on the web to impugn people. She’d practically invented the NSA’s handbook on the subject.

The Angel smiled. “I want to put Pearce and the others on Greyhill’s radar, too. I need Greyhill sweating every second that he doesn’t do something about this new ‘threat’ we’ve just uncovered.”

“Not a problem.” Bath was happy to oblige. People might get killed if Greyhill overreacted, but that was on him, not her. She was just the messenger. In her line of work, morality was a fiction she could ill afford.

39

Adrar des Ifoghas

Kidal Region, Northeastern Mali

^{9 May}

The small band picked their way down through the shadows of the eastern slope while on the other side of the mountain the Mali army lay dead under the merciless afternoon sun.

After the battle that morning, Cella tended the few wounded Tuaregs while Mossa and his men dispatched the suffering survivors. They returned to the cool of the caves, ate again and drank, then Mossa led his men in the noonday prayers while Pearce and Early waited outside.

Pearce raised Ian on his recharged sat phone. Didn’t tell him about the battle, just that everything was on schedule. Got updates on Judy, who was comfortable but now restricted in her air base quarters. Cella’s daughter was already on a chartered flight to Rome.

He thought about Lisbon. Counted the years. Dorotea was a beautiful little girl. It was certainly possible. And those eyes.

First chance he got, he needed to talk to Cella.

After prayers, Mossa briefed Pearce. Mossa assured him that two devastating defeats in two days would send the Malians reeling back to Bamako. There’d be nothing to fear from them for a month, at least, and he’d be back well before then. But Mossa was no fool. He still posted guards, and rotated them frequently out of the scorching sun and back into the caves for rest, water, and food, waiting for the worst of the heat to pass before they began the next leg of their journey.

Mossa was wearing his indigo tagelmust, of course, but had swapped out his combat camouflage fatigues for a traditional blue kaftan and cloth pants, all in royal blue. Leather sandals had replaced his boots, too. Pearce wondered why the change.

Moctar and Balla volunteered to carry Pearce’s remaining Pelican case containing the M-25, Switchblade UAV, and firing tube. He couldn’t imagine them hauling his load on foot for the next six days, but then again, he didn’t know how he’d manage it by himself, either. But he couldn’t leave that technology behind. Too expensive, and too dangerous if the wrong people ever got ahold of it. He’d proven that already back in Anou. And, technically, it was still the property of the South African army, even if they hadn’t taken possession of it yet. He’d have to refund the Hybrid Quadrotor, of course, but at least he could truthfully report on its combat effectiveness.

Like Mossa, Moctar and Balla had rewrapped themselves in their tagelmusts. It was the Tuareg way. Both men were a decade younger than Pearce, but he knew that only because they had uncovered their faces the night before. Wrapped up again, they were ageless, mysterious, and fearsome.

“Moctar, a question.”

“Yes?” The young Tuareg had good English.

“Most Muslim women cover themselves, but not the Imohar women. Why is that?”

“Why would I want to cover my daughters’ heads? I want them to feel the wind in their hair and the sun on their faces, the way Allah intends.”

“Western women feel the same way. They refuse to be covered.”

Moctar laughed. “That is the difference between your people and mine. If I tell my women they shall be covered, then they shall be covered. But I give them the freedom to be uncovered because it pleases me. Your women don’t cover because it pleases them. Your women rule you. All your women wore hats before, yes?”

“Yes, quite often. Until the 1960s.”

“Women’s Liberation,” Moctar said. He pronounced it like a judgment rather than a fact. Pearce let it go.

Balla called out, pointing ahead. An RPG was slung over his shoulder, along with a pack carrying more HEAT rounds.

“And there is our transportation.” Mossa nodded at a small caravan of fourteen camels marching toward them, shimmering in the heat of the sand. Seven camels carried Tuareg gunmen, AKs slung on their laps. Seven other saddles were empty.

“Do you have a mechanical one of those?” Mossa joked, pointing at the camels.

“Actually, yes. It’s called an LS3—a Legged Squad Support System. It looks like a headless, skinless horse.”

“Truly? That would seem to be both a marvel and a nightmare,” Mossa said.

“I grew up mucking rich people’s horse barns. The LS3 has some advantages.”

“Mucking?”

“Shoveling shit.”

“The problem is the putting of the horse in a barn, not the shitting of the horse,” Moctar observed.

By the time they made it all the way down the mountain, the camels had arrived and were already kneeling. The camel driver saw Mossa and raced over. The two men embraced like old friends. Balla and Moctar began securing the Pelican case to a camel.

“Have you ever ridden one of these beasties?” Early asked.

“No,” Pearce said.

“You’re in for treat.”

“That’s what you said to me that time you tried to hook me up with that WNBA power forward.”

“Excuse me? I’d like to hear that story,” Cella said, chuckling.

“She was on a USO tour in Iraq. A big girl, let me tell you,” Early said, lifting his hand a foot above his head like a measuring stick. “About yea tall, and a French braid like a hawser, down all the way to the middle of her back. You know, from behind you could—”

“Forget it,” Pearce barked.

“Pearce! Early! Come!” Mossa beckoned them with his hand.

The six kneeling camels were still four-foot-tall mounds of muscle and very light brown hair, almost white. On top of each were wooden saddles with high slanted backs and elongated three-pronged forks where a stubby saddle horn should be. Each of the saddles was elaborately decorated with goat leather and brass cutouts in bright geometric patterns in bold colors, especially red and turquoise. The animals were further adorned with trappings of long leather strips and woven fabrics. The other Tuaregs remained mounted. Their hands were coal black, as were the small part of their faces he could see behind their veils.

Moctar pointed at Pearce’s camel. “Your ship of the desert, for a sea of sand,” he said. He laughed. “I heard that in a movie once.”

Pearce had ridden plenty of horses growing up in Wyoming. He’d even broken a few broncs in his youth—or at least tried to. He knew the key to riding an animal was to exude confidence. Nervous riders made nervous mounts. Pearce marched up to his camel, grabbed the fork, and hauled himself up on the stirrup, like he’d done it a thousand times before. The camel never flinched. None of them did. They were a serene bunch. The Zen masters of the Sahara. Pearce knew that a group of horses would have been far more skittish, especially around strangers.

“You’ve ridden camels before?” Mossa asked.

“Horses.”

“I rode an elephant once, in a circus near Tupelo,” Early said. “Cost me five dollars.”

“I should like to ride an elephant someday,” Mossa said as he mounted his own animal.

The camel driver and Mossa exchanged words. Mossa nodded, turned to Pearce.

“He would like to trade you for your rifle.” Mossa pointed at Pearce’s M4 slung over his shoulder.

“What’s wrong with his AK?” Pearce asked. “This thing is a little finicky in the sand anyways.”

“Mano likes the new M320 grenade launcher on it. He feels the side-loaded breech is superior to the previous model.”

Pearce smiled. “Man knows his stuff.”

“Mano Dayak is a dealer in such things. He can fetch a great price for that weapon back in Niger.”

“What would he give me for it?”

Mossa chattered a question. The driver answered.

“Two AKs and a camel of your choice.”

“Very tempting. Tell him I’ll think about it.”

The camel driver tapped Pearce’s camel with a crop and the animal’s rear end rose up. It felt like he was in the front seat of a downhill roller coaster. Pearce clutched the saddle with every ounce of strength in his thighs to keep from pitching forward, even though he was gripping the fork. A moment later, the camel stood on its front legs and leveled out. Pearce’s butt was nearly ten feet in the air. It seemed like twenty. He liked the view up there. But it also made him feel like a target.

The other riders all mounted their camels, and the animals rose on command. Mossa’s animal was blazingly white and the tallest by far, and the most ornately decorated. He prodded his camel with a commanding “Het-het” and took the lead. Pearce’s fell in line automatically, no doubt by force of habit. The small caravan was headed for the endless yellow horizon. As strange as the last twenty-four hours had been, he couldn’t begin to imagine what the night might bring.

40

Adrar des Ifoghas

Kidal Region, Northeastern Mali

^{10 May}

Three a.m.

The bodies lay where they fell during the day, cut down by gunfire, grenades, or land mines. Most had bloated, baking beneath the scorching sun all day. The burned-out hulk of a six-wheeled BTR stood upended where it had died, a hole blown in the bottom deck by an RPG as the vehicle crested the trench line, the crew turned to ash.

In all, Guo counted seventy corpses on his way up the mountain. The Mali troops were brave enough but poorly deployed, and even more dismally led. As far as he was concerned, they had been useful for mine clearing at best. The hard way.

The veil of moonlight and the blanket of stars provided more than enough ambient light for this new generation of night-vision equipment. Two of Guo’s best men advanced to either side of him, quiet as butterfly wings. They were all kitted out in the same black tactical uniforms and fully enclosed helmets. The uniforms were temperature controlled and the headgear completely covered their faces, ears, and mouths, much like a high-tech motorcycle helmet. Black flexible “smart glass” wrapped across their faces, fronted by double-barreled night-vision goggles. Each helmet’s enhanced audio provided another tactical advantage over their opponents in the dark. Guo’s command helmet also featured POV windows from the other two operators’ cameras, giving him additional tactical information.

The three men easily located the Tuareg lookouts on the ridge above, two men dozing off and two others whispering in low tones. Telling stories, judging by the way they laughed and smoked. From their distant observation post, Guo and his team had counted fifteen Tuareg fighters in the battle, not including the three that fell. That left eleven not visually confirmed. He was certain Mossa was still alive. Why else would the other brigands remain behind?

His orders were clear. Kill Mossa, capture Pearce. That wouldn’t be easy, but glory was only glorious because it was hard-won. Thankfully, Guo had another tactical advantage to deploy. He blinked an order in his command window and the other two men halted, then took cover. They were just a hundred meters from the ridge.

Guo pulled a cylinder from a vest pocket and emptied the contents on the ground. Pulled a controller from another pocket. A hundred Madagascar hissing roaches scurried up the hill. Each of the giant cockroaches was fitted with cameras and sensors and steered with controls wired to their abdominal sensory organs and antennae. Software auto-piloted them to find warm bodies. Guo and his team tracked their movements and location on the helmeted smart glass.

Originally developed for search and rescue in collapsed buildings, the bio-bot roaches were excellent surveillance tools in war. Dr. Weng’s lab found that using living insects offered numerous advantages over manufactured ones. They had been designed, perfected, and field-tested over millions of years by Nature herself. The best humans could do was mimic natural systems. Weng found that the problems of propulsion, fuel, and load bearing were still overwhelming for miniature human-manufactured insects like mosquitoes and spiders. Even when they were successfully built, their range and payload capabilities were negligible. Retrofitted cockroaches provided a naturally selected, high-tech solution. It was only a matter of time before the hawk drones would be replaced with real ones controlled remotely, too.

Thirty minutes later, the bio-bots had located fifteen warm bodies. It was too dark in most of the caves for the roach cameras to function properly, so it wasn’t clear where Mossa and Pearce were located. Mossa’s death was imperative. Pearce’s capture was secondary. The three operators separated, moving into positions, dividing up targets. Guo gave the signal.

Suppressors muted the bark of their automatic rifles. Single shots took down the first three Tuaregs. Grenades tossed behind boulders took out four others. The team advanced up the hill. Guo fired a grenade launcher throwing flash bangs. Two more Tuaregs dropped, clutching their ears, until Chinese bullets shattered their brainpans. Guo and his men finally crested the hill. The remaining Tuaregs were clustered in two caves. No easy way to get them out. Guo pulled a white phosphorus grenade and tossed it into the first cave. When the phosphorus was exposed to the air, it flashed a brilliant white light and caught fire. A Tuareg leaped out of the cave enveloped in unquenchable flames, screaming. Guo’s men let him pass. A second came out, clothes ablaze, gun firing. He was cut down, but not before putting a round into the smart glass of one of his men. The operator’s POV video image on Guo’s command screen went black.

According to Guo’s display, there were still three people left in the first cave, and six more in the next, ten meters ahead. Guo dashed for the second cave and tossed another WP grenade. More screams.

WHOOSH! An RPG screamed out of the black maw of the cave and roared over Guo’s head. He dropped to the ground reflexively. Good thing. Bullets spanged into the rock just behind him. Had he remained standing, he would have been cut in half. His comrade called, two more down.

BOOM! A grenade went off ten meters behind him. His second video screen went blank. His last comrade down. Guo laughed, battle-crazed. This is how heroes died, he told himself. He tossed another flash bang into the cave, waited for two seconds for the flash to pass, then tossed in a conventional grenade. It thudded. Guo dashed in, gun blazing. Bullets tore high into the chest of a man against the far cave wall trying to raise a rifle. The other four were already dead.

Guo heard the crack of a rifle. A sledgehammer slammed into his back, square in the center of his body armor. Guo dropped to the ground and rolled hard to the left, drawing his pistol. He emptied the mag into the man’s chest. The Tuareg spilled to the ground, grasping sand in his fists until a last breath escaped his lungs.

Guo stood up unsteadily and surveyed the rest of the carnage. Five dead in here. But not Mossa or Pearce. Just a boy and four women, burned to death. Disappointing.

No glory in that.

He stumbled back out into the warm night air and loaded a new mag in his pistol. He approached the prone body of his man by the cave and checked for a pulse, but there was none. Blood soaked the sand around the corpse. Too bad. Guo edged his way as quietly as he could into the other cave. He crept along a broad, low-ceilinged passageway for several meters until he came to a large natural cave. There were two bodies on the ground. One moaned. Guo ran over to the one moaning. Not Mossa, not Pearce. He checked the other body. Dead. Not Mossa, not Pearce.

Guo kneeled down next to the bleeding Tuareg. He pulled a knife. The Tuareg’s eyes widened with terror.

“Where did Mossa go?” he asked in French.

Five minutes later, after much blood and pain, the Tuareg died. And Guo had his answer.

41

CBS Studios

Washington, D.C.

^{10 May}

Meet the Nation was the oldest of the Sunday-morning news shows, and its anchor, Howard Finch, the most ancient and venerable of the bunch.

“Senator Fiero, thank you so much for being here today. Presidential candidates are even busier than sitting senators, so I appreciate your taking the time to join us this morning. My sources in the know say that you have the Democratic nomination all but sewn up for 2016. That must feel pretty good.”

“As you well know, there’s nothing ever ‘all sewn up’ in politics, especially in the Democratic Party. We’re listening to the American people, and they’re concerned about the direction this nation’s headed.”

“My polling data suggests that the majority of Americans are pretty happy with the way things are going now under President Greyhill. For the first time in a long time, we seem to be fighting in fewer places, fighting fewer political battles over things like debt ceilings, and experiencing something of an energy renaissance, thanks to the new federal policies on oil and natural gas extraction.”

You’re a smug old bastard, Fiero thought. “There’s no doubt that our economy has enjoyed a temporary boost from the oil and gas industry, but of course, all of that began under former president Myers, not President Greyhill.”

“So you don’t give President Greyhill any credit for the peace and prosperity this country is currently enjoying?”

“Well, I certainly give him credit for not undoing the hard work that we in the Congress accomplished along with President Myers in helping right the fiscal ship, particularly in regard to the budget freeze. But there are still millions of people in this country, Howard, who haven’t been able to dig out from the wreckage of the financial crisis of 2008, and this country faces significant strategic threats that are ill-served by our current foreign policy.”

“What threats are you referring to?” Finch asked.

“There’s a new ‘Scramble for Africa’ now under way. China in particular is making tremendous headway all over the continent, securing significant reserves of natural resources in the forests, oceans, and mines of that great continent. They’re also establishing strategic relationships with African governments along the way.”

“No offense, Madame Senator, but help me out here. Why do we care a fig if China is growing rice in Angola or fishing in the Gulf of Guinea?”

“The West owes a particular moral debt to the African continent for our centuries of exploitation, particularly our own sordid history regarding the slave trade. It’s our responsibility to see that Africa develops in a way that benefits all Africans, not just the wealthy dictators and oligarchs, and certainly we shouldn’t allow the continent to once again be reexploited by the mercantilist policies of the Chinese government. That being said, the Chinese are playing a very smart geopolitical game. The greatest opportunity for Chinese influence today—Chinese money, Chinese trade contracts, and even Chinese weapons—is Africa. If there’s ever going to be a shooting war between our two great nations in the future, the Chinese warships, tanks, and planes used against us will be built and fueled from the natural resources they harvested out of African soil.”

“Are you proposing we put American boots on the ground in Africa to stop the Chinese?”

“We already have boots on the ground over there. The reason why AFRICOM was created back in 2007—and by the way, I voted for that spending authorization—was to take on the al-Qaeda threat in Africa. But it’s been horribly neglected under President Greyhill. I’m drawing up a bill to strengthen and expand those forces to meet the rising tide of militant Islam that’s exploding across the continent, particularly in places where Chinese influence has taken hold. Mali, for example. I’d hate for that poor nation to become another staging base for al-Qaeda, the way they used Afghanistan.”

“I thought the French took care of the Islamic threat in Mali back a few years ago,” Finch said.

“The French managed to push back the threats briefly, but the al-Qaeda presence is on the rise. Jihadists all over the region have engaged in terrorist acts against pipelines, tourists, and local police forces. But, of course, not against Chinese facilities, at least not in Mali.”

“Are you implying a Chinese connection to terrorists in Mali?”

“There’s a natural alliance of interests, don’t you think? At least, if your goal is to push out Western influence. And isn’t that the stated goal of both the Chinese Politburo and the jihadist terror organizations?”

Finch shook his head. “I’m sorry, but I just think Americans have had a bellyful of foreign wars these days. As you’ve rightly pointed out, this nation still faces severe crises at home. Why get involved in a country like Mali? I’m willing to bet that half of Americans can’t even find it on a map.” He laughed. “I’m willing to bet that half of Congress can’t find it on a map.”

Fiero flashed her megawatt smile, hiding the rising rage boiling up inside of her. “I assure you, Howard, that those of us on the Senate Intelligence Committee are well aware of the location and significance of the nation of Mali. And let me give you an example of why the American people should care about what’s going on over there. Most Americans agree that we need to be moving forward as quickly as possible on green energy. We’re all too painfully aware about the effects of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases created by burning carbon fuels. Green energy is the future, and the future of green energy is energy storage in the form of batteries, and batteries aren’t possible without what scientists call rare earth elements. Mali is a potential new source of REEs, and the Chinese are locking them up even as we speak—the same way they did other resources, like lithium in Afghanistan after we pulled out. It’s clear to those of us on the Intelligence Committee that the Chinese are following a very deliberate resource strategy. And yet President Greyhill seems content to do nothing about this. So no one should be surprised if, in a few years from now, all of the batteries in our electric cars are all manufactured in China. Or, worse yet, maybe all of our electric cars themselves will have to be made over there because they won’t sell us the batteries.”

“So it’s your opinion that the United States needs to act on this matter? To secure what you term ‘REEs’?”

“What I’m saying is this. There’s no question that the American people are tired of war, but the American people are also very practical. As you suggested, Howard, most Americans simply aren’t aware of what’s going on in Africa, and I’ve decided to sound the alarm—even if it costs me an election. That’s what real leadership is all about. But President Greyhill seems to be more interested in winning an election than in protecting the interests of the American people. I just hope it’s not too late to act before then. And if I might quote President Myers, all it takes for evil to thrive is for good people to do nothing.”

“Interesting,” Finch said before turning to the camera. “We’ll be back after these messages.”

Fiero glanced over Finch’s shoulder. Fowler was standing by camera number two. He had a thin smile on his face, and he nodded his approval, adding a wink as an exclamation point.

A home run, in Harry Fowler–speak.

She just wished she could see Greyhill’s face when he finally watched the tape. It was her first shot fired in anger, and she’d aimed it right at Greyhill’s nut sack.

42

Adrar Province

Southwestern Algeria

^{10 May}

The sand in front of them was mostly flat, dotted with the occasional juniper bush. Pearce had no idea how those plants could possibly thrive out here, but there they were. Just like the Tuaregs, he supposed. These nomads had managed to survive out here for two thousand years as well, despite the heat and seeming lack of water. Thrive, in fact, trading in spices, salt, gold, and slaves, purchased or stolen between empires.

Taking his cue from the Tuaregs, Pearce had pulled off his combat boots. Not only was this cooler, but now it was his soft feet resting on the camel’s neck rather than the hard soles. No point in making the camel suffer.

After an hour in the wooden saddle, his backside was already getting sore even with the cloth padding added. It didn’t bother him too much. Saddle sore was a rite of passage where he grew up. The soreness was even a kind of comfort. Not everything about his childhood had been miserable. Life in the mountains working for his dad’s failing sawmill was always hard, but a whole lot better than growing up in a slum or refugee camp. There were days he missed Big Sky Country. But today wasn’t one of them.

The ride on the one-humped camel was remarkably comfortable, better than on most horses he’d ridden over long distances. Maybe it was the soft sand, too, and their big padded feet. They hardly seemed to leave an impression. The camel’s gait was long and graceful, like a slow-drifting creek. The effect was hypnotic. Their elongated shadows rode just ahead of them and to the right, gliding across the sand. Pearce had let the rope rein drop from his hand. His camel was so docile that it followed the animal in front without any guidance from the loop of rope tied around its lower jaw.

What struck him most about the journey now was the utter silence, save for the swishing sound of the camel’s soft pads on the sand. If he hadn’t heard that he might have thought he’d gone deaf. As a Westerner, he was accustomed to the constant bombardment of big-city noise, as true in the Third World these days as anywhere. This was a welcome respite. But soon he found himself battling his demons again. “Like a house swept clean,” the silence soon gave way to bad memories. Memories he’d tried to bury, but always returned. Johnny Paloma, especially. He nudged his camel on, even managing to get him to pick up speed. Caught up with Early’s.

“How’s the arm?” Pearce asked.

“This? Fine. In fact—” Early slipped the sling off, tossed it in the sand. He flexed his arm, grimacing a little. “Feels good.”

“How about your head wound?”

“Head wound? There’s nothing wrong with my head.”

“Really? Then why in God’s name are you out here instead of at home with Kate and the kids?”

Early’s handsome face darkened.

“Last time I saw you was on a Facebook post in Santorini with the family,” Pearce added. “You look better without a beard and the olive-drab bandage wrapped around your noggin, too, by the way.”

“Santorini. Yeah, that was a great trip,” Early finally said. “We always have great trips.”

“So?”

“You know how it is. Kind of hard to ride the bench once you’ve played in the game.”

“An adrenaline junkie? Fine, I get it. So take up hang gliding.”

“Not the same. Besides, hang gliding doesn’t pay as well.”

“You don’t need any money. Kate’s dad is loaded.”

“I’m no freeloader. And after the Myers thing, well, let’s just say I wasn’t getting a lot of offers. The K Street cats want access, and I was persona non grata on the Hill, even with the blanket immunity.”

“And Kate’s okay with this?” Pearce pointed at the wilderness. “Shouldn’t you be coaching a Little League team or cutting the grass?”

“This was supposed to be temporary. Then I was promised a replacement.”

“But Cella’s father never found one?”

“Sure he did. Problem is, I found him, too. With his throat cut ear to ear, bled out in the sand a half mile east of Timbuktu. I called it in. ‘Another guy’s on the way,’ he said. Until then, I sit tight. At twice my rate, too. That buys a lot of Little League uniforms.”

Pearce thought about that. “You’re worth it. Cella’s lucky to have you.”

Early laughed. “Tell her that. She wants me gone so bad she can taste it.”

“What’s the story with her?”

Early eyed him. “You tell me, partner. You have a longer history with her than I do.”

“What did she tell you?”

“Nothing. Which tells me a whole lot.”

“Her dad has always had someone around to protect her. I’m just surprised it’s you, that’s all.”

“It was a gig. I took it. I’m home as soon as I can get there.”

“I’m flying out in five days. Come with. Trust me, Cella will be fine. Especially with Mossa and his men around.”

“You sure? The noose is tightening around his neck, in case you haven’t noticed. That’s why she sent her kid away.”

“What kind of mother does that?”

“The kind that loves her kid.”

“Then why didn’t she go with her?”

“If you know Cella, you know how fierce she is. She’s devoted to the old man.”

“How did she ever decide to raise a family out here? You’d think she’d move back to Italy just for the sake of her daughter.”

“She’s a complicated lady. You’d have to ask her.”

“That means the noose is tightening around your neck, too, you know.”

“I got a big neck. Stiff one, too.”

“Seriously. You might not walk away from this one.”

“Can’t help that. I’ve been hired to do a job. I’m going to see it through. So would you, if you were me. I think.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Unlike me, a handsome Army Ranger on a grand adventure in the Sahara, you look like a steaming turd recent shat out of a cat’s anus, a dim shadow of the CIA stud I used to know. What the hell happened to you?”

“After the Myers thing, I kinda lost it. Did some shit I probably shouldn’t have done, but had to. You know how it is. “

“Yeah, I do.”

Words like “duty,” “honor,” and “loyalty” were more than just slogans for men like Pearce and Early. Early heard rumors that Pearce had gotten his revenge on the Russian responsible for the death of Myers’s son.

“But it was more than that. You were right about her, Mikey. She was the real deal. I actually started to believe again. And then she was forced to resign. Politics as usual.”

“And then what?”

Pearce blew out a long breath. “I ran, I guess. Hid in the work. At least, the humanitarian stuff.”

“How was that working for you?”

“Okay, until a few days ago.”

“What happened?”

“The last job went sideways. One of my guys got killed.”

“I thought you weren’t working security anymore.”

“That’s the hell of it. We weren’t. For just that reason. We were trying to track a few rhinos. Johnny got killed anyway.” Pearce didn’t describe the condition of Johnny’s corpse when he found it. “I wasn’t there when Johnny needed me. He paid the price.”

“He signed on. He knew what he was in for, working for you.”

“Should’ve been me, not him.”

“Someday, it will be. You know that. So do I. It’s just that his ticket got punched before yours did. You’ve got to let that go.”

Pearce thought about that for a while. “If Cella left, though, you’d leave, right?”

“I’m a huge fan of Mossa, but I’m a bigger fan of my wife and kids. If you can convince her to vamoose, I’m on the next flight out of here with the two of you.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

Early laughed. “Good luck with that.”

43

Pearce’s cabin

Near the Snake River, Wyoming

^{10 May}

Myers’s body craved a good run, but her common sense told her to stay put and out of sight. Heaven only knew what kind of resources may have been deployed to find her. Even George Clooney owned his own spy satellite these days, but at least he was putting it to good use keeping tabs on African warlords. By now her disappearance had raised alarms with whoever was behind the Tanner suicide. She had to assume they were still looking for her.

Neither she nor Ian had slept in the last few days as they applied digital brute force to the vast data sets she had proposed in their search for the identity of Tanner’s blackmailers. In lieu of sleep, Myers resorted to periodic yoga stretches and body-weight exercises to keep the blood flowing and her muscles taut, fighting the inertia of countless hours of software writing and data analysis. She found a couple of crates and rigged up a crude standing desk to do her computer work. She’d read recently that sitting for more than three hours per day increased heart disease by sixty-four percent, among other pathologies. Sitting, apparently, was the new smoking.

