Tracer, page 28
The snake glared at this new enemy and hissed again. Korso kept the tongs steady, knowing that if the snake decided to dart at him at the same speed, there’d be no way to move out of the way in time. Korso slowly began to rotate the tongs in a figure of eight formation, hoping to hypnotise the thing like a snake charmer. It seemed to have an effect. The snake watched the jaw grip cautiously as it moved around, its head moving in time with the stick. On the fourth go round, Korso held his breath, and suddenly lunged with the tongs until the grabber encircled the snake’s neck. Without conscious thought, Korso released the trigger and the jaw snapped shut, instantly trapping the creature.
Korso breathed out again. The snake hissed as it writhed and struggled, but to no avail. Korso kept the thing planted on the floor as he grabbed the machete in his right hand. He stepped over the flashlight and moved in closer. But not too close. Just so he was out of the way of the cargo door.
‘Come down here and open this,’ he said.
‘Why don’t you just kill it?’ she said.
‘I’m about as close now as I ever want to be. Open this door so I can throw it out.’
Sighing loudly, Natasha edged forward while Korso kept his attention on the trapped snake. Its agitated writhing was easing off a little, which helped.
The cargo door was three times as wide as the crew door, the thick red door lever currently in the down position. Natasha placed the .22 on the fourth crate, then grabbed hold of the lever and raised it up ninety degrees. She pushed. The door section opened partially. She then grabbed hold of the frame on the right side and slid it all the way to the left.
Outside, four armed men stared back at them.
They were standing in a loose semi-circle about fifteen feet away. Three of them looked to be Guyanese nationals, probably local thugs. Two held pump-action shotguns, while the other gripped a large revolver. The fourth was an unshaven white man of medium height and build, with short dark hair that was greying at the temples. He wore cargo pants and a polo shirt. A bandolier around his waist held what looked like three smoke grenades and three flashbangs. He gripped a semi-automatic in his right hand. He was also smiling.
More specifically, he was smiling at Natasha.
‘Well, look who it is.’
Forty-Eight
58 minutes and counting…
‘Of all the people I expected to see here,’ the man said, ‘you were the very last. How’s tricks, Natasha?’
‘You should know, Jonas.’
Korso smiled inwardly. This Jonas was Cain, of course. He’d placed the voice instantly. And their open familiarity could only mean Natasha had to be the original leak that had started all this. And far more than just a simple leak, at that, each of them double-crossing the other in the process. Korso had suspected as much when she refused to speak with Cain, or Jonas, on the phone back in Amarillo. Those suspicions gained further weight just prior to the supposed rendezvous in Bilchner, when she’d donned that baseball cap, pulling it low over her face. And the reason was clear. Jonas would recognise her face in a heartbeat. Same with her voice. And she couldn’t allow that to happen. Not then.
Jonas turned to Korso and motioned with the gun.
‘And the last time I saw your face was through a telescopic sight. You can drop the machete now.’
Korso opened his right hand. The machete fell to the floor with a loud clang.
‘Good.’ Jonas said, lowering the gun. His eyes were dark orbs under heavy brows, and two deep ridges ran from the edges of his nose to the mouth’s outer corners. ‘You know, I was just departing Bilchner when I heard that C4 go off behind me. I was hoping you two had gone up in smoke along with that drug store, yet here we all are again. Was it a close call, at least?’
‘You wouldn’t believe how close,’ Korso said. ‘I suppose you’ve already killed our driver.’
Jonas shrugged. ‘Never met the fellow. We heard what sounded like a jeep drive off about five minutes ago, so he could have spotted us as we were approaching. If he’s got any sense he’s on his way back to Georgetown. So how did you like my little sentries in the cockpit? They cause you any problems at all?’
‘I’ve faced worse. You’ve got yourself some new friends, I see.’
‘You mean the guys? Just some local talent I brought along.’ Jonas turned to the similar-looking pair to his right, probably brothers. Both had shaved heads and beards, and wore faded t-shirts and jeans. ‘Alvaro there with the Remington, Miguel next to him with the .357.’ He turned to the similarly attired older man on his left. ‘And Hector here.’
