Carnifex (91 page)

"Put the barbarian on," the High Admiral snarled.

The President wasn't smiling when his image appeared on
Spirit
's bridges main viewscreen. His words were icy.

"We've had enough of you," he began, most undiplomatically. "For twenty-five years we have been working, in secret, and well. We are ready now. I've ordered the destruction of one of your robotic couriers to demonstrate that you are
vulnerable
. I've also ordered my strategic nuclear forces to prepare to engage your fleet, and to scour your base on the island of Atlantis free of life if there is the slightest retaliation for the destruction of that courier."

"Try and nuke our cities again, you miserable son of a bitch."

The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.

—Ecclesiastes 1:9

Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

—Galatians, 6:7

Whatever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave whither thou goest.

—Ecclesiastes 9:10

Though the sun was long set, still heat emanated in choking, stultifying waves from the tarmac of the airfield. Under a double-roofed hangar a Nabakov-21 transport waited for its load. With the Nabakov likewise waited a profusely sweating Omar Fernandez, along with a section of utterly reliable guards and a score of dripping men of the
Tercio
Jan Sobieski, seconded to Fernandez's department, who would be accompanying him on the upcoming flight.

Fernandez had reason to sweat, and it wasn't just the heat.
What Patricio told me to do? My God, does he understand the risks? This is the genie in the bottle. That . . . or perhaps he is right and it is that cap that seals the genie into its bottle. Even so . . . 

A three-ton tactical truck stopped behind the hangar and began disgorging troops who raced to surround the half of the hangar nearest the airfield. Two more trucks, hauling forty foot conexes, pulled up to the hangar on the side away from the airfield, the side toward which the Nabakov's loading ramp faced. The trucks' air brakes squealed loudly as they shuddered to a stop. A fourth truck stopped, this one, like the first, carrying security men. Those men took up positions around the far side of the hangar from the airfield, completing the circle. Inside that perimeter, the first of the heavier trucks began to back up to the Nabakov's ramp to transfer its cargo.

Fernandez watched the transfer closely.
I hope dearly that Patricio is right and we can keep this part of the secret
secret
.
Obras Zorilleras
worked hard on these. And we will need them still to be a surprise if . . . no, not "if,"
when
it comes to open war with Taurus.

Open war? I'm preparing for that well enough. Whoever is in charge—we can only hope it's that frog bastard, Janier—when the war starts he will be very surprised at the loyalty of some of the people working for him. That's for the future, though, and a lot may change. Be nice if we could ensure Muñoz-Infantes were in command on that day. We could just relax; war over and won. He won't be though. It'll be a Frog, Janier or some other one. I mean, it
has
to be a Frog or the mistress' quarters in Building 95 on Fort Muddville will be totally wasted.

Fernandez smiled at his own silent jest. It would never have done for him to make an open joke. And it was hard enough for him to smile at all. He pulled out his wallet and flipped it open to a small picture, that of his young daughter, murdered by Salafi terrorists years prior.

Baby
, he thought to his daughter's image.
Baby, by now you know everything your father has done and does. Do you still look up to me, even as you gaze down upon me? I can hope so. What I do, I do for
la Patria.
And I rarely take any joy in it.

The crew chief of the Nabakov found Fernandez deep in his reveries. "Legate," the chief said, "we're ready to board you now. The crews for the cargo are already loaded."

Carrera, Hamilcar standing beside, met Fernandez at the airport. "You have them?" Carrera asked. "They really work?"

"Tested against the best radar we could find to test them against, Patricio. They work. Mitchell and Soult came along, too. The package?" Fernandez asked.

"It flew in with me, along with my son. I didn't have all of the things in hand when I sent you the other shipment. One we took later. We'll marry up the package and the drone, here, then do the launches."

"I have a man watching the compound," Fernandez said. "He's a Sumeri, one of those who've been herding the targets for us. He's a good man, a tremendous asset. I'd like to pull him out before it's too late. I don't have to be explicit; I can tell him we think someone's on to him and to be prepared to flee at a moment's notice. Then we give the notice, maybe two hours before H Hour."

Loyalty to one's subordinates is . . . proper
, Carrera thought. "You can pull him out but not more than one hour before time."

Fernandez shrugged. He'd split the difference.
Whatever it takes to keep Khalid in play.

He'll split the difference
, Carrera thought.
Fernandez is nothing if not loyal.

"We're really not going to be able to keep this secret, you know?" Fernandez said. "Too many people are too much in the know about too many parts. At
best
we might have plausible deniability."

"At some point in time," Carrera pointed out, "we're going to
want
the word to

get out. For now, only your people know.
Obras Zorilleras
only knows they had to give up two models of Condor. The aircrew that brought the Condors here only know they brought conexes. The crew that brought myself and the package knew they're carrying something odd, but no more than that. And they're used to me traveling with some baggage, at least sometimes. The crew of the
Qamra
that will take me out to the
von Mises
won't know anything. And if I can't trust
your
people to keep quiet then we're fucked anyway."

"You're really sure about this, Patricio? This is . . . " Fernandez struggled for words and found none.

"Horrible?" Carrera supplied. "Monstrous? Inhuman? It's all those things, Omar. Are you worried for my soul? Despite reassurances otherwise, I'm rather certain that that's forfeit anyway. And I can think of no other way to end this. We have to raise the stakes to a level the other side can't handle.

"And besides, Omar," Carrera continued, "our mercenary days are almost ended. We have another war to fight and for that we must have all the force at our disposal in Balboa. This war must end,
now.
"

Hamilcar had hardly said a word in weeks. It wasn't so much that he was in shock over what the Pashtian witch-girl had told him, though there was some of that. Nor even had he been too shocked when over a hundred of the Pashtun, apparently from the witch-girl Alena's tribe, had lined up along the road leading to Camp San Lorenzo's airfield to go on their faces as his father's staff car passed to bring them to their plane. He'd known it was Alena's tribe because she had been there, too, standing in front of them to lead them in their devotions.