Myers checked the clock on her computer. It was almost time for Ian to check in. She’d passed on her assigned data analyses as they were completed over the last two days, but she still kept crunching data sets, following other leads that popped up. There was no question in her mind that the person or persons behind Tanner’s death were political, and most likely American, though international criminal syndicates had been known to play powerful roles in American political life, especially at the state and local levels both in the past and recently.

The one solid conclusion she had reached was that her old friend was as clean as she thought he had been. She’d known Tanner and his family for years and knew him to be an honorable judge and wonderful father and husband. But Myers was after his killer or killers, so she went after his records hammer and tongs, pulling out all of the stops, digging down to the subatomic level. To her great relief, she found absolutely nothing. With Ian’s help, she had been able to secure Tanner’s FBI background checks—as president, she’d only been briefed on the glowing summaries—and discovered that the FBI couldn’t believe his pristine personal and professional life. More than one of the FBI’s interviewees had referred to him as “Saint Vincent.”

Meyers had even managed to find one of Tanner’s fourth-grade report cards posted on the Internet—someone had found it at a garage sale and put it up, inappropriately, on Pinterest. Even then, according to his teacher, Tanner was an outstanding young gentleman with impeccable manners, social skills, and high academic potential. Taken together, her inability to find any dirt likely meant that the blackmail “evidence” used against the esteemed jurist had to have been manufactured out of whole cloth.

For a brief period of time she began to wonder if Tanner’s death was somehow pointed at her, some kind of payback for a slight—real or imagined—committed by her while in office; but she’d been out of office and out of the political loop long enough that she eventually dismissed the idea. What would be the point now? Besides, if these people were powerful enough to get a man of Tanner’s character to put a gun in his mouth and blow his own brains out, she knew that they could have just as easily come after her with whatever “evidence” they had concocted against him.

Her monitor dinged. Ian was checking in. “Here, Margaret.”

“Good to see you, Ian.” Myers saw that he looked as tired and baggy-eyed as she did. The two of them had hardly slept the last two days as they sorted through the mountains of data they had compiled. “What do we have?” Myers asked. She had forwarded her findings to Ian and he had spent the last two hours cross-referencing their results.

“There is a lot of outrage in American politics, isn’t there?”

“Yes, unfortunately. Some of that is ginned up by the politicians themselves to rally votes, but mostly it’s bad policies by a failed government that’s hurting millions of Americans fueling that rage.”

“I don’t know if this is the right list or not, but based upon everything we discussed and the search results we have generated, there are four congressmen, three senators, and five corporate CEOs that rise to the top of the outrage list. These are some very hated people.”

“Then those are our targets. Any connections between them?”

“Funny you should ask that. There is one senator and one CEO that are very closely connected. Both go by the surname Fiero.”

“As in, Senator Barbara Fiero?”

“Précisément. Her husband’s name is Anthony. These are very rich people, by the way.”

“I’ve met Senator Fiero. She is many things, including extremely intelligent, ambitious, and beautiful, but the one thing she is not is a computer programmer. She isn’t our super hacker.”

“Maybe she has her own private Edward Snowden in the NSA,” Ian joked.

“Edward Snowden wasn’t in the NSA. He worked as a private contractor for the NSA. That’s a big difference. What do you know about the senator’s husband?”

“A little mysterious, that one. He’s a private hedge fund manager with many international connections.”

“Is he a computer guy? Or does he have access to one?”

“He’s not a computer guy, but he appears to be connected to a very savvy data outfit known as CIOS. It’s a first-rate shop. The best, really, run by the best software engineer in the business. Answers to the name of Jasmine Bath.”

“Better than you? That’s hard to believe, given what I’ve seen you do and what Troy has told me about you.”

“I’m no slacker, but I don’t have the background and experience she’s had in the TAO. She is to computer spying what Peyton Manning is to your American football.”

“So CIOS and this Jasmine Bath computer genius could mount an operation like the kind we’re talking about?”

“With the kind of cash the Fieros have? Absolutely. And if they really are using her to turn the kinds of decisions we’ve talked about, then they’re even richer than what we think, I’m sure.”

“How so?”

“This isn’t about blackmailing individuals. They’re extorting whole industries. Imagine how much money they could solicit from the entire banking industry, or the entire oil industry, if they could deliver legislation that would save those industries tens of billions of dollars in taxes and regulatory expenses. And then imagine the stock picking they could do, knowing months in advance that these sectors were about to benefit from huge changes in favorable legislation or court rulings.”

“I’m still not buying it. You’re talking about the next Democratic nominee for the presidency. The senator is already quite wealthy thanks to her husband, and she’s already one of the most powerful politicians in Washington. Why would she play these kinds of games?”

“When is anyone ever satisfied with the money and power they already have?”

Myers didn’t have an answer for that. Time wasn’t their friend and they had limited resources. They could start digging into the six other candidates they had generated as well, but that would only put them further behind. She’d gotten as far as she had in life by learning to trust the people around her, and Ian clearly thought the Fieros were the two best suspects to pursue.

“Okay, then. Those are our targets. The Fieros and CIOS.”

“Targets? Are we talking wet work?”

“No, but they’ll wish it was wet work when we’re through with them.”

“Best be careful with CIOS. Bath will have every security precaution in place, as well as the means to retaliate against us if she thinks we’re coming after her in any way, wet work included.”

“Agreed.” Myers frowned.

“Problem?”

“It’s hard to imagine Barbara Fiero would be caught up in something like this. But as I think about it, maybe it’s not so far-fetched. She has a reputation for being the luckiest woman on the Hill. She always seemed to know exactly the right place to be or the right vote to cast or the right person to meet at just the right time. If she has the kind of extreme insider information we’re talking about, that would explain a lot.”

“Knowledge is power, Margaret. You of all people should know that.”

“They say genius is seeing the obvious. Clearly, I’m no genius or I would have seen through her earlier.”

Myers remembered Fiero during the NSA hearings held by her committee in the Senate. She was one of the few Democrats on that committee adamantly in favor of the NSA’s domestic spying program. One of the Democrats asked the NSA straight up, “Are you spying on Congress?” Fiero interrupted the question and said, “That’s a national security question that shouldn’t be asked in a public forum. But I, for one, support the NSA’s security programs both here and abroad, and I for one wouldn’t care if they were listening in on my telephone conversations, because I have nothing to hide.”

The gall of the woman, especially if what they now believed about her actually turned out to be true. She should have seen it.

“Ian, now we have to go on the offense. Are you still with me?”

“To the bloody end.”

“Thank you.”

Myers hoped that Ian’s words weren’t prophetic. They divided up tasks and went back to work.

44

Maersk Oil Pumping Station

Tamanghasset Province, Southern Algeria

^{10 May}

The sobbing Algerian was twenty-three years old, clean-shaven and close-cropped. The knees of his Maersk oil coveralls were soaking up the Danish engineer’s blood on the cement floor, seeping from the headless corpse a few feet away.

“Are you a woman? Quit crying!” Al Rus shouted in Arabic. He slapped the young man’s face.

The Algerian fought back his desperate tears, gasping for breath, trying to stem the tide.

Al Rus hit him again.

“Are you a Muslim?”

The boy’s eyes sparked with hope. “Yes! Yes!”

“Then why are you helping these Crusader dogs rape your country?”

“My father. He is not well. We needed the money—”

“Thieves steal because they need money.”

“I am no thief. I was only an apprentice to that man.”

“You are no Muslim.”

“I am of the faithful!”

“You swear it?”

“I swear it!”

“Why should I believe you?”

“I repent!” The young man turned his head and spit on the corpse of his dead Danish friend.

“You will stop helping the Crusaders?”

“Yes, yes, a thousand times, yes! Mercy. In the name of Allah,” the boy whimpered.

Finally, Al Rus nodded. “Yes, I believe you have repented of your thievery. But I think you are weak in your faith. You are no Salafi. I think you will turn back to your thievery and burn in the fires of hell in the next life.”

“No! I am strong in my faith. You will see.”

Al Rus nodded again. “Yes, we will see.”

He stepped over to an interior door and pushed it open. On the floor, a woman. Naked, bruised, bloodied. But still very much alive.

Al Rus held out the knife handle. The Algerian glanced at the woman, a friend, and then at the knife.

Salvation.

The young Algerian stood up unsteadily on trembling legs and took the knife. It shook in his hand. He glanced back up into the Norwegian’s merciless face.

Al Rus’s satellite phone rang. He pulled it from his belt. Saw the number. Nodded to the Algerian, then to his men, and stepped outside into the burning sun to take the call.

It was already hot, and not yet noon.

“Yes, of course. I have been waiting for your call,” Al Rus said in English. It was Guo.

The woman’s screams echoed from the pump room. He ignored them, focusing on Guo’s instructions. Didn’t notice her screaming suddenly choking off, like a needle lifted from a record.

“I understand.” He snapped off the phone. One of his fighters, a Chechen, approached him. “Here’s your knife.”

Al Rus took it, wiped the bloody blade on his pant leg.

“Did you take a video?”

“Yes. Of course,” the Chechen said. “It will be posted shortly.”

“Good. There is still one more lesson for the others. No one is fooled. ‘A dog always returns to its own vomit.’” Al Rus hated secularized Muslims worse than devout Jews, or even Christians.

The Chechen glanced back at the pump house, nodding in agreement.

Al Rus smiled. “And then we have a new mission.”

45

Pearce Systems Headquarters

Dearborn, Michigan

^{10 May}

Ian’s task was clear: spy on Jasmine Bath and Senator Fiero. The risks were equally clear: decades in a federal penitentiary—or worse. The trick was coming up with a strategy that would accomplish the former and avoid the latter.

Jasmine Bath was the best in the business. Period. Her cyberdefenses were impeccable, but her ability to counterattack was fearsome indeed. On the other hand, Senator Fiero and her husband would be more vulnerable and less able to retaliate in the digital realm, so they were the better targets to pursue. Undoubtedly, there would be some sort of exploitable link between Bath and the Fieros. Ian knew if he could break through the Fieros’ defenses, he might have a good shot at breaching Bath’s.

The problem with that strategy, though, was that Bath and CIOS would undoubtedly be keeping a watchful eye on the Fieros. Ian had to find a way to disable CIOS without being detected so that he could exploit any breaches in the Fiero firewalls. But how?

Ian wasn’t confident he had the resources to deal with Bath. It reminded him of an exam he was once given in computational semiotics at Oxford. The tutor came into the lecture hall and demanded that each student come up with a question too difficult to answer—and then answer it. The entire room groaned with frustration and anger. It took Ian a few moments to realize the purpose of the exercise. People prefer the path of least resistance. People tend to work on problems they already know they can solve, thereby limiting intellectual growth. But avoiding problems that seemingly can’t be solved also limits intellectual growth because it means that people become increasingly unaware of what it is they don’t know. Science, in the end, is about knowing, and the beginning of “knowing” is finding out what you don’t know. Only by becoming aware of the impossibility of a problem—insufficient knowledge or skill—would possibilities for solutions begin to suggest themselves. And that’s when the first solution to Ian’s insoluble problem suggested itself.

Ian knew he wasn’t smart enough to overcome Bath, so he needed to draw on others for help. The international hacktivist community had been under assault by the national security agencies of Western governments throughout the world in the last two years. Whether through DDOS attacks, counterhacking, or just old-fashioned spycraft—honey traps, bribes, break-ins—agencies like the NSA and Britain’s GCHQ had crushed the backbone of many autonomous hacker groups. The surviving members were both afraid and eager for payback. Ian knew how to tap into their collective talent and rage.

Ian reached out to an old contact in the GCHQ who provided him with the necessary info. Carefully hidden behind a series of hijacked computers, Ian faked a new Edward Snowden leak, distributing the explosive “secret” that CIOS corporation and Bath had been the primary architects of the most recent antihacktivist campaign, along with a few IP addresses. This tiny nick put enough blood in the water to draw in the hacktivist sharks, and within hours a digital feeding frenzy had begun.

Within twenty-four hours of Ian’s launch, CIOS was fighting for its digital life, with Jasmine Bath leading the defenses. If Ian couldn’t disable CIOS and Bath, he could at least distract them long enough so that he could accomplish his second strategic objective—going after the Fieros.

Ian attacked the Fieros on two fronts with Myers’s help. First, he deployed one of Pearce Systems’ most reliable human assets, a redheaded Kiwi named Fiona York. As a former JTRIG operative specializing in physical operations, she was perfectly suited for what he had in mind.

York and an assistant picked up sixteen specially fitted miniature air and ground vehicles from Rao’s lab. Some of the MAVs deployed the same high-speed miniature cameras swallowed in pill form to photograph colons.

The MGVs were fitted with gecko-inspired microfiber pads that allowed them to climb walls or other vertical objects. Their primary objective was building and car windows. They were equipped with low-powered infrared beams that could “hear” the vibrations on glass caused by people speaking on the other side of them—a surveillance technique invented in the 1940s by the Russian Leon Theremin, inventor of the Theremin music synthesizer.

York deployed the miniatures with the help of a SmartBird drone, dropping them near the Fieros’ personal residences and vehicles in California and D.C.

But Ian’s main attack was cyber. It was only logical that CIOS would have put better security on the senator since she was their primary client and her home was geographically proximate to CIOS headquarters. Ian further surmised that Anthony Fiero didn’t want his vast financial empire exposed to Bath’s probing queries, which was yet another reason Ian decided to focus his efforts on him. That focus paid off quickly.

Ian knew that Fiero’s private company would have its own IT resources, separate from CIOS. A frontal assault on mainframes or hard drives was possible, but time-consuming. Better to attack on the periphery. Fortunately, that kind of attack was easier than ever these days, thanks to the “Internet of Things,” the machine-to-machine communication that facilitated more and more of modern life. Ten billion devices were connected now. By 2020, that number would rise to fifty billion.

Ian began by downloading the latest hacker list of known back doors to the top ten business software apps. Through one of those back doors, he gained access into an older version of Microsoft Outlook on the tablet of Anthony Fiero’s personal assistant. From that infection vector, Ian was able to make the leap into a variety of other Microsoft software programs, which then spread into the assistant’s laptop, then other devices and apps connecting the assistant’s laptop to Fiero’s laptop. Then the infection really spread.

Once inside Fiero’s laptop, Ian’s malware infected Fiero’s tablet, iPod, and even his Xbox One game system. The Xbox One Kinect feature provided Ian with voice and video images inside of Fiero’s home, which activated whenever the motion-activated Kinect system was triggered by his presence, recording everything he did or said in front of the gaming machine.

Automated software and data synching between machines and cell phone then spread the virus to Fiero’s phone, a treasure trove of data unto itself. A side benefit was that the phone infection spread to Fiero’s wireless Bluetooth connection, which, in turn, gave Ian access to Fiero’s car and its “smart” radio and GPS apps. Now Ian could listen in on or record any conversation Fiero had in his car through the radio and speakers, and geo-locate him even if Fiero’s phone wasn’t there.

The other significant penetration Ian achieved through Fiero’s phone was to invade the “smart” thermostat system Fiero deployed to remotely control his utilities when he was away from his home. Unfortunately for Fiero, the apps that controlled the smart thermostat also sent wireless data to the utility company, which in turn had access to Fiero’s bank accounts for automatic bill pay. Once Ian was inside Fiero’s bank account, he downloaded copies of all his financial transactions and acquired the personal data needed to find and penetrate other bank accounts, domestic and offshore, including those of his wife, who was also linked to those accounts. Those financial holdings were so vast, however, that Ian had to bring in a trusted consultant, a former Europol bank examiner who specialized in tracking down illicit Russian mafia drug money around the globe.

Ian also created several botnets exploiting the viral pathways now infecting almost all of the Fieros’ computer and computer-controlled devices, including Anthony’s newly installed “robo-toilet.” The botnets all went to work copying, downloading, or recording every sliver of data they could get their digital hands on. Like the NSA and its massive data-collection capabilities, however, Ian was overwhelmed with the sheer volume of data pouring in. It would take several days, maybe even weeks, for them to sort through it all and connect the dots. Myers had set about the analysis task immediately, while Ian kept expanding the data-collection nets. She was happy to let him take the lead on this operation. She had always been smart enough to delegate the hardest work to the most talented members of her team.

For all of their success, Ian thought the best news was that they had managed to slip their noses under the tent without Bath even knowing they were there. In a long string of personal achievements in the digital world, Ian couldn’t think of anything to top that.

46

Adrar Province

Southwestern Algeria

^{10 May}

They rode until late evening, arriving at a wadi to rest and feed the camels. The sun had long before dropped below the jagged horizon of the Adrar miles behind them. The flat sands shimmered like a silvery sea beneath a high, blazing moon.

Balla stood watch in the distance over the camp while Moctar prayed the last prayer of the day. The camels stretched their long necks, grunting as they munched on the salty green leaves of the tamarisk trees. There was no water, but the camels had drunk their fill before they’d arrived at the Adrar. The Nigerien camel driver was baking bread in a shallow desert oven he’d dug with a trenching tool. That left Pearce, Mossa, Early, and Cella to sit and relax around the small campfire where the teapot was heating up. It was still near eighty degrees Fahrenheit, but that was thirty degrees less than the hottest part of the day, so the evening felt almost cool.

Mossa had unwrapped the tagelmust from his face and smoked a cigarette. He sat cross-legged, sharpening the takouba resting on his knees with a whetstone. The traditional Tuareg sword was about three feet long and almost two inches wide at the base near the leather-wrapped hilt. The sound of the stone scraping on the ancient steel was the only sound in the air, save for the munching jaws of the camels.

“I want to thank you for saving my life today, Mr. Pearce. Twice.”

“I was just trying to save my own neck. And please, call me Troy.”

Mossa held his takouba up, examining the fine edge he’d just put on it. “You have amazing weapons in your arsenal. Did you invent them yourself?”

“No. I have a research team that sometimes creates new systems, but mostly we take existing technologies and modify or combine them. The grenade launcher you saw me use in the village was off-the-shelf technology, and so were the MetaPro glasses. We just wrote a piece of targeting software to link the two, and to make them function better together.”

“You saved many lives today,” Mossa said. He laid the blade back down across his knees, put the whetstone away.

“And took many more,” Cella added.

“Hardly seems kosher,” Early said. “All this new technology has too many advantages over us mere mortals. Might even make wars obsolete someday.” Early recalled the slaughter at the village, but he’d seen plenty of other examples of technology-induced carnage on too many other battlefields.

“From your lips to God’s ears,” Cella said. “It can’t happen soon enough.”

“Your machines will change wars, but not the men who fight them. There will always be wars, until there are no men,” Mossa said. “When all men are dead, then their machines will still keep fighting for them, because they will have been programmed by the men who made them.”

“It’s Terminator and Skynet,” Early mused.

“I loved that movie,” Mossa said.

Early burst out laughing. Cella and Pearce did, too, infected by Early’s loss of control.

“I said something funny?” Mossa said.

When Early finally recovered, he wiped the tears from his eyes. “No, I’m sorry. I meant no offense. But you look like an ancient warrior from the distant past. The thought of you sitting in a movie theater with your sword, watching a futuristic sci-fi movie, well, it just seemed funny.”

“I watched it on a DVD, actually. At my son’s home in Tripoli, years ago.” Mossa’s eyes misted into a memory. Cella took one of his hands in hers, squeezed it. The others stared into the crackling fire.

Pearce wanted to know more about Cella’s husband. How they met, how he died, and how Cella of all people would be caught up in a genocidal war like this. But now was not the time.

Mossa returned to the present, to his guests. “You two met in your war, yes?”

Pearce nodded.

“In Afghanistan, or Iraq?”

“Iraq,” Early blurted after an uncomfortable silence. “A joint mission, helping the Kurds in the north.”

“You were both CIA?”

“Me? Hell no. U.S. Army Ranger.” Early threw a thumb at Pearce. “He was the spook.”

“A spy. Interesting. I don’t think of spies as fighters.” Mossa flicked his cigarette into the fire.

“I was with the Special Operations Group, part of the CIA’s Special Activities Division. Sort of like their own little army.”

Mossa brightened. “So you were a soldier?”

“Yes.”

“But not now?”

“No.”

“And yet here you are, fighting.”

“That’s different.” Pearce pounded Early on the shoulder. “I came for this knucklehead. But now, no more wars.”

“What did you learn about war in Iraq?”

“He also fought in Afghanistan,” Cella said. “That is where we met. A long time ago.”

“What did I learn? I learned that war is too important to be left to the politicians.”

“And yet they are the ones who want them. But it has always been that way. What else?”

“I know that I fought with good men, mostly.” Thoughts of Annie washed over Pearce. “And women.”

“Women fighters?” Mossa was incredulous. “What a waste.”

“Yes, a few women back then. More now, these days.”

“Why did you fight in Iraq?”

“For my country.”

“What changed?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why did you stop fighting? Did you stop being an American?”

“The war was voluntary. Most Americans didn’t fight in the war. Almost none of the politicians did—neither did their children.”

“You got that damn straight,” Early said. His face soured. “Funny how the guys that never fought are the first to want to fight.”

“That is true everywhere,” Cella said. “Politicians want the votes. They get votes when they bomb other people.”

“We call them ‘chicken hawks’ back home,” Early said.

Mossa lit another cigarette. Pointed at Pearce. “But I asked about you, not about the chickens. Why did you stop fighting?”

“We started two wars we didn’t know how to finish. Too many people I knew got killed waiting for my government to figure that out.”

“We have a saying: ‘It’s easier to fall into a well than to climb out of one.’”

“We jumped into two of them,” Early said. “Now look at them, now that we’re gone.”

“But you had the best weapons. Did your technology fail you?” Mossa asked.

Pearce shook his head. “No. The technology worked fine. We killed many, many more of them than they killed of us.”

“And yet you are the ones who quit the war. You, yourself, left. So your technology did fail.” Mossa pointed at Moctar, head devoutly touching his prayer rug. Mossa whispered. “Moctar loves his people, but he loves Allah even more. Such men are more dangerous than drones.”

“Even to you?” Pearce asked.

“Yes. Even to me. He is al-Qaeda Sahara.”

“What?” Early couldn’t believe it. “Then why is he here?”

“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.” Mossa winked. “He will only put a bullet in me if he is ordered to. He loves me like a father, and his people. He is a good man, as well as devout. Besides, even the prophet Jesus had his Judas, did he not? Not that I am a prophet or even the son of a prophet.”

“The muj always knew that they would win simply by not losing,” Pearce said, using the pejorative slang word for mujahideen. “They were willing to die by the tens of thousands. They bought time with their blood. But I agree. Technology is never a substitute for the will to win.”

“So many needless deaths,” Cella added. “On both sides.”

“They started it,” Early said. “I’m just sorry we didn’t finish it.”

“And how would you finish it?” Cella demanded.

“Kill every last motherfucking one of them,” Early said.

“‘Them’?” she asked.

Early’s eyes narrowed. “The muj. The crazy bastards. The terrorists.”

“They call us terrorists,” Cella said. She meant Mossa and her adopted family.

“I don’t know who ‘they’ are. But I know you. You’re the good guys.”

“And if you didn’t know us?”

“But I do. I’m here, aren’t I?”

“Imbecilli!” She flipped a dismissive hand in the air.

“Daughter, please.” Mossa raised his head. “These are our guests.”

“I’m sorry.” Cella wrapped her arms around her raised knees and buried her face, hiding from the conversation.

Mossa turned back to Pearce. “So you stopped fighting the war, and yet you are still a warrior. Both of you.”

“Not for America.”

“Why not?”

“You don’t understand. Our politicians are corrupt.”

“You Americans. You are so quick to change everyone else’s government. Perhaps you should change your own.”

“That’s called treason where we come from,” Early said.

Mossa smiled. “Truth is always treason to the wicked. Was not George Washington a traitor to the British Crown?”

“I’m no politician,” Pearce said. “And the country is divided.”

“Ha!” Mossa laughed. “You don’t know the Imohar, do you? We have a little unity now because everyone else is trying to kill us. When the outside threat is gone, watch what my people will do to each other again.”

“What do you mean?”

“The MNLA wants Azawad—a separate Tuareg nation. But Ansar Dine wants sharia law, not Tuareg law, al-Murabitoun wants to wage jihad against foreigners, and AQS wants a West African caliphate. But worst of all, most of our people have settled in the cities driving trucks or in the villages raising sheep and selling tires and tobacco, and are forgetting our ways altogether.”

“So why do you still fight? Every government around here wants the Tuareg fighters to surrender, and want you dead.”

Mossa ran his fingers along the takouba blade, his fingertips gliding over carved images in the metal.

“The men who make our swords are called Ineden. Do you know this term?”

“Blacksmith?” Pearce offered.

“Yes, that is what they do, but Ineden are also a separate caste of people. They have their own special language and, it is said, their own magical powers, which they breathe into these swords as they make them. Do you understand?”

“No.”

“The Ineden are forged, by God, to make swords. I am Ihaggaren, forged in God’s furnace to wield the sword. Like you, I am a warrior. Do you not see? The warrior is given by God to serve his people. I win my war by being faithful to God and to my people. What they do with their victory, inshallah, is up to them. That is why you are miserable, Troy. You are a ronin, a masterless warrior. You know this term?”

“I’m surprised you do, but I don’t know why I’m surprised by anything you say anymore,” Early said.

“When a samurai no longer had a master, he sold his services or turned to crime,” Pearce said. “Or killed himself.”

“No. When a samurai no longer had a master, he was no longer a samurai. He lost his purpose.” Mossa turned to Early. “A samurai is devoted to his master, not to war. Serving his master was his true purpose. Did you know this? Or have you not read The Hagakure?”

“When did you read it?” Pearce asked. He had been assigned it as a text at The Farm years ago.

“When I was a young man, younger than you. It meant nothing to me at the time. But my Russian instructor had insisted on it, despite its being a ‘remnant of bourgeois classism,’ or some such nonsense.”

Pearce couldn’t help but smile. Had the Soviets copied the CIA curriculum, or the other way around?

“How long were you in the Soviet Union?” Pearce asked.

“Not the Soviet Union. Benghazi, at the military academy, for six months. We had several Russian instructors. Gaddafi was a socialist, besides being a Pan-Arabist.”

“You fought for Gaddafi?”

“I was recruited into the Islamic Legion in 1971. He recruited many poor fighters, but especially Tuaregs. He favored us, and gave us the chance to fight. Good money, homes. My two sons were born there.” He nodded at Cella. “Her husband. He became a doctor.”

“And your other son?”

“A fighter, like me. With his brother, in Paradise. I hope to see them both soon.”

“Don’t say such things,” Cella said.

Mossa ignored her. “Libya was good to me. But it all came at a very high price. A price I was willing to pay for too long.”

“What was the price?”

“To forget my people, my fathers, my tribe, my chief, in order to serve Libya and the Pan-Arab movement. But Gaddafi forgot that Tuaregs are not Arabs. We are Berbers, and we were here in the Sahara before the Arabs. And, inshallah, we shall be here long after they are gone.”

Mossa drew a big circle in the sand with his finger, then split the circle into parts and named them. “Libya here, Niger here, Mali here, Algeria here, Burkina Faso here. Do you see what these nations all have in common?”

“Sand,” Early said. He never missed the obvious.

Mossa laughed. “No. Not even that.” Mossa wiped the borders away with his hand. “They are merely lines in the sand. Meaningless. The Sahara is the Sahara, and the Imohar are its masters, without borders.”

