Demon (8 page)

He drew a long breath and exhaled slowly. Mike checked his watch. Not even four o'clock yet.

Damn,
he thought.
What a long, fucking miserable day.

Mike sat there for another twenty minutes, stewing and thinking about Greg McDaniel.
“You can't kill this one.” Kill what?

He stopped trying to interpret the words of a dead man from a dream and grabbed the flask and took another swig. Jesus, he was tired but restless. He wanted to participate or sleep. But not here in an alley in An Nasiriyah like some coward waiting for a fight to end.

Part of him didn't want to go anywhere near Basra. Diving into the psychopathic fallout wasn't at the top of his list of things to do in his life. But the other part, that section of him that fed on accomplishing tasks, the same area that didn't mind executing a well-planned kill, wanted to find Henry Prince.

He looked around his car, trying to keep his mind busy. He had nothing to distract him, though. Not even a crossword puzzle. All he had were his thoughts, and all he kept thinking about was Greg McDaniel and finding Henry Prince and ending all this.

“Fuck it,” Mike said.

He started the car and left An Nasiriyah. Mike knew he wouldn't find Prince, but he would be closer to the action. And that would be a hell of a lot better than hanging out like a chickenshit in an alley in An Nasiriyah.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

S
emyaza sat up and looked around him. Tall walls stood on both sides of him. Underneath him was a filthy surface covered in rocks and dirt and debris. All around lay the bodies of dead people.

The soul of his new vessel had fought just as hard as Hank's had, but this time it did not last as long. Semyaza had been prepared, learning its weaknesses quickly. As a result, this vessel did not lose as much internal blood and tissue as Hank. Semyaza had minimized the damage and hoped it would delay the corrosive effects his presence would have on the body. Maybe he could hold on to this one longer than Hank. Maybe he would eventually find a way to maintain a vessel for more than a few days versus a few hours. Maybe.

Do not leap so far ahead,
he thought.

Semyaza reached into the mind of the host, as he had with Hank, and learned another language. This one had spoken Arabic. Much of the other information remained the same: a family he loved, how to drive an automobile, and so on. The religious beliefs differed, though.

He glanced over at the bodies surrounding him, many piled one on top of the other. Mounds of human refuse. Some had been bludgeoned. Others stabbed. Most died clenching crude weapons. Others sharp objects. A few had resorted to using their bare hands. Blood soaked the ground of what he learned was an alley.

Semyaza stood and breathed. The air reeked of death. It held a mix of blood and excrement, folded together in an abominable stench.

The smell overpowering him, Semyaza walked out of the alley and onto a main road. There, more bodies lay.

All around you shall discord rule,
he thought.

Semyaza walked down the main street, past buildings on fire and cars tipped over. More and more bodies lay strewn around him. He stepped over men and women and children, all savagely killed.

He felt nothing for them. It was because of man he was imprisoned. Bound underneath them while the little mud people danced and raped and killed, debating whether they believed in God and whether or not to worship Him. Yet they were superior to Semyaza. He was required to bend the knee.

I will not serve.

Thinking about it made him want to kill more, to employ the vessel's hands and feel the warm blood of a human as he took its life from it.

Patience,
Semyaza thought. First, he had to find living people. The corpses around him served no purpose. If his vessel started to fail, he would need a breathing mud person close by.

Semyaza walked through the sea of bodies toward the other side of Basra. Toward people. Toward a collection of possible new vessels.

Yet so far, his current host seemed to stand up well to his presence. No skin flaked away. Muscles did not deteriorate. It would all dissolve sooner or later, but knowing he could extend his residence pleased him.

Progress,
Semyaza thought.

CHAPTER TWELVE

M
ike made it as far as the cordon outside Basra when he ran into an armed roadblock. He flashed the Jeremiah Hosselkus ID, but it didn't work. The sentries wouldn't let anyone in or out of the city no matter how important the person acted.

“Basra is secured to all personnel.” The sentry had added special emphasis on the
all
, dragging it out for a good second.

