TWENTY FOUR
Cavendish followed McCain out of Base Headquarters and clambered into the military officer’s Chevrolet. The dawn sky was now well lit by the rising sun, painting its glorious colours across the entire horizon. McCain gunned the Chevrolet into life and drove the relatively short distance to the MQ Reaper Flight.
The pilotless drone was remotely controlled from a very nondescript looking trailer. It stood on its jacks, its wheels clear of the ground. It had no windows so presented a very unprepossessing sight. Its silhouette against the backdrop of the dawn sky simply showed it up as nothing more than a rectangular box on wheels. It was an absurd notion that such an inanimate object could wreak devastation on its unsuspecting victims.
There was also an air conditioning rig, its huge tubes connected to the control trailer. At the end of the trailer was a short flight of steps. There was another trailer close by, coupled to a generator which hummed quietly beside it.
McCain brought the Chevrolet to a halt in a small parking lot, alongside other military vehicles and jumped out. Cavendish followed him as he bounded up the steps and pulled open the door. McCain waited until Cavendish was inside before pulling the door closed behind him.
The lighting inside the control room was subdued. A narrow strip of floor ran down towards the far end forming a narrow passage, and on each side of that were rack upon rack of electronic control equipment.
The far end opened up into a tee shape, the bar of which was the Reaper drone control desk. At a little below head height were two screens, each one showing a different topography of the ground over which the Reaper was flying.
Two men were sitting at the controls. Cavendish knew that the officer on the left was flying the Reaper. The officer on the right was the sensor control officer, responsible for target detection and target lock.
There was another man at the end, sitting on a kind of jump seat. It wasn’t until Cavendish got closer that he recognised the CIA man, Randy Hudson.
Marcus asked the others if they were OK; they both said they were, but Susan insisted that she took care of Marcus’s injuries. Marcus wasn’t aware that he had any, but Susan led him away to the room that served as a kitchen and told him to wait there. She then picked up a bowl and went outside in search of water.
David was shaking like a leaf, but he had a terrific smile on his face. The trembling was simply a reaction to the death of Janov, and the fact that he had been responsible for it. The shaking didn’t bother him, but he wasn’t keen on the idea that he had killed somebody although he did realise it had been a case of kill or be killed.
He went along to the room where Abdul had been tied up. He sat on the end of the bed opposite, the one he had slept in, and laid the AK47 down beside him.
‘This is where it ends,’ he told Abdul, speaking in Farsi. ‘I expect we will be taking you with us, but what happens then, I have no idea.’
Abdul couldn’t reply because he was still gagged. David realised this and leaned across the space between the two beds and pulled the gag from Abdul’s mouth.
‘What happened out there?’ Abdul asked, lifting his chin towards the door.
David told him.
‘So you killed Janov?’ Abdul said to him. He leaned back against the wall. ‘It is for the better,’ he mumbled. Then he pushed himself up away from the wall. ‘When will we be leaving?’
David made a gesture, lifting his shoulders. ‘I don’t know. But I think we’ll probably leave within the next twenty minutes or so.’ He pointed towards the other end of the house. ‘Susan is fixing Marcus’s wounds. When they’ve finished, we’ll go.’
Hudson turned when he heard the sound of footsteps. As soon as he saw Cavendish, he stiffened. Cavendish walked up to him and stopped.
‘Good morning Hudson. Why am I not surprised to see you here?’
Hudson regarded Cavendish in the half-light with a contemptuous stare. ‘I’m here on business, Cavendish. What are you doing here?’
Cavendish sniffed. ‘I hope I’m here to stop you and your dirty little games,’ he told him.
Hudson bridled at the remark. ‘You’re not on your own ground, Cavendish, so have a care what you say.’
‘Why?’ Cavendish replied. ‘Will I get the same as last night?’
Hudson shook his head. ‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.’
‘Of course you haven’t, but why are you not surprised to see me here I wonder?’
Just then the sensor operator called out two co- ordinates. Chuck Berry, who was sitting in the pilot’s seat responded by repeating the co-ordinates and operated the controls to bring the Reaper on to a different heading.
Cavendish glanced over Berry’s head and saw the map displayed on the screen. Berry looked up at him.
‘What can we do for you gents?’ he asked.
McCain told him why they were there. ‘So perhaps you could arrange to speak with Sir Giles Cavendish later today?’
‘You’re off track, sir,’ the co-ordinator told Berry.
The lieutenant turned his attention back to the screen. ‘Back on track. Select missile.’
The co-ordinator responded. ‘AGM-114L, number one rail selected, port side.’
McCain turned to Cavendish and whispered out of the side of his mouth, holding his hand there to observe a kind of respectful silence.
‘Hellfire Missile,’ he whispered. ‘Fire and forget. Great to watch.’
‘Time over target?’ the sensor operator called out.
Berry checked the figures on his screen and then glanced down at a knee pad he had resting on the top of the control panel.
‘Time over target is ten minutes.’
Susan finished washing the blood off Marcus’s upper body and around his head and ears. She wanted him to let her examine him elsewhere, but he wouldn’t hear of it.
‘I’m ok,’ he told her. ‘I can stand, I can walk and if I have to, I can run.’ He got up from the wooden chair as he said it and put both hands on Susan’s shoulders, holding her gently. ‘When we get back to London, you can examine me wherever and whenever you like.’ He leaned forward and kissed her.
Susan pulled away and playfully slapped him. ‘There’s nothing wrong with you, Marcus,’ she laughed. ‘Now, how about sorting ourselves out and getting out of here?’
Cavendish knew, for no obvious reason other than a gut feeling, which target the Reaper would be firing a missile at. He also knew that if he tried to prevent it, he would be restrained not only by McCain, but by Hudson as well. He could think of no way of preventing Berry launching a Hellfire Missile at the farmhouse where Susan and Marcus had gone to meet with Abdul Khaliq and Susan’s brother. If they were there when the missile struck, they would all die.
He had less than ten minutes to come up with an answer.
David stuffed the gag back in Abdul’s mouth and walked out of the room and down to the kitchen.
‘I’m starving,’ he complained as he walked in on Susan and Marcus. ‘How about some breakfast before we go?’
Marcus disagreed. ‘I don’t think it’s wise; if any of the locals round here heard the shooting, they could send the local Taliban out here.’
David nodded thoughtfully. ‘You’re probably right. What about Abdul?’
Marcus and Susan exchanged glances. ‘He comes with us,’ Marcus answered for the two of them.
Susan was feeling so much happier now. That feeling of anticipation, nervousness, expectancy; call it whatever you will, had left her. She felt so much more secure, and that was probably because she had seen Marcus demonstrate an uncanny ability to look at a situation and unpick it so expertly. And with David showing consummate professionalism in the way he handled the situation, she saw no reason to worry about anything. Soon