Mossa turned to Pearce. “I was miserable when I came home. I thought it was because I was a warrior without a war. But in truth, I had become a ronin, like you. It wasn’t until I took up the rifle on behalf of my people that I became human again.” He slipped his takouba into its leather sheath. “If you don’t mind my saying, you are like a sword without a sheath. You, too, Early. Do you understand my meaning?”

“No,” Early said.

“The best sword remains in its sheath so that it is ready when it is needed. A sword outside of its place will rust and break and become worthless, only to be tossed into the fire.”

Cella shook her head. “You men and your talk of war and borders and killing. If you made life inside of you instead of taking the lives of others around you, you would hear how foolish you sound.”

Mossa laughed. “You should talk, daughter! You are the fiercest warrior of us all. You fight for those you love, too. Only not with bullets.”

The camel driver called out, lifting the great round wheel of bread out of the hot sand.

“You see? All your talk of war, and you should have been making tea!” Cella stood up and headed over to the camel driver to help.

“She is worse than two generals,” Mossa said. “But she has a good heart.” The Tuareg glanced at Pearce. “But you already know this.”

“She saved many lives in Afghanistan, including mine, I think.”

“And yesterday you came here. Perhaps she is the one I should thank for our lives.” Mossa stood. “But first I shall make the tea.”

Pearce scanned the wide horizon. If the Malian army decided to come after them here, nothing could save them. He was all out of tricks now and there was nowhere to hide.

47

Maersk Oil Pumping Station

Tamanghasset Province, Southern Algeria

^{11 May}

Lieutenant Beaujolais kneeled down to get a better photo on his cell phone. The Danish woman was beautiful. Such a waste. He pressed the button. The cell phone camera flashed. The woman’s face appeared on the small screen. Blond hair, brown eyes, a mouth twisted in a rictus of terror.

He pressed SEND. The message was addressed to the French Foreign Legion command. He stood. The rubber soles of his boots made a crackling sound as he moved. The floor was sticky with blood. He took a photo of the Danish woman’s twisted body, three feet away from her head.

“Lieutenant!” The shout came from outside.

The lieutenant pulled his pistol and dashed outside. The corporal’s voice came from around back.

“Lieutenant! Here!”

Beaujolais ran to the far side of the building. The corporal, a wiry Haitian, pointed in the distance. A man stumbled around in the distance on a low dune, like a drunk.

“You! Stop!” the lieutenant called. But the man stumbled on.

Beaujolais fired his pistol in the air. “STOP!” But the drunk plodded on.

The lieutenant and the corporal ran the distance, their boots marching a straight line through his wobbly footprints. They were both in fantastic shape, but sprinting uphill a hundred meters in the hot sand left them both exhausted, thighs and calves throbbing.

The lieutenant’s eyes stung with sweat. He wiped it away with his free hand, afraid he was seeing things.

Mon Dieu.

The wide-eyed Haitian corporal saw the same thing.

The two soldiers raced the last few meters, shouting for the man to stop in French, English, and Arabic. He didn’t.

The Haitian dropped his rifle and tackled the man from behind. He didn’t resist. They rolled him over. The drunken man held up his two arms, raising blackened stumps to heaven, crying out, I am no thief! in Arabic, blood and tears streaming down his lidless eyes. He wasn’t drunk.

He was out of his mind.

No question. This was the man on the AQS video beheading the Danish woman in the pump house posted just hours before.

The Haitian opened his canteen and tried to give the man water, but he spit it out. The corporal dumped it on his face to cool him and relieve his sun-scorched eyes.

The lieutenant shot a cell phone picture of the man’s blistered face for confirmation from HQ, but he was certain it was him, the killer in the video. But this wretch wasn’t AQ Sahara. They wouldn’t do this to their own kind. Besides, he had no beard, no weapon, and they left him behind—unlike the other two masked butchers in the video holding the girl. Maybe they forced this man to behead her?

“Who did this to you?” the lieutenant asked in Arabic.

The man wept and burbled.

“I can’t understand you.”

“Al Rus,” the man finally muttered.

The lieutenant cursed. They had just missed him. But at least they knew he was in the area. Maybe headquarters could do something with that.

The Oval Office, the White House

Washington, D.C.

Diele poured himself another scotch. Without asking.

Again.

President Greyhill was coming to regret his arranged marriage with the esteemed former senator from Nevada. Diele had helped broker the deal that got Myers to resign her office in exchange for blanket pardons for Pearce and his friends. The broker’s fee Diele charged was the vice presidency. The exchange gave Greyhill the big desk in the Oval Office, but he could never shake the feeling that Diele had one hand on the doorknob, ready to shove him back out.

But Diele had his uses. He was a formidable ally to have in his corner—the kind of bare-knuckled street fighter who would gleefully kick an unsuspecting opponent in the balls before the fight even began. The kind of fighter that would rather kick an opponent in the head when he was down on the ground clutching his scrotum than actually get in a ring and prance around for ten rounds. That made Diele extremely valuable to Greyhill.

But the vice president was a pain in the ass, too. Didn’t know his place. Stomped around the Oval Office like he owned it. Drank up Greyhill’s best liquor. Didn’t even have the courtesy to ask Greyhill if he wanted one of his own, which he did.

“Quit pissing your pantaloons. It’s a nonstarter,” Diele said over the top of his glass. “Fiero can’t touch us.”

Greyhill shifted in his chair behind the famous desk. The pronoun “us” grated on him. “You’ve seen the headlines today, haven’t you? Seems Fiero is awfully prescient.”

Today’s below-the-fold front-page article in the New York Times featured a map of Africa and the spreading influence of the Chinese. A Washington Post op-ed had picked up on the Fiero Sunday-morning interview, too, and echoed her concerns.

“Slow news day at the fish wrapper, that’s all. And who watches those tired old news shows anyway?” Diele fell onto the couch, put his feet up on the heirloom coffee table. Greyhill clenched his jaw. Diele was a primitive.

“But what about her point? China and REEs and all of that? And, of course, the terrorist connection.”

“What terrorist connection? She didn’t offer any proof. Just some damn hearsay speculation. Don’t you see? She’s throwing everything out on the stoop, see what the dog’ll lick up. Or in this case, the reporters. You can smell her desperation. Don’t you think if any of this was legit, it would’ve popped up on the PDB?” Diele was referring to the Presidential Daily Brief, a document provided each morning by the director of national intelligence. Greyhill preferred an oral presentation by someone from the DNI’s office with just bullet points. He seldom read the actual documents. Diele pored over them.

“Our national intelligence community hasn’t always batted a thousand. Remember Benghazi? A dead ambassador and three brave Americans murdered by our ‘allies.’ Just because something isn’t in the PDB doesn’t mean it isn’t happening.”

Diele drained the last of his drink. The ice rattled in the glass. “Worst-case scenario? The terror threat turns out to be real. Then we send in the drones. But don’t even think about getting sucked up in that quicksand over there. It’s all a damn mess. The first Marine boot you put on the ground over there will be marching on your political grave.”

Greyhill frowned. Diele might be right. His instincts usually were. But Greyhill had taken note of the vice president’s grammatical shift. Suddenly, it was “your” political grave. Another irritating pronoun. He took the change as both a warning and a threat.

48

Karem Air Force Base

Niamey, Niger

^{11 May}

The raccoon rings beneath Captain Sotero’s eyes spoke volumes to Judy. Clearly, the woman hadn’t slept in days. No doubt because of her and Pearce’s arrival four nights before.

The captain sat at the small table in Judy’s dining/living room in the spartan visiting BOQ trailer where she’d been largely confined by AF Security Forces guards since her return from Mali.

“You have everything you need here, Ms. Hopper? Any personal items you need sent over?”

“No, everything’s fine. Just a little cramped, that’s all. But I’m used to that.” Judy had grown up in even more austere environments as a missionary kid in Africa. “Wouldn’t mind being able to stretch my legs every now and then.”

“Sure, no problem. Just help me clear up a few things, will you?”

Judy smiled. “If I can. I mean, I’ve told you everything I know already.”

“You see, that’s what I’m not so sure about. I think there’s a lot more to you and this humanitarian mission you’re supposedly on. For starters, where is the American you were supposed to be evacuating?”

“Like I said before, he decided not to come.”

“And you said his name was?”

“I didn’t say.” Judy didn’t know if Mike Early was in trouble or not for being there. Her dad had raised her with the maxim “Better to keep your mouth shut and appear the fool than open your mouth and confirm it.”

Sotero’s weary eyes narrowed. “His name is Mike Early. Your friend Mr. Holliday just confirmed that for me.”

“Okay.”

“But your friend”—Sotero checked her notes on a tablet—“Pearce, he decided to stay?”

“Something like that.”

“In Mali?”

“Yes.”

“You see, that’s what’s confusing to me. Do you remember Sergeant Wolfit? The man who was with me the night we first met?”

“Vaguely.”

“Square-jawed? Broad across the chest?” She mimed his torso with her hands. “Always looks pissed off?”

“What’s your point?”

Sotero pulled up a map on her tablet, turned it around. Pointed at a winking dot. “See that? That’s an RFID chip. The one that was attached to Sergeant Wolfit’s weapon. The weapon he believes your friend Pearce stole from him that night, an M4 carbine.”

“Do you always plant RFID chips in your guns?”

“We inventory everything, especially weapons. It’s easier to chip and scan them than do the paperwork. The Air Force is pretty good at technology these days.”

“Makes sense.”

“So you know anything about that? I mean, Pearce stealing his weapon?”

“You’d have to ask Troy when you see him.”

“If you’ll look closely at the map, you’ll see the chip is now located in Algeria. What’s Pearce doing in Algeria?”

Judy shrugged. “Maybe it’s just the gun that’s in Algeria.”

“Why would the weapon be in Algeria without Pearce?”

“You’d have to ask Troy when you see him.”

“So you’re saying Pearce is not in Algeria right now?”

“I have no idea where he is exactly.”

“But he’s probably still in Mali?”

“Like I said, I have no idea.”

Sotero spun her tablet back around. “Is Pearce really on a humanitarian mission?”

“He went in to get Mike Early, yes.”

“That’s kind of strange, too. We checked with the State Department as well as with the Mali government. We have no record of Mike Early entering the country of Mali, at least not legally. What is Mike Early doing in Mali?”

“I don’t know. You’d have to ask Mike when you see him.”

“Is this Early guy still in Mali? Or is he with Pearce in Algeria?”

“I’m sorry. I’m not trying to be difficult. I really don’t know.”

“Okay, let’s try another tack. Do you have any idea why my base commander has been detained in Frankfurt?”

“No.”

“Funny thing is, he was dispatched to Bonn–Bad Godesberg for what was apparently a bogus meeting the same day you arrived here, and when the meeting didn’t occur, he was flagged by the NSA as a possible terror suspect on the way back. He’s still in custody.”

“That’s unfortunate.”

“You don’t understand. Colonel Kavanagh is the most squared-away officer I ever knew, and a real straight arrow. He’s a ring knocker—academy grad, third-generation Air Force. No way he’s AQ-affiliated. I think someone’s messed with his data profile. You have any idea who that might be?”

“No.”

“Or why they would want him detained while you and your friends are operating out of this base?”

“No.”

“Of course you don’t.” Sotero took a deep breath. “Let me ask you something else. Do you know who Mossa Ag Alla is?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Never heard of him?”

“Not that I can recall.”

“He’s an AQ affiliate. A real bad-ass. Just got bumped up to number one dickhead on our extensive list of dickheads.”

“I believe you.”

Sotero sighed with frustration. “Okay, one last try. When you flew out of here on the tenth, your IFF signal stopped broadcasting when you crossed into Mali airspace, and then you dropped off the radar. What was that all about?”

Judy wasn’t a missionary anymore, but she couldn’t bring herself to lie about anything. It just wasn’t in her nature. “Security precautions.”

“Failure to broadcast an IFF signal is highly irregular and dangerous, which is why it’s also illegal.”

“Illegal in Mali, technically, since that’s where the violation occurred. I don’t suppose you have jurisdiction over there, do you?”

“And did you make any unauthorized or unscheduled stops on the return flight?”

Judy had to think about that. Technically, her flight to the Niamey civilian airfield was both authorized and scheduled, just not with the United States Air Force. “No.”

“Look, Ms. Hopper, I’m not trying to disrupt or interfere with your CIA op or whatever it is you guys are actually trying to do, but all I have to stand on is an extremely thin paper trail—basically, a one-paragraph order from this mysterious Colonel Sanders whom I still can’t reach—and nothing else to show for it. You were supposed to bop in and out and then bounce out of here in twenty-four hours with your man Early. Instead, there are now two Americans missing, presumably at least one of them is in Algeria, and he’s carrying a weapon stolen from a very pissed-off SF sergeant who’s about to be busted to corporal if that rifle doesn’t show up in the next twenty-four hours.” Sotero caught herself rambling. She rubbed her face to help her focus.

“So this is all about a missing rifle?”

“No, it’s not about a missing rifle. It’s about you people clearly lying about what your real mission is, and about me not being able to get independent verification that authorizes your fake humanitarian mission. I need to be very, very sure that I haven’t let a couple of bad guys onto my base. If I have, there’s a cell in Leavenworth with my name on it.”

“I promise, Captain, you haven’t.”

“This Pearce guy, he’s a friend of yours?”

Judy wanted to call him a first-class jerk for the way he’d been acting lately, but now was not the time for a Dr. Phil moment. “Yes, he’s a friend. A very good friend. A decorated veteran, too.”

“I’m glad to hear that. So you’d vouch for him?”

“Of course.”

“And you wouldn’t want anything bad to happen to him, right?”

“Not at all.”

“Straight up?”

“Word of honor.”

“Well, since you’re being perfectly honest with me, let me be perfectly honest with you. I just got word that a strike mission has been set for that dickhead I was telling you about, that Mossa character? Reaper, missile, you get the picture. If your friend Pearce is with Mossa, your friend Pearce is going to die.”

“Oh my word. When?”

“You tell me where Pearce is, I’ll tell you when the strike is.”

“I told you, I don’t know.”

“Do you know somebody who does? Because if you do, you’d better give me his name.”

Judy knew somebody, all right. Ian could still locate the tracker in Troy’s body. She also knew Ian had just eavesdropped on their entire conversation. She just prayed that he could do something about it.

He couldn’t.

CIOS Corporate Offices

Rockville, Maryland

Jasmine Bath listened in on the entire interrogation, too. She already knew Mike Early was a former close associate of Margaret Myers. When Sotero had initiated a query on Early and his status in Mali earlier, two of Bath’s algorithms tripped and he was flagged. She traced back the query to Sotero’s tablet and immediately hacked it.

Bath had always admired Pearce, if for no other reason than she had been able to acquire so little information about him. Either he or someone working for him was very good at keeping him out of all of the known databases and obliterating his digital shadow. There were thousands of “Pearce-shaped holes” everywhere she looked, as if someone was going in after Pearce whenever he popped up anywhere and erased any data relative to him and his company, Pearce Systems—one of the few organizations in the world she’d never been able to hack. This all just confirmed what she learned earlier from her hacked phone call between Zhao and Anthony Fiero.

Today’s interrogation now also confirmed for Bath that Pearce and Early were both in Mali at the same time as Mossa, and Myers had initiated Pearce’s mission into Mali, presumably to rescue Early. And yet Early was never rescued, nor did Pearce return. In fact, thanks to the RFID chip tracking on Captain Sotero’s hacked tablet and its ridiculously childish security system, Bath now knew where both Pearce and Mossa were located in Algeria.

That was all information that Fiero would desperately want in light of the concerns raised by Zhao. Information that Bath passed on immediately to Fiero before she herself succumbed to the pressure to torpedo it. Bath hated the idea of Pearce getting killed before she could meet him and figure out how he had managed to remain such a mystery to her. But Fiero was still paying the bills. Her curiosity about Pearce would have to remain unsatisfied.

No matter. Bath knew she would find greater satisfaction in her newfound knowledge that connected Zhao Yi, the Fieros, Pearce, and Mali. Knowledge she could use to finally untangle herself from the violent web she had been spinning all these years.

Bath decided it was time to make her move. She couldn’t afford to wait seven more months to retire, despite her plans. She’d been riding the tiger too long. Staying on would prove fatal. But if she wasn’t careful, so would the dismount.

49

The Office of the Vice President

The White House, Washington, D.C.

^{11 May}

Senator Fiero picked up a photograph from the fireplace mantel. It was a picture of Vice President Diele leaning against the Oval Office desk, talking down to President Greyhill seated on the couch. Very telling.

“You’re confusing the hell out of me, Barbara. Yesterday, you were busting our balls on national television about our failure to address the terrorism threat, and now you’re here asking us for a favor.”

Diele poured himself a scotch from a crystal decanter. The cold ice cracked beneath the warm liquor. He didn’t offer her one.

“I’m sorry. I’m not sure why that’s confusing to you. You’ve read the same reports I have. This terrorist Mossa is a dangerous new threat in the region. I want him stopped. So do you.” She set the photo back on the mantel. “I know you, Gary. You want this guy’s scalp as badly as I do.” Diele and Fiero had served together in the Senate for years.

Diele took a thoughtful sip of scotch. “You’re right, I do. He’s Asshole Numero Uno, as far as I’m concerned.”

Jasmine Bath had done a brilliant job seeding the various jihadi websites—legit and NSA-managed—with the uploaded war footage supplied by Zhao. Dead bodies, flaming vehicles, Tuaregs firing machine guns. A real horror show. Her automated systems also planted hundreds of fake comments on those sites in support of Mossa, linking him and the Tuaregs with al-Qaeda, jihad, and every other hot-button word flags that lit up the NSA algorithms. Within forty-eight hours of the first upload, Bath had transformed the obscure Tuareg chieftain into a worldwide villain. Carefully leaked “anonymous government sources” also put Mossa and his “AQ-affiliated terror group” on the front pages of the leading mainstream media sites, always scrambling to fill the insatiable twenty-four-hour news cycle.

“Terrorists like this Mossa character are Whac-A-Moles. You smash one down, three more jump up.” Diele took a sip. He was starting to look his age, Fiero thought. His famous mane of silver hair had receded in recent years and his pinkish-gray scalp was really starting to show. He needed a good set of hair plugs if he ever hoped to make a presidential run.

“Who said ‘The cost of freedom is eternal vigilance’?”

“Does it matter?” Diele asked.

“No, I suppose it doesn’t.”

“And you probably know the answer anyway. You always did like to show off.” Diele fell into an upholstered chair. He pointed at the empty one next to him. “Take a seat.”

“Thank you.” She sat.

“You still haven’t answered my question. Why not go running to another talk show this Sunday and decry this administration’s failure to deal with the Tuareg threat? Isn’t that your strategy? I bet Fowler is behind all of that.”

Just like Diele to give credit to a man, Fiero thought. She bit her tongue.

“I did answer you. I really do think this Mossa sonofabitch needs to be taken out, quickly, before he causes real damage over there—or over here.” She smiled demurely. “You and I have worked together well in the past on the issues that mattered most, wouldn’t you agree?”

Diele nodded thoughtfully. Fiero had always voted the right way when it came to the War on Terror. She’d supported all of the NSA spying stuff that even he felt a little uncomfortable with, at least privately. Diele loved crossing the aisle and cutting good deals with reasonable people. What most voters didn’t understand was that mainstream Republicans and Democrats in Congress shared nearly identical values. They only kicked up a big stink about the other side to keep their voters in line. But the truth of the matter was that Washington was perfectly content with itself, even if the American public loathed it.

Diele’s father had taught him years before that every system was perfectly designed to get the results it achieves. Congress was no different. Congress wasn’t broken. Congress was perfect, as far as most congressmen were concerned. It gave them wealth, power, and privilege.

“Yes, I’d agree with that. You’ve always been reasonable on the issues that mattered most.”

“This one matters, Gary. You know it does. I don’t want another 9/11 on my conscience. Do you?”

“God knows I’m not opposed to a drone strike. You know my record on that. It’s just that Greyhill is scared shitless to pull the trigger. He’s enjoying the highest approval ratings he’s ever had. He won’t want to rock the boat.”

“Why does it have to be public knowledge?”

Diele leaned forward, raised a silver eyebrow. “You’re telling me you’d keep quiet about this? It would be a helluva feather in your cap to claim you provoked us into a drone strike. At the very least, you could say Greyhill had broken his promise to keep us out of any new wars.”

“A drone strike isn’t ‘boots on the ground,’ and it’s hardly a war. Presidents Bush, Obama, and Myers all saw to that. But, yes, formally I am promising you, Scout’s honor, that I will keep my mouth shut.” She ran two slender fingers across her chest, then held them high, like a Boy Scout pledge. “That’s how serious I am about this.” She wasn’t kidding.

After Guo’s report of the failed battle, Zhao contacted Anthony Fiero and made an offer. If his wife would help take out Mossa, then he could make arrangements to supply his consortium with rare earth elements. If she couldn’t show Zhao at least a good-faith effort with a drone strike, there was no way he’d keep his promise and she and her husband would go bankrupt. Worse, a bankruptcy would be a financial scandal that would ruin her chances in the election.

“And if Greyhill refuses to launch the drone strike?”

“Then it will be one more albatross I’ll hang around his neck come election time. Don’t forget how JFK beat Nixon like a drum by mocking the Republicans for being weak on defense.”

Fiero saw the calculations spinning in Diele’s eyes. Her threat to campaign against Greyhill made the unlikely promise that she wouldn’t blow the whistle on this meeting seem more credible to the old fox. The best lies always contained the most truth.

“One last thing, Barbara. How is it you came by this intel? Thirteen intelligence agencies have tried and failed to find this guy, and you waltz into this office with the goods quicker than a hooker at a Shriners convention.”

“I happen to believe that the private sector is almost always more efficient than the public sector, even when it comes to intelligence gathering. After all, look how heavily dependent the NSA has been on the good graces of Google, Verizon, and all of the other big data corporations.”

“Your source?”

Fiero didn’t dare tell Diele that her source was a Chinese operative who had eyes on Mossa in the desert. Of course, neither had Zhao told her it was actually an AQS operative by the name of Al Rus who was actually conveying the intel.

“My husband does quite a bit of work with a private security company called CIOS. They specialize in searches like this. They’re rather lean and nimble, not some ossified government bureaucracy. They’ve located Mossa with an RFID chip.”

“Who managed to plant that on him?”

“No telling. But the intel is good.”

“You’re absolutely certain?”

“Yes.” That was only half true. She was certain that Troy Pearce carried a rifle embedded with an RFID chip. She just assumed he’d be standing next to Mossa when a Hellfire missile came crashing down.

“Worse-case scenario? It’s a signature strike. You take out a few bad guys, even if it’s not the right bad guy.”

Fiero was referring to the latest iteration of drone strike policy. Originally, the president or some member of the national security staff targeted specific individuals after some kind of official vetting. President Obama was famous for his regular “Terror Tuesday” meetings where he personally selected individuals for death by drone, weighing carefully the evidence presented to him by various agencies.

But such procedures became ponderous and time-consuming. By the time a target was vetted they often had already disappeared. Also, the “evidence” presented was sometimes of dubious origin anyway. The current policy was far more efficient. Anonymous individuals—no names, no discernible identification—who fit the “signature” of a terrorist—for example, a young man armed with a rifle on the road to a known terrorist village—could be killed under the presumption that he was probably a terrorist anyway. After all, if it walked like a duck and quacked like a duck, it must be a duck.

“Easy enough to confirm,” Fiero said. “Dispatch a Reaper out of Niamey. Put him on camera, run it through your database, and if he’s the target, pull the trigger.” She smile-frowned. “Gee, Gary, do you want me to go over there and do it myself?”

Diele laughed, standing. “You’re something else, you know that?”

“So I’ve been told.” Fiero locked eyes with Diele. Saw the bolt of electricity that coursed through him. Better than Viagra for most of these old guys, she’d been told.

“Can I get you something to drink?”

“That would be delightful. Bourbon, neat, if you don’t mind.” She didn’t want Diele’s grubby hands touching her ice.

“Lime or lemon?”

“Neither, thank you.”

Diele splashed a couple of fingers of Maker’s Mark into a glass.

“Now that we’re being so chummy, let me throw you a couple of bones,” Fiero said. “First of all, Myers is tied up in this somehow.”

Diele twisted a lemon slice and hung it on the rim of the glass. “How?”

“Remember Mike Early? He was one of her special assistants for security.”

“Vaguely.” He refilled his own glass.

“He’s over there with this Mossa character. She also dispatched Troy Pearce over there to be with him.” Fiero was careful to leave out the fact that Pearce was sent to get Early out of there. “You do remember Troy Pearce?”

She knew, of course, that he did. Diele hated Myers’s guts and had learned after the fact the vital role Pearce had played in the drone counterterror operations she had launched against the Mexican drug cartels. That put Pearce on Diele’s shit list, too. But since Greyhill had extended blanket immunities to Myers and anyone she named in exchange for her resignation, Diele was never able to get even with Myers or Pearce.

Diele handed Fiero her drink, his face flushed with anger.

“Thank you, Gary.”

“Pearce, eh?”

“And Myers.”

“How is Myers connected to all of this?”

Fiero was careful with her answer. She’d seen a copy of that morning’s PDB. She knew Diele had seen it, too. Thanks to CIOS, Myers and Pearce had been effectively linked to Mossa and AQS, but not in any concrete manner. It wasn’t conclusive, but it was good enough to raise eyebrows around the room, she was certain.

“Not sure, but does it really matter?” Fiero said. “She clearly wants something over there. For all I know, she’s cooking up some sort of deal with the Chinese. Mossa is key to the whole region. Take him out and likely you’ll be screwing Myers in the process. How’s that for a bonus?”

Fiero had chosen her words carefully. Diele had been a famous cocksman in his day, and his lust knew no bounds. She’d seen the way Diele had leered at the first female president whenever they were in the room together, much the same way he leered at her when he thought she wasn’t looking.

“Greyhill is still smarting from the ass-whipping she gave him in the primaries,” Diele said, which was true enough, but getting even with that bitch Myers was okay by him, too. “I’m sure he’ll be on board with this.”

“How sure?”

“He’s got his head so far up his ass he doesn’t have a clue what’s going on around here. He’s more interested in playing golf with some ambassador or sitting in on policy briefings than actually running things. I do most of the day-to-day around here. I’ll give the order, and if he ever gets wind of it, I’ll sell it to him.” He took a long sip of scotch. The ice tinkled as he drained the glass. His eyes brightened. “Myers will seal the deal.”

“One more thing, Gary, in the spirit of full disclosure.”

“What?”

“If Pearce and Early are running around with Mossa in the desert, they’re going to be collateral damage in a drone strike.”

“Fuck ’em. If they don’t want to get blistered, they shouldn’t put their dicks in the toaster.”

“They’re American citizens.”

“They’re enemy combatants, as far as I’m concerned.”

“You would’ve made one helluva president, Gary,” Fiero said. She raised her glass in a mock toast. “Or maybe you already are.” She finally took a sip of her drink.

The old man’s ego swelled. He knew she was piling it on, but he didn’t care. She was right. In many respects, he was the acting president.

“One more thing, Barbara, while we’re being so chummy. I need you to promise you’ll back us up on this should it ever come to a committee hearing or, God forbid, a full Senate inquiry.”

