Demon (12 page)

How are we ever going to govern our country if we run away every time there is a problem?
Yusuf thought and shook his head.

After dwelling on it a moment longer, Yusuf chased the thoughts and disappointment away and focused on the task at hand. He had to keep a speed of fifteen knots until they entered the gulf. Then they would come up to twenty knots and head for the Strait of Hormuz. It would take a little over a day to clear the Arabian Gulf, and then they would turn southwest for a ten-day transit to South Africa.

Yusuf rubbed his eyes and yawned as he considered the voyage ahead and the long day he had experienced. He would stay in the wheelhouse until they reached the gulf. Then he would turn the watch over to Alwad and try to sleep.

“W
e need figs,” the ship's cook said.

“How many?” Sayid said.

“Just bring a whole box.”

Sayid washed his hands, dried them, and walked out of the galley. As he moved through the steam emanating from the scullery to his left, he fanned it away from his face.

“We need figs,” Sayid said. “Fetch them.”

He had taken the position as cook's assistant because, like everyone on the crew, he needed the money. Unlike everyone else, though, Sayid had a tough time swallowing his pride. A former member of the Republican Guard, Sayid had sunk from a life of authority to one of desperation. He had tried to land a position in the new Iraqi army but had been rejected by the Shiite majority. They said it was because of his ties to the old regime, but Sayid knew it was because he was Sunni. When he applied for the national police, the same thing happened.

“We need rice, Sayid.” He walked the length of a passageway and through a door. “Be a good dog and bring a sack up.”

Sayid had held several jobs on oil wells and pipelines only to lose them and see the work contracted to foreigners from Russia and China. Those he did not lose to competition, he lost to fear. Once they learned of his past, he was let go. They had to take precautions in case he might be tied to an insurgent group. Cowards, all of them.

Outside the refrigerator, Sayid clenched his fists as thoughts of pummeling the cook raced around his head. Then thoughts of his wife and children took their place. His anger abated. His temper calmed. His fists relaxed.

“You must endure this humiliation,” Sayid said. “For them.”

Sayid reached out and grabbed the handle and opened the refrigerator. The door swung open and cold air hit his bare arms and face, raising gooseflesh. The contrast to the heat of the kitchen was refreshing.

He stepped in and started looking across the shelves for figs. His eyes passed over an assortment of fruits and vegetables. Milk. Soft drinks and juices.

The figs resided in a small crate under the bottom shelf. Sayid lifted it and turned to leave when he heard what sounded like a marble hit the floor behind him. Then he heard several more, as if a bag of dry beans had spilled from one of the shelves.

Sayid turned and took two quick steps backward. The crate fell from his hands. The figs scattered across the floor.

A corpse sat on the floor, its back against the far wall. The skin and muscle had peeled off the arms and hands and neck. Most of its face was skeletal except the muscles around the cheekbones. The ears had fallen off. Its eyes had dissolved. The teeth dropped from its mouth. He realized the noise he had heard was teeth hitting the floor.

Sayid was transfixed by the sight; he was frozen in place. He knew he had to report it but could not tear his gaze away. It was not the first dead body he had seen, yet he had never seen one in such an alarming state of decomposition.

What happened to this man?
Sayid thought.
And how did he end up in here?

It was then, while he tried to find the ability to break his stare, the body moved. It happened fast, and Sayid had not the time to react. It raised its arms toward him, its skeletal fingers outstretched. Its head turned, and the vacant sockets locked on him.

He tried to scream and run, but something stabbed him. It hit him in the back and ripped up his spine. Sayid collapsed. His brain folded on itself. Every one of his muscles convulsed.

His vision failed and the world went dark. He tried to pray but could not form words.

Then his breathing ceased, and Sayid's grip on his life failed.

O
n the deck above the refrigerator unit, two stewards swabbing a berthing compartment attacked each other, beating each other with their mops. One cracked the handle across the head of the other and then ran the broken and jagged end into the chest, right of the sternum.

