The Ghost of Flight 666

CHAPTER 19: Ironing

Slade stood there silently with his dark eyes focused on Freddy. The terrorist shrank back with an audible gasp, but he was frozen. He could neither say nor do anything but tremble.

Alfie didn’t recognize Slade. He looked up at the tall man in the suit, and said, “He buddy, what’s up? You don’t like our cologne?”

The warm, sweet smell of urine filled the elevator car. A dark stain grew on Freddy’s khaki’s. It dripped on his shoe and soiled the elevator carpet.

“Holy shit Freddy; you pissed your pants! Son of a bitch!”

The door opened, but Slade blocked the way. Waters stood there shaking in the back. Alfie couldn’t figure what was happening. He looked at Slade and then at Freddy, pleading, “Listen buddy, I don’t know what your problem is, but my friend is sick. I have to get him to his room.”

“Be careful who you choose as friends,” Slade told him.

“What?”

Slade nodded to Freddy. “You’re friend there has an interest in photographs. It will catch up with him.”

“Photographs?” Alfie started.

The elevator door started to close, but Slade stopped it with his arm. He moved aside to allow Alfie to drag Freddy out of the car. They hurried down the hall.

Slade followed in slow menacing steps.

When they got to the door, Freddy fumbled for his key card. He couldn’t dig it out of his pocket with his shaking hands.

Slade reached over.

Both Freddy and Alfie gasped and shrank back.

Slade swiped his skeleton key over the door. The lock clicked open. Freddy and Alfie stared at him in horror; no lock was safe.

Slade pushed the door open.

Freddy finally found his voice. “You, you can’t touch me Slade! I’m the president’s man! Do you get that, goon? I’m the president’s man!”

Slade said simply, “Corporal Garret’s wife and daughter died. They were beheaded — Freddy.”

He went grey, sweating, stammering, “What’s it to me?” He rushed into his room. Alfie followed.

When they were safe inside Freddy’s room, Alfie looked through the peephole and watched the tall man leave. “Shit Freddy who was that guy?”

“He’s a spook; an assassin,” Freddy said in a trembling voice, going straight to the john and stripping.

“What does he want with you?”

“I gave him up; him and his Special Forces pals. They butchered Turgut Ataturk, the president’s nephew, in a Cobra strike against ISIS. I gave them to Ataturk to even the score.”

“Shit Freddy, shit! Who was this Garret woman — don’t tell me she was,” Alfie couldn’t finish.

“I think she was one of the Special Forces guy’s wife,” Freddy admitted, turning on the shower.

“His wife and kid!” Alfie gasped.

“Collateral damage!” Freddy shouted from the shower, regaining his courage now that his own filth was washing off his pallid skin.

“Freddy!”

The shower turned off. Freddy emerged a minute later in a robe, drying his mossy hair. He stuck his glasses back on his nose and shrugged, “What about it? They’re pigs. I’ll sick the president on his ass!”

Freddy’s laptop chimed. He had a message. Before he could reach the screen, while both of them were looking at it, it brightened. The image on the screen was a simple one: a dagger plunged through the Greek letter Delta. It turned slowly round and round on Freddy’s computer.

“Holy shit Freddy, you’re going to have the whole Delta Force gunning for you!”

Freddy went to the computer and tried to turn the screen off. Nothing worked. The Delta Force icon turned slowly on the screen, ever watchful, ever mindful.

“Freddy, they’re never going to let you go — ever! You are fucking screwed man!”

Slade checked his files after sweeping the room. The Company was flying him out of Paris tomorrow. He was heading out to the Enterprise. There he would link up with Killer’s Specter Team again and investigate the Galaxus at port in Bandar Abbas.

“A night dive; I hate night dives! That’s when sharks feed!” Slade complained, reading the tasking. He was serious. Slade had a phobia about sharks, especially big ones. Night dives didn’t help. They were creepy, kind of like being buried alive.

To get his mind off being eaten alive in the pitch dark, Slade ordered a pizza and hopped in the shower.

He had one white shirt, the one he was wearing. Now after two days it was getting ripe. Slade washed it in the sink.

Fifteen minutes later, dressed in his robe and roper boots, Slade hated the idea of going barefoot on the hotel carpet, Slade was back reading the file at his desk, waiting for the iron to heat up so he could iron his shirt. Room service interrupted him. Leaving the laptop half situated, he went to the door and got his pizza. Slade started his ironing and munched on the pepperoni, pineapple pie, wishing he’d ordered extra cheese. A frosted glass of Guinness perched precariously on the ironing board.

Turning on the TV, Jeremiah caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. He made quite a sight: wearing a hotel robe, chewing on pizza, ironing his uniform, horn-rimmed glasses perched on his oft broken nose.

“The glamorous life of a spy! James Bond eat your heart out!”

Slade was almost done ironing his shirt when the alarm on his computer went off. He swore, and looked over his shoulder but the computer was on the desk behind him and facing away. He swore again; he hated when he was sloppy.

A pass key buzzed the lock. No matter who had it wouldn’t work. Slade always changed the lock code for his room with another Company toy.

“You’ve got the wrong room!” he said irritably.

Boom! The door burst open right in front of Slade, stopping abruptly on the chain. The second hit ripped the chain out of the wall. Three bearded figures rushed in. He could do only one thing: leaping back he flung the hot iron at the first of the attackers — clang! The impact of the hot iron on his attacker’s face included a momentary sizzle followed by a scream. The foremost two attackers fell headlong over the ironing board.

