Battlefield 4: Countdown to War (15 page)

28

Qi’s text with the number and encryption code for Garrison’s secure phone came through. Kovic stared at it for some time. If the
Valkyrie
sent that message about the unusual signal to the NSA, then the Commander would have sanctioned it. What was also on Kovic’s mind was that since it was Garrison who selected the Marines for the mission, he would be wanting answers too. He would have seen the photographs; he would be making the calls home, fielding the questions he couldn’t answer because doubtless Cutler wouldn’t be giving him anything but Agency spin.

But calling him was a risk, breaking his useful cover of being officially dead. And then there was the matter of Garrison’s son, the dedicated young Marine who had died in Afghanistan under Kovic’s command. Garrison’s opinion of him couldn’t get any lower. He could just pick up the phone to Cutler and Kovic would be blown. But if there was anyone else in the world who might share Kovic’s desire for retribution it would be him. And if something happened to him, if this mission failed and he didn’t survive, well then at least there was someone on the US side who could do something with the knowledge other than bury it – which was what Cutler was most likely to do.

It rang only once.

‘Sir, this is Kovic.’

There were several seconds of silence at the other end.

‘Holy mother of fuck. What in goddamn hell’s name are you doing on this line? How come you’re even alive?’

Kovic could hear his sharp angry breaths, the breaths of a 200lb, underslept, sixty-two-year-old naval commander on his sixth cup of coffee, being telephoned on his private cell by the man apparently
responsible for the deaths of six of his Marines, not to mention his own son. He could feel the anger from fifteen hundred miles away. It didn’t feel like nearly far enough.

‘I am deeply, profoundly sorry for the loss of your men, sir.’

‘We’ve been here before, Agent Kovic. Haven’t we?’

More than once, Kovic had tried to contact Garrison after Tommy’s death, but he had refused to take the calls so he had written him a personal note. They had only ever spoken in the run-up to the
Highbeam
mission and Garrison had kept that conversation extremely short.

‘I guess so, sir.’

‘I just got off the phone to Sergeant Olsen’s mother. She wanted me to explain why her son’s corpse is appearing on photo sharing sites and why the US government can’t stop it.’

There wasn’t anything Kovic could say about that so he remained silent. If Garrison needed someone to sound off at, why not him? Whether it would have been any different if someone else had led the mission he couldn’t say, but that was irrelevant now. The Commander was properly warmed up now, a man who would have fielded a hundred questions from the Pentagon and another hundred enquiries from the US Navy’s press office, trying to nuance a statement that wouldn’t increase America’s humiliation any more than absolutely necessary – while the CIA stayed silent.

‘Do you want to tell me how come you’re alive? Your boss thinks you’re dead.’

If that was what Cutler was saying, fine.

‘It may only be a matter of time, once the people who killed your men find out I’m still in circulation.’

He explained about the fire and Louise.

‘That’s some track record you have for dodging bullets. What makes you think I won’t pick up the phone and tell Cutler you’re out there?’

‘Because my guess, sir, is that you are as suspicious as I am about what really happened, that whatever explanation Cutler gave you it left as many questions as it answered.’

Garrison was silent while he processed this. A good sign.

‘You ran into a DPRK patrol. The CIA is holding you responsible, you aware of that? As far as they’re concerned,
you
screwed up.’

‘I believe it’s a lot more complicated than that, sir.’

He let out a long sigh. ‘Do I want to hear it?’

‘The short version is we were blown. They knew we were coming. Either it was a set-up from the start, or there was a leak and they ambushed us. Either way the intel was contaminated. Whichever it was, it falls on Langley’s shoulders. So that guarantees only one thing.’

‘What?’

‘You’ll never get the truth from them.’

‘And what are you going to do about that?’

‘I’m going to ask for your help.’

‘Kovic, I’ll say one thing for you. You’ve got one fuck of a lot of chutzpah.’

‘I have a name.’

He told him about Tsu and his plan to find him. Saying it out loud, it sounded preposterous and they both knew it.

‘You’re right, you need help all right but I’m no psychiatrist.’

He could feel Garrison wanting to hang up.

‘Your ship reported an unusual signal to the NSA.’

‘How do you know this?’

