The Medusa Stone

King Solomon’s Mine

At first it wasn’t a noise — merely the absence of the all-consuming silence. Mercer strained to listen, his ears ringing with the effort and his eyes watering as he stared into the sable blackness. There! A tiny sound existing only in the deepest level of his consciousness, a hissing like a gentle whisper. He tried to shout, but his mouth was cemented closed by his thirst and he could manage only a hoarse croak.

Time might have passed, he had no way to tell, but he was sure that the mysterious hiss was growing louder. He wouldn’t let himself hope. He couldn’t do that if he was wrong. Then he saw a light, just a muted flicker. To him, it was like a blinding star burst. He drank it in, his eyes streaming with the joyous pain of it.

“Hello?” he rasped.

“Hello yourself,” Selome called cheerily from a short distance away. “I’ll be with you in just a few minutes.”

“What are you doing?” Mercer’s question was too quiet for her to hear, so there was no response.

It took ten more minutes, but he didn’t care. Selome was coming for him. The tears behind his eyes were no longer caused by the light. As he waited in his stone cocoon, he had a thought that tempered his joy. He’d given up on himself. He’d actually believed that he was going to die. He’d never, ever been one to quit until the very end, but this time he’d really thought he was finished. Even as he was about to be rescued, he was furious with himself, and even worse, disappointed.

Mercer suddenly felt the dirt beneath him begin to shift.

The constricting pressure against his chest slackened. He could hear Selome more clearly now. She was digging furiously, using some sort of heavy spade, and with every slash into the dirt ahead of him, Mercer felt the tunnel floor sink a fraction of an inch. When he tried to wriggle, he gained ground, his shoulders scraping against the walls, his back no longer squashed to the ceiling.

Then in a rush like childbirth, he was free, sliding forward dangerously fast, gaining speed as the slope steepened and the ceiling vanished above him. He started to tumble, caught in a cascade of loose soil and rocks that scored his eyes and nose and jammed solidly into his ears. He banged against the walls as he fell, wanting to cry out at the agony of a smashed shin, but there was so much dirt boiling around him that if he opened his mouth, he would suffocate. Then his headlong plunge stopped, and he lay still as more rubble poured over him, the weight of it increasing with every second.

He was about to black out when the dirt blanketing his body was thrust aside. He felt a hand grasp his belt and shake him. Dirt flew like water from a spaniel and he could breathe again. He cleared the filth from his eyes and peered around. His first sight was of Selome standing over him.

“I should dig for buried treasure more often. It’s amazing what a girl can find.” She looked radiant even in the glimmer from the flashlight.

“Gold doubloon I’m not.”

He couldn’t believe how good it felt to be sore. It meant he was still alive. He swayed to his feet, reaching to brush a tendril of hair from Selome’s face. “I didn’t think you were coming back.” His voice was thick. He wanted to tell her what had happened when she left him alone, but he couldn’t. What he felt went beyond words. He simply stepped into her embrace, soaking up the heat of her body. “Thank you.”

There was just enough amber incandescence from the flashlight for him to visually explore the chamber they occupied and to understand how she had gotten him out of his tomb. The gallery was roughly rectangular and at least thirty feet tall with a shallow alcove at one end. Its walls had been covered with blocks of dressed stone. Mercer recognized the stones used in the closet-sized niche. He had seen them before. They were the same type as those lining the main tunnel from the surface. This room had been a staging area, a link between the direct path to the kimberlite ore beds and the older, more meandering tunnels. Behind him, a towering pile of dirt reached almost to the ceiling. At its summit, he saw the tiny round hole that led to the rest of the old mine and had held him prisoner for so long.

When the new, straighter drift had been driven into the mountain, the workers must have back-filled the passageway to the room and pillar mine chamber. In the thousands of years since then, the fill had settled enough for Mercer to crawl almost to the point where it emptied into this room. Of course, Selome had recognized that if she dug into the base of the mountain of dirt, it would collapse into the room and free him.

“I’m sorry it took so long, but when I fell into this chamber, I cracked my head against the floor and blacked out.” There was an angry bruise above her left eye.

“You won’t hear me complaining.” Mercer gulped half the remaining water from their canteen and examined the shovel Selome had used to loosen his earthen constraints. “It’s a shame you had to use that. It’s a beautiful example of a bronze-aged tool.”

