Finding North (54 page)

“
Yes, sir,” MJ
said.

He shot the Boy Scout full
of amphetamines. The Boy Scout came around with a jolt. He started
screaming for his lawyer.

“
You’re no longer in the
UK,” Matthew said.

Startled, the Boy Scout
looked at Matthew.

“
You’re in the first class
accommodations of the Central Intelligence Agency,” Matthew
said.

The Boy Scout became
eerily quiet. Matthew let the silence drag.

“
Where?” the Boy Scout
asked.

“
Afghanistan,” Matthew
said.

The Boy Scout started
screaming for his friend. Rather than blow the work of MI-6, they
let the Boy Scout scream. After a few minutes, he stopped
screaming. They waited. Matthew cleared his throat, and the Boy
Scout attacked. The shackles and ties held him down. Joseph pushed
him back into his seat and held his handgun to the Boy Scout’s
head.

“
We have a few questions,”
Matthew said. “We don’t really care how we get the
answers.”

He nodded to the one-way
glass. The light went on in the room behind, showing a
sophisticated interrogation room. The room was set up for every
form of “advanced interrogation.”

“
In fact,” Matthew said.
“I don’t think I’d be over-stating it, but most of us would like to
see you strapped to a car battery.”

“
Water boarded,” Raz said
with a snort.

The Fey Team played along
by nodding their heads.

“
Prove it,” the Boy Scout
said.

Leena took out a knife and
sliced off his right earlobe. The Boy Scout screamed. MJ came in to
sprinkle anti-coagulant on the wound. He left without bandaging
it.

“
Your family has been told
that you are gravely ill,” Matthew said. He nodded to
Joseph.

“
Full-blown AIDS,” Joseph
said.

“
YOU CAN’T DO THAT!” the
Boy Scout screamed.

“
Mmm,” Matthew nodded. “I
think we already have. You see . . .”

Matthew looked at the Boy
Scout.

“
No one knows you’re
here,” Matthew said. “No one cares if you disappear forever. You’re
in prison for the rest of your life. If we make you a eunuch, who
would know?”

A flicker of fear flashed
across the Boy Scout’s eyes before he sniggered. His entire
presence exuded arrogance.

Alex’s stomach dropped.
Something was wrong.

Chapter
Thirty-seven

She slipped out of the
room and sent Margaret inside. The sound of Alex’s boots echoed off
the concrete floors as she paced back and forth.

Had they been sold
out?

Had someone on her team
betrayed this mission?

Jesse appeared in front of
her.

“
What’s going on?” Jesse
asked in Spanish.

“
Feeling,” Alex
said.

“
Of?” Jesse
asked.

“
He’s ready for this,”
Alex whispered. “Expected it, even.”

“
That makes sense,” Jesse
said. “He would have expected us to come to ask him
questions.”

Alex shook her
head.

“
What’s going on?” MJ
asked.

She’d forgotten he was
standing outside the interview door.

“
Nothing,” she smiled and
nodded.

“
Were you talking to
Jesse?” MJ asked.

“
Uh,” Alex
said.

“
Dad’s journals and shit
said that the only reason Dad survived so long in the field was
because of your ‘feelings,’” MJ said. “You just said that word —
feeling. What’s going on?”

“
Just a feeling,” Alex
shrugged.

“
Of what?” Jesse
asked.

“
Did he say something?” MJ
asked.

“
He asked me what I was
feeling,” Alex said. She walked away from MJ and Jesse. “I have the
feeling that . . . he expected us to be here,
planned for it . . .”

Alex nodded and turned
around.

“
He’s always so
self-assured,” Alex said. “Confident . . . He was
afraid, just for a second, like . . .
like . . .”

“
He’s already given up his
life,” Jesse said.

“
We need to get out of
here,” Alex said. “Now.”

MJ tapped three times on
the door. The Fey Team quickly filed out of the room.

“
What’s going on?” Joseph
asked.

“
He’s already given up his
life,” Alex nodded.

“
Fuck,” Matthew said. “How
do we get out of here?”

“
Sergeant?” Joseph
attempted to raise the desk Sergeant on the ear bud communicator.
“Sergeant, are you there?”

“
Anything?” Alex
asked.

Joseph shook his head.
They ran to the elevator. The elevator cars were open on their
level, and they filed in.

“
They aren’t going to
work,” Jesse said.

James pressed the buttons
and nothing happened. The elevators were locked open. James called
to the operative playing the Boy Scout’s friend. When he didn’t
respond, James and Troy ran down the hallway.

“
Shit, shit, shit,”
Matthew said. “God-damned Boy Scout.”

“
Don’t panic,” Alex said.
“Sergeant Dusty?”

Troy and James returned
with the news that the operative who was playing Idrisov was dead.
His throat had been cut probably around the time they’d taken the
Boy Scout. The soldiers looked at each other. They had been
together the entire time they’d been on this level. They were
supposed to be the only people in this part of the
facility.

“
There’s a stairwell
over . . .” Sergeant Dusty turned in place in the
elevator landing. “There.”

He pointed to an unmarked
door. He went to the door. It was welded closed. Sergeant Dusty’s
hand ran down the weld. He nodded.

“
Troy?” Alex asked.
“Leena?”

They shot down the
surveillance cameras with their handguns.

“
Cliff?” Sergeant Dusty
asked.

Cliff was already digging
in this backpack. He took out a portable plasma cutter and a pair
of dark glasses. Sergeant Dusty plugged in the plasma
cutter.

“
No one ever checks
pilots,” Alex said to James.

She nodded to Cliff, and
he started cutting into the door. He was able to easily cut a panel
out of the first layer of the steel door. He’d almost finished the
second layer when the power went out.