The survivor watched the other man twitch on the ground, blood spreading out below him. He looked around for another to kill, but the compartment was empty.

He gripped the mop handle and yanked it from the corpse's chest. He turned the splintered end toward his face, opened his mouth, and drove it through the back of his head.

O
n the deck below the refrigerator unit, an engineer dropped his clipboard with tank readings on it and sprinted across the deck plates toward another man taking similar readings. He prepared to launch himself toward the man when his mind suddenly cleared, as if a mysterious dense fog had lifted.

The engineer froze and looked around him, not sure what had happened or where he was. He rubbed his head.

“What just happened?” the other man said, rubbing his head much the same way.

“I do not know.”

“C
aptain.”

Yusuf turned from the gyrocompass he had been reading to his second officer. “Yes, Feisal.”

“We just received a call from the ship's cook.”

“Let me guess: he forgot to order cumin before departing.”

Feisal leaned in closer and whispered, “We have a fatality.”

Yusuf's back straightened, and he immediately wondered if whatever had broken out in Basra had made it on board. “Where?”

“Refrigerator unit number one. It . . . it . . . I do not know how to describe it. What he said is ridiculous.”

“What did he say?”

“That there is a human skeleton in the refrigerator.”

Yusuf tried to make sense of what he had just heard. “A skeleton?”

“Yes, Captain. The cook has secured the refrigerator and is not letting anyone enter in case it is the same substance that caused the riots in Basra.”

“Feisal, you have the deck. I will go down and see this for myself.”

“Captain, what if it is contaminated?”

Yusuf shook his head. “I did not hear any reports of people turning to skeletons in Basra. We will take all necessary precautions, but I want to hear the cook's report firsthand.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

T
he first mortar hit the Humvee, turning the armored car into an inferno. The sound of the explosion ruptured Mike's left tympanic membrane, causing temporary deafness. The concussion that followed immediately brought on rapid disorientation and a loss of oxygen. Metal chunks shredded the air over his head. The heat of the flames singed him even though he lay twenty feet away.

The screams of Marines burning alive sounded far away and underwater. Mike ignored them and forced large gulps of smoke-filled air into his lungs. He coughed and puked bile and whiskey.

It took a few seconds for him to regain his bearings. Breathing normally took a little longer. His eyes adjusted to the flame-filled night. He couldn't hear anything with his left ear, and everything coming to the right sounded muffled. What he heard was a firefight.

Mike rolled onto his hip and saw Marines unleashing solid bursts of fire into the night. Lowe walked up and down the firing lines, yelling out orders. The insurgents returned fire. Site R91 was a battlefield.

He yanked his knife from his pocket, flipped the blade, and sliced a small strip from his shirt and then cut it in half. After he wadded the sections, Mike stuffed them as far as he could into his ears and then put the knife away.

Mike held his Beretta close to his chest. To his right he heard dampened screams through breaks in the gunfire. He looked. Greengrass lay on his back, his hands clutching at his stomach. A corpsman knelt beside him, treating the injury.

Another series of mortars exploded all around them, sending sand and shrapnel flying in all directions. More screams cut the night air. Mike's ears rang and the shouts of pain sounded far away.

He pushed up to a crouched position and moved toward the nearest firing line. As he did, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye. He pivoted and dropped to one knee, Beretta extended and both hands ready to fire. Two insurgents moved in fast, sprinting toward the site, trying to outflank the left firing line.

Mike aimed and fired. The nearest one's head rocked back and his body hit the ground. Mike shifted his aim, sighted the second man still running at full speed, and squeezed the trigger. Another head shot.

A mortar exploded close by. The ground shook and Mike fell forward. His left hand braced him, keeping him from hitting the ground. As he did, he saw another insurgent running at full speed, AK-47 firing on full automatic. Mike dropped all the way to the ground, pivoted to a sitting position, and squeezed off three shots in rapid succession. All three shots hit the man in the torso: one in the chest and two in the stomach.