‘The signal went from the NK border to somewhere in the Chinese interior.’ He quoted the grid reference. ‘That location is Tsu’s mountain HQ. He’s our man, sir. I’m going to ask you if your people can look out for any similar signals – capture coordinates for the origin and destination of each dispatch. We may not crack the content but where they’re going might tell us something.’

‘You’re clutching at straws here, Kovic.’

‘Straws are all I have right now.’

‘And that includes my private family cell number.’

‘Yes, sir, and I’m going to need you to take the SIM card out and destroy it after we’re done.’

‘Oh, I think we’re done.’

The line went dead.

29

Seven Hours West of Shanghai

‘Kovic, wake up. There’s a problem.’

Wu, at the wheel, was slowing down.

In the back next to Qi, Kovic woke grudgingly from a deep and grateful sleep.

‘Big or small?’

‘Could be big. There’s a checkpoint up ahead. They’re searching vehicles.’

Qi shut the laptop and slid it into the compartment under the front seat.

‘Army or police?’

‘Neither. These guys don’t seem to have any insignia.’

‘Welcome to Tsu’s fiefdom.’

An hour before they had turned off the Hangrui Expressway that taken them almost due west from Shanghai. As it curved south they left the smooth freshly laid blacktop and turned north on to progressively less well tended roads, hemmed in by thick forest, with the first peaks of the Huangshan mountains rising behind.

They took their place in a line of vehicles, mostly trucks and minibuses. Inside the cab, each of them prepared for their first encounter with a potentially hostile authority. Wu and Zhou were dressed in blue work overalls. Their story was that they were coming to provide Wu’s ‘aunt’ Mrs Chen with a much-needed running water system and connection to the municipal drains. Mrs Chen was one of Kovic’s former assets who had retired to her home village inside Tsu’s territory. In the back of the pickup were pipes, U-bends, spanners – even a toilet; everything needed to convince even the most suspicious guard that they were genuine plumbers. Qi’s cover was that he was a student who had missed the bus taking his class to
the mountains for a field trip and was having to hitch-hike. His story would account for the climbing gear. He had also created the necessary paperwork for each of them.

As for Kovic, he was Ray Nyman, physical instructor, former Special Forces operative and now freelance security contractor. For the Chinese authorities, Africa was a neutral place where their country was doing lots of business and was zero threat. To smooth the way he also had a hundred thousand Yuan on him, some of it sewn into his clothes.

When they pulled up it was almost dark, slanting rain running down the windshield. From somewhere up the line came the sounds of a scuffle and shouts of ‘
On the ground, now!
’ which didn’t bode well.

‘Better get in the coffin,’ said Wu. ‘Sounds like they’re in a bad mood. Don’t think they’ll take kindly to a foreign face.’

The least enjoyable part of Kovic’s training at the Farm had been abduction survival, specifically being confined in cramped spaces like the trunk of a car and driven to other parts of the grounds to be yelled at and accused of being an infidel, imperialist CIA pig and so forth at wearisome length. He could stand extreme levels of interrogation, but the being shut in a trunk part brought him out in a cold sweat. He never admitted it, naturally, or he would have failed that part of the course, rendering him ineligible for the best postings. And in all his tours he had never had to do it for real. He hadn’t bargained on having to do it in China, with his own team.

In the cab of the Great Wall Wingle, Wu’s cousin had installed a hidden compartment under the rear seat. Qi’s surveillance kit went into it, along with the semi-automatic QB-88 sniper rifle with telescopic and night sights that Kovic had procured for Wu, plus four QSZ-92 pistols. And now, so did Kovic.

Wu called it the ‘coffin,’ a word Kovic wished he hadn’t bothered to teach him, but which Wu found hilarious.

‘Think of it as payback time,’ suggested Qi.

‘For what?’

‘In advance, for what you are making us do.’

Qi lifted the seat and Kovic got in. It was hot, dark and stank of
diesel and fresh spray paint. Thoughtfully the cousin had added two air holes.

‘How many of them can you see?’ Kovic said from his hideout.

‘Only two, plus a small minibus, empty. Looks like they’re just making it clear who’s boss.’

‘They heavy looking types?’

‘You planning on taking them on?’

‘If they’re gonna give us a hard time, we may have to. Their uniforms might come in useful – and the bus. If Wu can let go of his Wingle.’

It was crass and childish, but it took his mind off being folded up into the equivalent of a carry-on bag.