“You have my word. And I can keep my people in line. You also have the chair of my committee in your pocket, along with the other neocon Republicans to back you up. You won’t have any trouble from us.”

“Good. One last thing. I want you to back off of Greyhill on this whole ‘soft on terrorism’ angle your campaign is running.”

“Why should I? It’s true, isn’t it?”

Diele darkened. “Doesn’t matter. Technically, he’s my boss and the head of my party. I’m supposed to watch out for him.”

“Technically, you are. Taking out Mossa takes one arrow out of my quiver, as per our agreement. But the truth of the matter is, you want Greyhill to get reelected so you can keep your job. I get that. But I want his job, too. So how about this? I keep hammering on this, and if he wakes up and finally sees the threats and starts to take action, we’ll all be better off. But if he doesn’t and the American public still supports him, he’ll still get reelected and you’ll still have your job. There’s a third possibility, of course.”

“What?”

“That I keep hammering, that it costs him the election, and in the spirit of bipartisan cooperation, I nominate you as SecDef or any other damn position you’d want in my administration.”

“Sounds like a step down to me.”

“Okay, then here’s a step up. I keep hammering at Greyhill from the outside while you pull your levers on the party on the inside, eroding confidence in his leadership. If my campaign is successful, Greyhill’s numbers will plummet before the convention, and you can ride in to rescue the nomination for your party.”

Diele’s face turned positively postcoital, brimming with satisfaction. “You and I always did work well together, didn’t we?”

“We’re the smart ones, Gary. We’re the ones that run the whole damn town.”

50

Tassili du Hoggar

Tamanghasset Province, Southern Algeria

^{12 May}

After the wadi they traveled east two more days deeper into the desert, riding in the mornings, resting in the heat of the day, then pushing on past sunset. They were making good time. Mossa explained that they weren’t riding traditional pack camels, but smaller and faster Arabian war camels that could cover over a hundred miles per day if needed, but for now their pace was more relaxed. Pearce and the others rode most of the day but walked the last few miles in the cool of the evening to spare the animals, tied nose to tail by ropes slack with indifference.

The desert had changed since the wadi. Now they traversed gently sloping dunes gradually rising toward the jagged teeth of the Hoggar Mountains in the distance. This was more like the Sahara of his imagination, though still not quite as grand as he’d pictured.

They all walked in silence. The desert seemed to require it. Pearce felt humbled by it, the way a student waits for the master to speak. The setting sun behind the caravan threw long shadows in front of Pearce, the head of his image stretching past the Tuareg walking in front of him. It would be night soon. He was lost in the rhythms of the camel’s unusual gait. Right rear, right front, left rear, left front, step after silent step. Every horse he’d ever known walked just the opposite: right front, left rear, left front, right rear. There was something graceful, even hypnotic, in the strange, silent padding of the great white animals.

Troy had made no efforts to speak with Cella privately since they’d left the village. It was impossible to do so with her father-in-law hovering over her, and she had shown no interest in a private conversation. She seldom strayed more than a few yards from Mossa, especially now that there were no wounds or injuries to treat among the others. They seemed deeply connected, though they hardly spoke, either, except in the company of others. He’d noticed over the years that most Middle Eastern men seldom spoke to women, at least the older, traditional men, even when women were around, which was seldom. But Pearce suspected that their mutual silence was consensual rather than cultural. Cella probably felt very safe around Mossa. Perhaps their common grief had bound them together as well.

“What are you thinking?”

Pearce startled at Cella’s whispered voice. She had somehow managed to slip into step next to him without his noticing. Maybe he really had been hypnotized by his camel’s gait.

“Not much, really.”

“I love the desert this time of day.”

“It’s amazing,” Pearce agreed. The darkening blue sky was giving way to purple, and a swath of stars glittered in the vast expanse overhead. In the distance, a great rock arch towered over the sand, like a portal to another world.

“The Tuaregs are matrilineal. Did you know this?”

“Hadn’t really thought about it.”

Cella pointed at the jagged teeth of granite mountains looming far ahead. “Tin Hinan is the mother of all Tuaregs. She lived in the fourth century B.C. At one time she was buried out there.”

“But not now?”

“An American archaeologist stole her body in the 1920s with the help of the French army. Or so it is believed by some.”

“Sounds like an Indiana Jones movie.”

“I liked those movies. Especially the first one. I liked the woman in it, especially his woman. What was her name?”

“I don’t remember.”

“It doesn’t matter. I liked her.”

“Why did you like her?”

Cella’s face lit up. “Because when Indy accidentally found her in Tibet, she punched him in the face instead of kissing him.”

Pearce laughed. He jutted his chin out and thrust it toward her. “Knock yourself out.”

“Don’t tempt me.”

“I probably deserve it.”

“You definitely deserve it.”

They walked along in silence for a while.

“I always thought you would come back to Milan,” she finally said.

“I did, too.”

“What happened. A woman?”

“A war.” He took a few steps. “And a woman. Later.”

“You leave her, too?”

He shook his head. “She died.” It was hard for him to say that, even now, a decade later. He thought of Annie often, but strangely, not so much on this trip.

“Oh. I’m sorry.”

“You lost someone, too. Your husband.”

“Yes.” Now it was Cella’s turn to be flooded with painful memories.

“How?”

“He came back here to be with his father when the war broke out a few years ago in Mali.”

“He was a doctor?”

“Yes.”

“Killed?”

“Yes. A week after Dorotea and I arrived in Bamako.”

“I’m sorry. He must have been a good man.”

“He was. He deserved better.”

“Your daughter is beautiful. At least he lives in her.”

Cella’s eyes searched his. Pearce grew uncomfortable. What did she want to know? That he knew Dorotea’s eyes were the same color as his? That he hadn’t stopped thinking about it since the moment he put the girl on the plane? He looked away. They walked in silence for a while. Pearce wanted to catch up with Early, anything to get away.

“Have you been back to Lisbon?” she asked.

She said Lisbon casually, as if it meant nothing to her. Or him. After all, it had been six years before.

“Once. Business. You?”

“No.”

“No more UN work?”

“No. The clinic kept my husband and me busy enough.”

“How did you meet him?”

“He was a cultural attaché in Roma. We met at the opera, actually.”

“A cultured man.” Pearce hadn’t been to an opera since Milan.

“You almost met him. He would have come to Lisbon, but he had other business.”

Pearce thought he’d been slapped across the face.

“I didn’t know you were married when you were in Lisbon.”

“To my shame, I forgot I was married when I saw you again.”

Six years. It seemed like an eternity ago, until now. Memories of Lisbon washed over him. Now he knew why she didn’t stay with him. But what did that mean now? He didn’t know what to say to her. He fell back on his combat training. Fail forward.

“Your daughter is beautiful.”

“She will be spoiled rotten by the time I see her again. My father is a maniac. He has probably already bought her a horse, and maybe even a castle in the Tyrol to hide her from me.”

Low Tuareg voices called out. The camels stopped.

“What is happening?” Cella asked.

Early jogged toward them from the front. His sling was gone, but he clearly favored his injured arm.

“The boss wants to see you.”

“Problem?”

“Could be. Scout just came back.”

Pearce, Early, and Mossa lay flat on the crest of a dune next to the scout, a young Nigerian Tuareg named Iskaw. Towering chimneys of granite loomed a half mile ahead. The dunes were like waves of a rolling sea of sand washing up against the rocks.

Mossa held a pair of mil-spec binoculars to his eyes. He conferred with the scout in whispered Tamasheq, then handed the binoculars to Pearce. “Take a look. Just inside the rocks.”

Pearce glanced through the glass, but he hardly needed to. The small flickering campfire was easily seen by the naked eye. The firelight danced off of the tall stone columns above, almost like a strobe.

“Do you see him?” Mossa asked.

Pearce adjusted the focus. Now a shadow came into view. It stood in front of the fire, its back to Pearce. Couldn’t see his face. He wore Western clothes. Definitely not a Tuareg.

“A European,” Mossa said.

“I can’t make him out.” Pearce thought he saw a beard on the man’s face.

“The scout saw him clearly earlier. Swears he is a European. Tall, bearded.”

“Anyone with him?”

“No. By himself, out here. Very strange.”

Pearce handed the glasses back. “Can we go around him?”

“No, our camp for the night is just past his position.”

“Why there?”

“Water.”

“We can take him out,” Early said.

“But he may be innocent,” Mossa said.

“Out here? Maybe.” The big former Ranger wasn’t into taking chances these days.

“Only one way to find out.” Pearce rose. “You three wait here. If he cuts my head off, he’s probably a bad guy.”

51

Tassili du Hoggar

Tamanghasset Province, Southern Algeria

^{12 May}

Pearce crept to within ten feet of the man by the campfire, his back still toward him. The air was sweet with the tang of burnt camel dung crackling in the flames.

“I thought you were a cautious man,” Pearce said. “I’m surprised you let me sneak up on you like that.”

August Mann turned around, a cell-phone-sized monitor in his hand and a grin on his dark, bearded face.

“No surprises. I’ve been tracking you with this SPAN. You can tell all of your friends to come out now.” Mann’s German accent punctuated his faultless English.

SPAN was a self-powered wireless ground sensor network. Mann had scattered the tiny sensors like seeds all around the area. Anyone who came near enough to one of the sensors lit up on his monitor, which was linked to a portable sUAV Mann had deployed overhead.

“Just you?” Pearce asked.

“One war, one German. What else do you need?”

Pearce laughed. The two old friends shook hands, grinning, warriors in the field together again. A brilliant engineer and a fearless fighter, Mann was Pearce Systems’ very first hire and now headed up their nuclear deconstruction operations in Europe deploying unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs). It was good to have him here. The lanky German came from a long, proud line of military men. His grandfather had commanded a PZKW IV in Rommel’s Afrika Korps. Mann served briefly as a tanker with the Federal Republic’s Bundeswehr, too, before helping to develop their first combat UGVs.

“I assumed you’d bring some friends along,” Pearce said.

“I did.”

“Where are they?”

Mann pointed in the distance. “Out there, lurking in the gloom, keeping an eye on things.”

Like Pearce, Mann preferred the civilian side of drone operations these days, but when wet work was necessary he was the first to answer the call, usually relying on a cadre of trusted East European operators to assist him.

“How many?”

“Six.”

“How good?”

“Untested. But reliable.” Mann glanced at his monitor again. “How many with you?”

“Thirteen, plus one extra camel. Yours, as per your request.”

Mann showed him the monitor. “There are fourteen persons out there.” One blip was far from the others.

“Looks like we have company.”

“Problem?” Mann asked.

“Nothing but.”

Mann tapped his screen. A moment later, a shotgun blast echoed in the night. Mann smiled. “No more problems.”

“Reliable, and now tested.”

“Yes.”

“Thanks for coming, August. No telling what’s waiting for us up ahead.”

After Mossa had laid out the route from the Adrar des Ifoghas to the airstrip, Pearce was able to pass along the GPS coordinates to Ian, Mann, and Judy along with an estimated schedule of arrival times—just in case they lost radio communications. Mann had promised to arrive here at the Tassili du Hoggar with whatever reinforcements he could bring. He and his team had parachuted in just hours before. Judy was still scheduled to pick them all up in the Aviocar three days from now.

Pearce whistled in Early and the others out of the dark. Mann was introduced to Mossa and the rest of the caravan, along with the unburdened camel that had been brought along for him. One of Mossa’s men checked the corpse in the sand. He brought back an assault rifle and a pair of night-vision goggles smeared with blood to Mossa.

“He says it was an Arab,” Mossa said. “No stone.”

“What does that mean?” Mann asked.

“Shi’a pray with a stone,” Pearce said. “Sunnis don’t. Neither do Salafists. AQS is Salafist.”

They all pushed on toward the oasis farther into the narrow granite canyons, their tall spires scraping against a luminous moon. Soon there would be food and water, and then they could all bed down for the night. Mann’s aerial drone and ground team would keep watch over the caravan.

Pearce was exhausted, mostly from the heat. For the first time in his life he felt like he was getting too old for the field, but there was nowhere else he’d rather be, trudging through the desert beneath a canopy of stars in the company of brave companions.

52

Tamanghasset Province

Southern Algeria

^{13 May}

The kneeling camels were bedded down for the night, as were the weary Tuaregs. A small campfire had burned itself down to red embers, but the air was still warm in this part of the desert. They were far enough out in the wilderness that there wasn’t much chance of encountering anyone else. Only someone who knew exactly where they were could possibly find them.

Unfortunately, someone had.

Karem Air Force Base

Niamey, Niger

The ground control station was a windowless air-conditioned trailer parked near the hangar where Judy’s Aviocar was secured.

Inside the GCS, an Air Force captain sat in the pilot’s seat scanning six separate video monitors. In the seat next to her, a sensor operator. Together, the two of them were flying an MQ-9 Reaper twenty thousand feet above the Sahara Desert, silent as the stars.

The drone’s onboard sensor had located the RFID tracking unit embedded in the M4 rifle Pearce had stolen earlier from AFB Karem, where this Reaper had been dispatched from.

“Confirmed?” the pilot asked.

“Confirmed.” The twenty-year-old sensor operator was an airman just out of training at Holloman AFB. It was, in fact, his first combat mission in the field. In addition to the RFID signal, he had an infrared visual on the sleeping camels and Tuaregs.

The pilot confirmed with the CIA deputy director at Langley in charge of the mission. Diele’s handpicked appointee had access to the Reaper’s video feeds, too.

“Cook them all, Captain. We want to be sure.”

“Yes, sir,” the captain said. She’d been trained to avoid collateral damage wherever possible, but these were all tangos as far as they could tell. She looked at her sensor operator. Saw the look in his face. A flicker of doubt. Suddenly this shit was real, not a video-game simulator like he’d been training on back in New Mexico. Today he would play God, tossing lightning bolts out of the blue, dealing fiery death.

“Light ’em up, son.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Four Hellfire missiles were loosed, guided by the airman’s hand.

Tamanghasset Province

Southern Algeria

The Hellfire II AGM-114N was designed to kill human beings in confined spaces like tunnels, caves, and buildings, but it was also an effective antipersonnel weapon in open areas. Each AGM-114N carried a thermobaric warhead combining PBXN-112 explosive fill and fluorinated aluminum powder. The bursting fill container created a cloud of oxidized fuel ignited by an explosive charge, resulting in a massive, fiery blast. The fiery blast, in turn, created an enormous vacuum that produced a crushing and sustained high-pressure wave.

The first Hellfire exploded three feet above Pearce’s weapon just before the other three lit up their targets as well, all perfectly aimed. The resulting pressure waves ripped camels and men apart like claws from an invisible monster. Those not immediately atomized or incinerated had their lungs crushed by the vacuum and their internal organs liquefied by the force of the pressure blast.

Death for the entire caravan was instantaneous, or nearly so.

The Reaper’s infrared camera recorded the explosions as brilliant flashes of light, and picked up the glowing heat signature of the white-hot craters and smoldering fragments of bone and metal scattered across the cooler sands a thousand feet away. The Reaper’s video camera verified that there were no survivors. The deputy CIA director voiced his approval and commended the operators, promising a unit citation along with a solemn reminder to immediately erase all video and audio recordings of the mission. The hard drives were wiped before the deputy director ended his call.

Pearce Systems Headquarters

Dearborn, Michigan

Ian wanted to scream. He’d never been so frustrated in his life. Pearce had told him not to intervene under any circumstances—even if it meant Pearce’s own death.

Ian complied.

But that didn’t mean he couldn’t keep an eye on things. Thanks to Judy’s quick thinking during her interrogation by Captain Sotero, he knew a Reaper strike against Pearce was imminent. Ian broke into Karem AFB’s mainframe and was able to monitor and record the Reaper’s mission.

Ian hated terrorists. He’d lost both of his legs in the infamous London 7/7 bombing years before and had dedicated his life to fighting them. He understood the need for drone strikes and antiterror operations, but he’d also seen the mistakes that could be made, and the wrong lives taken, just like on this mission. That didn’t help win the war on terror. Far from it.

The only consolation was that he now had another link in the chain of damning evidence against Senator Fiero.

Tassili du Hoggar, Tamanghasset Province

Southern Algeria

Pearce checked his watch. Just an hour before sunrise.

It had been hours since he awoke from a dream of distant thunder. Only, it hadn’t been a dream.

The camels bleated nervously, too, as he glanced around. They quickly settled back down. He tried to go back to sleep, but couldn’t despite his exhaustion, or maybe because of it. He never slept well in the field anyway, but even within the confines of the tall rock walls of the oasis he still felt naked and vulnerable, especially to an air strike. He remembered the sound now. Muted but echoed in the narrow chamber of rock where they camped. There had been several, nearly simultaneous claps. No telling how far away. Might as well get up.

Pearce reached for his M4 carbine but remembered he’d traded it with the Nigerien camel driver before they parted ways. Mano and his men were radioed by friends that a Niger army unit was harassing a Tuareg village on the other side of the border. He asked Pearce again for a trade. Pearce understood. Mano wanted a good weapon if he was going into battle. Pearce explained he had only one mag for the M4 and one grenade for the launcher, but Mano didn’t care. He traded Pearce his good Russian-made AK-47 and five full mags. The trade made for good diplomacy. When the Nigerien Tuaregs departed for home, Mossa thanked Pearce for relenting. Pearce knew it was impolite in many Mideast cultures to refuse an offer of trade. The gun really wasn’t his to begin with, but the Air Force had plenty more of them so he was glad to do it. He hoped it gave Mano an advantage.

Pearce finally rose and quietly stepped over to the cool green waters of the narrow oasis farther into the canyon. The sharp moonlight lit the wavy gray and brown rocks ringing the small pool of greenish water. He was afraid to drink it but glad to splash it on his face and the back of his neck. He probably stunk to high heaven, but he couldn’t smell it anymore. Soldiers in the field got used to their own stench and the rank odors of their comrades. Sweat, urine, cigarettes, cordite, diarrhea, and wood smoke wrecked any possibility of olfactory sensitivity. Men at war reeked, but if everybody and everything did, who noticed? He checked his watch again. It was around midnight tomorrow where Ian was. Might as well see if he was awake and get a sitrep.

Pearce’s cabin

Near the Snake River, Wyoming

Myers woke with a start. Someone was definitely outside.

She threw back the heavy green woolen blanket and stepped onto the wood floor in one seamless move. She picked up the old .410 double-barreled bird gun she’d found in Pearce’s bedroom closet and made her way toward the kitchen without turning the lights on. She’d been in his cabin long enough to have a good sense of the layout. The only thing she’d ever shot with a .410 before was white-winged dove in Uvalde, Texas, one hot September, but she figured the small-gauge rounds were good enough to at least scare the hell out of her would-be assailant, and maybe even kill them outright with a shot to the face. She wasn’t scared so much as angry. How had they managed to find her?

She heard another noise in the kitchen. The sound of a closing door. Coming in or going out? Didn’t matter. Had to find out who was wandering around out there.

Myers let the shotgun barrel lead her into the kitchen, when the lights suddenly popped on. She remembered what her husband had taught her—keep your finger off the trigger until you’re ready to shoot. The lights startled her and she mashed the trigger, but thankfully her finger only pulled on the trigger guard.

“Sorry, ma’am. Didn’t mean to wake you.” An athletically built young Asian woman stood next to the light switch. She wore Nike printed tights and a top, along with a windbreaker that barely covered her shoulder-holstered pistol.

Myers lowered her shotgun, relieved. “You’re one of Pearce’s people, aren’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am. Stella Kang.” She extended her hand. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.” Stella was a Korean-American from Los Angeles who picked a career in the Army over jail time for a crime she committed while attending USC. She accidentally chose the Army’s drone program and learned to fly Ravens. After one tour over in the Sand Box she returned home and eventually wound up at Pearce Systems as one of his field operatives specializing in drone ops.

“What on earth are you doing here?” Myers checked her watch. “And at this ungodly hour?”

“Ian sent me.”

“What for?”

“He’s a big believer in backup systems. I guess I’m your backup, especially since you ditched your Secret Service detail after you resigned.”

“Ian is a worrywart.”

“He thinks you’re being monitored out here. He’s concerned about your security situation.” She nodded at the small-gauge shotgun. “No offense.”

Myers patted her gun. “If I’m attacked by a flock of pigeons, I’ll be fine. You hungry? All I have is Spam around here.”

Kang brightened. “Are you kidding? I grew up on Spam. Some tea would be great, too. We still have time.”

Myers propped the shotgun in the corner. “Time for what?

“Ian wouldn’t give me all of the details, but he wants to put some other pieces into play. We’ve got to roll.”

“Where to?”

Stella shrugged. “No telling, but I’d pack light if I were you.”

Tassili du Hoggar, Tamanghasset Province

Southern Algeria

The camels drank their fill again while the rest of camp packed up their few belongings. They had all dined on the cold Turkish army rations Mossa and his men had hauled from the caves in Adrar. They wanted to get moving fast before the heat stole away the better part of the day.

Mossa approached Pearce, a small leather bag slung over his shoulder. His tagelmust hadn’t been wrapped around his face yet. Pinpoints of silver dotted his unshaved skin.

“Today you will enter the Sahara as you Westerners imagine it. It is more beautiful and more terrible than you know. I should like to give you something to help you survive the journey.” Mossa reached into his leather bag and set something into Pearce’s hand.

“A date?” Pearce asked. The fruit was small and hard.

“It is God’s survival pack. If you get lost out there, this date will allow you to survive for three days. The first day you eat the skin, the second day you eat the meat of it, and the third day you suck on the seed to generate water in your mouth.”

“And the fourth day?”

“If you have not found water by the fourth day, you are dead.” Mossa reached into his leather bag and tossed Pearce another date, laughing. “Here’s three more days.”

Pearce smiled, examining the dates. “Better than MREs, probably.”

“One more thing. Give me your hat. It’s ridiculous.”

Pearce had been wearing his sweat-stained floppy boonie hat since Mozambique. It had done a pretty good job keeping the sun off of his face and neck, but it screamed to the world he was a Westerner, probably a soldier. He handed Mossa his hat. Mossa tossed it to the ground and pulled something else out of his pack.

“I would be honored if you would wear this,” Mossa said. It was ten feet of indigo cloth. A tagelmust.

“I don’t deserve it.”

“You have fought well. I suspect you will have to fight again before we reach our destination. Since you fight like a brother, you might as well look like one.” Mossa looked at the pile of folded cloth in his hand. “Pretty cool, eh?”

“Damn straight,” Pearce said. He took it and unfolded it, obviously pleased. “Better show me how to put it on.”

53

Tamanghasset Province

Southern Algeria

^{14 May}

The huge transverse sand dunes rolled in great, granular waves. Mossa was right. This was the Sahara of Pearce’s imagination. Straight out of Lawrence of Arabia. As thrilling as any seascape he’d ever seen, but silent as the blinding sunlight glinting on the billions of microscopic bits of quartz.

“Yes, rolling. A good description. These barchans really do move,” Mann said, using the technical term for the huge dunes. “Up to a hundred meters per year.” The German wore a white towel on his head secured with a bungee cord. A primitive keffiyeh. His long nose was painted with zinc oxide. The caravan snaked between the dunes, careful to avoid the steep slip faces, which could avalanche down.

“Nice hat,” Pearce said.

“Not as authentic as yours, but it works.”

“How are the girls?”

Mann had recently settled down with a younger wife. The union had produced beautiful twin girls. They lived in England where most of the nuclear power plant demolition work he supervised was taking place.

“They’re becoming too English. I only speak to them auf Deutsch anymore.”

Pearce hadn’t seen the dark-haired German since the Mexico operation. Missed his company.

“Seems like you and I are always around the sand, one way or another.” They first met years before while windsurfing off the coast of California, not far from Pearce’s beachfront condo in Coronado.

“I forgot to bring my board. You?” The German grinned.

“Didn’t even bring my shorts.”

Truth was, Pearce was in heaven. He’d seen plenty of sand before, especially in Iraq. But somehow there it was a nuisance, a constant grit that got in his teeth and eyes. Sometimes it was so fine it was like talcum powder. And there was no shortage of heat over there, either. But out here, on the dunes of the Sahara, it all felt so clean. Purified. Now he understood, at least a little, why the ancient monks had fled to the desert. But maybe it felt clean because there weren’t any people around. People had a way of ruining things.

Six hundred and thirteen meters now,” Salah said. His Chinese-made military binoculars featured a laser range finder. The AQS fighter was perched just below the crest of the dune, his body carefully hidden. Only his head and binoculars were on the crest line—barely—and the tinted lenses were designed to not reflect the harsh sunlight. There was nowhere to hide in the desert once you were seen.

“How many?” Al Rus asked. He was standing in the bed of his Nissan pickup next to the big machine gun, his short-barreled AK still strapped to his chest. Four other armed pickups were next to him, engines off. They were in the flattest part of the trough between two big rollers. Beige camouflage webbing tented over their vehicles, partly to hide, partly for shade. Not nearly as efficient as camels and far louder, the trucks still made the journey easily enough after his men lowered the air pressure in the oversize tires to improve traction.

“Seven.” Salah was still winded from the long, hard crawl up the far slope of the dune. “Six Tuaregs. And one fool wearing a dish towel on his head.”

Al Rus’s men laughed. The oldest, Abdelmalek, said, “That must be Pearce.”

“Quiet! Do you want them to hear us?”

The men hushed.

Al Rus checked his watch. His scout never reported back. No matter. The scout had confirmed Mossa’s arrival at the oasis, and Guo’s intel had been correct. These dogs really were heading for the abandoned Aéropostale airfield. Al Rus had put his team between the oasis and the airfield. What else could he do? The desert was too vast to find a man who didn’t want to be found. Perhaps someday he would acquire one of those devil drones. The Shi’a Persians had them and the Crusader infidels had them, so why shouldn’t he?

“Vehicles?” Al Rus asked.

“None. Only camels.”

Allah be praised, Al Rus thought. He has delivered them into my hands. “Come down, Salah. Carefully.”

The young man slid slowly backward down the dune so as not to attract attention by his movement. Once his head cleared the crest line, he turned around and belly-crawled a few feet in the scalding sand, then leaped to his feet and ran the rest of the way, thudding into the side of a truck.

“Idiot!”

“I am sorry, lord,” Salah whimpered. He was the youngest of the group.

“Clear the nets. On my signal, start your engines.”

The men pulled down the nets and stored them in the truck beds as quietly as possible. Sound carried out here. Drivers took their positions, as did the gunners.

Al Rus took the gunner position on his truck, told his other man to drive. “Kill the infidels!”

The engines roared to life and the trucks jumped forward, throwing sand and exhaust as they raced between dunes. The plan was for two of the trucks to break off and attack from the rear, while the other three trucks would charge straight into the single file of camels heading toward them. The animals would break and run, and it would be an easy matter to chase them down.

Just as they passed the first dune, a shadow flickered in the corner of Al Rus’s eye. He whipped around to see a four-wheeled vehicle no more than a meter tall pacing with them a kilometer away. Its cowling was ungodly, the shape of a demon’s head, or an alien, long and smooth and black. His spine tingled. Something was wrong. Al Rus turned around in the bouncing truck bed. Another one of the vehicles was following them, also a kilometer back.

Mann showed Pearce his screen. He had just tapped on each truck image on the screen, then assigned a Wraith UGV attack drone to each.