“
Zack?” Alex
asked.

He took a small
sledgehammer out of his backpack and banged at the panel. The metal
shattered and they were able to get inside the stairwell. The team
started moving into the stairwell.

“
Zack?” Alex
asked.

“
USAF command says two
bombers are inbound to this location,” Zack said.

“
How did
he . . .?” Margaret started.

“
Power’s off,” Sergeant
Dusty said. “The facility blocks all communication with the
outside. That’s why we have their ear buds. It must have gone down
when the power went out.”

“
How much time do we
have?” Alex asked.

“
Ten minutes, max,” Zack
said. “The entire base is slated for decimation. Rigged to blow in
ten minutes. They had a report that we’d left with the remaining
prisoners. The go-ahead was given by the desk Sergeant fifteen
minutes ago.”

“
When we had the Boy Scout
in the infirmary,” Matthew said.

“
They’ve started the
launch and sent two B52s,” Zack said.

“
How did we not know
this?” Alex’s voice rose with fury.

“
Messenger!” Zack
said.

“
Up,” Alex
ordered.

“
Count the stairs!”
Sergeant Dusty yelled. “We need to go exactly thirty
stairs.”

Troy and Matthew took the
lead and began to count. Their voices echoed around the concrete
stairwell. The team followed, with Joseph, Raz, and Alex in the
back.

“
Thirty!”

They heard Sergeant Dusty
say something. There was banging on the wall. By the time they got
there, Colin had taken over the sledgehammer, and there was a
sizable hole in the wall. The team was ferrying pieces of concrete
away from the small space of the thirtieth step. Joseph took over
from Colin.

“
What are we doing?” Zack
asked.

“
We’re connecting into the
Afghan tunnel system,” Alex said. “How many headlamps do we
have?”

The team went through
their pockets and packs.

“
They were created during
the war with Russia,” Sergeant Dusty said. “We just have to get out
of the blast radius. This tunnel will take us to Kabul.”

“
How do you know this?” MJ
asked.

“
Four headlamps,” Matthew
said.

“
Pass them out so we have
one at front, middle, and end,” Alex said.

“
I was on the tunnel crew
my first tour here,” Sergeant Dusty smiled. “We mapped the entire
system. Most of the tunnels aren’t used. A few of them up in the
mountains are a real pain in the ass.”

“
I thought that was a
Marine team,” Margaret said.

“
Clearly not,” Joseph said
and gave the sledgehammer to Raz.

Raz took a turn pounding
on the rock wall behind the concrete. Within minutes, they were
looking at the side of a thin tunnel.

“
Go!” Alex
said.

Sergeant Dusty went first,
and Alex followed. The rest of the Fey Team squeezed into the small
tunnel behind them. With just enough space to belly-crawl, the
tunnel seemed to go straight up toward the surface. They moved at a
fast, aerobic pace and were soon covered in sweat and dirt. They
were nearly a half-mile away and only a foot or two from the
surface when they heard the deep rumble of the black site
exploding.

The shock wave knocked
them onto their bellies. Alex hunched her back and tucked her head
to keep falling rocks and dirt from injuring her. Her mouth and
nose filled with dust and smoke. She felt the shock wave ripple
through the mountain. With each wave, the sand and rock shifted
around her. She covered her mouth with Vince’s scarf, but every
breath sucked more dirt into her lungs.

The smaller blasts were
followed by one large, earth-shattering blast. For a moment, Alex
felt the dizziness she’d felt before when her head was out of
whack. She closed her eyes. When she opened them, she wasn’t seeing
double anymore.

“
Report!” Joseph
screamed.

Raz scrambled to Alex to
make sure she was all right. She touched his face and felt him
smile.

“
Fey and Rasmussen,” Raz
said.

“
Dusty,” he
chuckled.

“
Leena’s legs are in a
cave-in!” Margaret screamed.

“
My arm’s probably
broken,” Colin said.

“
Margaret, it’s going to
have to be you,” Alex said. “Can you get her out?”

“
The tunnel fell in,”
Margaret said. “The rest of the team is behind her.”

“
That’s okay,” Alex
said.

“
We are elite soldiers,”
Joseph said. “We can handle this.”

Alex put her hand on
Sergeant Dusty’s leg. He turned around to look at her, and his
headlamp shone in her face. She pushed him forward and nodded. He
continued on through the tunnel.

“
Colin, can you bind your
arm?” Alex asked.

“
Done,” Colin said.
“Margaret and Leena are right behind me.”

“
Is she responsive?” Alex
asked.

“
Margaret
is . . .” Colin started.

“
I’m here,” Leena
said.

“
Yea!” Alex cheered.
Joseph and Raz joined her.

“
She thinks she’s
reinjured her knee,” Colin said. “She can feel her toes. She says
that Troy was right behind her. He’s tickling her
calves.”

“
That’s wonderful news,”
Alex said. “Do we know anything about the rest of the
team?”

“
Wait,” Colin said. “She
says Troy’s tapping out Morse code on her legs.”

“
She says they’re alive,”
Margaret yelled. “James is injured but not badly.
And . . .”

“
Shit,” Colin
said.

“
What?” Alex
asked.

“
There was a cave-in,”
Margaret said. “They’ve captured Zack and Cliff.”

“
Shit,” Alex
said.

She looked ahead to see
Sergeant Dusty’s headlamp coming back in her direction. At the same
time, she heard the sound of shovels digging overhead. She directed
Sergeant Dusty to stop and pointed up. He looked up and nodded. He
retreated further down the tunnel.

“
What do you want to do?”
Joseph asked.

“
I don’t think we have a
choice,” Alex said. “We need to . . .”