‘They’re armed,’ said Zhou. ‘One’s got a Hawk semi-automatic slung over his shoulder. The other’s just taken a revolver out of its holster.’

Mrs Chen had already warned Kovic what to expect from the local police, that the chief was effectively Tsu’s puppet and ran the force like a private army on his behalf.

‘They are bullies,’ she had warned him, ‘but since this is China, they should respond to cash.’

‘Okay, the people they searched are moving on. They’re starting on the car in front.’

‘The driver’s passed his ID out the window,’ said Zhou. ‘They’re opening the trunk.’ He started to laugh.

‘What’s going on?’ The coffin was heating up and he could feel his balls sticking together like badly packed fruit.

‘Three goats. In the trunk. Oh, now they’re pulling the driver out. He’s waving his papers. The cop’s just ripped them out of his hands. And the goats are trying to escape!’

There were three sharp cracks, and then silence. These weren’t your average officious cops.

‘Goat stew anyone?’

‘I think we need to be very, very careful here,’ said Qi.

The shocked driver was pushed back into his seat and waved on. The cop holstered his revolver.

Wu moved forward and stopped by the outstretched hand of the
cop who had done the shooting. He passed out the papers for all three of them.

‘From outside the district.’

The cop’s face was frozen with disapproval.

Wu went into overdrive. Despite the unpleasantness of his confinement, Kovic couldn’t help smiling at his refusal to be cowed by bureaucracy – even when it came with a gun.

‘My aunt is much respected in Fenju, and it is a matter of concern to the community that a person of her standing does not have proper sanitation.’

‘Shut up, I don’t give a shit about that.’

‘No, listen. She said that if we had any problem we should insist on speaking to the Superintendent. ’

Kovic could hear more trucks pulling up behind. With any luck this might induce them to lose interest and move them on.

‘Stop talking. Pull over here and get out – all of you.’

Wu continued to remonstrate while doing what he was told. Kovic wondered how long this was going to take. Already he was finding it difficult to breathe and the fumes were giving him a raging headache.

‘Okay. Easy now, guys, let’s keep it cool,’ Kovic whispered, more to himself than anyone else. This was Tsu’s private army – answerable only to him. A dead goat or a dead man wasn’t going to cause a fuss round here. While Wu kept up his barrage of indignation, Zhou gave Kovic a whispered commentary.

‘They are both young, one with the semi looks quite weak, bad acne too. They’re examining all the pipes in the back.’

Kovic could feel the equipment being rearranged, uncomfortably close by.

‘Careful with those, don’t get them scratched.’

Wu sounded suitably indignant. The guard showed his contempt by dropping something hard that banged an inch from Kovic’s ear.

Qi, who had said nothing so far, now piped up.

‘Would it be permissible to make a supplementary payment in order to expedite the processing of our papers?’

Nicely put, thought Kovic. Prison had rubbed some of Qi’s natural arrogance off him.

Kovic could hear fumbling, and a safety catch coming off. So much for ‘a soft answer turneth away wrath’, but then the Bible never was much of a training manual.

‘Stay where you are! Attempting to bribe an officer is an extremely serious offence! You will accompany us to our headquarters.’

The way this was going, Kovic thought he might as well have stayed in his seat where at least he would have been more use, and been able to breathe.

‘Get in the vehicle – all of you in the front where we can see you. You will drive to our headquarters now! Feng, in the back with me where we can watch them.’

Shit, thought Kovic. The good news is we’re going in; the shit news is I’m still under the goddamn seat. Wu fired up the engine, the fan blasting Kovic with hot air through his breathing holes. At this rate he wouldn’t make it to headquarters. He tried to visualise the map, and calculate how far they were from the mountain. Where their base was he had no idea. He was going to die of asphyxiation in this improvised tomb, with two assholes on top of him – literally.

Wu was driving fast – figuring that the sooner they got where they were going the sooner Kovic could get out. Kovic felt the tail slide on some gravel, which was followed by a sharp rebuke from above him and a hard slap.

‘Don’t drive so fast.’

Kovic had had enough. He scrabbled around, feeling for the weapons. He could feel himself becoming hazy, intoxicated by the heat, and the fumes. His hand closed round one of the QSZs, and he tried to move his head as far away from it as possible while he took aim.