“Ready on your command.”

“Now,” Pearce said.

Mann tapped the automated attack toggle while Pearce signaled Mossa and the others to retreat. Two electric-powered Wraiths sped past the feet of his camel. This was the “team” that Mann had assembled, literally, on short notice. They were the latest example of LARs—lethal autonomous robotics. Each solar-powered vehicle was capable of up to sixty-five miles per hour and each carried a drum-fed twelve-gauge shotgun capable of firing 250 rounds per minute. Mann had loaded each Wraith with 180 shells, alternating between explosive rounds, armor-piercing slugs, and antipersonnel 000 buckshot.

“This should be interesting,” Mann said, clinically. “The first real world test for the new software.” He urged his camel to the crest of the dune where, perched high in the air, he could grab a commanding view of the action.

“Careful you don’t get your head blown off,” Pearce said.

Mann ignored him, intensely studying the action unfolding through his binoculars.

Pearce nudged his camel, joining him at the top. Mossa’s camel trotted up beside the two of them.

“This is what you call war?” Mossa asked.

“This is what we call hell,” Mann said.

The six Wraiths swarmed toward the speeding trucks, vainly firing their 7.62 machine guns at the speeding UGVs. Fistfuls of sand spat near the Wraiths’ tracked rubber wheels as they rocketed toward the pickups. When they had closed within range the Wraiths opened up. Heavy slugs tore into the thin steel door panel of the lead truck, splintering the driver’s ribs before they plowed into his lungs. Screaming in pain and terror, the driver panicked and flipped the Nissan. The gunner was tossed high in the air, then thudded into the sand just seconds before the spinning truck crashed into him, snapping his spine. The Wraith continued to fire, emptying its ammo box in seconds, exploding the upturned Nissan and incinerating the men trapped beneath it. It then sped off to find a secondary target, as instructed by its swarming software program.

Three other trucks broke off and sped in different directions, one racing for the shadowed slip face of the next dune. Big mistake. The front tires dug into the liquid sand as the vehicle tried to climb the steep face heading for the crest, triggering a mini avalanche that quickly swamped the truck’s hood, smothering the engine and trapping the driver inside. The machine gun was fixed to a pivot point that gave the gunner a 180-degree sweep over the front of the truck, but not enough play to turn it completely around. The Wraith tracking it raced up to the bed and spat twenty-five rounds in a second, shredding the gunner along with the rest of the truck. It then sped around to the side, crashed into the truck cab, and detonated.

Pearce watched the second Wraith explode, taking out the half-buried Nissan.

“What was the point of that?” he asked Mann.

“They’re rigged to self-destruct. I assumed I wouldn’t have the means to transport them back home and I didn’t want them to be captured. Besides, I may have just invented the first automated drone suicide bomber.”

“I hope you built seventy-two robot virgins to go with it.”

The other two surviving trucks spun in desperate circles and fired their weapons, but Al Rus commanded his truck to turn around and stop. Hitting a fast-moving target like the Wraiths while driving was a nearly impossible task. But the drones weren’t engaged in serious tactical driving. They just came on hard and fast. With his truck stopped and facing down the approaching Wraith, Al Rus easily drew a bead on it with his machine gun. The Wraith sped directly toward him. He opened up with his machine gun. The large-caliber slugs threw up a wall of lead in front of the Wraith that it ran into blindly. Its thin cowling shattered just seconds before the unit exploded in a ball of fire. His driver shouted “Allahuakbar!” as Al Rus gave the order to race away past the wreckage and toward safety, away from his dying friends and the fiendish robots cutting them to ribbons.

Three more explosions rocked the desert.

Al Rus watched the two Nissans explode in fireballs as the Wraiths detonated next to them. His command was dead, but at least he was alive—for now.

The two surviving Wraiths spun around, throwing rooster tails of sand into the air. Their ammo completely expended, they were only rolling bombs now.

Al Rus didn’t know that. All he knew was that the two drones were gaining on him fast and his machine gun couldn’t swing around. He unstrapped his AK-47, braced himself, and fired a series of controlled bursts. Steel-jacketed rounds tore into the Wraiths’ thin cowlings.

Direct hits. The Wraiths exploded. He was home free.

Pearce, Mossa, and Mann watched the surviving pickup race away into the desert.

“What happened?” Pearce asked. “You let that one get away.”

“I’ll have to analyze the data later. But all in all, not a bad result,” Mann said.

“We could chase him,” Mossa offered. “At that speed, he will blow a radiator or a head gasket, especially in this heat.”

“He could be leading us into a trap,” Pearce said. “Let him go.”

An angry finger of smoke rocketed out of the sky. It crashed into the pickup truck in the distance, ripping it apart like a fiery fist.

Pearce glanced at Mann.

“Don’t look at me.”

Pearce pulled out his sat phone and hit the speed dial. “Must have been Ian.” The phone rang. Ian wasn’t picking up.

Base Aérienne Arlit

Arlit, Niger

Lieutenant Beaujolais stood in the air-conditioned ground control center, cheering with the French Air Force Reaper pilot and the rest of the operations crew. He had provided the final visual confirmation the commanding officer required before launching the missile. Beaujolais gladly confirmed The Viking’s identity. The Hellfire had just vaporized Al Rus. The AQS scourge of the Sahara was finally dead. Operation Dress Down Six was a success.

The purchase and deployment of American Reaper drones had already paid off handsomely for the French military, especially now that resources for their Africa operations were dwindling. But this new technology had just proven its value in spades. The ability to loiter for hours, identify suspects, and execute them with the push of a button heralded a new era in French antiterror operations in the region.

Corks popped. The commander poured the champagne himself. They raised glasses and the entire command shouted in unison, “Vive la France!”

54

Karem Air Force Base

Niamey, Niger

^{15 May}

Judy was still confined to her quarters. She couldn’t sleep. She paced nervously in the cramped little room. She checked her watch again, as if that mattered. She was due to pick up Pearce in the Aviocar in less than twelve hours and she was still locked up in here with a twenty-four-hour armed guard stationed outside her door.

Ian had promised to call her last night but didn’t. She couldn’t stand it anymore. She fingered the copper-colored carabiner latched to her belt loop. The Security Forces guards didn’t think twice about confiscating it. They couldn’t possibly know it fired aerosolized super glue and pepper oil. Pearce had Rao make it for her, since she refused to carry a gun for self-protection. She could easily use it to disable the lone guard at the door, a really nice kid who was kind of sweet on her. But she couldn’t do it, especially to a soldier just doing his duty.

The SF guards had given her cell phone back after her interrogation. Of course, they’d bugged it, or so Judy had to assume. She’d pulled the battery and the SIM card out and stored them. Besides getting tapped, Ian had taught her that a smartphone could also be remotely activated and used for both audio and video surveillance. But the SFs hadn’t taken her analogue aviator watch, which actually wasn’t just a watch. She flipped up the face and tapped the touch screen. It was meant only for extreme emergencies. This felt like one.

Ian answered.

Judy dashed into the bathroom and turned on the shower to mask her voice from the guard outside her door. “Thank God, Ian. Where have you been? You were supposed to call me.”

“Busy, love. What do you need?”

“What do I need? I need you to get me out of here. I’m trapped.”

“I know. I’m working on it. Working on lots of things. Sit tight.”

“What about Troy?”

“Working on that, too. Bye.” Ian ended the call.

“Ian! Ian!”

Judy growled, frustrated. She thought a very, very bad word but couldn’t bring herself to say it. Her dad would have been ashamed if she had.

Malta International Airport,

Luqa, Malta

One of the smallest members of the European Union, Malta was a strategic three-island archipelago south of Sicily, some two hundred miles east of the Tunisian coast, in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea. The Armed Forces of Malta (AFM) was a very small volunteer force comprising land, sea, and air elements whose primary task was defense of the islands and safe-passage guarantees for the high-traffic commercial shipping lanes passing through its waters.

With a minuscule budget and few human resources, the AFM recently turned to drone technologies to enhance its capabilities. With the aid of an EU grant, the AFM engaged the services of Dr. T. J. Ashley, the former head of Drone Command during the Myers administration but now the CEO of her own private consulting firm. With the assistance of Dr. Rao and Pearce Systems, she had put together an air-sea rescue drone system package based on a highly modified Boeing A-160T Hummingbird VTOL aircraft and fitted with four external covered litters, like one of the old M.A.S.H. helicopters, just without a pilot.

Ashley’s improved thirty-five-foot-long A-160X airframe could carry a 2,500-pound payload over 2,200 nautical miles at a speed of up to 165 knots. With a rotor diameter of just six feet, it was perfectly suited to land on flat decks and helipads, where wounded sailors or injured merchant mariners in the Mediterranean Sea could be loaded on—in theory—and transported back to almost any hospital in Europe, even London.

Ashley’s initial field tests were encouraging. She’d managed to fly seven consecutive Hummingbird missions fully loaded with life-sized dummies on missions over five hundred miles without incident. The AFM wanted only a three-hundred-mile mission capability, but Ashley wanted to push the performance envelope as far as possible. The United States Marine Corps had successfully tested the Hummingbird as a supply vehicle over much shorter distances. If human cargo was going to be put at risk, she wanted to be damn sure that the machine was capable of transporting them safely. As a former Navy officer, Ashley knew how important air-sea rescue operations were and she was proud to be pioneering one of the first drone programs that could save sailors’ lives at sea.

Ashley’s short-cropped hair was buffeted by the strong predawn coastal winds, but she didn’t mind. It was going to be another warm day beneath a brilliant blue Maltese sky, and the Hummingbird had just been prepped for its last test mission. If her luck held, she’d be heading back to Texas next week.

“Dr. Ashley?”

Ashley turned around. “Yes?”

“My name is Stella Kang. Ian sent me.”

Aéropostale Station 11

Tamanghasset Province, Southern Algeria

Pearce, Mossa, and the rest of the caravan crested the last of the small dunes. A decrepit air station shimmered in the heat down below them. It looked more like an abandoned Howard Hawks movie set than a failed airport. A two-story-tall cement tower was flanked by two squat buildings, a pump house, and a generator room. A third building, the largest, was the hangar. The three buildings all faced the cracked but serviceable concrete runway and stood on the north side of it. A rusted pulley clutching a shredded halyard tinked against the flagpole on top of the tower, buffeted by a nearly imperceptible breeze. Sun-bleached painted letters on the dusty hangar wall read “Aéropostale.”

“I wonder if he ever flew here,” Pearce said to himself.

“Who?” Early asked.

“Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.”

“Say again?”

“The writer. You know, The Little Prince? He flew airmail routes for this outfit between the wars.”

“Sorry, buddy. I skipped the Lit courses. But I can tell you all about my Aunt Bertie’s goiter.”

“What happened to this place?” Mann asked.

Mossa pointed to the crumbling pump house. “The French dug a well there, but it was shallow and dried up after the first summer, so they had to leave this place. My father saw his first airplane here, when he was a boy. But that was a long time ago.”

“Mossa gave you an airport, as promised. Where is your plane?” Cella asked.

Pearce checked his watch. “Still another hour. Judy will be here, guaranteed.”

Mann raised a pair of binoculars to his face. “Not a bad location, if you wanted to open up postal routes into central Africa.”

“Drug smugglers fly their planes into here sometimes,” Mossa said.

He ordered Balla and Moctar to scout ahead. They nudged their camels forward down the slope toward the airport, guns up, while the others waited and sweated in the late-morning heat.

The tower and the hangar were empty of drug runners, but decades of human detritus—crushed food tins, cigarette butts, empty paper oil cans—littered the hangar. The well in the pump room was dry as dust and the pump was long since removed from its bolted perch, as was the generator and any piece of valuable metal that might have been attached to it.

The tower building was no better. The first floor had served as some sort of lobby and office complex. The porcelain and plumbing in the two restrooms had been ripped out, save for the pan in the Turkish toilet, stained and vile.

The second story served as the observation tower. Whatever electronic equipment had been there had long been removed, and anything of value spirited away. The tower windows offered a 360-degree view, but they were wide open to the sky. Small shards of yellowed glass crunched beneath their boots, and the back wall was pocked with bullet holes.

“How’s the arm?” Pearce asked.

Early shrugged. “Never better.”

“Then you’re here on overwatch.” Pearce knew Early was lying, of course. If they were attacked, his friend would be in the safest position.

“You got it, chief.”

“You want one of the RPGs?”

“Nah, I’m fine with this.” Early charged his SCAR-H and flipped the firing-mode switch to automatic. The rifle had no burst mode.

“Stay frosty up here.”

Pearce and Mossa worked their way back down the crumbling cement stairs to the skid-marked tarmac. They made their way over to the hangar where the rest had gathered. The rolling hangar doors had long since disappeared, burned for firewood, Pearce guessed. Even the metal tracks to guide the wheels had been ripped out of the floor for scrap. At least the corrugated steel roof panels were still in place, though sunlight leaked through the scattered gunshot holes, shot from inside judging by the shape of them.

The camels and the others were all inside the cavernous building, hiding from the sun. The cracked floor was strewn with dried chestnuts of camel dung of indeterminable age. Clearly, they weren’t the first visitors to park their animals in here.

Mossa approached his men, sitting cross-legged in front of their kneeling camels. Pearce found Cella near the hangar entrance, smoking a cigarette, staring at the sand.

“We never finished that conversation we had the other day,” Pearce said. “Borrow one of those?” He pointed at her cigarette.

“I thought you quit.” She held out a pack. He pulled one out.

“I quit a lot of things.”

She flicked her lighter. He lit up. They smoked in silence for a while. Pearce thought she would take the bait, talk about her daughter. Something was wrong about that situation. But it really wasn’t any of his business.

“What’s next for you?” Cella finally asked.

“Work.”

“Where?”

“Wherever.”

“Must be lonely for you.”

“I was never much of a people person.” Pearce saw movement in the sand. “What’s that?”

Cella shielded her eyes. “Looks like a snake.” The long, thin shape S’d down the dune toward them. She called over her shoulder to Mossa in Tamasheq.

Mossa came over to them. She pointed at the snake, now stopped on the dune. “What kind of snake is that?”

“I have never seen such a snake.”

Pearce threw down his cigarette and bolted for the dune.

The snake suddenly reversed direction, S-ing backward up the dune, tail first.

Pearce was faster. He snatched up the snake around its neck. The snake flopped and twisted in his fist. He felt the tiny servos grinding in his grip as the rubbery snake body flailed. Pearce wrapped his other fist around the snake’s neck and tried to twist off the head, as he’d done to a hundred other snakes in his life. But the metal spine wouldn’t give way that easily. When he reached the tarmac, he put the flailing snake under his boot and cut the head off with his combat knife. He picked up the severed head. He lifted his boot and the body flopped around on the tarmac. He examined the head more closely as he marched back to the hangar. Video and audio sensors inside the unit. No question.

“What is it?” Cella asked.

“Surveillance drone.” He tossed the head to Mann, now standing at the door along with Balla and Moctar.

“Excellent craftsmanship,” Mann said. “Israeli or Chinese.”

“I’m betting Chinese.” Pearce turned to Mossa. “Get your men ready. We’re going to have company.”

Pearce tapped his ear mic. “You see anything up there, Mikey?”

“A plane. Two, maybe three klicks away. Due west.”

Pearce pulled his sat phone out of his pocket, speed-dialed Ian. “How soon?”

“ETA ten minutes.” It was four in the morning where Ian was, and he hadn’t slept in twenty-four hours. Pearce heard the fatigue in his voice.

“From what direction?”

“East.”

Pearce cursed again. “I need eyes on the ground, and backup, if you can swing it. We’ve got company on the way, maybe already here.”

“How many?”

“Don’t know yet.”

“Troy?” Early said.

“Yeah?”

“Chutes.”

“How many?”

“Looks like… oh, shit. Six, seven, eight, nine—”

Ian interrupted. “I only have the one option if you want assistance.”

“Do it. Now.”

“Will do, but it will take longer than ten minutes to reach you. And there’s been a slight change in plan.”

“What change?”

55

Karem Air Force Base

Niamey, Niger

^{15 May}

Same trailer, same ground control station, different crew.

There were only two Reapers on the base and two GCS trailers. The original DoD plan was to deploy four five-person crews, each working twelve-hour shifts in the two trailers, keeping both Reapers in the air twenty-four hours per day. But budget cuts and crew shortages meant they could only field two full crews at any given time, and that meant keeping only one Reaper aloft for twenty-four hours at a time. Until they were fully staffed and funded, the second GCS trailer would remain shut down in reserve.

This morning’s crew, known as Blue One, was flying a fully armed Reaper on a surveillance mission along the Algeria–Niger border. Technically, the computer was flying the machine on a preprogrammed flight pattern. Intelligence sources on the ground reported possible AQS traffic in the region. The Reaper mission was tasked with monitoring the border traffic and recording any suspicious movement.

Red One team had launched the aircraft sixteen hours earlier. Blue One had just relieved them four hours ago. The pilot, sensor operator, and GCS controller were bored out of their minds. The pilot wasn’t even in her seat. She was doing yoga stretches, trying to work out a knot in her lower back. The mission monitor was in the clinic on IVs, fighting a bout of dysentery, so the flight engineer, Captain Pringle, was doing double duty. His feet were up on the desk and his eyes were shut, because he was pulling a double shift as a favor to the Red One flight engineer, who’d just taken a three-day emergency pass to be with his pregnant wife in Landstuhl, Germany, giving birth to their third son.

In other words, it was a typical workday. Until the sensor operator shouted, “Shit.”

Pearce Systems Headquarters

Dearborn, Michigan

Ian easily took control of the Reaper. The night Pearce stole the M4 carbine was also spent installing a remote wireless override for the Reapers’ ground control station. Just one of the many useful toys Ian insisted Pearce keep on hand at all times.

He radioed Pearce. “Help is on the way.”

Karem Air Force Base

Niamey, Niger

Lieutenant Colonel Kavanagh examined the latest aerial surveillance photos, which Red One had produced the day before. A thick Cuvana e-cigar was parked in a pristine crystal ashtray on the desk, a gift from his forbearing wife. He loved the big flavor and vapor; she loved the fact that there wasn’t any smoke or stink. A military marriage required many compromises. The e-cigar was an easy one for both of them.

Kavanagh was lean and hard for his age, despite his new career piloting a desk. He’d flown tank-busting A-10 Thunderbolts up until the year before, including Operation Iraqi Freedom, when a rapid decline in his visual acuity pushed him out of the cockpit. It wasn’t too bad, though. Two more years and he could retire, and working with the latest drone technology had been a challenge in the best sense of the word. And as it turned out, he was a damn fine base commander, too. His wife even thought he looked handsome in glasses.

He zoomed in on the Reaper surveillance photo on his big desktop screen and highlighted the image anomalies. He hoped the poindexters back at Langley could make something out of them. If this was, indeed, an AQS border crossing, the terrorists must be wearing first-rate camouflage, because he hadn’t seen anything more than rocks and camels in weeks. He didn’t bother to look up when there was a knock on his door.

“Enter.”

His administrative assistant, a young airman first class, entered. Her ABU name tag read “BEEBY.” Her young face frowned with confusion. “You have a visitor, sir.”

Kavanagh kept zooming and highlighting. “Who?”

“You won’t believe it.”

Kavanagh looked up. “Try me.”

Kavanagh was still in a foul mood after the FUBAR over his credentials back in Germany. How or why anybody had put him on a terrorist watch list was beyond all reasoning. He’d only managed to get back to Karem last night after a long and uncomfortable ride in a rock-hard jump seat in the back of an unheated cargo transport.

The airman smiled. “Okay.” She turned in the doorway and spoke to someone in the cramped waiting room. “The colonel will see you now.”

Beeby stepped aside, and Margaret Myers marched into Kavanagh’s office.

Kavanagh’s jaw dropped. He rose. “Madame President?” He began to raise his hand in a salute, but checked himself.

“Former president. But please, call me Margaret.” She extended her hand. He shook it.

The airman stifled a giggle.

“That’ll be all,” Kavanagh said, dismissing her. She left, closing the door behind her.

“Please, have a seat,” he said, pointing at the only other chair in the tiny room.

“No, thank you. I’ve had quite enough of sitting for a while.”

“Long flight?”

“Is there a short flight to this godforsaken place?”

Kavanagh smiled. “Good point. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I need a favor, Colonel.”

“Favors are hard to come by on an Air Force base. We tend to function on the basis of SOPs.”

Myers glanced around the spartan room. The large computer monitor dominated the tiny steel desk. A framed photo of Kavanagh’s wife and children stood next to a picture of him as a younger man in the cockpit of an airplane. She knew it was an A-10 Thunderbolt, the same plane as the model airplane on the shelf behind his head. The Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs was one of her favorite places to visit as governor. She’d tried to convince her son to apply there, but he didn’t have any interest.

“Even for your former commander in chief?”

“Depends on the favor, I suppose.”

“I’d like you to release a young woman in your custody named Judy Hopper.”

“May I ask why?”

“I suppose that’s the second favor I’d ask you. I’d rather you didn’t.”

Kavanagh leaned carefully against his desk, folding his arms across his chest, thinking.

“I’m sorry, but Air Force regulations clearly state: only one favor per ex-president. I can grant you one or the other, but not both.”

“Okay, then release Judy and allow us to proceed on our way.”

“For what purpose? And please, don’t tell me that cockamamie story about a rescue mission.”

“It’s about a cockamamie rescue mission. Can we leave now?”

“Seriously, ma’am. What is this all about?”

“It’s about two American heroes who are stuck on the wrong side of the world that need a lift back home, badly. Right now.”

“I can’t authorize an illegal border crossing, even if it is for a spy mission. That kind of operation needs a much higher clearance than my pay grade allows.”

“I’m not asking you to authorize anything. I’m asking you to let Judy go, release her airplane, and wish us luck. What we do when we lift off the tarmac isn’t any of your concern.”

Kavanagh scratched his silver hair, thinking, as he sat back down in his chair. The springs squeaked.

“If you got hurt or captured or, God forbid, shot down, it puts my ass in a sling and the U.S. government on the hook. I’m sorry.” Kavanagh folded his hands on the desk.

Myers leaned on his desk, her face nearly in his. “If I got hurt or shot down or captured, technically, it would be my ass in the sling, not yours. And since when does an American military officer worry about his ass? Is that how you qualified to fly one of those?” She pointed at the A-10, affectionately known as the Warthog.

“No, ma’am.”

“I know it takes a lot of guts to fly one of those. I know a lot of brave young men and women who graduated from the Academy. Just like you.” She nodded at his Air Force Academy ring. “I’m not asking you to get out of your chair or out from behind your desk. I just need you to sign whatever paper you need to sign and let us go. I’ll take full responsibility. I’ll sign any document you put in front of me to that effect.”

“I can’t believe the CIA or the DoD or whoever has recruited you to run some special op into hostile territory. No offense.”

“None taken. There are better-trained men and women than me for that sort of thing.”

“So, then, you admit this is personal?”

She banged the desk. “You’re damn right it’s personal. These are friends of mine and their lives are at risk, and I’m not going to stand around and do nothing about it.” She picked up the photo of the colonel’s wife and kids. “Would you let some pencil-pushing bureaucrat stand between you and your family if you knew their lives were in danger?”

“Hell no.”

“Then you understand.”

“Who are these people you’re going after?”

“Two of the finest men I’ve ever known. They risked everything for me, and for our country, time and time again. They deserve better than what they’re getting from our government, which is nothing.”

“Why not call the White House? I’m sure the president would listen to you.”

“Don’t you think I’ve tried? The administration quoted me chapter and verse on the ‘no new boots on the ground’ doctrine. Can you imagine it?”

“But that was your policy, ma’am.”

“Nonsense. My policy was to not start new wars that don’t advance American national interests. But when American lives were at stake? I would’ve unleashed hell to save one American life. That was my job as president. And that’s my reasonable expectation as a citizen. President Greyhill won’t send troops in order to protect his interests.”

“You’re putting me in a helluva position.”

“What kind of position do you think my friends are in over there?”

Kavanagh’s neck flushed red. “I wish to God you were still the president.”

The plane is already fueled and ready to go, according to the colonel,” Myers said.

“I still don’t think you should come. It’s risky,” Judy said. “And Troy would kill me if something happened to you.” She was working a piece of gum hard in her jaw.

“If something happens to me it’ll probably happen to you, so Troy will be the least of your worries.”

The two of them headed for the Aviocar, which had already been wheeled out onto the tarmac. They approached the plane. A square-jawed slab of meat in civilian clothes blocked the entrance to the Aviocar’s cargo door. Judy recognized him. It was Sergeant Wolfit, the man from whom Pearce had stolen the M4 carbine. Judy noticed that a new M4 carbine was slung across the sergeant’s broad chest, filling out a bright orange Tennessee Vols T-shirt. His narrow eyes bored a hole into Judy.

“We have permission to take this plane,” Myers said. “Colonel Kavanagh authorized it.”

Wolfit shifted his gaze to Myers. “I know, ma’am. I’m here to ask permission to join you.”

“Why?” Judy asked.

He tapped his rifle. “Sometimes men are handier than drones.”

“Permission granted. And please, call me Margaret.”

Wolfit’s flinty face broke into a wide grin. “Thank you, ma’am.”

Judy pushed past Wolfit and into the cargo door, turning left for the cockpit. Someone else was in the copilot’s seat, also in civilian clothes.

“Who are you?”

The silver-haired man smiled. “I’m a friend of Margaret’s. Name’s Kavanagh.” The colonel extended his hand. Judy shook it.

“Hopper.” She fell into the pilot’s seat.

“We already ran the preflight check. You’re good to go.”

“Thanks.” Judy reached into an oversize shirt pocket. Pulled out a Polaroid.

“Hope you don’t mind the company, Hopper.”

“Not as long as you keep your hands off the yoke.”

Kavanagh laughed. “I like your moxie, kid. But I probably have a few more years in the pilot seat than you.”

“Don’t bet on it.” Judy pulled the gum out of her mouth and stuck it on the instrument panel, then fixed the Polaroid on the gum. Her good-luck charm. It was a faded picture of her as a young girl on her father’s lap flying an airplane for the first time. Seemed especially appropriate now. There was a very good chance this flight would be her last.

56

Aéropostale Station 11

Tamanghasset, Southern Algeria

^{15 May}

Pearce ran to his camel and pulled off the Pelican case, flung it open, and grabbed the firing tube, already loaded with the fully charged Switchblade UAV. He wished like hell he had grenades for the M-25, but he’d already used them all back at Anou. But at least he could use the Switchblade for surveillance.

Pearce ran to the hangar entrance, pulled the launch tube over his shoulder, and fired. The pneumatic whump spit the five-and-a-half-pound drone into the air high enough for its electric motor to kick in. The small plane sped into the hazy blue sky. If there were any bad guys out there, the Switchblade should be able to see them.

“I have an image,” Mann said, holding the tablet in his hands that served as both a flight controller and view screen. Pearce cross-trained all of his people to handle all kinds of vehicles for emergency situations like this. Even though Mann was a UGV specialist, he could pilot a UAV when the occasion called for it. Mann used the tablet only because he hadn’t practiced with the MetaPro glasses yet.