“Then I’m glad you’re not an archaeologist. I ruined about five of these things getting you out.”

There was a collection of primitive tools in one corner of the room, picks and shovels, some scaled for an adult’s use, other miniature versions for the child slaves. Next to them sat rotted piles of leather that had been buckets and water flasks. A little bit off lay stacks of clay lamps.

“We can bemoan lost artifacts later,” Mercer said. “Right now I want to get us out of here and take care of some business.”

He rigged the stones blocking the alcove exit with explosives from his kit bag, careful to use just enough to take down a section of the wall and not blow it apart. He had no idea what was happening in the main tunnel beyond the barrier and didn’t want to advertise his presence until he was ready.

“What about fuse? Didn’t you use it against Mahdi?”

Mercer plucked another coil from his bag and snipped off a length. “Second rule of hard rock mining: you can never have enough fuse.”

“What’s the first rule?”

Mercer held up more dynamite. “You can never have enough explosives.”

The fuse was much slower than the one he’d used to disable Mahdi, so they had plenty of time to make it to the trench redoubt he’d dug with Selome’s help. He covered his head with one arm, keeping his body over Selome. When the charge blew, the concussion pelted them with debris.

He looked up and blinked. The wall hadn’t crumbled, but there was a three-foot crawl space at its bottom and light from the outside spilled into the chamber. Neither of them had ever thought they would see sunshine again and they embraced in its comforting aura.

“Now, let’s see this put to an end.” Mercer slung his bag over his shoulder, snatched up the AK-47, and led Selome into the tunnel.

The echoing sounds of a gun battle reverberated down the length of the shaft, stray tracer rounds winking by. Mercer quickly shoved Selome back into the chamber.

“Stay here and don’t move until I come for you. You just saved my life. Now it’s my turn.” He stepped out, keeping low to the footwall, the AK at the ready.

Mercer couldn’t tell who was using the mine as a cover position so he started crawling forward as more rounds streaked over his head. His eyes adjusted to the sunlight filling the shaft, but the haze of cordite smoke was nearly blinding and he had to get close to recognize the men firing out toward the camp. They were Sudanese soldiers. Habte must have made the call because he guessed the return fire ricocheting down the drive was from the Marines.

The rebels held an unassailable position against the American soldiers as long as they had ammunition. Unless a rocket launcher was used, there was no way to dislodge them. The Marines surely knew Habte’s warning to Henna about the trapped miners, so explosives were not an option. Remembering Mahdi’s sneak attack in the mine and the brutal raping that had taken place outside the women’s stockade, Mercer felt nothing as he brought the AK to his shoulder.

With controlled double taps on semiautomatic, he shot four Sudanese in the back and the remaining two in the chest when they whirled to face the threat that had come unexpectedly from behind. He scrambled up to their barricade and searched frantically for something white to wave at the Marines still pouring rounds into the tunnel entrance. He had to make do with the well-used handkerchief he found in the pocket of one of the dead man. A second after waving it over the barricade, he heard a command in English to hold fire.

He stood. “Don’t shoot. I’m an American.”

“Dr. Mercer?” a Texas drawl asked over the din of a continuing battle farther from the mine.

“Yeah, I’m Mercer.” The euphoria he should be feeling had been suppressed by his desire to make the Sudanese and especially Gianelli suffer for what had happened in the past weeks. “I’ve got a woman with me, and there are forty miners still trapped in here.” He looked to where he thought the Marines had taken cover, but he couldn’t see them. There were too many places to hide on the desert floor — behind the scattered equipment boxes or near some of the heavy equipment that hadn’t been damaged during the battle or behind one of the countless piles of dirt excavated from the mine.

“Ya’ll have to hold tight for a spell longer. This is one hot LZ.” The soldier’s comment was drowned by the thundering rotors of an AH-64 Apache gunship as it crabbed across the desert, its chin gun pouring a steady stream of 20mm rounds into the far side of the camp.

Mercer spotted the cluster of Force Recon Marines huddled next to an overturned and still burning D-4 bulldozer. The soldier in charge saw him, waved in acknowledgment, and led his squad across the camp. Mercer drained the contents of two Sudanese canteens, and when the Marines were out of sight, he bolted from the mine, jinxing around toppled lighting towers and mountains of overburden. Though the rain had stopped, the sky was thick with clouds. The heat and humidity made his dash slow, and his bruised chest protested every breath. The knife wound in his leg was a sharp throb. Suddenly, the sky directly overhead exploded. A pressure wave of air slammed him to the earth, the concussion blasting against his eardrums. He rolled to his back and began scrabbling across the ground.

