The Prisoner's Gold

22

Cobb dragged McNutt the last few yards back to the ravaged Land Cruiser, then laid his unconscious form on the ground. Steam was still hissing from the engine when Cobb climbed over the gore-splattered back seat and accessed the cargo area of the vehicle. He quickly found the first aid kit that he’d brought along and tore it open.

The bullet had ripped through McNutt’s leg and come out the other side, leaving two external wounds to close and a multitude of blood vessels to plug internally. Unfortunately, the kit was designed with superficial lacerations in mind; McNutt’s injuries were simply too severe for gauze and tape. Even with the military-issue, quick-hardening bandages and next-generation spray-on skin, there wasn’t much Cobb could do.

Then he had an idea.

Cobb threw the first aid kit aside and scrambled for the backpack that contained his laptop. Rummaging through the case, he quickly laid his hands on the cylinder he was seeking then returned to his fallen friend.

He dropped to McNutt’s side and slid a folding serrated knife out of his pocket. He used the blade to cut off McNutt’s T-shirt, some of which he’d already used as a makeshift tourniquet. Next he ran a long slit up the leg of McNutt’s trousers to expose the wound.

The hole was to the side of McNutt’s thigh and just larger than an American quarter. Blood formed a perfect half-sphere as it bubbled up out of the puncture before seeping down the Marine’s leg. Cobb used McNutt’s sliced shirt to swab away at the bulk of the fluid and then brought up the cylinder that he’d retrieved from his computer case.

He pointed the aerosol can at the wound and began to spray. A thick, black, gelatinous substance squirted out of the can and into the hole. Cobb laid it on heavy, then he pulled back and watched. In just a few seconds he could see the dark gel hardening. A moment later, the blood around the edges of the wound stopped flowing entirely.

Miraculously, the spray had saved McNutt’s life.

But Cobb had no way of knowing if the substance would eventually kill him.

The thick gel was filled with colloidal quantum dots: microscopic semiconductor particles designed to function like solar cells. The US military was constantly field-testing stuff like this. A soldier could spray it on a rock and shove in the plug of a power cord — or even just the frayed wires where the plug used to be. The black ooze would harden in seconds and collect enough solar energy to power an electronic device in a pinch.

In this case, Cobb simply used it for its quick-hardening property and hoped like hell that none of the small particles would be swept through McNutt’s system and cause an embolism. He also had no idea if the material was toxic; the military wasn’t big on warning labels.

At least it did the job for the time being.

Cobb rolled the sniper onto his stomach and applied more spray to the exit wound. Once the bleeding stopped, Cobb wrapped the leg with the quick-hardening bandages from the first aid kit, then moved the unconscious man to the front passenger seat to get him out of the sun. He would have laid him down in the back seat, but there was so much blood and gore back there he was concerned about infections.

Next Cobb went to take a look at the engine. He didn’t have any spare parts, but he hoped there was something he could do to fix it. Instead, just as he rounded the front of the vehicle, he caught a glimpse of something down the road. Way past the remains of the burning helicopter, far off in the distance, a trail of dust was rising.

Someone was coming.

Cobb cursed loudly as he retrieved the telescope that McNutt had used earlier and then climbed to the roof’s luggage rack for a better view. As he focused on the billowing stream of dust in the distance, he slowly breathed a sigh of relief.

It wasn’t reinforcements.

It was a commercial truck.

With massive wooden boards surrounding the bed, the Pakistani rig was painted in brilliant reds, greens, and blues. The front of the cab was decorated with more superfluous crap than Cobb had ever seen on a vehicle that wasn’t in a parade: lights, fringe, beads, fluttering fabrics, and carvings in the shape of peacocks. He could also see that the bed was crowded with Muslim men — their beards and taqiyah skullcaps announcing their faith. He reasoned the truck was most likely headed for Kashgar, and then probably on to Gilgit, and maybe even Peshawar.

As far as he was concerned, any of those cities was better than here.

Cobb climbed down and grabbed the M60 from the rear of the Land Cruiser. He stepped onto the asphalt and hoisted the barrel of the machine gun skyward with a single arm, allowing the weight of the weapon to pin his elbow to his side. The pose was meant as a display, not as a threat, and it freed his left arm to flag down the approaching visitors.

Cobb stopped in the middle of the road and waited.

He could clearly see the vehicle speeding toward the ruins of the helicopter. Moments later the truck slowly picked its way around the wreckage and approached the human blockade.

Cobb didn’t move.

He simply stood there and stared.

The driver stopped the truck a hundred feet away. From this distance, the Pakistani was the only man that Cobb could see. All the others were hunkered down in the back, completely out of sight. Were they praying? Getting weapons? Planning an attack?

Cobb didn’t know, but he kept his cool.

He slowly moved his finger to the trigger, just in case.

The driver, who didn’t know what to make of the scary man with the M60, started to whisper to his brothers behind him. At their urging, he called out in his Uyghur dialect.

Cobb countered with a single word. ‘English?’

‘Ah! I can speak!’ a different voice yelled out.

A man’s head popped up in the rear of the truck. He wore a white and blue skullcap over black hair, and his face sported a short beard. Cobb put him at no more than twenty-five.

‘I speak the English good! What you are needing?’

‘I need transport to Kashgar. My friend is hurt.’

The young man’s face darkened as his eyes darted lower, toward where McNutt sat slumped in the interior of the SUV. Cobb could hear the others mumbling to the man in Uyghur and Urdu, but not loudly enough for Cobb to make out any words.

‘Okay,’ the young man said. ‘One moment.’

Then he ducked his head back down behind the headboard of the truck. A heated discussion arose, and occasionally a loud voice would bark something out for the driver’s attention. He routinely answered in monosyllabic grunts or with the word ‘acha’, which Cobb knew to mean ‘good’ in both Hindi and Urdu.

Finally the man popped his head up above the board again. He looked a little sheepish when he spoke, as if bargaining hadn’t been his idea. ‘How much?’

Cobb had been prepared for this. Haggling was a way of life in western Asia, and it stretched well into the interior of China too. ‘I have two hundred American. It’s yours if you get us to Kashgar — but no police or army … Two hundred. That’s all I have.’

Of course, that wasn’t true. Cobb had a few thousand in hundred-dollar bills stashed in watertight bags on his body and a few thousand more in the SUV, but he knew he’d need most of that for a back-alley doctor who wouldn’t ask questions and the rest to cross the border back into Kyrgyzstan.

The negotiator ducked his head down and informed the others of the deal. There was some thoughtful bickering, but no more outright arguing. Cobb took that to mean they would accept the deal. One lone voice still sounded like it wanted more.

There was always a greedy one.

Then he raised his head above the barrier with a sad look. ‘Two hundred? Is all you have? Nothing else? They are wanting baksheesh.’

Cobb knew the word meant ‘gift’, but in practice it was more like a bribe.

He slapped his free hand on the M60. ‘You get the machine gun, too — after you get us to where we need to go.’

The young man’s face erupted into a wide grin, full of genuine joy. He only had a few teeth left, but the smile was the best thing Cobb had seen all day.