Pearce cursed himself for not thinking about the UAV earlier. He should’ve been more cautious. He packed the tube back into the case and crossed back over to Mann. Mossa and the other Tuaregs were peering around the German’s shoulders, too, trying to see what was going on. These hardened desert fighters had never seen such technology.

“Troy!”

Pearce whipped around. Cella pointed northeast, toward the horizon. He ran over to her.

“Look!

Pearce saw it. A white speck running low and fast, racing toward them. Looked like a chopper. Might be Ian’s backup ride.

Or not.

“Troy!”

Pearce ran back to Mann. Wished his friend had brought his comm set.

“I’m counting six vehicles. Due west of our position, about two kilometers, and closing fast.” He handed Pearce the tablet. Mann was right. They were screaming across the desert floor. He tried to zoom in, but when he did, he lost them—they’d race right out of the frame. When he zoomed back, he could see them but not really make them out. Looked like desert patrol vehicles, militarized versions of dune buggies. Two men each. Full-faced helmets. Fixed weapons on the platforms.

“Hostiles?”

“Identification unclear. But they don’t look like taco trucks to me.”

Pearce couldn’t help but grin. The last time Mann had visited him in San Diego, he had feasted on every Asian-fusion taco truck in town. Swore he’d buy himself his own truck when he got back home to Germany.

The noise volume in the hangar rose. The familiar echo of beating rotor blades. That chopper was suddenly closer.

“Keep me posted,” Pearce said, handing the tablet back to Mann. He ran back to Cella. Moctar and Balla followed him. Mossa stayed with Mann, fascinated by the technology in the German’s hand.

The helicopter was less than a thousand yards away now. It kicked up sandy dust in spinning vortices as it raced toward the hangar.

“You see the bird?” Early asked in Pearce’s earpiece.

“Yeah.”

“And the vehicles with guns heading our way?”

“Noted.”

“Any bets on who gets here first?”

A kilometer past the northeast end of the Aéropostale runway, Guo lay prone on the far side of a dune, hidden beneath a sand-colored sheet woven with reflective materials impervious to infrared sensors. He would be invisible to any optical camera overhead, and on an infrared monitor he would likely appear, if at all, as a glitch in the sensor.

His eye tracked back and forth through the high-powered scope. What made the modified rifle and scope special was the bullet it fired, developed by Dr. Weng especially for him. It was, in effect, a miniature guided missile. Based upon a design stolen from Sandia Labs, the bullet contained a miniature CPU, actuated fins, an optical sensor, and a power supply. The rifle scope contained a laser. All Guo had to do was paint the target with the laser and fire the bullet. The bullet’s CPU would instantly course-correct against variables such as wind speed, friction, and even the Coriolis effect.

Guo had observed Al Rus’s clumsy attack on Mossa’s caravan from a safe distance and the ease with which the AQS fighters had been dispatched by the fast-running UGV drones Pearce deployed. What wasn’t clear was the aerial strike against Al Rus directly. Was that UAV deployed by Pearce or someone else? Until he was sure, he would remain as invisible as possible.

Once again, Mossa and Pearce had escaped, but Guo knew exactly where they were headed for an extraction. The Aéropostale runway was the only logical choice out here. The best chance Guo now had to capture Pearce and kill Mossa was to intercept them there. He reported back to Zhao and explained the desperate tactical situation. Zhao authorized the deployment of Guo’s specially trained team of handpicked fighters from the PLA’s famed “Fierce Falcons” airborne assault unit. Guo kept them in reserve in Bamako, hoping never to deploy them. Now they were on the ground, racing for the airfield, two men each in fast-attack desert patrol vehicles equipped with Type 87 automatic grenade launcher rifles and 7.62mm machine guns. If they couldn’t kill Mossa, Guo would, and if necessary, Pearce too—along with his entire team.

Those DPVs are about a minute out,” Early reported. “Permission to fire.”

“Not until we know who there are.” Pearce stood at the hangar entrance again, next to Cella. Balla and Moctar had joined him as well. Pearce had a clear visual on the copter now. The noise volume in the hangar had cranked up to eleven as Dr. Ashley’s A-160 Hummingbird approached for landing on the far end of the runway. Ian had instructed Ashley to program the Hummingbird’s AI navigation system to home in on Pearce’s internal tracking device and to land at least one hundred yards away for safety. It had worked perfectly.

Moctar and Balla laughed, shielding their eyes from the dust, marveling at the pilotless Hummingbird flaring as it touched down on the tarmac.

Pearce had only seen photos of the pilotless air-rescue vehicle and the four coffin-shaped litters attached to the bottom like missiles on a rail. At least they were clear plastic. Maybe his claustrophobia wouldn’t get the better of him.

“Get out of that tower, Mikey,” Pearce said. “Let’s scoot out of here while we can.”

Early ignored Pearce’s offer, tempting as it was. “Permission to fire on the vehicles?”

“Hold your fire. We still don’t know if they’re friendlies.”

The hangar noise was deafening. The Hummingbird’s Pratt & Whitney turboshaft engine had barely slowed, just enough to not take off again. Pearce could barely hear Ian shouting in his earpiece.

“What’s the holdup?” Ian said. “You need to leave—now!”

Mann ran up to him, followed by Mossa. Pearce was blind to the advancing DPVs inside the hangar. The German pointed at the tablet. Leaned in close to Pearce’s ear. Screamed to be heard.

“Six vehicles! Two split north, two south, two holding!”

Mossa slapped Pearce’s shoulder. “Go! Get on! We will cover you!”

Pearce’s eyes pleaded with Cella. He grabbed her arm. “That thing can carry four of us, including you.”

She shook her head, nodded at Mossa: I’m not leaving without him.

“They’re right on top of us, boss!” Early shouted.

“Switchblade down!” Mann shouted.

“Hold your fire, Mikey—”

BOOOOOM!

The Hummingbird erupted in a fireball. Flaming debris scattered like a shotgun blast. A rotor blade shot through the hangar door over their heads with a shraaang!, spearing into the back wall, then crashing to the floor.

The camels leaped up, bellowing. The Tuaregs grabbed the rope bridles, trying to keep the huge animals from bolting out of the hangar.

“Guess we know they’re not friendlies!” Early’s SCAR opened up overhead, roaring in Pearce’s earpiece. So did Early, shouting his war cry.

BAM! BAM! BAM!

Grenade explosions pounded the hangar walls. Dust rose like a low fog off of the floor even as it descended from the rafters. Pearce grabbed Cella by the arm and ran with her for cover in the hangar. The camels bellowed louder and shat.

Pearce shouted in Mossa’s ear. “Take your men! Take cover! They’re coming!”

More grenade rounds crashed into the walls. Still no one wounded. In the corner the floor was slick with piss and camel dung.

And then it was quiet. Not even Early’s gun was firing.

“Mikey! You all right?”

“Reloading, that’s all. Got my head down.”

“Stay down!”

Pearce tapped his comm link. “Ian! Where the hell is my backup?”

“Thirty seconds away,” Ian said.

Two desert patrol vehicles whipped around the burning Hummingbird wreck and slammed to a halt a hundred yards in front of Early’s position. Two more DPVs whipped around the far side of the hangar and stopped a hundred yards opposite Pearce’s position, guns manned and pointed directly at them.

Everybody pressed against the far wall, trying to keep out of the line of sight of the DPVs.

“Mr. Pearce. Can you hear me?”

It was Guo, in Pearce’s earpiece.

Pearce didn’t recognize the voice. How did he break into his comm link?

“Mr. Pearce?”

“Who the fuck is this?”

“Put down your weapons. You are surrounded.”

“Ian, you hearing this?” Pearce asked.

“Hearing what?”

“Someone else on my comm link.”

“Can’t hear him on my end.”

“Change channels anyway.”

“Will do.”

“Mr. Pearce?”

“You broke my helicopter, asshole. Who’s gonna pay for that?”

“Put down your weapons. You and the bandit Mossa must come out. Your friends will not be harmed. Do it now, or my men will open fire.”

“Give me one minute to talk to my people first.”

“You have thirty seconds.”

Pearce told Mossa what the voice had just said. Cella translated for Balla and Moctar. The two Tuaregs protested. Mossa calmed them down.

“They would rather die than see me surrender,” Mossa told Pearce.

“They’re about to get their chance.”

“What time is it?” Mossa asked.

Pearce checked his watch. “Noon, give or take. Why?”

Mossa sighed. “The cavalry does not always arrive in time, do they?”

“Inshallah,” Pearce said.

Piloting the stolen Reaper from Dearborn was less than easy. Ian’s control signals were bounced off of a satellite Pearce Systems leased from the Israelis three hundred miles into space, but the overall distance between Ian and the Reaper’s location over Algeria was several thousand miles. This created a four-second transmission delay, which meant that anything Ian was seeing was four seconds old. That made hitting moving targets a real challenge. The Air Force forward-located their drone base in Niger to avoid that very problem.

With the burning Hummingbird wreckage on the tarmac and six unknown vehicles surrounding the airfield, it wasn’t hard to determine that Pearce and his team were facing hostiles. Ian’s Presbyterian father had taught him it was always better to ask forgiveness than permission, so when the DPVs stopped moving, Ian fired at the two vehicles closest to Pearce.

The two DPVs nearest Pearce exploded, shredding them instantly. The sound of the missile strikes erupted inside the hangar like grenades going off inside of an elevator. The Tuaregs instinctively grabbed at their ringing ears, pounding with pain.

Pearce’s ears had been damaged by combat over the years, which at the moment was a blessing, because the explosions didn’t shock him as much. Early’s SCAR opened up again.

Pearce ducked around the corner just in time to see Early’s 7.62mm rounds walking up the hood of one of the DPVs, then plowing into the driver’s torso. The standing gunner opened up on Early, but too late. Fingers of blood spurted out of the gunner’s thigh, doubling him over, exposing his head to Early’s withering fire. The helmet erupted in a gout of blood and the gunner tumbled to the tarmac.

Pearce fired his weapon at the second DPV near Early, but it was already rocketing away to a safer position beyond the reach of Early’s gun. Mike had always been the better shot. Any rational observer would have bet that the DPV with the automatic grenade launcher and machine gun would win a duel against a lone man with a sprained arm and a rifle, but that only meant they had never seen Mike Early in battle in full berserker mode or heard his bloodcurdling war cry.

“Good shooting, Mikey. Now duck your ass back down,” Pearce ordered.

Early wolf-howled. “The party’s just getting started!”

“Save your ammo, cowboy. It’s going to be a long day.”

Guo raged.

Two vehicles destroyed by a UAV, and another disabled by the guılao gunman in the tower. Where did the UAV come from? If Pearce had a UAV at his disposal, surely he would have used it earlier.

No matter. He would solve the UAV issue later. The guılao problem he could solve now.

“Second positions,” Guo whispered in his headset. The DPV nearest Early sped away instantly, and the two in reserve behind the hangar retreated back several hundred meters. They knew to keep moving in broad, irregular patterns to avoid the same fate as their comrades.

Guo painted Early with his laser scope, fixing the red crosshairs on the big American’s head.

Pearce turned around, shouted back into the hangar. “Everybody stay put. I’ll be right back.”

He scanned the tarmac. It was clear. The DPV he’d fired at was too far away to worry about. Pearce ran in a crouch out the hangar opening and toward the tower entrance, expecting a hail of machine-gun and grenade fire to cut him down before he got three feet. But his adrenaline had kicked in and his luck held, and moments later he sped up the crumbling cement stairs to the observation tower, shouting in his mic, “Mikey! Get covered up!”

Pearce reached the top of the stairs, greeted by Early’s toothy grin plastered on his huge, sweaty face. “God I miss this shit!”

Early’s head exploded. Blood and brain matter splattered on Pearce’s face and torso. Instinctively, he dropped to the deck. Early’s headless corpse thudded onto his back. Pearce rolled out from beneath the heavy body and sprung into a crouch, desperate to get away from his dead friend without exposing himself to the killing fire.

“Mikey…”

The ragged neck wound pumped hot blood onto the floor with the last beats of Early’s dying heart, the blood surging over broken glass, spent casings, cigarette butts.

“GOD DAMN IT!” Pearce’s face twisted with rage and grief.

Cella crested the stairs. Saw Early on the floor. She gasped. “Mike!” She ran to his corpse.

Pearce crashed into her, wrapping his arms around her waist, putting his back to the shooter to cover her, driving both of them back down the staircase just as another bullet smashed into the wall above their heads.

Cella screamed and cried and beat Pearce’s shoulders with her fists, grieving and hating all at the same time as he forced her back down the stairwell.

57

Aéropostale Station 11

Tamanghasset, Southern Algeria

^{15 May}

Pearce vise-gripped Cella’s wrist and dragged her in a dead run back to the hangar entrance, slinging her inside and into Mossa’s arms. She buried her head in his chest and wept like a child. Mossa patted her head but locked eyes with Pearce, his face dark with grief.

Pearce shook his head. Mike’s dead.

Mossa led Cella over to a corner and sat her down, then returned to Pearce. Mann stood next to him.

“A sniper, but I did not see where the shot came from,” Mossa said.

Mann cursed. “They shot down the Switchblade earlier, so I didn’t spot him, either.”

“Ian? You see anything?” Pearce asked in his mic.

“Sorry, nothing.”

“Can you take the others out?”

“I can try. But I only have two shots left. Good chance I’ll miss them while they’re on the move.”

“You saw the Hummingbird wreckage?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Do you have a backup plan?”

“That was the backup plan.”

“It’s turning into a Hungarian cluster fuck down here.”

“Fortunately,” Ian said, “I have a backup plan for the backup plan.”

The sky flashed like lightning.

A second later, a thundering boom vibrated the air.

Pearce felt it in his chest. A flower of smoke petaled high in the sky, like a Fourth of July firework.

“Ian! Did you see that? Ian? Ian?”

Karem Air Force Base,

Niamey, Niger

“Log the incident.”

The Blue One flight engineer, Captain Pringle, had given the self-destruct order. Having lost control of the Reaper thirty minutes earlier and unable to regain control or force a return to base, the operational protocol was to hit the self-destruct switch. He knew he hadn’t done anything wrong, but he’d get blamed for it anyway. The Air Force was funny in that regard. Destroying a fourteen-million-dollar airframe, no matter the justification, was generally frowned upon by the comptrollers in blue suits.

It was a lousy way to end a lousy mission, but better than letting the MQ-9 get hijacked and parted out. If Pringle was lucky, he’d only get a reprimand and a notation in his service jacket. If he had let that Reaper fall into enemy hands, he would’ve been busted out of the service for sure. Maybe even court-martialed. Too many American RPVs had been stolen in recent years. Several nations had built their drone programs primarily from stolen American and Israeli technology.

Pringle wished to God he hadn’t pulled this second shift. He knew better than do to favors for anyone, let alone volunteer. Life had proven to him once again: No good deed goes unpunished.

Oh well, he said to himself, and shrugged. He’d been thinking about separating from the service anyway. Try to land some cushy civilian contractor job back in the States.

Didn’t see it, exactly.” Ian’s brogue got thicker with his growing fatigue. “My screen went blank. Near as I can tell, they hit a self-destruct switch.”

“I bet the bad guys saw it, too,” Pearce said.

“Count on it.”

Pearce worried. He figured the only reason the DPVs hadn’t attacked again was that they were afraid of the Reaper overhead. If they knew it was out of action, he could expect trouble soon.

“I need eyes on the ground, Ian.”

“What about your Switchblade?”

“Shot down earlier.”

“Then you’re fecked.”

“You just figured that out?”

CRACK!

The sound exploded in Pearce’s earpiece.

“Ian! You there?”

Pearce Systems Headquarters

Dearborn, Michigan

The flash bang burst two feet from Ian’s workstation. The exploding light stabbed his eyes and the concussive blast knocked him out a second later, blood pouring out of both of his ears.

The FBI SWAT team had disabled the building’s security system with a chemical EMP grenade detonation and easily disarmed the three lightly armed security guards on the property, not at their sharpest just after four in the morning.

Earlier that morning, the special agent in charge of the Detroit FBI field office had received an emergency request from Washington to immediately assault Pearce Systems headquarters and seize all evidence and persons. Credible intelligence indicated that an AQ-affiliated cell located there was about to commit a terrorist act with a weapon of mass destruction.

The all-volunteer SWAT team, headed by an assistant SAIC, deployed to Dearborn within thirty minutes of the request. Thirteen minutes later, Dr. Rao, Ian McTavish, and a half-dozen other Pearce Systems employees on the premises were in plasti-cuffs, hooded and loaded into security vans and whisked away to a secure location while other specialist teams began searching for hazardous materials and WMDs. Once the all clear was given, an intel team seized computers, phones, hard drives, and other storage devices. Before the sun rose at 6:07 a.m. that morning, Pearce Systems would be completely shut down and its personnel quarantined, all thanks to a bogus emergency command issued by Jasmine Bath through a back door in the FBI’s Washington Bureau server.

Troy Pearce was on his own now.

Pearce’s cabin, near the Snake River

Wyoming

Skeets received the go signal from Jasmine Bath at exactly 2:13 a.m. local. He knew that meant the FBI had just launched its assault on the Dearborn facility. His mission was to take out Myers and anybody else he might find in the cabin. The two attacks had to be perfectly coordinated. Bath couldn’t afford for Myers to warn McTavish or vice versa.

“Skeets” was a nickname, of course, one of the ridiculous monikers that soldiers picked up while in service, especially in special forces units. A fourth-generation coal miner, the steely West Virginian had escaped black lung and double-wide-trailer payments by enlisting in the U.S. Army. He tested off the charts and could run for miles without winding. But what brought him to the attention of the NCOs was his preternatural sharpshooter’s eye and dull moral conscience. Killing came easy for Skeets, and without regrets. PTSD was for pussies.

The Army had been good to him. Fed him well, trained him better, even knocked some of the hillbilly out of him. He traded his thick regional accent for the clipped staccato cadence of Army patois. The war had been fun, and getting paid to hunt people even more so. But three tours of yessirs and nossirs and bullshit regs and ROEs were quite enough, thank you. He had the good sense to take online college courses in business in his downtime. Discovered he was a laissez-faire capitalist. Decided he wanted to be an entrepreneur.

So he quit Uncle Sam’s Army and joined the ranks of private security contractors at five times his annual salary as a sergeant. He quickly earned a fearsome rep in the merc community and was soon invited to join the CIOS corporation.

CIOS was generous with its cash offer, and selective in the targets he would be sent to assassinate. Jasmine Bath, the corporation president, had personally assured him that only America’s worst enemies would ever be targeted, and only those that could not be legally arrested or killed but otherwise posed an immediate security threat. Skeets told her she was lying and that he didn’t give a rat’s ass who the targets were, guilty or not. Bath hired him on the spot and his income doubled.

Skeets had kept the cabin under surveillance from a distance for the last four hours but hadn’t seen or heard anyone on the property.

He disabled the surveillance cameras mounted high in the trees with a silenced .22 semiauto firing subsonics, then burst into the cabin, 9mm pistol drawn. Found nobody. As instructed, he searched for computers, phones, and storage devices—anything that might identify more links in Pearce’s network. But the place had been cleaned out. Skeets called it in to Bath. She told him simply, “Burn it down.”

He did. The old cabin went up faster than dry kindling, the fire ignited by a timed charge. He watched the towering flames lick the early-morning sky in his rearview mirror as he sped away.

Skeets felt no remorse. Pearce was a target. So was the former president. It was a job. Nothing more.

Aéropostale Station 11

Tamanghasset, Southern Algeria

The situation was static, which was fine by Pearce, because that meant he was still alive to know the situation was static, and that the rest of the caravan wasn’t dead, at least not yet.

Ian was offline, Judy was incarcerated, and the tangos out there hadn’t opened fire since Early’s death. Ian’s stolen Reaper had pushed them way back, but the DPVs were still in control of the field with three of them remaining. The DPVs mounted automatic grenade launchers that could fire five hundred rounds a minute up to six hundred meters effective range, and the 7.62mm machine guns were almost as lethal.

If Pearce and the others tried to make a run for it on the camels they’d be run down and cut to pieces. But staying in the sweltering hangar reeking of camel piss indefinitely probably wasn’t a viable option, either. It would only be a matter of time before the DPVs lined up across the hangar and unloaded their arsenal into them. At least the big animals had calmed down and were kneeling quietly in the back again.

“The explosion. Your drone?” Mossa asked.

“Not my drone, exactly. My man stole it. But it looks like it was destroyed.”

“Too bad. It was useful.” Mossa was staring at the burning wreckage of the two DPVs blasted by the Reaper.

“That sniper out there might be on the move, too. I didn’t see the shot, but given the angle I’d say he was somewhere in that direction.” Pearce pointed toward the northeast.

“If I were him, I would move,” Mossa confirmed. “We could hunt him, but then his friends would hunt us.” He looked up into the sky. “Without your friend up there, they will attack soon.”

“You said something about the cavalry not arriving in time?”

“I radioed one of the local chieftains. He said he was on the way.”

“Any idea when he will arrive?”

Mossa shrugged. “Abdallah Ag Matta is a good man, but he is an Imohar, and our sense of time is not like yours. He will get here as soon as he can.”

“Let’s hope it’s soon enough.”

58

In the air over the Sahara

Southern Algeria

^{15 May}

Phoenix-Zero, this is Juliette Niner-Niner. Come in, please.”

It was Judy’s third attempt to reach Pearce. He wasn’t responding on this channel. She was worried sick. She was an hour late for the pickup. Was Pearce lying dead in the sand somewhere because of her?

Aéropostale Station 11, Tamanghasset

Southern Algeria

The three DPVs skidded to a halt on the far side of the runway some five hundred yards opposite Pearce’s position. The loose sand south and east beyond the cracked tarmac was flat for as far as the eye could see. They had a clear line of sight if they wanted to lob grenades and hot lead into the hangar.

Pearce’s earpiece crackled again. “It appears as if you’ve lost your drone protection, Pearce. I should kill you all right now, but I have orders. I will make the offer one last time. You and bandit Mossa surrender, and I will let your other friends live.”

“You still haven’t told me who you are, asshole, or how you’re gonna pay for my broken helicopter.”

Guo laughed. “Your friend’s head exploded like a balloon.”

“You motherfu—”

“Yours will, too.”

Machine guns opened up. An RPG rocket whooshed past the DPVs, its crooked plume trailing behind it. The big bulbous HEAT round exploded in the sand thirty feet behind the vehicles.

Mossa laughed and slapped Pearce on the back. “You see! Abdallah Ag Matta has come!”

Mossa’s walkie-talkie crackled. A Tamasheq voice shouted over the tinny speaker.

Pearce shook his head. “Tell them to back off. Those DPVs will cut them to ribbons.”

“Too late.”

The DPVs gunned their engines, wheels throwing sand. They spun hard right in a synchronous turn, racing back toward the advancing Algerian Tuaregs.

“Troy!” Mann pointed at the sky. “Look!”

It was the Aviocar, about a mile distant.

“Is that our ride?” the German asked.

“I don’t know.” Then he remembered. “Shit!” He’d switched channels when his line was tapped by the shitbird with the sniper rifle. Pearce switched back to Judy’s channel.

“Judy, that you?”

“Yes! I’ve been trying to reach you. Are you all right?”

“Switch to the other channel. Hurry.”

The DPVs opened up, firing their machine guns and grenade launchers at the Tuareg fighters.

Judy came back on. “What’s the situation down there?”

Mossa ran back to the camels, shouting orders to his men.

“It’s a Class Five shit storm down here. Hold off. I’ll get back to you.”

Pearce ran back to Mossa and his men. “You can’t go out there.”

“I must. My people will die.” Mossa mounted his camel. So did the others. Mossa and Moctar held their rifles high; Balla gripped an RPG.

“You’ll die,” Pearce said.

“Inshallah!” Mossa laughed. He yanked his camel’s bridle, and the big beast rose, as did the others.

Pearce’s camel began to rise out of habit, even though its saddle was empty. Pearce knew it would quickly follow the others.

He leaped on.

Mossa shouted his own war cry and sped out of the hangar, Balla and Moctar right behind him. Mann was throwing a long leg into his saddle. Pearce barked at him. “No! I need you here.” He pointed at Cella.

The German gritted his teeth. He wanted to fight. But he understood authority, knew the woman wasn’t safe by herself. He nodded curtly and dismounted.

“Thanks,” Pearce said, urging his camel out the door and into the harsh light. Pearce’s animal caught up to the others quickly. The four men galloped abreast, racing for the battle raging ahead.

Thirty camel-mounted Algerian Tuaregs charged in a line toward the airstrip, desperate to save their Tuareg headman, Mossa, cursing the devils and firing their rifles. They’d managed to close quietly within a hundred yards before opening up, completely surprising the DPVs. Abdallah Ag Matta waved his takouba high above his head. If he was going to die, he wanted to die like his fathers of old.

He did. An armor-piercing round tore out his throat and threw him from the saddle.

Several more Algerian RPGs were loosed, smoke trails twisting in their wake. Exploding warheads rocked the speeding DPVs, but the Chinese sped onward, closing the gap. They opened fire.

The first 35mm grenades exploded, throwing murderous shrapnel. Camels screamed as hot steel shards ripped into their hides. Torrents of lead ripped open their bellies, spilling their guts, spewing blood and fat. The wounded animals tumbled forward on their crumbling legs, tossing their riders, some already dead in the saddle. The smaller, faster war camels Pearce and the others rode had recovered their nerve now that they were out in the open and charging into battle. Pearce couldn’t believe how fast they moved and how smooth their gait was. It was easy for him to fire his rifle—far easier than if he had been on a horse at full gallop. Six long days on the back of his animal had produced both a bond and a knowing skill—good enough that riding the camel felt like second nature now.

The four of them closed the gap on the unsuspecting Chinese from behind. As Pearce had predicted, the charging Algerian Tuaregs were getting mowed down by the automatic-weapons fire, especially the grenade launchers. One of the DPVs peeled off to chase a knot of Algerians in full retreat—but Pearce guessed the Tuaregs were just trying to lead the vehicle into a trap. Pearce followed behind the Chinese, putting the gunstock to his cheek and firing controlled bursts. The DPV gunner’s helmet cracked open and the man tumbled out of the speeding vehicle and into the sand.

Pearce shifted his aim and fired again. Armor-piercing rounds tore into the hood, causing the driver to twist the wheel violently—too violently—cartwheeling the DPV in the softer sand where the Tuaregs had led him. The driver was tossed in the air but fell clear of the tumbling vehicle, only to catch a hundred rounds of volleying fire in his chest as the cluster of Tuaregs wheeled their animals around and emptied their guns into him.

The blue-turbaned Tuaregs glanced up at Pearce and waved their rifles high in the air. It suddenly occurred to Pearce he was wearing a tagelmust, too, and must have looked just like them. All warriors share a bond, even enemies, but at that moment Pearce was a Tuareg. Pearce shouted his war cry and urged his camel after the other DPVs still chasing the few remaining Algerians, now in full retreat, turning in their saddles and firing their guns in vain.

WHOOSH! Balla fired his RPV in full gallop. It smashed into the rear of the nearest DPV, blasting it into a cloud of fiery metal. Pearce cheered along with the others riding beside him. But their joy was premature. The final DPV’s launcher erupted, still chasing the other Algerians. Dozens of grenades exploded beneath the feet of the fleeing camels, breaking them open, spilling their intestines, snapping their legs in half. The last Algerian Tuaregs and their animals died screaming in the reddening sand.