Mike didn't see any more insurgents advancing on the left flank. He turned his attention toward the front line. All the Marines, probably forty in all, unloaded their M16s on what remained of the attackers.

The mortars stopped falling. Mike moved to a kneeling position, the Beretta pointing forward, and waited, scanning from side to side for any more insurgents.

The firefight moved from full-on battle to intermittent firing to silence. The smell of cordite and blood and shit blended together like a quilt that blanketed the desert. Screams and cries and even whimpers saturated the air.

Around him Mike counted several Marines on the ground, dead. Others jerked and yelled as corpsmen treated their wounds. Greengrass lay to one side, his stomach covered in battle dressing.

Mike walked over to Greengrass and knelt beside him. The major was alive but unconscious. An M had been written on his forehead in black marker. He'd been given morphine to kill the pain.

“He's got shrapnel in his stomach,” a corpsman said.

Mike turned to him and pulled the wads of shirt from his ears. “Is he going to make it?”

“Should. We've got air evac en route.”

“How many dead?”

“Of us? Looks like ten, counting the sentries. Seven more injured. You're bleeding, by the way.”

The corpsman pointed at Mike's side. He looked down. Blood seeped through his shirt and ran down his right thigh. He didn't feel any pain until he touched underneath his ribcage and found the wound. He winced.

“You need to get that looked at,” the corpsman said.

Mike looked from him to the firing line where Lowe had been commanding the defense.

“Shit,” Mike said.

“I said you need treatment.”

“Not now, Doc.”

“Fine. I got other people to tend to. Excuse me.” The corpsman walked off.

Mike stood and walked over to Lowe's body. The gunnery sergeant had a hole through his throat and another wound to his chest. Blood dotted his face. His eyes were closed.

Rubbing his mouth, Mike cursed. He'd just been talking to the guy. Now he was dead, the victim of some random attack.

Mike rose and looked around him.
Some random attack,
he thought.

He heard screaming in Arabic. Mike walked to the noise and found two Marines pointing their rifles at an insurgent squirming on the ground. Blood poured from wounds to the bastard's shoulder, stomach, and leg. A different corpsman stood to the side, ready to treat the injuries; but the Marines held him at bay.

“I need to look to those wounds, or he's going to die,” the corpsman said.

“You can fix him when we get some fucking answers,” the Marine on the right said.

“Who the fuck are you, Haji?” the Marine on the left said, the barrel of his M16 pressed against the insurgent's forehead.

The guy responded in vowels and cries of pain.

Mike walked to the closest Marine. “Let me talk to him.”

“Who the fuck are you?”

“CIA,” Mike said. “I can ask him questions you can't.”

“Like what?”

Mike pulled out his Spyderco knife and flipped the blade open and looked directly at the insurgent. “All kinds of stuff not subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice.”

The Marine looked at Mike, his knife, and then the insurgent. “Uh, sure. We'll just back up some.” He smacked his comrade pressing the barrel against the survivor's head. “Back off, man. This guy's CIA.”

The other Marine did as told.

“He's going to die unless I treat him,” the corpsman said.

“With that amount of blood loss,” Mike said, “I'd say he's going to die even if you do treat him.”

The corpsman held up his hands. “I want no part of this.”

“Then leave.”

The corpsman left. Mike moved forward and squatted in front of the insurgent.

“Who are you?” Mike said in Arabic.

The man didn't speak and refused to make eye contact with Mike.

Mike moved the knife toward him, the blade a few inches from his face. “Who are you?”

“I am no one,” the man said.

“You're about to be a dead no one. Why are you here?”

No answer.

Mike took the knife and dug it into the wound in the man's leg. He screamed and wretched.

“Why are you here?”

The insurgent took deep breaths. “To stop you.”

“Stop what?”

Again no answer.

Mike pushed the blade deeper into his thigh. “Stop what?”

The man screamed until Mike pulled the blade out. Between rapid breaths the man said, “The prison. We came to stop you from opening the prison.”