The burned attacker fell with his chest on the ironing board but his right leg got caught in the folding metal legs. He fell awkwardly. The result was a resounding snap! Another scream followed and he curled up on the floor clutching his compound fracture with one hand and his burned face with another.

An attacker leapt over the impediment but tripped, falling face first in front of Slade. With a predatory leap Slade was on him, shoving him down to the carpet with his knee and punching the attacker hard in the back of the head. The blow was hurried and at an awkward angle, but it was enough for the attacker to drop his knife and go into seizures.

Slade looked up at the third attacker, a burly, bearded man holding a large knife. He worked his way around the ironing board, yelling in Arabic, “I will gut you American! I will gut you!”

Grabbing the power cord for the iron, Slade yanked it back and began whirling it in a tight circle. As the man lunged he let it fly. Slade didn’t try anything fancy; he hurled the hard, heavy, hot object right at the assassin’s chest. It struck with a clang and a sizzle; then he yanked it back and started twirling it again. The attacker feinted, hoping to get Slade to commit, risking getting burned again to be able to slip in for a killing blow. Slade whirled his weapon as he would an ancient flail, waiting until the attacker pulled back from his fake, off balance and stationary.

This time he let fly at the attacker’s head. The man shrieked as the iron knocked into his head, burning his chin before bouncing off. In desperation he threw his knife at Slade. It was a hurried throw, easily batted aside. The attacker dug in his vest for a gun. Slade charged.

He was only a few meters from the attacker and easily got to him before he drew the gun. Hitting him in the jaw with a palm heel strike stunned the assailant. Another strike to the throat stopped his breath. Slade yanked on the man’s shoulder and got behind him, wrapping his arms around the attacker’s head. With one swift jerk he broke the man’s neck. The attacker dropped like a stone.

With two out of the three out and the remaining attacker writhing in pain from a broken leg and a burned face, Slade took stock of the situation. Looking down the hall revealed no more threats. He quickly closed the door.

Slade rearmed and retrieved a roll of duct tape from his bag, taping the attacker’s hands and feet together, ignoring his screams of pain. Hauling the attacker up on the bed, Slade pulled him around by the hair until he faced the chair. He looked down at the attacker; he knew who he was, or at least he guessed. He wasn’t Arab, and he wasn’t an Algerian; no, the young man was Indonesian or Malaysian.

Slade sat down, thinking, “Maybe I can kill two birds with one stone. He’s going to see a jihadist lawyer if they don’t outright let him go. I should give him something — Freddy!”

Slade smiled mirthlessly, “You people should be careful who you trust. Freddy Waters told me all about you — everything! I’m just a bit hazy on the details, so we’ll go over them now!”

“Die Crusader dog! I will never talk to you!” the prisoner protested, and he spat at Slade.

Slade erupted in anger, grabbing the attacker by the collar and ripping his shirt down to his waist, exposing a lean dark back. “So, you’re trying to be funny are you? Okay, two can play at that game! He went to his bag and dug out a bottle. The attacker looked at it in fear.

“What is that, acid? Hah, you can never make a soldier of Allah talk!”

“Yeah, I’ve heard it all before. The Islamist warrior is very brave, very brave indeed when he is throwing acid in the face of a woman or a girl — I’ve seen your handiwork Abdul! Very brave indeed!” Slade laughed. He grabbed the young jihadist’s head in his hands and tilted it up into an unnatural, painful angle, putting his furious features inches from the now frightened jihadist. “You terrorists hide behind women and children in mosques, slink into hotel rooms and behead people with their hands tied behind their backs — yes, you’re brave, so brave!”

He showed the terrorist the bottle. “We’re going to see how manly you are! This isn’t acid. These are bacon bits; that’s right Abdul — pork!”

He sprinkled the bacon bits all over the attacker’s back. The man began to shout and curse. Those curses turned to screams when Slade applied the still hot iron to his naked flesh, searing the bacon bits into his back.

“There you go, how brave are you now?” he demanded. “What’s your name? Who sent you? Answer my questions and you get to go to paradise as a whole man. Make it tough on me and you’ll go there as a eunuch. I’ll boil your balls off with this iron. You won’t even be able to bugger the little boys!”

The sound of flesh burning mixed with the smell of human and bacon roasting was enough to sicken even Slade, but he persevered. At length, he removed the iron and repeated his questions.

“I am Abdulla Hussein! Khallida, Khallida!” the man yelped. “It was Khallida’s tasking!”

“How did he find me?” Slade demanded.

“No, no I cannot, no, I don’t know — Aiee!”

The iron hissed.

“How?”

“I don’t know, no, no! They don’t tell us!” the attacker pleaded. “We hear rumors, rumors of someone in the president’s administration. He is Muslim Brotherhood!”

Slade hesitated, knowing this was probably the truth. After a moment of thought, he asked, “Where is your Paris cell located? Who is your boss?”

The door burst open and a chorus of voices shouted, “Freeze!”

It was half a dozen gendarmes. Slade froze.

“Drop the iron!”

“You’re sure?”

“Drop it I say!”

Slade shrugged, dropping the iron flat on the terrorist’s back.

“Aiee!” the resulting scream was very convincing.