And then the DPV wheeled around, guns blazing.

Pearce felt the 7.62mm slugs pounding into his camel’s chest and the great beast lunging downward. Pearce jerked as hard as he could out of the saddle to leap clear, but the fifteen-hundred-pound animal collapsed, landing on top of Pearce’s leg. Searing pain jolted though his knee and up his thigh.

Instinctively, he knew it wasn’t broken. The soft sand had saved him. So had the dead camel as more rounds pummeled into its corpse, now shielding Pearce from the DPV. Pearce glanced up just in time to watch Moctar and Balla charge.

Moctar’s belly crimsoned and his upper body fell away. The lower half stayed in the saddle, hot blood geysering onto his galloping camel.

Balla shouted and fired his weapon, but he aimed too high and missed. Bullets pounded his chest like angry fists and threw him to the ground.

Mossa charged madly at the DPV, flinging his AK aside and raising his takouba high in the air. The faceless gunner turned his gun but held his fire—waiting until Mossa had closed within inches. The gun erupted. Mossa’s upper body disintegrated in a hail of fragmenting grenades. The DPV gunned its engine and sped away toward the north.

Pearce leveraged his free foot against the saddle and pulled on his pinned thigh with his hands. His luck held. His leg was trapped beneath the dead camel’s shoulder, near the neck. Otherwise, he might have been trapped for good. A few moments later, he worked his injured leg free. It was sore like a bad sprain, but he tested it and it was still mostly functional. He suddenly realized Judy was screaming in his earpiece.

“Troy! Troy!”

“Judy?”

“Thank God! You’re alive!”

“Apparently.”

“Where are you? Are you okay?”

“I’m south-southeast of the airstrip, about two hundred meters, about even with the hangar.” Pearce limped over to Mossa’s camel. It knelt down next to its master’s corpse like a grieving dog.

“Yes, I see you now. I’m coming in.”

“No! It’s too dangerous. There’s a fast-attack vehicle down here.”

“I see it. It’s heading north, about three hundred meters north of you. Plenty of room.”

“Don’t argue with me, damn it. I said wave off.”

“Sorry, Troy, but she’s following my orders,” Myers said. “Hope your bags are packed. How soon can you be at the hangar?”

“Two minutes.”

“We’ll be there.”

Pearce approached Mossa’s camel. It opened its huge mouth and growled.

“Shut up and ride!” Pearce threw his good leg over the beast and it complied, rising up quickly. Pearce grunted “Het-het” and got the camel galloping back toward the hangar.

The bullet-wrecked DPV flew over the crest of the dune and slid to a halt on the far side about a kilometer north of Guo’s position, out of sight of the hangar as per Guo’s instructions. Guo remained in his sniper hide beneath the reflective cover, waiting for the Americans to clear the area. He didn’t want to give Pearce the satisfaction of a last-minute Hellfire missile strike with victory in his hand. Guo had killed Mossa, so his primary objective was achieved. Capturing Pearce was only a desired outcome, not a mission priority.

There was one more mission objective to be achieved. There were several options to achieve it. With Zhao’s permission, he’d initiate the most necessary one.

Judy surveyed the wreckage in her windscreen. She was still five hundred feet off the deck. Three smoldering DPVs were to her right, and the smashed Hummingbird airframe blocked the end of the runway. Judy would have to get up a good head of steam if she hoped to clear that wreck on takeoff. The Aviocar needed four hundred meters of runway to get airborne. That would be cutting it darn close, but that was the least of her worries at the moment.

“There he is,” Myers said, pointing to the east. Pearce was up ahead, a hundred yards from the tarmac, galloping toward the hangar, his head still wrapped in the indigo tagelmust. Myers called in her headset. “We see you, Troy.”

His voice crackled back. “Last one to the hangar buys the beer.”

“He looks friggin’ cool. I want one of those,” Kavanagh said.

“The camel or the turban, Colonel?” Myers asked.

“Both.”

Judy set the Aviocar down smooth as silk on the cracked runway but couldn’t avoid the debris scattered on the tarmac from the smashed Hummingbird. The Aviocar’s heavy rubber wheels threw chunks of metal against the fuselage. She prayed the wheels hadn’t been punctured or the airframe damaged. She’d have to check before they tried to take off again.

“Nice landing,” Kavanagh said into the headphone mic, grinning behind his aviators. “Your dad would be proud.”

“If our luck doesn’t hold, you might be meeting him sooner than you think.”

She taxied past the burning wreckage of the two DPVs taken out by Ian’s Reaper. Judy ordered Kavanagh to feather down the engines while she braked the plane, parking in front of the hangar, leaving the two motors running at low RPMs.

Judy waved at Mann crouching in the shade of the hangar. He smiled and waved back, his other arm draped protectively over the Italian woman Pearce had described earlier as his wife. She looked like she’d been through hell and back after six days of desert travel and the nightmare that had just transpired here, but she still looked gorgeous. It wasn’t fair, Judy thought.

The Red One team sensor operator called in. “Colonel, you’ve got company heading your way.” He was patched into everyone’s headset. Kavanagh had ordered the second Reaper at Karem AFB into the air and both teams on duty. If he was going to go out in a blaze of glory, he wanted all hands on deck to witness the folly.

“What is it?”

“Three bogies coming in hot and low on the deck—about ten meters.”

“Fighters?”

“Cruise missiles.”

“ETA?”

“Three minutes, tops.”

“You heard it, people,” Kavanagh said. “Let’s get this train loaded and rolling.”

“Troy? Did you catch that?” Myers asked.

“Yeah.” He was breathless in the headphones.

Wolfit pushed the cargo door open and jumped out, M4 at the ready, just as Pearce’s camel thundered past the plane’s rudder.

Myers, Kavanagh, and Judy scrambled out after Wolfit. Everybody ran for the hangar except Judy, who ducked beneath the plane to check for damage.

Pearce halted the camel at the hangar entrance and slipped off before the camel had a chance to kneel. He slapped its flank and it bellowed in protest, then trotted into the hangar where the two remaining camels knelt.

Cella ran up and threw her arms around Pearce’s neck. Myers ran up, too, with Wolfit and Kavanagh at her side.

“Troy, we’ve got to go,” Myers said.

“Mossa?” Cella asked. “The others?”

Pearce shook his head. “I’m sorry.”

Cella swore bitterly.

“You’re coming with us,” Pearce ordered.

Cella glared at him, then softened, nodding yes.

“Good.” He turned to Myers. “Take her, please.”

“What about you?”

“Not without Mikey.”

“Where is he?” Myers asked.

Pearce ran as fast as his limp allowed back toward the tower, Mann beside him.

“There’s no time,” Myers said.

“You two get back to the plane. We’ll hustle him back, I promise.”

Kavanagh nodded at Wolfit, and the two of them chased after Pearce and Mann while Myers and Cella dashed for the plane.

Judy was still underneath the Aviocar. She didn’t find any damage in the fuselage, but the starboard wheel was leaking air fast. “C’mon, you guys!” she barked in her headset.

Pearce was the last one up the tower thanks to his limp. The colonel knelt by Early’s corpse and was covering his bloody neck stump with his own civilian shirt. The staircase was narrow. Wolfit handed Pearce his weapon and took Early’s feet, Kavanagh the shoulders. Pearce noticed the colonel’s knees were soaked in blood. Everybody’s boots were slick with it, too. Mann led the way down, and Pearce followed the rest.

They cleared the stairs and dashed for the plane.

“ETA one minute, Colonel,” Red One reported. “Advise you leave now.”

“Working on it, son. Thanks for the tip.”

Judy had already strapped back into her seat and revved the engines, keeping her feet pressed hard against the brakes. The plane shuddered in protest.

Mann ran and leaped into the cargo area as Wolfit approached. Wolfit stepped up into the bay effortlessly and swung around, the two of them pulling Early’s heavy corpse in behind them, deep into the cargo area. Kavanagh walked Early’s broad shoulders in, then jumped in behind him.

Pearce limped as fast as he could. Myers shouted at him. “Looks like you’re buying the beer!”

The air cracked.

Pearce spun like a top, then dropped to the tarmac, blood spraying from his head.

59

Aéropostale Station 11

Tamanghasset, Southern Algeria

^{15 May}

As soon as he saw Pearce drop, Guo called the DPV for a pickup. He had to evacuate quickly—no time to savor the killing of the two Americans today. The cruise missiles would be arriving within moments to sterilize the battlefield. He was under strict orders to leave no evidence of Chinese presence behind, and with five smashed vehicles and ten dead operators in the field, there was only one way to burn away the evidence. The mobile missile launch platform in Mali had already fired on his command. He designated the COMPASS locators in three of the DPVs as the targets.

The surviving DPV slowed just enough for Guo to leap into the passenger seat. He shouted, “GO!” but it was hardly necessary. The driver smashed the gas pedal to the floor. The rail threw big sand and fishtailed as the Chinese raced due north, away from the coming holocaust.

Three ground-hugging Chinese cruise missiles streaked across the Algerian desert, flying just meters off the deck to avoided radar detection and air defense systems. Onboard TERCOM and COMPASS navigation systems maneuvered autonomously around obstacles while keeping the missiles zeroed in on their targets. They had been launched just minutes before from a single portable launcher now deployed in Mali by Dr. Weng and Zhao, with more missiles for reloads stored in a Chinese-secured Bamako warehouse.

The CJ-10 “Long Sword” cruise missile had been largely designed from reverse-engineered American Tomahawk cruise missiles salvaged by the Pakistanis from failed cruise missile strikes against the Taliban in the late 1990s. Like the Tomahawk, these weapons were designed for surgical strikes. Tomahawks were the weapons of choice for many American presidents before the advent of drone technologies like the Predator, and sometimes after. President Obama launched over two hundred Tomahawks against Gaddafi’s military in 2011, helping to topple his murderous regime. In fact, the Americans had launched two thousand Tomahawk strikes against other nations without declaration of war since 1983—ample precedent for today’s action, as far as the Chinese were concerned.

The Long Swords locked onto their respective targets just one kilometer away, their 500 kg warheads set to ignite with devastating precision.

Sergeant Wolfit slammed the cargo door shut as the plane lurched forward.

Cella hovered over Pearce’s unconscious body, medical bag open, cutting away at the tagelmust still wrapped around his head. Myers straddled his legs to steady him against the shuddering fuselage streaking down the runway.

The tagelmust finally gave way. Myers gasped. Pearce’s face was slathered in a mask of indigo and surging blood.

“It’s just a scalp wound,” Cella shouted. She smiled at Myers. “He’s alive.”

“Thank God,” Myers whispered.

Judy slammed the Aviocar’s throttles as far forward as they could go, but the boxy little plane still wasn’t hitting maximum speed, thanks to the deflating starboard tire. The smoldering ruins of the Hummingbird loomed large in the windscreen. They weren’t going to make it—

“Now!” she barked.

She and Kavanagh yanked back on the yokes together, pulling them hard into their guts. The Aviocar leaped into the air like a thrashing marlin.

The plane shuddered as metal screamed against metal, the belly of the fuselage scraping hard against the twisted remains of the A-160. Judy felt the Aviocar twist—and for a fleeting second she was sure they were going to crash. But the rugged transport plane corrected under Judy’s deft rudder and yoke work, and seconds later they were in a steep-banked climb with nothing but hazy blue sky filling her windscreen.

“Yee-haw, baby!” Kavanagh shouted. He flashed a huge grin at Judy. “You wanna fly A-10s sometime, you look me up, you hear?” His voice boomed in Judy’s headset. She was glad for the distraction and grateful nobody else in the cargo area was online. Early was back there, dead, and Pearce shot in the head. Kavanagh’s caterwauling was all she could handle for now.

The three cruise missiles each struck within half a meter of their designated targets, guided by the COMPASS locators on the DPVs. The fuel-air explosions produced a massive concussive blast followed by a boiling cloud of searing fire hot enough to melt the desert floor. Anything not vaporized by the initial pressure wave was consumed by the engulfing flames. One square kilometer of the Earth’s surface had just been wiped clean of organic life and any evidence that it ever existed.

The force of the blast waves rocked the Aviocar as it clawed its way past two thousand feet, shaking everything inside that wasn’t strapped down.

“Jimminy Christmas!” Judy shouted as she white-knuckled the yoke for a second time, wrestling the plane back into line. How the Aviocar managed to keep flying was beyond her.

“You must be living a clean life, Hopper. That was damn near miraculous.”

“I’d say it was good engineering.”

“I was talking about the flying, not the plane.”

Judy allowed herself a smile. “Thanks.”

“I can’t wait to see how you handle an Algerian fighter.”

“Why do you say that?”

Kavanagh pointed high in the windscreen. “Take a look.”

A MiG-25 jet fighter streaked across the sky. She guessed fifteen thousand feet. Its flight path perpendicular to their own. She glanced at her warning switches. No antiaircraft missile lock.

“He must be texting his girlfriend. He doesn’t see us.” Judy nudged the Aviocar lower to the ground. At least make it harder for the MiG pilot to see them if he changed his mind after all.

“And if he does see us?”

“Hope you’re a praying man, Colonel. This Aviocar has the speed and firepower of a postal truck.”

Fiero residence

Washington, D.C.

The small manila envelope arrived at the Fieros’ home late in the evening by private courier. She glanced at the return address. Part of a prearranged code. She tried not to panic. Fiero thanked the mysterious young man in golden dreadlocks, tossing him a fifty-dollar bill to get him quickly off the porch and on his way. Her husband was at their home in California. She would have preferred to open this in his presence. He liked to face bad news head-on. She hated it, but avoided the temptation to Skype him as she tore the envelope open.

Inside, a three-by-five index card. A wafer-thin 32-gig flash memory card was taped to it, along with the phrase “1 of 2” constructed from multiple magazine cutouts, like an old-school kidnapper’s ransom demand.

This was bad. The double entendre clear, as per their arrangement. Previous arrangement, Fiero corrected herself. This card meant that her relationship with Jasmine Bath was over. She had worked with Bath for years, using her husband, Anthony—The Angel—as an intermediary.

The intel on this flash card was a double-edged knife. On the one hand, it would contain information Fiero could use to protect herself against her enemies. The republic was founded on the principle of checks and balances. “Ambition must be made to counteract ambition,” Madison said. But Madison was only half right. Greed and ambition were the two sides of the scale that kept things in balance, but fear was the fulcrum. Bath’s data was like a thumb Fiero could press on either side of the scale to tip things her way. Greed and ambition were her best protections with Bath on her side.

But the other flash card, still in Bath’s hands, contained intel that could also ruin Fiero and her husband if Bath was feeling threatened by her. Bath was saying that the memory card was one of two, but also that Fiero was one of two—both of them held weapons that could destroy their enemies, as well as each other. Bath was allowing Fiero to protect herself but was smart enough to protect herself against Fiero.

It was a smart play. Bath had been inaccessible for the last forty-eight hours. Fiero’s first assumption was that she had bailed out, and her first impulse was to find the bitch and kill her. Bath was the only person in Washington with the kind of inside information that could put her in a steel cage to die of old age. That made Bath a threat, and Bath knew it. But Bath also knew that keeping those secrets secret were her last, best defense in the event Fiero ever found her. Keeping Fiero safe was Bath’s best guarantee of remaining safe. So it was a stalemate.

The only problem was, Fiero hated stalemates. She only wanted to win. But this time she’d have to live with her frustration. She could imagine a life behind bars far more frustrating than this turn of events. At least she still had her power, her money, and her freedom. She could still even win the White House. And who knows? She may yet get the better of Jasmine Bath, whether in this life or the next.

Karem Air Force Base

Niamey, Niger

Pearce awoke two days later. His body had needed the rest as much as his brain needed the time to heal itself.

Myers hadn’t left his bedside. His eyes fluttered open. Saw her smiling face. She wore camouflaged Air Force ABUs.

“Welcome back.”

“How long?”

“Two days. You had us worried there for a while.”

Pearce smiled. “Sorry about that.”

“Did you go toward the light?”

“Yeah. And it was a train.” He winced with pain. “A damn big one. Where are we?”

“Back at Karem.”

“Arrested?”

“Anything but. Colonel Kavanagh is taking good care of us. No one in D.C. knows we’re here and the base is on full alert. We’re safe, for now.”

She raised his bed. He saw himself in the full-length mirror on the opposite wall. Lightly touched the white gauze bandage wrapped around his head.

“I thought you looked more dashing in the blue one,” Myers joked.

Pearce rubbed his shaved face. “I seem to be missing a beard.”

“Came free with the haircut. Dr. Paolini said it was medically necessary.”

“She always hated my beard.”

“Can’t say I disagree with her.”

Pearce glanced around the room. Mossa’s prized gift, the tagelmust, was nowhere to be found.

“I’m sorry. It was bloody and one of the techs tossed it into a biohazard burn bag before anyone noticed.”

Pearce shrugged. “Inshallah.”

“Do you know what happened to you?”

“The last thing I remember was picking up Early.”

“You took a pretty good lick on that noggin of yours.”

“What’s the verdict?”

“Full recovery expected. But you might have to start parting your hair on the other side of your head once it all grows back in.”

“You’re assuming I actually comb my hair.”

Myers explained what had happened to him. How the bullet had only grazed his head but opened up his scalp, which bled furiously. The best guess was that the speeding bullet had hit him just hard enough to knock him down, but slamming his head on the tarmac had knocked him out cold.

Myers described in great detail Judy’s masterful handling of the Aviocar and saving all of their lives. She didn’t tell him the ride in back was like sitting inside of a tumbling clothes dryer.

She went on to describe how Cella stanched the bleeding with a pressure bandage and cradled Pearce’s head in her lap in the back of the plane as Judy fought to maintain control of the Aviocar. How Cella’s clothes were soaked in blood by the time they landed at Karem, and how Cella had pushed the base medic aside and sewed Pearce up herself, cleaning and dressing the wound with skill.

The door knocked lightly and swung open. It was Cella. She saw Pearce was awake. She beamed. Approached the bed. She wore clean Air Force hospital scrubs. She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Back from the dead, I see.”

“Call me Lazarus.” He pointed at her scrubs. “You get drafted?”

“The Versace store was closed when we got here.” Cella pinched Pearce’s wrist, feeling for his pulse, counting the seconds on her watch. “How are you feeling?”

“Fine.”

“Liar.”

“Okay, I feel shitty, but not too shitty. Headache. Vision a little blurry.”

“That’s to be expected. You have suffered a severe concussion, but fortunately no brain bleeding.”

“We have to get you out of here. You need better medical attention than the base can provide,” Myers said.

“Where am I going?”

Cella grinned. “With me.”

60

Paolini estate

Lake Como, Italy

^{6 June}

Pearce stood by the floor-to-ceiling picture window, watching Ian and Dorotea play soccer. The Scotsman and the girl laughed and jostled like two old friends.

“Both are artificial legs?” Cella asked.

“Yes. Robotic legs, technically.” Pearce tapped his skull. “He has a wireless BMI implant that drives them.”

“He moves quite well.”

“The legs feature miniature gyroscopes and accelerometers embedded on semiconductor chips, rare earth magnets, brushless electric motors, advanced software, you name it. He’s the project manager for it, so it only seemed fair to let him have the first pair.”

“Fantastico.”

Ian bounced the soccer ball on his forehead like a trained seal, barking like one, too. Dorotea howled with laughter.

Pearce squeezed Cella’s hand. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For the last month. You gave me back my health. And more.”

After Pearce woke up in the clinic at Karem AFB, Myers and Holliday arranged for Cella’s father to charter another jet and secretly bring the two of them back to Italy, where Cella could tend to Pearce’s medical needs and her father could provide them both security.

At first, Pearce continued to suffer blurred vision and nausea, along with frequent headaches. But a consulting neurologist prescribed medications, and over the course of the following weeks Pearce went from bed rest to walking and then finally light exercise.

But the best part of his recovery had been learning how to play again. Under the watchful eye of Renzo Sforza and his security team, the three of them hiked and rode horses around the estate and, later, sailed and swam around the less populated areas of the lake. Pearce and Dorotea formed an instant bond, despite the fact the child spoke virtually no English and Pearce spoke neither Italian nor Tamasheq. Within days, the precocious little girl had taught herself a few phrases in English from an online language program. She also insisted on cooking for him, brushing aside the kitchen’s gourmet chef with a flurry of hands and florid Italian. Dorotea’s culinary repertoire was limited to scrambled eggs and butter pasta, which Pearce ate lustily in her presence to her squealing delight, and that made her love him all the more.

She had Pearce’s eyes, no doubt. But Pearce hadn’t raised the issue of the girl’s paternity. Pearce didn’t think it was fair to the child, nor to Mossa’s son, nor Mossa, either, who had protected both Cella and Dorotea with his life. Dorotea was who she was no matter who the biological father might be, and Pearce loved her for that. If the girl wasn’t his, would she be any less beautiful or brilliant?

Cella leaned against Pearce, happier than she’d ever been.

Pearce whispered in her ear. “We need to talk.”

Cella glanced at him. What was in his eyes? She couldn’t tell. She didn’t dare hope, but still. A future together. Maybe more.

“What is it?”

“I’m heading back home,” Pearce said.

Cella paled. “For how long?”

He shrugged. “Forever, I guess.”

“That’s a long time.”

“I belong there. It’s who I am.”

“I don’t understand. You belong with us.”

“I know. Just not here. Come with me.”

Cella’s eyes flared. “Why should we? Our home is here. My father is here.”

“But this isn’t my country. These aren’t my people.”

“Dorotea and I, we are your people.”

“It’s not the same. You heard Mossa. I am what I am, an American and a soldier. My job is to defend my country.”

“You know how I feel about war.”

“I know. I hate it, too. So does every thinking person who has ever fought in one. I hope I never have to fight another one again.”

“You’re a liar. You love it. Why else choose it over us?”

“You know how I feel about you and Dorotea. That’s why I want you to come with me.”

Cella’s face hardened. She turned away from him, arms crossed. She stared at her daughter outside, playing with Ian.

“Her blue eyes are mine, not yours.”

“Blue is blue.”

“She is not your daughter.”

“I don’t believe you. Not that it matters.”

“She was born ten months after Lisbon. I can show you the birth certificate. She is Rassoul’s.”

“You knew all along?”

“Of course.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“You wanted to believe it, so I let you.”

“Why tell me now?”

“I wanted you to know the truth. Now you are free.”

“How does that make me free?”

“I won’t go with you, not for war. But I can’t have you stay for a lie, either.”

He wrapped his arms around her. “I don’t care that she isn’t mine.”

She softened, turned around. “I know. You are a good man. But you are determined to leave. If you left and thought she was yours, you would feel guilty for being away, perhaps come back. Now you can go with a clear conscience.”

“I hate leaving without the two of you.”

She touched his face. Searched his eyes. “And yet, you choose it.”

“So do you.”

“I am who I am as well.” She wrapped her arms around his neck.

He held her close, whispered in her ear. “If you ever change your mind, you know where to find me.”

She nodded. “And you as well, you fool.”

Pearce held her tightly. He smelled the summer in her hair. The last light of the sun was falling behind the jagged ridgeline, throwing shadows on the lake.

It would be night soon.

61

Cayo Grande

Los Roques Archipelago, Venezuela

^{1 July}

Jasmine dug her toes into the blinding white sand, admiring the intense clarity of the blue Caribbean. The warm sun caressed her skin, darkening it nicely. Even the mint in her mojito was particularly sweet. The weekend trip to the idyllic Venezuelan island was a first little present to herself, the promise of still better things to come.

She wished she could have seen Fiero’s face when the senator received the envelope. Fiero always knew the time would come, but foolishly assumed that Bath would telegraph her departure date. Events had spun out of control. Myers and her team had gotten too close and knew Bath was after them—otherwise, why would Myers have fled the cabin? That left too many loose ends. Loose ends that could be twisted into a noose to hang her with.

CIOS had been the source of Jasmine’s strength, but on the run, it posed her greatest threat. The only way her enemies could ever find her is if they pointed it back in her direction. She’d been exceedingly careful to minimize her digital footprint while still at CIOS, and then obliterated what little there was of it when she bolted.

The humans in her network posed the biggest risk. An automated kill switch wiped them away, too. Skeets was the last. Yesterday’s coded notice in El Nacional confirmed it. Jasmine’s last contract killer was dead.

She’d gone completely off the grid, of course, and dove deep into the analogue weeds. Paid for everything in cash, living a modest, prearranged fictional life in Caracas, unnoticed in its large Afro-Latin population. Hid her marvelous hair in braids, and her stunning almond eyes behind a pair of Ray-Bans.

Venezuela suited her perfectly. The anti-Yanqui Maduro government would never honor an American extradition request for her were one ever made. Frequent blackouts, street protests, and other social ills were a tolerable nuisance in the otherwise modern capital, but they were also a benefit, keeping the failing socialist government too busy to attempt finding someone like her, were they so inclined.

It suddenly occurred to her that the greatest crimes ever committed were the ones never discovered. Jasmine wondered where her achievements would rank on that infamous, unknowable list. She smiled. Took another sip of her mojito. No one could touch her now.

She was free.

Aviation Mission Fellowship Station

near Mwinilunga, Zambia

Pearce tossed Whit Bissel the keys to the brand-new Cessna bush plane parked on the grassy apron in front of the hangar. The motor ticked, still hot from its recent flight. They stood next to it, admiring its lines.

“I don’t know what to say.” The beefy blond missionary still wore his oily coveralls and the same wire-rimmed glasses.

“Don’t say anything. It was easier to buy you this than telling you I’m sorry for the way I acted, which I am.”

“That plane’s worth a lot more than the avgas you borrowed from me before.”

“You mean stole from you, not borrowed,” Pearce said. “I bought the plane in Jo’Berg. There’s a Cessna dealer down there.”

“I heard about your friend. I’m sorry for your loss.”

“His name was Mike Early,” Judy said. “He was my friend, too.” She was walking up from Whit’s house carrying a tray with glasses of tea. “How does she fly?”

“Better than the pilot,” Pearce said.

“But you’re the pilot. That’s not saying much.” Judy grinned. She’d taught him how to fly. He was actually pretty good at it, just not as good as she was. “What’s wrong with your hand?” She nodded at the bandage wrapped around his left hand.

“This? Nothing. Just a little cut.”

“Those are the worst,” Whit said, sipping his tea. “Especially paper cuts. They really sting.”

Judy gave Pearce the stink eye. “You know lying’s a sin, right?”

“I’m a sinner, all right. But I’m not lying.”

He wasn’t. It really was a cut—from Guo’s combat knife. Pearce had used it to open up the Asian’s belly, then plunge it through his throat and pin him to a tree. Pearce could still hear the frenzied hyenas whining and yelping as they fed on the dying operator.

Pearce reached for a glass of tea. “Thanks. Cheers.”

Judy set the tray down on a workbench just inside the hangar. She walked back past the Cessna. Saw something in the tail’s vertical stabilizer.

“Hey, there’s a bullet hole.”

Pearce and Whit got closer.

Whit nodded. “Sure looks like one.”

Judy and Whit turned to Pearce. He shrugged. “Yes, it is.”

“And?” Judy asked.

