They waited for the guards to start another loop, then Mac followed Didge down to an area by the fence where they were partially unsighted to the main entry guard house.
‘You’re clear, boys,’ crackled Robbo’s voice over the radio headsets.
Mac followed Didge to the fence, grabbed four chunks of cuscus meat and threw them onto the grass on the other side.
Moving back to Robbo, they waited for the guards to do their tour. Darkness was settling as the guards walked the near fence, smoking. The German shepherd tried to lurch at one of the chunks of meat as the guards passed it, but he couldn’t reach and was wrenched back into line.
‘Dammit,’ snarled Didge.
The guards kept to their route and Mac prayed the dog would notice the baits that Didge threw. But then the guards stopped, lighting cigarettes, while the talkative one remonstrated.
‘Are these people going to talk all night?’ whispered Robbo. ‘It’s like a bloody sewing circle down there.’
The guards moved on and, as they settled back into their rhythm, the shepherd suddenly lurched to his right, snapped at a bait with flashing teeth, and was back in line before the handler could tug at him.
‘Sleep tight,’ said Robbo.
Robbo talked them through the final instructions: Mitch and Beast were covering the fence lines with supporting fire should the need arise, while Johnno was going to access the main switchboard for the facility and see if he could disable the security camera systems. Didge was going into the facility with Mac, while Toolie played babysitter.
Going through final prep for the gig, Mac listened to Robbo give the various contingencies and warnings. There was a chance that the radios wouldn’t operate underground, so they agreed on a sixty-minute shutdown for the gig. If Didge and Mac weren’t out of there in under an hour, the rest of 63 Recon would do the Harold.
As Didge checked and rechecked his B amp;E gear, Robbo’s tone of voice changed.
‘What the fuck’s that?’ he hissed.
Mac followed Robbo’s gaze through his field-glasses to the main block of the compound.
‘ Shit!’ muttered Mac when he saw what Robbo was looking at. Three people were standing in front of the main loading bay, illuminated by floodlights and all dressed in white NIOSH-10 clothing – better known as biohazard suits.
‘What the fuck is this, McQueen?’ snarled Robbo, still looking through the glasses. ‘What is this place?’
‘You know, vaccines and -’
‘Vaccines?’ rasped Robbo.
‘Look,’ said Mac, voice soothing. ‘It may be nothing, we’re just checking -’
‘What is this fucking place?’ demanded Robbo, slow and threatening.
Though he realised it didn’t look good, Mac tried to hold firm. ‘It’s classified, Robbo.’
Robbo planted his hands on his hips, his face furious.
‘Okay,’ said Mac, trying to lighten it. ‘It’s officially vaccine research, but there’s an undeclared area underground, okay? It’s probably a drug lab.’
‘Vaccines? Are you fucking kidding me?!’
‘Look -’
‘It’s just a place where they grow diseases, McQueen!’ said Robbo.
‘Yeah, I know, mate,’ said Mac. ‘It’s the underground facility we’re interested in.’
‘Oh, now I feel better,’ said Robbo sarcastically. ‘When were you going to tell me? Huh?’ said Robbo, tapping Mac in the chest. ‘You don’t think I have the right to warn my own men about walking into a place like this?’
‘I’ve got two masks, gloves for Didge -’
Robbo looked Mac in the eye. ‘You were going to tell Didge when? When you got the top off the fucking ventilator?’
That was precisely what Mac had intended, though he decided not to say so.
‘Sorry, mate,’ said Mac. ‘That’s the gig.’
‘That’s the gig?’ demanded Robbo. ‘You mean, if the dumb soldiers knew where they were taking you, we might find a way not to get there?’
Mac just shrugged.
Sighing, Robbo gave Didge a look and then turned back to Mac. ‘Why is it, McQueen, that all of you spooks are just total fuckers?’
CHAPTER 44
The army trucks continued transporting people out of the facility as Mac cased the campus from behind the middle ventilator. After the flare-up about vaccines and diseases, Mac was leaving the topic alone with Didge. Mac harboured his own fears about scientists playing with diseases, but his objective was to infiltrate the underground section of Lombok – the fact that it could be a drug lab was only very small comfort.
The paddock area had been dog-free for twenty minutes thanks to the Xanax baits and the five floodlights around the paddock were weak enough to create darkness around the ventilators.
After a concerted effort, Didge loosened the final screw on the circular vent cover and he and Mac lifted it off in silence, placing it quietly on the grass beside the vent.
‘Cap off, Blue Leader. How we doing on the circuit boards?’ asked Mac over the headset.
‘Standing by, Albion,’ said Robbo, cool but professional. ‘We’re in – gonna use a bio-suit to infiltrate.’
Heart thumping, Mac listened for any out-of-place sounds as the crickets started up and the birds died down. Bats flapped and monkeys chattered as the last line of orange-red glow evaporated on the horizon. And then night came like a black velvet cloak had been thrown over the day.
Checking their handguns and controlling their breathing, they concentrated on saving their energy for the real work. Johnno was supposed to be a good operator, but Mac always got nervous when someone was going into enemy territory.
‘Stand by, Albion,’ came Robbo over the headset.
‘Standing by, Blue Leader.’
Looking at each other, Mac and Didge got the okay forty seconds later.
‘Green for go, Albion. Repeat – green for go.’
‘Roger that Blue Leader. Albion out.’
Tapping Didge on the shoulder, Mac held out one of the biohazard masks. When they both had the helmets in place, he handed Didge a pair of gloves.
Looking over, Didge peered down the open shaft and then brought a flashlight up and into the shaft, turning it on and cupping a gloved hand over the lens to stop it shining too brightly below.
The light reflected on a circular shaft that dropped for fifteen metres, ending in a sealed fan unit which blocked the shaft.
‘Shit,’ hissed Mac, his voice bouncing within the confines of the biohazard mask.
‘You okay, Albion?’ asked Robbo over the headset.
‘Affirmative, Blue Leader,’ said Mac, watching as Didge looped his rope, strained at the knot and then put a slip-knot at the base of a tree next to the vent. ‘Fan unit blocking entry. It’s sealed, but working on it. Out.’
Didge picked up a new set of wrenches and screwdrivers from his B amp;E kit, clambered over the edge of the vent shaft and rappelled into it, disappearing quickly.
From above, Mac shone the flashlight at the sides of the shiny steel, letting the light bounce around long enough for Didge to release the screws. Standing on the far corners of the fan unit, Didge undid his rappel harness and attached it to the metre-wide fan.
Climbing out of the shaft, Didge jumped down, then turned and tried to pull the fan out with the rope. Mac joined him, the two of them straining until a groaning sound came from the shaft, followed by the fan unit coming loose as Mac and Didge fell back on the grass.
Shining the flashlight down the shaft again, Mac saw that it ended in a right-angle intersection with a box- section air shaft that ran parallel to the ground. Pulling a small cloth bag from his breast pocket, Didge put his