Two hundred feet above him, the flaming carapace of the Apache gyrated out of control, streamers of greasy smoke belching from its engine, its tail rotor assembly coming apart like a shrapnel bomb. One of the rebels had fired a surface-to-air missile into the helo and scored a direct hit. The gunship crashed close enough to throw Mercer again, fiery sheets of aviation fuel raining around him, but incredibly none landed on his clothes or skin.

When he stood, the ribs that had first taken a pounding under Hofmyer’s fists and later by Mahdi and the tunnel walls had finally given out. He felt a sharp stab of pain that reached all the way to his heart, and the agony of the broken bones forced him to his knees. He had taken so much physical abuse that he wondered just what he hoped to accomplish. The Marines were here. They would handle the rebels. He was putting his life in danger for absolutely no reason.

Deciding that maybe it was best to wait this one out, he was searching for a good place to hole up when bullets kicked up erratic fountains of dirt at his feet. Clutching his ribs with one arm, Mercer ran as best he could, reaching cover behind a big portable generator. He squinted into the haze created by the dozens of smoke grenades, their clouds of smog cutting visibility to almost nothing. He didn’t see who had opened up on him, but spotted a Sudanese ambush set up for a squad of patrolling Marines. The American soldiers were alert and moved well, but they were about to be diced in a surprise cross-fire.

The AK bucked in his hands, stitching two of the guerrillas and then the clip ran empty. Mercer fumbled to slam home a fresh one, dodging to the other side of the mobile generator as rounds pinged off its metal hide. The Marines dropped to the ground, entering the melee and killing three more Sudanese. Mercer was joined a second later by the four young Americans.

“Thanks, pal,” the leader of the patrol wheezed, slumping against the Ingersoll-Rand.

“My pleasure. Can’t tell you how glad I am to see you.”

“You’re Mercer, right?”

“Yeah.”

“We were briefed to look for you when we landed, but weren’t you buried or something?”

“I was until about ten minutes go.” Mercer took a protein bar the Latino corporal offered and devoured it in three bites. “What’s the situation?”

“Shit, you know more than we do. Briefing said about fifty armed troops guarding this camp with minimum equipment and arms. Bastards capped an Apache just a minute ago with a portable SAM, and there seem to be a lot more than fifty.”

“The number’s about right,” Mercer countered. “But these guys have been fighting for years in the Sudan. They’ve got combat experience to spare, and their former commander was one mean son of a bitch.”

“Yeah, well, anyway, we’ve taken heavy losses. If it weren’t for all the civilians mixed up with the bad guys, the captain would’ve called in some close air support and bombed the shit out of this place.”

Any chance for a continued conversation was shattered by a chain of detonations at the fuel tank farm. The eruptions of flame and smoke towered into the leaden sky, building and blooming like deadly flowers. The ground shook so hard that Mercer felt his teeth were going to loosen from his jaw.

As he was recovering, the Marine seated on the far side of the corporal jumped spastically and the paintwork of the generator behind him splattered with clots of blood and the back of his skull. The Marines reacted even before they knew where the shot had originated, sending out a scathing return fire and racing from their cover. Mercer had no choice but to follow. He ran in a doubled-up position, aiming the AK behind his hip and unleashing a fusillade of his own.

They slogged up a mound of overburden, the soldiers slowed by the pounds of equipment each carried and Mercer by his own condition. Another shot blew a geyser of dirt just an inch to the left of Mercer’s shoulder, grit lashing his face as he clawed his way to the summit. In the protection of the artificial hill’s flat peak, he realized just who was shooting at them and why.

The Israeli team was still here. The two shots were so accurate that they could only come from a sniper rifle. They were either firing to add to the confusion so they could slip into the mine or they were planning on an evacuation and wanted to keep the combatants occupied while they escaped. For Mercer, both options were unacceptable.