“I’ll call Comair. They can fly someone up from Jo’Berg and fix it.”

“No need. That’s an easy patch job,” Whit said. He headed back to the far end of the hangar to grab some tools.

Judy leaned in close. Whispered. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“What you don’t need to worry about. Everything’s fine.”

“You sure? You’re okay?”

“Better than okay. I promise.”

Pearce really was feeling pretty damn good. Ian’s intel, as usual, had been dead-on. He found Guo and his men in the DR Congo aiding a regional warlord in exchange for a diamond mine contract. Pearce took out Guo’s men with single shots to the head before turning Guo to dog food. A twofer, as far as Pearce was concerned.

“How about you?”

Judy smiled. “It’s good here.”

“Any chance you coming back?”

“Do you know why I left the first time?”

“I have an idea.”

“I lost faith in a lot of things, including humanity. People suck.”

“Tell me about it.”

“But when I walked into that bar? I knew I wasn’t supposed to be there. I don’t regret doing it, because you’re my friend and Mike was in trouble. But after he died and you nearly got killed, I woke up.”

“To what?”

“I’ve been running for a long time. Especially when I was working for you. Don’t get me wrong, it was great, but it was still running. It’s time to stop running.”

“The God stuff?”

She smiled. “Something like that.”

“Still friends, though. Right?”

Judy threw her arms around his neck. “You’ll always be my friend. I just can’t do what you do anymore.”

Pearce held on tight. “You ever need anything, you call, you hear?”

A truck horn blasted in the distance.

“’Bout dang time.” Pearce checked his watch.

“Africa time.” Whit laughed, walking up. He tossed a toolbox in the grass.

A big diesel fuel truck pulled onto the long grassy airstrip, followed by a flatbed truck carrying a big empty plastic storage tank.

“Two thousand gallons ought to keep you for a while, Rev. Thought you could use a proper storage tank, too.”

Whit shook his head. “You’re too generous, Troy.”

“You did me a favor by not knocking me on my ass when I told you I was taking your fuel.”

“How could I resist? You were quoting scripture.”

Judy laughed. “Yeah. What’s the story with that?”

“Some other time.” Pearce turned to Whit. “And I’ve prepaid for another two thousand gallons. Just call the distributor when you need it.”

“I’m embarrassed. How can I can ever thank you?”

“First thing, take care of this woman. She’s the best.”

The big towheaded missionary blushed. “You don’t have to worry about that.”

“Second, I need a favor.”

“Anything.”

The big diesel tanker rumbled to a stop near the hangar, its big hydraulic brakes blowing air. Whit jumped up on the running board and showed the driver where he wanted the storage tank placed. The driver nodded, released the brake, and pushed on. Whit jumped back down and returned to Pearce.

“Now, what can I do for you?”

“I need a ride back to Jo’Berg in that brand-new Cessna of yours in the morning. Need to catch a flight home.”

Whit laid a strong hand on Pearce’s shoulder. “Africa can use a good man like you. Plenty of honest work to do just around here.”

You wouldn’t be saying that if you knew what I’ve done, Pearce thought.

“Thanks, but I’m done with Africa for now.”

Judy threw her arms around Troy’s neck again. “You’ll always have a place here if you need it.”

“Hey, Pearce. You can steal my gas, but not my girl.” Whit’s big toothy smile flashed just a hint of menace.

Pearce shook the big missionary’s hand. “One more favor, Whit. Make damn sure I get an invitation to the wedding, okay?”

62

Sino-Sahara Oil Corporation Building

Bamako, Mali

^{7 July}

The Chinese had picked the location for the new Sino-Sahara Oil corporate high-rise to annoy the Americans. The newly completed forty-story building stood on the banks of the Niger River, but more important, towered over the lowly American embassy just a half mile away.

To Zhao’s dismay, the building replicated the garish modernist designs he loathed. That was because Zhao’s uncle, the chairman of CNPC, hired an unimaginative Beijing architectural firm owned by Zhao’s cousin, who provided the chairman with the appropriate kickback.

The building’s sole design virtue, in Zhao’s opinion, was that it was now the tallest building in the city by far. With any luck, the sunlight gleaming off of the soaring mirrored-glass skyscraper would blind the American ambassador or, at the very least, annoy him to distraction, reminding him daily of China’s rising dominance on the continent.

Zhao’s luxury suite on the top floor was proof of his dominance as the new head of the corporation. Mossa’s death and the resulting collapse of the Tuareg rebellion had guaranteed China’s acquisition of the new REE deposits and cemented Zhao’s reputation as the man who could always be counted on to complete the most difficult missions. Vast new economic and military resources were now flowing into Mali and the region. Zhao’s political future was assured and his family wealth enlarged, thanks to his success.

Zhao ordered his voluptuous Ukrainian secretary to alert his limousine driver to start the vehicle. His private jet would be leaving from Bamako Airport shortly. Zhao entered his private express elevator, one of the fastest in the world, built by the Japanese firm Toshiba. By virtue of its computerized lift and braking system, it rocketed him directly between his penthouse suite and his exclusive parking area in the subbasement at nearly forty miles per hour. It took only 7.27 seconds to travel the forty floors—a distance of four hundred feet.

Zhao was scheduled for a meeting in Beijing tomorrow with the president of China himself, first among equals on the ruling Standing Committee. It was the greatest honor of Zhao’s life. A new, broader Africa initiative was under way and Zhao was rumored to be the man to head it up. No doubt this was the next logical step in his progression toward leadership in the CPC. His meteoric rise to the pinnacle of national power might soon make him the youngest president in China. The elevator doors shut as Zhao’s spirits soared.

Just 7.27 seconds later, the entire building shook with an explosion as the elevator doors in the subbasement smashed open. It sounded like a plane had crashed in the elevator shaft.

The limo driver ran to the wreckage and tried to pry open the bent stainless-steel doors. He couldn’t. The concrete structure surrounding the elevator shaft had cracked on impact. Tons of concrete wedged the crushed doors in the frame. All the driver could do was peer inside. The flickering LEDs inside flashed like strobe lights on the blood-drenched interior. Zhao’s body had been pulverized by the high-speed impact, then shredded by the shards of shattered glass that had lined the interior walls.

Ian’s virus had worked perfectly. Penetrating the Toshiba mainframe had been relatively easy, putting the elevator completely in Pearce’s control. He recorded Zhao’s brutal demise on the elevator cameras.

Pearce watched the video on his transatlantic flight. He only wished Mossa could have seen it, too.

63

Fiero residence

Washington, D.C.

^{15 July}

It was the party of the year. If you weren’t there, you weren’t anybody.

Senator Fiero was practically the president-elect, or so it seemed, though the election was still over a year away. Greyhill’s “do nothing” governing style was wearing thin, while Fiero rode higher and higher in the polls thanks to a carefully orchestrated and well-funded advertising campaign, aided by the willing compliance of a Democrat-dominated media.

Early on, Fiero had amassed so much cash in her campaign coffers from all of the big donors that no serious challenger within her party rose up to campaign against her. The only other Democrat in the primary race that was registered in all fifty states was Congressman Lane. He may have been rising in the polls, too, but he was woefully underfunded and lacked any credible endorsements from party leadership. Thirteen members of the Kennedy family denounced his use of JFK’s inaugural Ask not phrase as unbecoming and, possibly, actionable in a court of law. Five Kennedys had publicly announced their support of Fiero’s candidacy, and the three most powerful among them were here at the party tonight.

Pearce centered the crosshairs squarely on Fiero’s upper lip. She had floated like a butterfly between guests all night—foreign ambassadors, Hollywood celebrities, hip-hop artists, and media pundits had all passed through the glass in his scope as he tracked the senator from room to room. Fiero hadn’t stood still long enough to take a clear shot.

Until now.

Pearce’s fingertip rested lightly on the trigger. It required less than two pounds of pull to fire. He slowed his breath, counted his heartbeats. Sent the signal from his brain to his finger to begin the smallest contraction, building pressure slowly, not allowing a jerked finger or a ragged breath to alter the shot trajectory. The pressure in his fingertip built. It was nearly sexual. The climax would be a solid thud from the tip of the suppressed sniper rifle; the release a spiderwebbed windowpane three hundred yards away and a spray of blood pluming from Fiero’s Botoxed face.

The expectation tingled the length of his arm all the way down to his index finger. Any moment now.

And then a woman stepped into view.

Margaret Myers.

The former president stood in front of Fiero, completely blocking his shot. The hand-loaded .300 Winchester Magnum round was powerful enough to tear through Myers’s skull and plow into Fiero’s. But that wasn’t an option.

He and Myers hadn’t spoken in over a month, but she had communicated her opposition to his killing spree through Ian. Myers knew Fiero was on his list. You can’t just go around murdering politicians you don’t like. The rule of law protects all of us. If you shoot Fiero, who’ll shoot me?

He ignored her. Johnny, Early, Mossa, Balla, Moctar, Mano. The rule of law didn’t do them any good. Why should a lawbreaker like Fiero benefit from the law?

Damn it.

He withdrew his fingertip from the trigger completely, glanced away from the scope. He nearly vomited. Myers had escaped death by the slimmest possible margin. One more heartbeat and she could have been Jackson Pollocked all over Fiero’s stainless-steel Sub-Zero refrigerator.

“Ian,” he whispered in his mic.

“She made me do it,” Ian replied.

“Who made you do what?”

“Don’t blame him,” Myers said. Her voice was in his earpiece.

Pearce put his eye to his scope again. She wasn’t in the kitchen. He moved the scope around, window to window. Found her in the second-story bathroom glancing out of the window, searching, but not in his direction. He watched her lips move. Her voice arrived a split second later, the briefest of time delays.

“I can’t see you out there, Troy, but I know you can hear me.”

“How?”

“Sorry, old man. But I owed her one,” Ian said. Clearly, he had told Myers what Pearce planned to do that night.

“You’re fired,” Pearce said.

“You’re hired, Ian,” Myers countered. “And I’ll double your salary.”

“You think this will stop me?”

“No, Troy, I don’t. But I’ve notified the Secret Service that there might be a problem. They’ll be on you as soon as I give the order.”

“Give it.”

“I’d rather not.”

“What do you want?”

“A word.”

“Shoot.”

“Nice punning, former employer.”

“Shut up, Ian.”

“I understand you want justice, Troy. I can give it to you. But not at the end of a gun.”

“I’m listening, but I’m also aiming.” Fiero had wandered back into his scope. She stood in the living room now, laughing too hard at something Alec Baldwin was saying.

“A bullet through the brain would be far too painless of a death, and far too quick, for someone as loathsome as Barbara Fiero,” Myers said.

“I like the way this is sounding.”

“I have a better way to make her suffer. She’ll be tormented every waking breath.”

“Tell me what to do.”

“Stand down. Do nothing. I’ll take care of it,” Myers said. “You have to trust me on this.”

Silence.

“Troy?”

“Trust issues, remember?”

“If I’m not telling the truth, you can always kill her later, right?”

More silence.

“How soon?”

“It begins tomorrow.”

“How will I know you’ve done it?”

“You won’t be able to miss it, I promise.”

“I’ll hold you to it. Otherwise, Fiero’s dead. Diele, too.”

“There’s a bigger picture here, Troy. And killing those two dirt bags will only ruin it.”

“If you start lecturing me about political compromise, I’ll start shooting.”

“We’re beyond compromise. But violence isn’t the answer, either. You’ll only be helping them in the long run.”

Myers explained her plan, filled in the big picture.

Pearce was stunned. He wanted bloody revenge, but she was right.

Her plan was better.

64

Pearce didn’t pull the trigger on Fiero, but Myers did. Pulled it on Diele, too. She released Bath’s secret audio of them plotting the illegal drone strike against Mossa and Pearce, which would have resulted in Pearce’s death, an innocent American citizen and a war hero.

The story first leaked on Fox News, a network Fiero had targeted for punishment over the years. Payback was a real bitch. So was Fiero. Fox News was happy to toss her into the wood chipper of public opinion.

Bath had recorded virtually everything Fiero had ever done as a form of protection against her wily employer. It was also a form of leverage. Fiero was one of the most powerful politicians on the Hill. If any law-enforcement agency ever decided to take Bath on, she knew Fiero would be forced to protect her in order to protect herself.

What Bath hadn’t counted on was Ian McTavish, the hacking genius that penetrated her defenses and stole everything she had before she destroyed it. Of course, what Bath possessed wasn’t limited to Fiero. CIOS held the entire Hill hostage, whether they knew it or not. Bath had hacked everybody, never realizing that Ian had hacked her. Now Myers and Ian had all of Bath’s data at their disposal.

The first recording they released was Fiero’s conversation with Diele, suggesting an illegal drone strike on Mossa and Pearce. To any political insider, there was hardly anything startling about the audio. It was a typical closed-door conversation, cold-blooded and calculating—standard Washington fare. But the Fox News morning anchors ate it up. So did the public. It was House of Cards for real. By noon, the talk-radio personalities were running with the scandal. By the end of the day, most evening news shows—local, national, broadcast, cable—led with it.

Harry Fowler, Fiero’s campaign manager, was in damage-control mode the minute the story first broke that morning, calmly placing a few phone calls to network presidents on his speed dial to quell things down and keep the contagion from spreading. It didn’t work.

The Fiero scandal had serious legs, and the dying broadcast networks couldn’t afford to be left holding Fiero’s bag. Audience share was everything. Like the Great Powers in World War I, the networks and cable news outlets were willing to shed buckets of blood for a scant few percentage points of gain. By the end of the day, Fowler and his team were in full panic mode, leaping into raging news infernos everywhere on the horizon, smoke jumping without parachutes. And that was just the first day.

Now that Fiero and Diele were a major news item, the networks were hungry for more revelations. Ian chummed the waters carefully, ladling out the juicy chunks in digestible, quotable bites, not only to the media but to party organizations as well. Why not turn the sharks on each other?

The Sunday-morning talk shows were crammed with Republican and Democratic legislators jockeying for position, trying to seize the moral high ground from their opponents, each concentrating their verbal volleys on either Fiero or Diele according to party affiliation. Neither had any true defenders. The best either party could hope for was that the other party would get the most blame.

But the public was outraged at both parties. Even the venerable Howard Finch, an old ally of Fiero and a lifelong Democrat, gave an impassioned plea at the end of his show, Meet the Nation, urging Fiero to reconsider her decision to seek the presidential nomination.

Fiero’s election hopes evaporated, and Diele’s future was suddenly questioned. Greyhill pushed him off of the ticket, fearing the vice president’s scandals would ruin his own reelection chances, hoping to hide behind the paper-thin shield of plausible deniability.

Myers felt no guilt breaking her agreement with Diele and Greyhill to keep the incriminating audio under wraps in exchange for the pardon and release of Ian, Rao, and the others. Both men had committed a federal crime by agreeing to the deal in the first place. It would only add to Diele’s time in prison and put Greyhill in the center of the firestorm. Her calculation was dead-on. Both men kept their mouths shut. And they didn’t renege on the pardons—You can’t unring the bell, Diele told Greyhill—because Myers would release that audio conversation, too.

Myers reveled in the ruin of Diele and Fiero. But as far as she was concerned, it was only the beginning.

Myers feared for her country. It had been seized decades before by career politicians, an entrenched class of professional extortionists skilled in the art of the shakedown, and worse, of stealing money from future generations to buy votes. They enriched themselves and their families at the expense of the country. The greater crime was that their self-serving policies contributed to America’s rapid decline. Chronic unemployment, failing schools, endless wars, massive trade deficits, and crumbling infrastructure could all be laid at their feet, and yet, they were never held accountable.

Knowledge was power, but secret knowledge was the most powerful. The permanent political class continued to rule virtually unopposed despite the fact that the majority of Americans held them in contempt, as every public opinion poll confirmed year after year. What voters lacked were specifics. Regarding flagrant violations of the law, prosecutors lacked evidence. Myers was determined to change all of that.

Every member of the House was up for reelection in 2016, and one-third of the Senate. The Fiero and Diele exposures were an earthquake, but Myers wanted to create a political tsunami that would wreck the permanent political class that had bankrupted the nation and betrayed the Constitution.

Fiero and Diele were quickly pushed off the front-page headlines as fresh sacrificial goats fell victim to the media knives. The new revelations were bigger than WikiLeaks, the Watergate tapes, and the Pentagon Papers combined. Dozens of veteran politicians suddenly found the urge to “be with their families” rather than continue in public service before any incriminating data was released against them, hoping to avoid expulsion or conviction in order to maintain their lucrative, full-salaried retirement packages.

The ones that didn’t quit were clean, because they had nothing to hide. Men like Rep. David Lane, the only Democratic presidential candidate still qualified to run in all fifty states.

The data dump continued. So much quality information was released that newsrooms had to rehire entire staffs previously let go. Those newsrooms and editorial boards that tried to protect political favorites were quickly bypassed by the New Media outlets willing to tell the truth. Federal, state, and local prosecutors geared up for a series of high-profile trials.

Myers couldn’t be certain where all of it would lead, only that the power of entrenched incumbents might soon be broken.

Everything was about to change.

65

Galápagos Islands

Pacific Ocean

^{18 October}

Jasmine Bath had a long bucket list. That was part of the reason she had needed to amass so much cash for her permanent retirement. She hadn’t quite reached her ultimate goal, but twenty-eight million dollars would go a long way, particularly the way she had invested it, spread out over twenty hedge funds in ten countries under as many different aliases.

She arrived in Ecuador under one of her many false identities, in this case a Swiss passport, and paid for everything in cash, including the hotel where she was staying, the air flight out to the islands, and the private Galápagos snorkeling tour—item number one on her list.

The October water around the archipelago was brisk but more than manageable in her wet suit. She had snorkeled and dived on numerous occasions in Hawaii, the Caribbean, and Fiji, but these ancient, pristine islands in the middle of the vast Pacific held a particular allure for her, thanks to Darwin. In her mind, this place was the origin of species. That wasn’t true, but no matter. It was her dream, and she was finally here.

Jasmine knew all about the wide variety of marine species she was likely to encounter. Seafaring iguanas, gentle whale sharks, and eagle rays were particularly interesting to her, but she was most excited about the sea turtles. She had a lifelong love of the magnificent, gentle creatures. She had swum with green turtles all over the world, and had recently donated a large monetary gift to a Florida turtle habitat—anonymously, of course. Swimming with the turtles in the Galápagos would be the ultimate experience.

Her private guide boat took her out to a favorite turtle haunt off of Roca Redonda, one of the smallest islands that made up the volcanic archipelago. The tiny western island was actually the top of a volcano. Deepwater marine life as well as mammals flourished in the nutrient-dense dark blue waters on this side of the archipelago thanks to the Humboldt Current. Captain Girondo—a young, muscular Argentine—would remain on the yacht to fix a gourmet lunch and, if her plans worked out, take a deep plunging dive into her unexplored regions later in the afternoon. There was one other boat in the area. Captain Girondo said it was a research vessel. No fishermen were allowed in these waters.

Today she decided to free dive without benefit of tanks. She’d take more time tomorrow and go deep. Thirty minutes into her paddling Bath managed to encounter several schools of harlequin wrasse, steel pompanos, bumpheads, surgeonfish, and sea horses among the coral. She swam with a red-mottled underwater iguana for a while and watched a yellow-bellied sea snake swim past. A dozen dolphins rocketed by her, and two curious sea lions came right up to her and played with her for a while. She’d read that the animals in these waters had no genetic memory of humans and were naturally fearless of visitors like her. She was utterly delighted. But she was also growing disappointed. Where were the turtles?

She continued swimming in lazy circles, bobbing on the surface until something caught her eye. In the distant murkiness of the deeper waters to the north she saw a cluster of movement, slow and deliberate. She took a deep breath in her snorkel and dived deep into the water to get a better view. She felt her ears pop as she descended twelve feet or so. No question. A bale of green sea turtles was stroking its way in her direction. She was thrilled. They were moving deceptively fast. They were less than three hundred feet away. She was tempted to surface again and catch another deep breath, but she was afraid her movements might be too jerky and send them off in another direction. She decided to sit tight and remain motionless, knowing she could easily hold her breath for another thirty seconds. On their current path they would swim right past her. With any luck, she’d be in the middle of them. Maybe even catch a ride.

The first great parrot-faced turtle approached. It cast a wary eye at her but decided she was no threat and swam past. A strong eddy brushed against her from the force of his powerful flippers.

A wall of enormous green turtles zoomed in right behind the first, dropping below her feet, merging to either side of her, skimming above her head, flippers stroking. Glorious.

The largest turtle of the bale approached, probably the oldest, she guessed, certainly the most graceful. As it pushed gently by, Bath reached out and grasped the top ridge of its shell, near the neck. Her air was thin and her lungs burned a little, but she didn’t dare let go. She couldn’t believe how swiftly and smoothly the big animal moved in the water. The ancient turtle clearly sensed she was holding on to him and it seemed to paddle faster, either to compensate for her weight or to shake her off. But it swam straight and didn’t seem distressed, so she held on. She felt such freedom. It was a dream come true, the chance to be at one with the—

Pain stabbed her ankle, like a knife cut. She wanted to scream but resisted, lest she drown. She released her grip on the turtle’s shell. Twisted around to see what had struck her.

It was another turtle, its beak clamped around her bleeding ankle. She couldn’t believe it.

But this turtle was different. The colors were right. So was the size. But the eyes.

Lifeless glass.

It wasn’t a turtle.

It was a machine, built exactly like a sea turtle.

The drone turtle began paddling in reverse, pulling her down.

Bath felt the water from its powerful strokes brush against her face. They were falling fast.

She kicked her seized leg, but the metal beak only cut deeper into her flesh. Blood clouded the water. The drone’s flippers paddled faster, the machine now pointing directly down into the inky black of the abyss. Stroke by stroke she was being pulled down, faster and faster. She heard the drone’s restless servos grinding in the water.

Bath glanced back up at the surface. The dappling sunlight was falling away fast. Searing pain exploded in her ears, like knitting needles stabbed into her eardrums. Her beating heart pounded inside her skull.

She kicked hard with her free leg, thrusting the big dive fin with all of her strength, clawing at the water above her head—anything to reverse direction. But the turtle was far too powerful and heavy. She felt the last of her air evaporate with the extra, futile effort.

Her lungs burned as if filled with acid. She looked back down at the turtle mindlessly plunging into the sunless void. Blood from her ankle streamed past her face. The freezing water burned her ungloved hands. She strained every muscle to bend forward and grasp her calf. She pulled with all of her strength. Nothing. The water turned from blue to black. She wanted to scream.

She couldn’t scream.

Had to scream.

Wasn’t fair.

Not this.

The turtle dived relentlessly, dragging Jasmine down with it, the two disappearing into the black, trailing bubbles and blood and the echoes of her wordless screams.

In the cabin of the boat, Dr. Kenji Yamada asked, “How much deeper?”

Pearce’s peace-loving whale researcher and UUV expert didn’t have much stomach for killing, but he understood its ecological necessity, especially in this case. Diseased animals had to be culled. The ponytailed scientist just couldn’t do it himself.

Pearce wouldn’t let him anyway. Pearce controlled the turtle drone. Had to.

Pearce had funded Yamada’s Honu project. Yamada used the funds to modify a Naro-Tortuga drone so that it looked exactly like a green sea turtle, enabling it to swim with and study the ones populating the Hawaiian Islands. Yamada never imagined the unit would be deployed like this.

Early’s death still haunted Pearce. He woke up some nights slapping at his face, certain that Early’s brains and blood were clinging to his skin. The days weren’t much better, haunted by the faces of Early’s small children streaked with tears, his sobbing widow, the folded American flag placed in her hands, the lowering casket. Mike was a true warrior and a true friend, and now he was truly gone.

Pearce had to make it right. Had to make the last person pay in full.

Jasmine Bath had to die.

But she’d been too clever. Covered all of her tracks, burned all of the bridges. Couldn’t be found.

Until now. Because Ian was better than Bath.

Ian called, said he had found Bath, gave him the details. Pearce worked out a plan, but not just to kill her. That was too easy. Wanted her to suffer, and worse. He knew that was wrong. He didn’t care, or couldn’t. The rage consumed him.

Hi-def and infrared cameras along with audio mics embedded in the drone’s head recorded every moment of Jasmine Bath’s raging, terrified misery. Pearce wanted her dead, but he needed to see her die. Badly.

She didn’t disappoint. She put on quite a show the deeper she went. Thrashing and screaming in a hail of bubbles until the last one dribbled away, the light dimming in her panicked, bloodshot eyes until she finally let go.

But the drone didn’t. It swam deeper still.

Bath’s limp arms trailed above her head, hair braids pluming in the frigid water as the blackening deep swallowed her up in silence.

“She’s dead, Troy,” Yamada said. “You can release her now.”

Pearce wanted to, but couldn’t. Couldn’t shake the image of Early’s head exploding in front of his eyes.

Drowning Bath wasn’t enough, terrible as that was. He wanted to drag her down to crush depth, watch her body erupt in a pink, gory cloud.

Wanted to drag her down to hell.

But Yamada was right. The woman was dead. The debt paid.

Pearce released his grip on the controller. Let her go. Watched her corpse drift away into the fathomless dark.

His rage, too.

He was free.

66

Pearce’s cabin

Near the Snake River, Wyoming

^{1 December}

The night was cold and clear, the Milky Way a vast gauzy film across a moonless, blue-black expanse. Snow-heavy pines creaked in a light breeze.

Pearce stood on the porch, pistol on his hip, coffee in hand. He thought about Daud.

He’d rebuilt the cabin all by himself. Taken him months, but it was worth it. Time to get sober again. Time to process everything, especially what Mossa had said back in the desert. The old man was right. Pearce was a masterless warrior. Useless.

The bright halogen lights of an SUV bounced into the tree line, inching its way along an unlit path in the snow. Pearce couldn’t be sure who it was from here. Bath had a network of wet-work operators. Even dead, she could get her revenge if she was vindictive enough and had signed the right kind of contracts.

Pearce had gone completely off the grid at the cabin, no electronics of any kind, including surveillance. After Ian had filled him in on all the details of his hacking op against Bath and the others, Pearce decided it was time to go back to basics, at least out here. Fireplaces, axes, well water, dried fish. He went completely off the grid at the cabin, no electronics of any kind, including surveillance. Connectivity meant vulnerability. He preferred the sound of chopping wood to laser printing anyway. He had all of the electronic gear he needed in the RV, and at his condo in Coronado, not to mention Pearce Systems headquarters in Dearborn. But out here was his solitude and silence. This was his desert.

The SUV cleared the tree line and approached the cabin. Pearce squinted in the harsh lights. Tossed his coffee and set the cup down on the rough-hewn table. The SUV lights snapped off.

Heavy doors slammed shut. Two figures in hooded parkas exited the SUV. Dark shadows crunched in the snow, trudging toward him. A figure emerged into the firelight from the window flickering in the snow. She pulled down her hood.

“Troy.”

Pearce nodded. “Glad you made it.”

Myers looked good. Radiant, actually.

Pearce stepped off the porch and gave her a hug. Myers pointed at the man standing next to her.

“Troy, this is Congressman David Lane.”

“Just Dave,” Lane said, shaking Pearce’s hand.

Myers trusted Lane. That was good enough for him.

It was time to serve again.

Time to get back in the fight.