His father had had the car stop and beckoned Alena and someone Ham thought was probably her brother over.

He'd spoken to them very briefly. "Upon our return, and until you are or he is dead, you are all hired to be bodyguards to my son. Is this acceptable?"

The tears of gratitude and religious devotion had been answer enough.

The problem was,
I don't
feel
like a god. I don't believe I
am
a god. I don't
want
to be a god. I'm just a little boy.

"Remember; easy now, boys," said the warrant officer in charge of the detachment. "Take her out gently."

The conex had room, more than enough room, for the Condor frame, motor, propeller, control station, a load of fuel, three sets of wings, lifting-launch system, or LLS, all the other parts required, and a tool kit for assembly. Unpacking and assembly presented no problem to the crews; they were the same ones that had disassembled and packed them back on the Isla Real.

The conex doors were unlocked and opened. Inside was the body, mounted on a wheeled framework. These, the crews pulled out onto the concrete floor of a stifling hangar, then proceeded to remove the fastening straps that had held the body and wings securely during shipment. There were also a dozen cots inside, secured around the control station at the far end. .

While one part of each crew went to work checking the engine, another lifted and then rotated the wings into position. These were secured in place with carbon fiber pins. A third team for each moved the lifting-launch system from the conex and trudged it out of the hangar where they checked tank pressure and began laying out the two balloons that would provide initial lift. Likewise, they unfurled the lifting and restraining lines that would, in the first case, attach to a jettisonable ring atop the Condor and, in the second case, hold the balloons to the heavy steel frameworks on which the birds rested. Still a fourth pair of teams moved out the cots and prepared the control stations inside the conexes.

The sun was up, and the air above the tarmac of the airstrip shimmering, by the time the Condors were ready to be wheeled out and hooked to the LLS. They were left under cover for the nonce, however.

The warrant officer in charge inspected both Condors from nose to tail, along with the ancillary gear. Eventually satisfied with his inspection, he sent the men to sleep in one corner of the hangar, then stood guard himself. There would be several nights of rehearsals before the night of launch.

In a cloth-hung room, cloth-hung the better to simulate the tents of the Bedouin ancestors, a tray of
kibsa
, lamb over rice with a yogurt based sauce, sat barely touched on the floor between the three brothers. Each man wore traditional robes, their heads covered with
keffiyahs
held in place by beaded cords. The
keffiyahs
were traditional white. The robes, however, varied, Bakr in white, Abdullah in blue, and Yeslam in red.

"This is like being in prison," said Yeslam ibn Mohamed ibn Salah, min Sa'ana, "like prison with a sentence of death on our heads!"

Bakr sighed. They'd all heard about the sentences of death, and the manner of death, of Mustafa and his followers. While the mercenaries had not advertised it, word had leaked out from the Pashtian Scouts that had actually carried out the crucifixions and bore the blame, or took the credit, for them. Khadijah, inconsolable, had taken to her rooms, shrieking and weeping at the indignity presumably inflicted on her beloved stepson Mustafa. The truth was much worse than she suspected.

"I am thinking," Bakr said, "that we'd all have been better off if someone had strangled Mustafa in the cradle. Yes, I believed we should support him, early on, but who could have suspected the kind of terror he would bring upon us."

"
I
suspected it," answered Abdullah. "You have not lived among those people. I have. There is a touch of vindictive madness about them. They keep it hidden, most of the time. But it was always there."

Yeslam shook his head. "Cursed be the day we sent Mustafa off on his grand adventure. Cursed be the money we gave him to start his project."

"
I
gave him no money," Abdullah insisted. "That was all the doing of you and Bakr.
I
counseled against it."

Both Bakr and Yeslam shrugged, eloquently.
Spilled milk.

"Then counsel us
now
, brother mine. What do we do
now
?" Bakr asked. "How do we keep our clan's life blood from spilling
now
?"

"I would suggest a bribe," Abdullah answered, "except that we do not have enough money—no, not if we turned over everything we own—to buy our way out of this. Our enemy is implacable, inconsolable, and inhuman. He will keep us locked up here—nor would we be safe anywhere else in the world—until the judgment day."

"You mean, he's just like us," Yeslam said. He closed his eyes, hung his head, and said in despair, "Allah help us."

The recon bird would go first. This was both to test Yithrabi air defense and warning radars, as well as to ensure that the secret was
still
secret, that nothing had tipped off the target and caused a mass evacuation. The other Condor, the drone, would follow in the trail cleared by the first.

For speed's sake, both crews got together to wheel out the first Condor. Just past the edge of the hangar they stopped and hooked up all five straps plus two electric wires. Four of the five straps that came from the balloon were attached to the steel frame. The fifth went to the jettisonable lifting ring atop the bird. The wires were hooked, one into a heavy duty control that would cause the balloon to cut itself away from the four restraining straps, on command, the other to the top of the
Condor
next to the ring.

These tasks completed, the crew began to fill the balloon with hydrogen. This was much cheaper than helium and, because the balloon was a throwaway that had only one mission, was not noticeably unsafe nor tactically unsound.

Gradually, the balloon filled until it had
just
positive buoyancy. At that point the crew stopped the filling and let it gently float to just above the Condor. They then resumed filling, until the restraining straps were taut.

The warrant officer in charge, holding the control box, looked over at Carrera and Fernandez. The latter nodded and the warrant pushed a green button. Instantly, all four restraining straps, plus the cable, were cut loose, falling to the ground around the Condor. At the same time, the balloon lurched upward, dragging the Condor with it, forcing its wings to bend slightly under the force of the acceleration and the resistance of the air.