Chancing a look over the parapet of their earthen fortress, he could survey the entire camp and the clusters of men fighting below. It looked as if the Sudanese’s numbers were greatly diminished. He could see a few holdouts near Gianelli’s big transporters. In the distance, there were figures running away from the battle, but he guessed they were Eritreans. Of the bodies he could see littering the ground that weren’t dressed in American desert BDUs, two were white, but from this range he couldn’t tell if either was Gianelli.

“Say again?” the corporal was shouting into the radio built into his combat helmet. “Roger that, Sky Eyes. Keep us posted.”

“What’s happening?” Mercer clipped his last banana magazine into the well of the AK-47.

“AWACS plane circling off the coast reports a low-level contact about six klicks east of here and moving in at a hundred miles an hour.”

“Shit!”

“What is it?”

“There’s a team of Israelis in the area. They’ve been after this mine for a while, but I think they’re cutting their losses and bugging out.”

“Well, they’re going to make it,” the Marine said, not really interested in another enemy with his hands so full of Sudanese. “We don’t have any more gunships to go after it, and if that AWACS only now just spotted it, you can believe it’ll disappear just as easily.”

Mercer knew the soldier was right. Flying nap of the earth, a good chopper pilot could evade even the most sophisticated airborne radar systems. He got an idea. “How’d you guys get here?”

“Blackhawks. There are a half dozen of them on the ground about ten miles north. We hoofed it the rest of the way in.”

“Can you radio for one to pick us up?”

“Yeah, but it won’t do any good. Those birds are just troop ships. No guns.”

“Just get one. We’ll be the firepower.” Mercer tapped the corporal’s M-16A1 with the butt of his AK.

The corporal switched the channel on his radio. “Captain Saunders, this is Chavez. I’m with Mercer. He says the bogey Sky Eyes just painted is an evac chopper for some uglies. I want permission to go after it in a Blackhawk.” He paused, his gaze on Mercer. “Yes, sir. I know. We’re on top of a hill, and it looks like things are dying down in our sector… Yes, sir, I’ll keep an eye on him… No, sir, I’ll ask him. Dr. Mercer, where are the rest of the Eritrean nationals?”

“Still trapped in the mine. There’s a woman in the main tunnel who knows exactly where they are.”

The soldier nodded and activated his mike again. “In the mine, sir… Yes, sir, we’re standing by.”

“Well?”

“The captain’s calling a chopper. We’ll pop some green smoke when the bird gets here. We’re going to drop you at our staging area and go after the Israelis ourselves. It’s not my place to ask, but what kind of international situation are we getting ourselves into here?”

“Think of the deepest pile of shit you can imagine and then double it,” Mercer grunted. “Only bright spot is, we’re the good guys for a change.”

The soldier carrying the heavy Squad Automatic Weapon spotted a target and ripped off about fifteen rounds, empty brass arcing from the 5.56mm in a tight necklace. Chavez and the other Marine scanned the camp for more targets but only indistinct shapes moved in the smoke and they couldn’t chance a friendly-fire kill.

“Whad’ya have, Moose?”

“Two of them with AKs at ten o’clock, moving clockways. They’re behind that ten-wheel truck.”

“Keep ’em pinned,” Corporal Chavez ordered. Moose gave the SAW’s trigger another long pull. “But watch your ammo discipline.”

“How long till the chopper gets here?”

Chavez clicked to another frequency on his radio. “Inbound helo, this is Charlie One. Give me an ETA to sector seven, about eight hundred yards north of the mine entrance… Copy. We’ll pop green when we hear you.” He turned to Mercer. “About six minutes.”

Moose fired another barrage with the SAW and the two other Marines started to pour lead down the hill, screaming unintelligible curses. Mercer saw half a dozen rebel soldiers advancing from their left flank. Four were armed with AK- 47s and two carried RPG-7 rocket launchers. One went down before he could fire; the other took a snap shot with the bazooka-like weapon and a section of the hill erupted like a miniature Mount St. Helens.

The Squad Automatic Weapon fell silent. Moose had been killed by blast debris. Mercer, Chavez, and the other Marine dodged for cover, and even as dirt continued to rain down, they fired back. When Mercer emptied his last clip, he tossed aside the AK and reached for the SAW. The machine gun was huge, almost too heavy to carry into combat, but its effectiveness was unquestionable.

Three charging guerrillas were hit in the hail of gunfire, snapped back by the pounding gun in near perfect sequence.