‘Hazor,’ the man said in a thick rasp, taking a drag on his cigarette.
‘Hazor. Right.’ Jonas turned back to Korso. ‘I wasn’t sure what I’d have to face up here, so I thought it best to come prepared.’
‘Have they any idea how your associates usually end up, or are you planning on surprising them later?’
Jonas’s eyes narrowed. ‘Be very careful with your next words, Jack, or whatever your name is. They could well be your epitaph. Do we understand each other?’
‘I think so.’
‘Don’t think. Be sure.’ He turned his attention back to Natasha. ‘Now you. If you’ve got a piece, bring it out nice and slow.’
‘I’m unarmed,’ she said, raising her hands and turning full circle. She wore a close-fitting shirt, so it was pretty obvious she wasn’t carrying. ‘We didn’t have time to seek out a source for weapons, not if we wanted to get to this location while it was still light.’
With Jonas’s attention now on Natasha, Korso quickly took stock of the situation. It was bleak, but not entirely hopeless. Before Natasha had slid the door open, Korso had moved to the left to allow space for her, which meant his left side was now partly in shadow. The four men were still too far way to notice the snake on the floor behind him, or his hand holding the tongs keeping it there. Natasha placing Yannick’s .22 back on the fourth crate, just out of view of the visitors, was another bonus.
So one peashooter with three rounds against four armed men. It wasn’t much, but if Natasha could just keep the guy talking for a little longer…
‘Interesting,’ Jonas was saying, ‘that you thought reaching this place today was more important than gearing up properly.’
‘It was a matter of prioritising one need over the other,’ she said. ‘It seems we chose poorly. Speaking of which, just how did you get here, Jonas?’
‘I rented a helicopter. Didn’t I tell you I have a pilot’s licence?’
‘It must have slipped your mind.’
‘Just like it slipped yours in mentioning the identity of your employer when you recruited me into this little scheme of yours. Or that it was his personal property we’d be liberating. Those were two fairly huge omissions, weren’t they? You manipulative little bitch.’
Natasha risked a glance at Korso, who looked back at her without expression. He’d always believed her own agenda was quite different to what she claimed. Jonas was merely verifying it.
‘And if I had mentioned it,’ she said, turning back to Jonas, ‘would you have accepted?’
‘Unlikely. I’m not the suicidal type.’
‘Yet you chose to double-cross me instead. That’s just as high-risk.’
Jonas smirked. ‘Do unto others, I say. Only make sure you do it first.’
‘A dangerous mantra to live by. But I’m still curious about a few things, such as how you persuaded Borozan to help you in this scheme of yours.’
‘Borozan? You mean that Russian lunkhead on the plane? I never even tried. Not worth the effort. Once I boarded with that sixth crate, one simple tap on the back of the neck was all it took.’ Jonas made a diving motion with his hand. ‘Into the sea he went. Food for the fishes.’
‘And what of the other pilot, Palma? Was he part of it, too?’
A shrug. ‘Briefly. Let’s leave it at that.’ He turned to Korso. ‘But I’m also intrigued. Because I can’t believe Natasha would have told you about me and her, yet you don’t seem too surprised about any of this.’
‘I’m rarely surprised by human nature,’ Korso said.
‘So if you knew about her involvement, why go along with her?’
‘I didn’t know. I only suspected.’
Natasha was also watching Korso now. ‘Since when?’ she said.
‘Since shortly after we met. When you originally briefed me, you spent over an hour supplying me with every piece of relevant information, no matter how small, without ever referring to notes. And nobody’s memory retention is that good. But it could be explained if you were heavily involved in the planning of the heist, and made a habit of repeatedly going over and over every facet of the job, making sure nothing had been missed or overlooked. The devil’s in the details, after all.’
She frowned. ‘Circumstantial at best.’
‘Sure. But there were other red flags. And they soon began piling up until there was only one possible answer to explain them all.’
‘What red flags?’