Rather than beat a retreat back to An Nasiriyah, Mike pulled the car over a mile away from the roadblock, sat on the hood, and watched. Tanks, troop carriers, and Humvees swarmed the outskirts. Both armed and surveillance helicopters orbited a couple of hundred feet over Basra. Smoke rose from several places in the city, but he couldn't make out what structures burned. He wondered if one of them was his hotel.

As the sun dipped near the horizon, Mike thought about what he should do next. It didn't take long to come to a decision: nothing.

“Mr. Hosselkus,” a voice said. Mike almost didn't respond until some part of his subconscious kicked him in the ass and reminded him someone had just used his alias. He twisted his torso. Gunnery Sergeant Lowe's head jutted out the passenger window of a Humvee.

“Gunny.” Mike pushed off the hood and walked over to Lowe. “What are you doing out here?”

“We were the lead in the search for Henry Prince. Once Basra went ape shit, they pulled us off to help set up roadblocks. Now we're redeploying.”

“Where to?”

“Back to R91.” Lowe spat tobacco juice on the road. “Not much for us to do here. They got enough swinging dicks to surround the city. And I don't want to be here when the exodus starts.”

“Exodus?”

Lowe nodded. “They're evacuating the city.”

“What? I thought the concern was whatever Prince had might spread.”

Lowe looked at him for a while. “What was the last thing you heard?”

“That people started killing each other and Basra was surrounded. No one in or out.”

“Well, the situation has changed. The man-on-man violence seems to have stopped. No one is going crazy and killing each other, according to the eyes in the sky. But looting has started. Several buildings are on fire, and grain warehouses near the port are being picked clean. Now the helos are broadcasting over loudspeakers to evacuate the city.”

Mike looked at Basra in the distance—more smoke rising from new fires.

“So, they're moving people out to save the city?”

“No, they're moving people out to more easily contain them. There are a couple of refugee camps outside Basra. Leftovers from the war. Get the people in the camps, isolate them, and keep an eye on them while checking for any abnormalities.”

“Quarantine.”

“Sure.” Lowe spat again. “But it'll also give us a chance to go in, clean up, and reestablish control before letting anyone back in. Just don't have the manpower to go house to house looking for Prince while also acting as riot police. Remember, we're a visiting force now, not occupiers. Plus, we got dead bodies all over the place. In a few more hours, there are going to be some big health concerns.”

Mike nodded. It would be easier to move the masses into one or two controlled locations. He crunched the numbers in his head. Over two million people lived in Basra. That's a lot of people to stuff in a few refugee camps.

“How many dead?” Mike said.

“A lot.” Lowe's eyes drifted toward the road. “Close to a hundred thousand estimated, based on observations from the air. Don't know about inside buildings yet. There are whole roads covered in bodies.”

Mike rubbed his chin and imagined what a hundred thousand people just lying around dead in the streets might look like. “Jesus.”

“Now you see why a disease outbreak is such a concern.”

“Yeah.”

Mike thought about how his day had started. He'd killed Anwar early in the morning. An isolated hit. A controlled death meant to minimize panic and make sure no innocents ended up dead and only the bad guy paid the price. Now, not even twelve hours later, a good chunk of the city lay slaughtered in the streets. He knew he couldn't have done anything to prevent it but wondered what the point of order was if chaos could so easily reign.

“What are you going to do at R91?” Mike said after a few moments of silence.

Lowe shrugged. “Now that the investigators and lab techs are done with the scene, the bodies are being moved to Camp Bucca for autopsies and further arrangements. Major Greengrass plans to lift that sewer pipe out of the hole. I guess the Iraqi archeology geeks still want to excavate the tomb. First, though, we got to stamp it safe.”

“Who cares? The scene is part of an investigation now. Fuck the geeks.”

Lowe laughed. “Honestly, I think the major wants to go down and see what's in there for himself—see if he can make sense of all this. I doubt he'll find anything to bring closure, but, hey, if it makes him feel better. The guy's had one helluva rough day.”