“Keep the fuckers back!” Chavez screamed as he worked on a gash in the leg of the other soldier. The man’s desert camo uniform was soaked through with blood from a point just below his groin.

Mercer continued to fire the weapon, traversing the barrel in tight sweeps to keep the Sudanese pinned. Another rocket slammed into the hill, and part of its peak blew away, exposing their flank. He had no idea how many rounds were in the boxy magazine clamped under the SAW, but he prayed it was enough to cover them until the chopper arrived.

“Evac flight.” Chavez was on the radio with the helicopter again. “We need some help here… Roger.”

Chavez unclipped a smoke grenade from his combat harness, slipped the ring, and tossed it to the other side of the hill’s summit. A second later, putrid green clouds boiled off the mountain, marking their location to the approaching Blackhawk.

Bullets raked the top of the hill, explosions of dirt and lead that sent Mercer and the two surviving Marines reeling. Yet over the din they could still hear the chopper as it came in, its rotors whipping the smoke in violent eddies. The copilot had opened the helicopter’s side door, but as they began their hover for the pickup, he was forced to return to the cockpit.

“The pilot can’t land, not enough room up here. You’ll have to jump in first,” Chavez screamed over the rotor blast, his dirty hand still clamped over the entrance wound in his squad mate’s leg. “I need to hold pressure on this dressing.”

Mercer emptied the SAW’s clip, a further thirty rounds chewing up the camp. He commandeered the wounded soldier’s M-16 and, as the Blackhawk lowered even closer to the hillock, leaped for the open door.

A surge of air grabbed the chopper at that instant, and Mercer’s chest slammed into the bottom of the door frame. In the split second before the pain struck, he felt the ends of his ribs grind against each other like corroded machine parts. The Blackhawk had been pushed away from the mountain of overburden, and Mercer found himself dangling above seventy feet of empty space, his legs bicycling uselessly as the pain loosened his grip on the door sill.

The pilot must have seen what happened. Ignoring the turbulence and the whirling blades’ proximity to the ground, he heeled the nimble chopper nearly onto its side, throwing Mercer bodily into the aircraft. By the time Mercer recovered enough to crawl to the doorway, the Blackhawk was once again on station over the hill. Chavez was ready to pass the wounded Marine up to him.

They came under renewed and intense fire, the chopper taking a dozen rounds, ricochets scoring the cabin like hot coals. Mercer fired his M-16 one-handed, the stock braced against the helo’s body as he lay half in and half out to help Chavez. He had his free arm under the young Marine’s limp arms when a third RPG rocket hit the top of the hill. The Blackhawk lurched with the explosion and the Marine slid from Mercer’s tentative grip. The soldier and Corporal Chavez disappeared in a hellish world of flame and smoke and debris.

The Blackhawk pilot lifted his craft away from the hill and out over the open desert, well beyond the range of any weapons the Sudanese might have. Mercer sat numb, unmoving, staring downward as if he could bring back the two dead soldiers by freezing his position. It took all of his strength to blink, to wash away part of the horror he saw in Corporal Chavez’s eyes in the instant of his death. He sat immobile for two minutes before he could reach up and slip a pair of headphones off the firewall that partially protected the cockpit.

“How’s the ship?” His voice sounded as if it came from someone else, a different person who could still function, still think rationally, still care about what happened next.

“We’re okay,” the pilot responded. “I’m sorry about your buddies back there. There was nothing I could do.” It wasn’t really an apology, just a statement of fact in war.

“What’s the status of that bogey?”

“Hold on,” the pilot said, and Mercer guessed he was switching frequencies to talk with the circling AWACS. “Bogey vanished from radar about five minutes ago roughly a mile from the camp, then was spotted again moving eastward about two minutes later. Sky Eye lost the signal right after that. Sounds like someone made a pickup.”

“Start flying east as fast as this thing can go. I suspect the helicopter we’re chasing is much bigger than this one, a cargo ship that won’t have your speed.” Mercer’s assumption was based on the Israelis’ deluded plan to recover the Ark of the Covenant. He had no idea how big the artifact was reported to be, but he guessed that the Israelis would provide a large enough machine, no matter what its size.

Mercer ducked his head into the cockpit.

“Who in the hell are you?” The pilot was startled that his passenger was a civilian.

“Philip Mercer. I’m the guy you were brought in to rescue.”