‘Now’s probably not the best time to go into all of them, but one big giveaway was your refusal to talk to Jonas during that phone call in Amarillo. Another was when you fitted that baseball cap low on your head in Bilchner, so he wouldn’t be able to recognise your features.’ He shrugged. ‘You showed me the signs. I simply paid attention.’
Jonas grinned at Natasha. ‘Looks like you weren’t quite as smart as you thought, sweetie.’
Natasha made a move to step outside the plane, but Jonas raised the gun again and she stopped. ‘Uh, uh. Stay right where you are. I much prefer seeing the both of you in that enclosed space, where you can cause the minimum of trouble. But what really interests me at this moment is what the hell you two are doing here at all. I know I didn’t give you any clues to this location, and I didn’t leave anyone else alive who knew. So how did you manage to find it?’
‘By thinking like you,’ Korso said. ‘It was a process of elimination. I won’t bore you with the intricacies, but I figured the best way to hide a stolen plane would be amongst other aircraft nobody gives a damn about. And when I found that page on Reddit, showing a boneyard in the jungles of Guyana that hardly anyone knew about, that kind of sealed the deal for me. You must know which web page I’m referring to.’
Jonas gave a sigh. ‘That damned Reddit page. I have to admit, though, everything pretty much fell into place the moment I landed on that site. Practically by accident, if you can believe it. I’m just amazed anyone else found it. Then again, I’m assuming you do this kind of thing for a living, and were brought in especially for this job?’
‘Against my will, but essentially correct.’
Jonas looked at Korso with more interest. ‘Which means you must be fairly successful in your profession.’
Korso shrugged. ‘I get by.’
‘I’d say you do a little more than get by, if your presence here’s any indication. But right now I’m wondering what is so goddamn important about a few measly crates of black-market caviar that Nikolic assigns you two to travel halfway round the world to find and recover them, at no expense spared. And not even the fresh stuff, but pasteurised no less. Now why is that, I wonder?’
‘You asked that same question before,’ Natasha said, ‘back in Amarillo. And we told you why.’
‘And the answer I got was as unsatisfactory then as it is now. I get that a man of Nikolic’s status would want to know what happened to his shipment. But what doesn’t make sense is the two of you going to such lengths to recover a few crates of expensive fish eggs, especially as they can be replaced easily enough with money and the right contacts, both of which Nikolic has in spades. And things that don’t make sense trouble me. Which is why I thought it might be a good idea to make my way down here pronto, and take a closer look at my investment. See what I might have missed the first time round.’
He opened his arms wide. ‘And who do I find when I finally show up out of the blue but you two assholes. Looks like I was right to trust my instincts. Now, Natasha, how about you toss that side pack of yours over to me, nice and slow.’
‘My pack? All it contains is some petty cash and my phone.’
‘Toss me the pack right now.’ Jonas raised his gun again. ‘I won’t ask twice.’
With a shrug she reached down and unlatched the pack’s belt strap. Korso saw one of the brothers whisper something to the other as they leered at her. It didn’t take a genius to figure out the subject under discussion. Natasha lobbed the pack underhanded to Jonas, who caught it with his free hand. Tucking the gun into his waistband, he unzipped the bag and looked inside.
While he was occupied, Natasha turned her attention to Korso again. He’d been waiting for her to re-establish eye contact. He moved his gaze toward the .22 on the crate at her right, then back to her again. She gave him an almost imperceptible nod in return. Good. They were on the same page.
Korso saw Jonas extracting the cash from the pack and passing some to Hazor on his right. Natasha was still watching Korso, who made a slithering motion with his right index finger. She noticed it, and frowned. Korso then lowered his eyes to his left, looking intently at the labaria he had trapped in the shadows. She lost the frown and gave him another barely noticeable nod. So she understood what he was trying to say. After three days in each other’s company, a few eye movements were now all that were needed to get his message across. All they needed now was a secret go signal. It was essential. If they weren’t in absolute synchronicity on this, they were both dead.
