“Right.” Tauber nodded. He swallowed. “Our understanding is limited.”
“Theoretical,” Parviz added helpfully. “Yes,” Tauber said and turned his gaze back to the TV where a car chase down a dusty LA street was grinding on.
“You are thinking of your sister,” Parviz said and opened the refrigerator. “Of what we found.”
“It’s her,” Tauber said. “She died before she was born. She got that molar crown from our family dentist. There’s no changing that.”
“You cannot know that,” Parviz said and set two bottles of hard lemonade on the table.
“It’s done. It can’t change, Parviz.”
“That is such empirical bullshit, it is. Everything we have done is change. All change. We send your sister and the others back where they should never have been. Just stepping through the field made changes. Sending these men back with their guns changed even more. Tomorrow we send men back again, and even more changes will be made.”
“That was a bullet hole in her skull,” Tauber said and shook his head as Parviz popped a bottle and held it to him. “It came from one of the men I sent back.”
“So, will you not send them tomorrow?” Parviz took a sip from his bottle and licked his lips.
“I have to,” Tauber said. “Or maybe I can’t. I don’t know. I don’t know if anything I do will help or hurt Caroline or if it’s too late for anything and all of this was decided all those years ago.”
“If done is done then you can’t hurt her anymore,” Parviz said. “And this way you will know what happened. In any case, it is written. We see the changes we made as new and very surprising. But God knows all and has put in place these events long before we became a part of them.”
“You’re going to the Quran on me?” Tauber said. “The same book that condemns you and Quebat to death for being who you are?”
“The word of the Prophet is up to the believer,” Parviz said. “I take what I want from the early verses. It is just like any other faith. I cannot walk away because some men choose different passages to guide them.”
Tauber took the bottle and tipped it back, half emptying the frosted bottle in three gulps.
“And you will know, in any case, it is the end of the bastards who brought you this pain,” Parviz said.
“Do you mean the aborigines or Roenbach’s men?” Tauber said.
“Does it matter?”
Tauber drained the bottle.
“That’s fucked up. ”Hammond spat on the floor in front of the Tauber Tube. They were powering it up in prep for the trip tomorrow. The coils were already frosting over.
“It’s all true,” Chaz said. “Fucked up,” Hammond said.
“Have I ever lied to you?” Chaz said. “Bangkok,” Hammond said without turning.
“I told you then I didn’t know that hooker was a dude.”
“Only thing that makes me believe you is that cash you’re handing around. That I believe in.”
“Dr. Tauber explained—”
“Dr. Tauber does not inspire confidence,” Hammond cut him off. “And those two Hadji fruitloops don’t help his case. But you’re no bullshitter, and I already got plans for my pay.”
“There’s another upside,” Chaz said. “We can go do a full recon on the ground. The terrain is the same, except for differences I can point out. But the elevations and approaches to the skinny village are basically just like what we experienced.”
“Let’s go take a look,” Hammond said.
On foot, they followed new 4x4 tracks all the way down off the mesa. It had to be the doc’s Land Rover that made them and they couldn’t be more than a week old. They were able to follow the tracks right to the opening of the cave, where tires marks crisscrossed around piles of freshly excavated earth.
While Hammond surveyed the ground they’d be fighting over, Chaz crouched to enter the cave. The floor level had been scraped lower by ten feet or more. It went back a good fifty feet and ended where some bones had been dug up in a far corner. He couldn’t see much in the gloom. The desert sunlight didn’t penetrate far.
He could pick out ribs and some long bones, and the sight made him shake off a chill. This was someone’s grave. Was this the history of the firefight they’d be walking into tomorrow? Was he looking at all that remained of his own future buried all this time ago in a cave, untouched for thousands of years?
Chaz backed out of the cave. Shit like that could test your head. Or break it. He rejoined Hammond who was walking back to the cave from what was the receding shoreline of the ancient lake. He told himself not to mention the bones to Lee.
“So, we’re good?”
“Yeah, we’re good,” Hammond said. “But I only have one question for the doc.”
“We’ll go ask him right now,” Chaz said. “What’s the question?”
“Can we make two trips through this thing at one go?”
“Two trips?” asked Tauber.
Chaz and Hammond stood before the coil in full gear the following morning. Dark forest camo BDUs, ballcaps, tactical gloves, body armor, ammo packs, rifle, frags, HE grenades, sidearms, and combat knives. Hammond had a Benelli combat shotgun strapped to his pack with Velcro strips and an ammo belt with its loops packed with fat buckshot and flechette rounds. The Tube was near maximum. It was giving off vapor. Clumps of frost dripped from it to make a puddle on the floor.
“We got that big ass fifty-cal to hump through,” Hammond gestured to the massive heavy machine gun resting on a tripod next to piles of steel ammo boxes and equipment totes. “And all the extra ammo and gear.”
“I suppose there’s no reason,” Tauber eyed the pile of ordnance with misgiving. “But the physical effects of multiple transfers might be unpleasant.”
“Yeah.” Chaz nodded. “The first trip through kicks your ass.”
“Can’t be helped. We need the Ma Deuce.”
“May I ask why?” Tauber said.
“That’s our back door,” Hammond gestured to the Tube. “We need to cover it as we fall back.”
“You’ll