“Hey, we’ve got orders to drop you at the staging area,” the copilot said.

“Fine by me, but you do that and there’s no way we’ll catch that other chopper. Chavez told me the AWACS can’t track it, and we’re the only other pairs of eyes in the area.”

The twin General Electric T700s screamed at their maximum rating, pushing the lightly laden utility helicopter at over two hundred miles per hour. The ground under the roiling sky rushed by in a nauseating blur. Mercer buckled himself into the seat closest to the open door, acting as another observer for the pilots, scanning their starboard side for the fleeing Israeli craft.

The pain in his chest was excruciating. He found an emergency medical pack under his seat and choked down some painkillers. He then used the pocket knife from it to slice off two seat belts. He tied the cut ends together and wrapped the belts around his chest, using the buckle mechanism to ratchet his makeshift binding tight. It was a dangerous mend, but for the first time since the Apache had exploded over his head, he could breathe with a degree of normalcy. He wiped sweat from his face and no longer feared mercury poisoning. He didn’t think he’d stopped sweating since his first mad dash into the mine with Selome and the diamonds.

“There!” the copilot called out. “At our one o’clock position about two miles ahead.”

The Blackhawk was fast approaching the Red Sea coast, and the weather had deteriorated. Wind whistling into the back cabin of the craft carried a deluge of rain, and drops peppered the wind screen like pebbles. The massive escarpment that protected the African coast from the ravages of the ocean dropped from under the helicopter in a gut-wrenching swoop, and the pilot mirrored the dramatic plunge perfectly. In another minute they would be over the Red Sea and shortly after that, if the fleeing helicopter didn’t change direction, they would fly into Saudi Arabian airspace south of Mecca.

The American chopper was gaining on the Israeli Super Stallion, but the huge khaki helicopter had a big head start and Mercer knew they couldn’t catch it until they reached the Arabian peninsula.

“If we maintain pursuit, we’re going to have to alert the Saudi Air Force,” the pilot pointed out.

“So do it,” Mercer replied, exasperated by the details.

“I’ve got a transmission on an emergency channel,” the copilot called. “I think it’s from the Super Stallion.”

The voice over the radio was accentless and the transmission was clear. “American helicopter, American helicopter, this is Mercy Flight One en route to Mecca with victims from the Sudan famine. Why are you pursuing us?”

“You want to handle this?” the copilot asked Mercer.

“Yes,” he replied tightly. “I’ve got it. Mercy Flight One, this is a United States Marine Corps helicopter. We do not wish to open fire, but you are carrying international fugitives wanted for terrorist acts. Over.”

“Negative, Marine flight. We are contracted to the relief agency Médecins Sans Frontiers. We are carrying starving children to a hospital in Mecca.”

“If you do not return to Eritrean airspace and land at Massawa, we will have no choice but to shoot down your craft. Over,” Mercer bluffed. With just an M-16, he couldn’t do more than dent the fleeing craft.

The coast of the Arabian peninsula was fast approaching, and the Blackhawk pilot was reluctant to broach the sovereignty of a friendly nation.

A new voice came over the net, one Mercer recognized immediately. Anger boiled up within him. “Dr. Mercer, how good to hear from you again,” Yosef said. “I was hoping you were listening. I’ve learned that you may be erratic, but you can also be very predictable too.”

“You are going to die, you son of a bitch,” Mercer seethed.

“I don’t think so,” Yosef replied mildly. “You see, we’re still holding your friend.”

Mercer felt as if the helicopter had hit the side of a mountain. He’d forgotten they still held Harry. At that moment he knew the fanatics were going to get away with everything.

Switching to intercom mode, he asked the pilot if their communications gear could make a satellite call, and when he received an affirmative, he asked him to contact Dick Henna’s cell phone.

“I take your silence as acknowledgment,” Yosef said across the airwaves. “Very reasonable. Calling in the Marines was poor form, Doctor. Since the sniper I sent after your friend with the phone didn’t return, you forced my hand a bit early, and without the Ark, there is no way to guarantee Mr. White’s safety. In fact, my last order to my people was that he is to be killed. Unless I rescind that order, your friend’s life is at an end. Give me and my team free passage, and when we arrive in Israel, I’ll have White released. Don’t consider this a failure on your part, just a stalemate.”

The pilot cut off Yosef’s speech by switching channels from the cockpit, and Mercer heard Dick Henna’s voice saying hello.