‘Now look at this impressive piece of kit,’ Jonas said then, pulling out a smartphone Korso hadn’t seen before. It had a full screen display, and was twice as thick as a normal cell, with a stubby antenna on top. ‘Satellite phones get smaller and smarter every year, don’t they? This one looks expensive. Just a finger tap away from your boss, no matter where you are in the world. Very useful.’ He put the phone back and pulled out the compact Geiger counter. ‘And what do we have here? Forgot to mention this little item, didn’t you?’ With a frown, Jonas dropped the pack and switched the instrument on. He checked the display at the top for a few seconds.
Then he looked up at Natasha, and grinned for the second time that day.
‘So I was right. There is something else in that plane, something far more valuable than a few crates of caviar. My guess is one of those little tins in there is coated with a radioactive marker, and this device is the only way of identifying it. How about it, Natasha? Am I close to the mark?’
‘Right on the money,’ Korso said, before she could answer.
‘Thought so,’ Jonas said, turning his attention to Korso. ‘So what’s in the tin?’
‘That’s a very good question, and one I’ve been asking her for the last few days.’
‘You mean you don’t know?’
‘I’m just a contractor. That information’s above my pay grade.’
‘Okay, I’ll buy that. And what was her response?’
‘She says she doesn’t know either, but I’m not sure I believe her. Not entirely, anyway. But based on what I know about Nikolic’s business interests, along with a few clues I was able to pick up along the way, I finally narrowed it down to three possibilities.’
Jonas’s eyes were boring into his. Same with the other three. People always want to know what’s in the box.
‘Which are?’ Jonas prompted.
‘Three,’ he said, glancing at Natasha, who didn’t nod this time. But her expression made it clear she understood what he was doing. ‘It’s a prototype of a new synthetic designer drug Nikolic’s been secretly developing. A very effective and highly addictive drug. Potentially worth billions.’
In his peripheral vision, Korso saw Natasha adjust her position slightly.
‘Two. Another prototype.’ Korso adjusted his grip on the tongs in his left hand, and felt the snake on the floor writhing around in response. ‘But this one for a chemical agent that attacks the central nervous system, killing the victim immediately before evaporating, leaving no trace behind. Again, conceivably worth a fortune to someone with the right connections.’
Jonas was chewing his cheek, clearly enraptured by the imagined riches just a few feet away from him.
Korso mentally prepared himself for what was coming, knowing that everything came down to the next few seconds. Maybe his last seconds on this earth.
‘One.’
Forty-Nine
50 minutes and counting…
As the four men waited expectantly for his next words, Korso edged to his right as he tensed his left arm, then yanked up the tongs in an underhand throwing motion, pulling the angry snake up with it. In his peripheral vision, he noticed Natasha already reaching for the gun just behind her. The three thugs were still in the same positions, the two brothers to the left of Jonas, the other one to the right, all unsure what was happening in front of them. Jonas was different. He’d been caught off guard but his reactions were a little faster. He was starting to bring his handgun up in Natasha’s direction.
Korso stayed focused on his own situation. He was already swinging his arm down and up in an underhand throw, tensing every muscle. Feeling every ounce of the six or so kilograms of lethal snake at the end of the tongs, he aimed for the two brothers; the biggest targets. He saw the long, curving, writhing body of the labaria as it passed his left leg, and as his arm continued along its upward arc, he pressed the button that unlocked the jaws of the grip. The moment the tongs were pointing horizontally at the brothers fifteen feet away, the snake finally came free and flew toward them at speed, like something out of a horror movie.
He heard a shot to his right and saw Jonas stumble. Down, maybe, but not out. Not from a .22. Another shot immediately followed, and Korso saw the one called Hazor dive or fall to the ground. Directly ahead he saw the snake land right at the brothers’ feet. They both yelled in terror and backed away, but the snake was faster. It darted straight for the legs of Alvaro and struck his naked ankle repeatedly. Dropping the Remington, Alvaro fell to the ground, holding his leg and still screaming as he desperately scrambled away. His brother, Miguel, was yelling something as he pointed his gun at the ground, trying to zero in on the rapidly moving snake as it slithered around in the dirt.