“I think you all have.” Mike jerked his thumb toward the city. “Just be glad you didn't have to deal with whatever was in that tomb up close.”

Lowe nodded and spat. “Damn skippy on that one. So what are you doing?”

Mike rubbed his hands together. “Nothing. Basra was my base of operations. I got nothing to run to ground. I'm a man without a job right now. Figured I'd just sit here and watch. It's either that or relocate somewhere else where all I'll do is sit and wait. Rather be here and see how all this turns out. Help out if I can.”

“Sounds like a waste of time. If you want, you can come back to R91 with us.”

Mike looked away at Basra again. He thought about how much longer it would be before he could get in. They would be evacuating for at least another day. Then there'd be the cleanup. He knew he could go in then, but what would be the point with no one there? With no intel to follow? Besides, now that he knew the scope of the damage, he wasn't sure he'd ever want to go back to Basra. He wanted to work a case, not chase a human bomb.

This case is over for you,
Mike thought.
Once Glenn's done being distracted with Basra, he'll come back with more people to kill. Might as well enjoy the peace and quiet. If you can call it that.

Either he went with Lowe or he sat back down on the hood and pondered the carnage and why he'd dreamed of Greg McDaniel while waiting for his next mope to kill.

“Sure, I'll go.” Mike turned back to Lowe. “The germ and bug chasers clear the tomb?”

Lowe nodded. “No chemical or biological compounds so far. They'll make another sweep once the pipe is lifted, but if nothing is showing up now, it's pretty much safe. Other than a lot of stale air, whatever was down there didn't leave a trace.”

“Think I could get a peek in that tomb?”

Lowe spat and grinned. “I think we can work something out.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

S
hipmaster Omar Yusuf looked down from the wheelhouse of the merchant vessel
al-Phirosh
at the mob looting the grain warehouse on the pier. A hundred or so people swarmed every side of the sheet-metal building. Dozens ran away with sacks of grain on their shoulders and in their arms. Others, rather than pillage, waited like jackals for the people with sacks to run by. Then they pounced, attacking the thieves and stealing the grain for themselves.

Yusuf shook his head and wondered where the police or American military were. Why had they not come and quelled this insanity? The port had the most protection of any place in southern Iraq, yet now it was left to the devices of a horde of looters. What had happened to cause Basra to turn on itself?

The mob had set fire to several buildings and automobiles in the port. Rather than extinguish them, the authorities retreated and surrounded the oil holding tanks, setting up a perimeter of last defense. That did not last long, though. After a few minutes, the authorities left the tanks to the mob, loaded in their vehicles, and fled the port like frightened rats. Thankfully, the mob did not seem to care about the oil and instead focused on the grain.

Yusuf, as soon as he had seen the first waves of the mob, had secured and lifted the amidships brow and pulled what crew he had on board inside the confines of the ship, leaving only the aft brow for foot traffic. He still had several crewmembers on shore and could only hope they were still alive unharmed and in safe shelter. If they did not have a place to hole up, he prayed they would make it back to the ship before it set sail the next morning.

“Do you really believe we need sentries?”

Yusuf turned from the looting to Alwad. He had not heard his first officer approach him and was surprised to see his grim face only a meter away. The deep scars crisscrossing his forehead and jaw seemed to have grown more cavernous over the last few hours.

“Yes, I do.” Yusuf had posted two deckhands at the foot of the aft brow, armed with Kalashnikovs maintained on board in case of pirate attacks. The seas off the coast of Africa had become overrun with the scum, after all. “You do not?”

“Those idiots would have to make it over or through that fence to get to us. Why deal with razor wire when the warehouses are unprotected? The path of least resistance always wins.”

“True, but I will accept being overcautious. How long have you been standing there anyway?”

“A few minutes.”

Yusuf shifted back to the scene in the port. “This is bad business. Have you heard anything on the radio that might explain what is causing this?”

“No. All they say is there is rioting all over the city. Not one explanation as to why. If this continues, I do not foresee us getting underway tomorrow.”