“Hi, Dick. It’s Mercer.”

“Jesus H. Christ. Where in the hell are you?”

“I’ll tell you in a second, but first, have you made any progress finding Harry?”

“Yeah, he’s back in Washington. He’s been here for a while now.”

“I’ll call you later.” Mercer killed the connection and slumped. Oh, God, thank you.

The guilt and the fear and the responsibility fell off Mercer in a liberating wave, leaving his mind clear for the first time since Harry’s abduction. It was over. He was finished. Nothing else mattered anymore. Harry was safe. Selome was safe. The Eritreans were free. Even Gianelli’s plan to blackmail the diamond cartel was over. He knew if he let it, his relief would cut through his resolve. But he wasn’t quite done yet. Mercer wasn’t going to allow Yosef to escape. He didn’t want it for his friends or for anyone else. He wanted this for himself.

The pilot spoke before he could switch the radio back to the fleeing chopper. “We’ve got two problems here, Dr. Mercer. One is we’ll enter Saudi airspace in about four minutes. The other is a pair of fast movers just came up on radar. They’re closing at mach one from the north. ETA is ten minutes.”

“Whose are they?” Mercer had a sinking suspicion he knew the origin of the approaching jets.

“I’ve got no IFF signature off either of them.” The pilot referred to the Identify Friend or Foe transponders carried by the military aircraft of the United States and her allies.

“So they’re not Saudi?”

“I doubt they’d shut off their IFFS over their own territory, especially since the coastline’s covered with SAM installations.”

“In other words, we’ve got ten minutes before that helicopter’s fighter escort arrives.”

“Yup.”>

“Let’s take ’em down.”

“Hey, listen, Doc, is that such a good idea? I mean, whoever has the clout to wrangle up fighter cover must be legit.”

Mercer grunted. “We’re about to be one of the checks and balances of the Israeli democracy. Maneuver us directly over that helicopter. I’ve got an idea.”

Two miles from where the land met the sea, the Israeli renegades banked north to meet up with the jet fighters, skirting the outer reach of Saudi Arabia’s coastal defenses. There was no chance the lumbering Super Stallion could outrun the Blackhawk, but they certainly were trying. It took only three more minutes for the American helicopter to take up a position above the Israeli’s huge rotor.

“You’d better have a damn good idea,” the copilot shouted. “Radar has those jets down our throats in four minutes.”

Mercer worked furiously. “When I shout, break left as hard as you can, then land this pig. Fast. Those jets may take a shot even after I destroy the Stallion.” He keyed his mike to speak to Yosef. “Listen up, you son of a bitch, and listen good.”

“Ah, the good doctor is back,” Yosef replied mockingly. “I thought you’d already left us.”

“I’ve always preferred roulette, but I know enough about poker to know that when your bluff gets called, the game’s over.”

Yosef’s voice was strained and his reply took just a fraction too long. “And you think I’m bluffing? Remember, it’s not your life you are gambling with but that of your friend, Harry White.”

“Asshole, I know you’re bluffing.” Mercer estimated how long it would take a two-pound object to fall from the door of his helicopter and land on top of the other. Gauging as best he could, he cut ten seconds’ worth of fuse from the coil in his kit bag and seated it into his last stick of dynamite. “And in about a minute you’re going to pay the highest stakes of all.”

“Bravado, Dr. Mercer,” Yosef replied. “In one minute, if I’m not given free passage, two F-16s are going to blow you from the sky. I may die, yes, but so will Harry White. Your revenge may be gratifying, but it will also be short-lived.”

“You should have known when to fold ’em, partner,” Mercer drawled. It took a few tries to light the fuse in the air whipping around the cabin, but once it was burning evenly, he shouted, “Now!”

The Blackhawk pilot had anticipated Mercer by a crucial half second, and when he released the explosive, he realized it would miss the upperworks of the Israeli helicopter. While an explosion near the hull of the Sikorsky would be damaging, it was doubtful it would cripple the huge cargo chopper.

Mercer’s mouth opened for a scream of frustration even as the Blackhawk twisted and fell from the sky so fast that he became momentarily weightless. Yet his gaze never left the Israeli helo or the little package tumbling torward it.

A helicopter’s rotor produces lift by creating a pocket of high pressure below the blades and low pressure above. For a chopper the size of the CH-53, tons of air rush into the vortex around the rotor, centering the craft like the eye of a hurricane. Into this maelstrom fell the dynamite. The little bomb would have fallen harmlessly past a conventional aircraft, but when it felt the relentless draw of the turbine-powered blades, it changed direction in midair. The millisecond before the packet was shredded by the rotor, the fuse touched the chemical explosives.

The helicopter vanished behind an expanding blossom of fire, and when it finally reemerged, the six rotor blades and the top third of the aircraft were gone. The Super Stallion was dead in the air, only its forward momentum carrying it in a flagging parabola. Mercer didn’t blink until it slammed into the cobalt-blue sea, fire from its ruptured tanks washing away on the waves spawned by the impact. In a second it was gone.

“Get us to the Arabian coast and under their radar umbrella,” Mercer shouted to the pilot, but the veteran was way ahead of him. The chopper settled into a flight path scant feet above the sea, the engines torqued for maximum speed.

“Those jets are breaking off and returning north,” the copilot yelled a minute later.

Mercer was too tired to care, but he gave a weak cheer for the crew’s benefit. “Let’s get back to the mine. We’re not done yet.”

It took forty minutes, and on the inbound flight they heard radio chatter from other Blackhawks ferrying the injured to the amphibious assault ship.

Habte was the first to greet Mercer on the ground, shaking his hand solemnly, then enfolding him in a brotherly hug that would add another day or two to the recovery time for Mercer’s broken ribs.

“I didn’t think I’d see you again.” Habte tried to keep the emotion out of his voice but failed.

“Came damn close.”

Selome was next to reach the little group huddled near the Blackhawk. She too hugged Mercer, much more gently, but her kiss was consuming — as if she was trying to fit every possible emotion into that one gesture. Mercer’s response was no less enthusiastic.

“I’m fine, don’t worry.” She preempted his question.

“The Marines have already freed the miners, and they’ve been sent with the worst of the injured to their base ship.”

Mercer was still on an adrenaline high. Everything felt otherworldly. An hour ago he had been fighting for his life, and now he was holding hands with a beautiful woman, surrounded by grimy but satisfied soldiers. It would take a long time for everything to soak in, the horror and the pain, but for just a few minutes he felt like he was invincible, and the thought made him grin.

“That’s great, but I was about to ask if you are ready for that vacation yet?”

A Marine approached, extending his hand to Mercer. Behind him, two guards held Giancarlo Gianelli and Joppi Hofmyer. The smile vanished from Mercer’s face, his gray eyes going deadly flat.

“Captain James Saunders, USMC,” the redheaded Marine introduced. “It’s an honor to meet you, Dr. Mercer.”

“Honor’s mine, Captain.” Mercer grasped the outstretched hand. “On behalf of all of us, thank you.”

“Just doing our job, sir,” the Marine demurred. “I thought you might want to see these two characters before I shipped them out of here. The FBI already has agents in Asmara to escort them to Europe, where they’re going to stand trial.”

“I’ve seen enough ugliness in the past weeks to want to pass up this last opportunity. Thanks anyway.”

“Fair enough.” Saunders gestured for the guards to take the two to a waiting helicopter, but when they were just a couple of steps away, Mercer reconsidered. “One second, Captain.”

Both captives were filthy and looked ravaged by their attempt to flee the battle, yet both were also uninjured. Mercer addressed Hofmyer first. “I’ve already kicked your ass once, so I’m not even going to bother with you.” Then he directed his hatred at Gianelli. The Italian yelped when Mercer’s murderous eyes fell on him.

“You, on the other hand, well, this I’m going to enjoy.” Mercer cocked his fist, centering Gianelli’s face perfectly, but he stayed his hand. “Screw it. You’re not worth the effort.”

Gianelli sagged with relief and stared goggle-eyed when Mercer turned away.

“Like hell you’re not.” Mercer twisted back and slammed Gianelli, the punch rolling the industrialist’s eyes into his skull and laying him flat in the dirt. “Thank you, Captain Saunders. I think I needed that.”

Selome ducked under one of Mercer’s arms and Habte braced up the other, so he walked between the two of them, using them for support. Then he straightened, the old fire returning, his face lit with a devilish thought. “What do you say we go find Gianelli’s safe and see what all this fuss has been about?”