Veteran (25 page)

‘You look a lot better than you did a couple of days ago,’ Pagan said.

No shit, I thought.

‘You okay?’ Morag asked. I held her gaze just a little too long and then nodded. She smiled.

‘What’s going on?’ I asked. ‘And can someone get me a gun so we can kill this guy?’ I said, nodding towards Rannu.

‘That won’t be necessary,’ Pagan said.

‘He’s with us,’ Morag said. I let this sink in.

‘Says who?’ I asked.

‘We’ve discussed it,’ Pagan said. I couldn’t believe it.

‘That’s great. You trust him? Do you know what he is?’

‘You mean the tattoo?’ Pagan asked. I nodded.

‘I was never a Thug,’ Rannu said from the other bed. I turned to look at him. There was edge in his voice. He’d said Thug with distaste.

‘No? What, you just like the look and the monofilament garrotte?’ I asked.

‘After I left the Regiment I joined the police—’

‘You’re not really filling me with confidence here,’ I said.

‘Jakob!’ Morag said. I turned to her.

‘What?’ I said both angry and surprised.

‘Just listen to him.’

Rannu was waiting patiently for the interruption to be over. ‘They wanted someone with a covert ops background to try and infiltrate the Thugs; I was chosen. High pay, one-off job. I was under for a year getting known in Leicester before they finally let me in.’

‘You must’ve done some bad things,’ I said, perhaps a little pettily. I caught the flinch before his impassive mask returned.

‘Anyway, I made my way up the organisation, getting enough to tear them apart. Getting enough to go after Berham. We were just about ready to go when Rolleston approached me.’

‘About us?’ I asked. Rannu shook his head.

‘About some domestic wetwork. I said I couldn’t. He insisted. I explained the situation. He told me his work was more important. I said no again and he burnt me,’ Rannu said. He said it matter of factly but I could see the emotion beneath the surface. This guy hated Rolleston as much as I did. Or he was a good actor. I let out a low whistle. To burn someone’s cover while they were deep was just about
the
cardinal sin in covert ops.

‘How’d it go down?’ I asked.

‘How’d you think? Badly. Lot of dead people. I only just made it out. Two months in hospital being rebuilt and another month in recovery after that.’ I knew that to do that amount of damage they must’ve tortured him.

‘So when Rolleston came to speak to you again you went to work for him?’ I asked. I heard Mudge’s sharp intake of breath. I watched Rannu as he struggled with his composure.

‘You know the score,’ he said. ‘We don’t have much choice.’

‘But now you’re all turned round?’ I asked.

‘Now I appear to have an option,’ he said, looking at Morag. I felt a surge of anger, maybe something else.

‘Good story, but by your own admission you’re an experienced undercover operator. How do we know you’re not just trying to infiltrate us?’ I asked.

‘For what purpose?’ I could see him beginning to get irritated now. ‘I won. Balor will hand you over to me now if I ask him. I already know your plan. I have everything I need to complete my job, so what do I have to gain? I believe the girl can set us free.’ That was weird. Morag was looking down and blushing. I wondered what was going on.

Still red-cheeked, Morag looked up at me and took my hand, the left one, the one that was still flesh.

‘I think he’s on the level,’ she said earnestly.

‘Hooker’s intuition?’ I said before I could stop myself, but she just smiled.

‘Something like that.’

Mudge looked down at my hand in hers and raised an eyebrow. She blushed again and let go. I glanced over at Rannu but he showed no reaction.

‘We could be forgiven for thinking that you’re just pissed off he so thoroughly kicked your arse,’ Mudge said, smiling.

‘It wasn’t that thorough,’ I muttered before turning to Rannu. ‘So you kick my arse and now you’ve turned over a new leaf and want to work with us.’ He shook his head. I noticed Pagan and Morag looking distinctly uncomfortable. ‘What?’ I asked.

‘I decided while listening to Morag at Balor’s table,’ Rannu said. I just stared at him, trying to master the ability to talk again.

‘Before the fight!’ I shouted. Rannu nodded. I spent another couple of seconds speechless. ‘Then why the fuck was there a fight?’ I demanded.

‘Two reasons,’ Rannu said calmly. ‘The first was I don’t like not completing missions, so I needed to know I was capable of it, which I was.’

‘Hey, you’re in hospital too, pal.’

‘Yeah, but not because you pulled off his arm and beat him half to death,’ Mudge said, grinning. I glared at him. ‘Sorry.’

‘And the other?’ I asked.

‘To save Balor’s face,’ Pagan said. I didn’t get it. ‘If Rannu had joined us straight away then we would’ve been the only party responsible for bringing trouble down on New York and he would need to make an example out of us. With Rannu still apparently representing Rolleston, he could pit the two sides against each other and to his people he would still seem to be in control.’

‘I got made an example of!?’ I protested.

‘But we were in control of that,’ Pagan said. ‘Well, we were supposed to be,’ he said, glaring at Rannu.

Rannu shrugged. ‘I was upset when I lost my ancestral kukri.’

‘And you don’t think tearing my arm off and trying to beat me to death with it was an overreaction to a lost knife?’ I screamed at him.

Rannu considered this. ‘Not in context. I’m still upset about it.’

‘Looked good on the viz,’ Mudge said. The thing was, even if Rannu was on the level, and I was beginning to think he was, you just couldn’t walk away from the kind of violence that Rannu and I had done to each other. You can’t just shake hands and let bygones be bygones. Every time I looked at him my shoulder ached. I mulled this over. I didn’t like the way the others were looking at me, as if they were waiting for my approval. I decided to change the subject.

‘What were you saying to Balor about secrets?’ I asked Morag. She smiled slyly.

‘Something I found sifting through the data Ambassador stole when he got free. Balor cut a deal with the CIA to get left in peace in New York. He does a bit of work for them here and there, let’s them use New York when they need to. None of his people know and he wants to keep it that way.’ I could see why. His reputation was that of a free agent able to defy governments. I’d even heard him described as a one-man nation state.

‘And how’s God coming along?’ I asked. Pagan said nothing and just looked at Mudge.

‘Never fucking ends,’ Mudge said. I guessed he was referring to always being kept out of military briefings.

‘Oh, come on,’ I said. ‘If the Leicester Strangler over there is in and you’ve told Balor and probably half of New York, I don’t see why my mate should be excluded. I’ll vouch for him: he’s solid.’

‘He’s a journalist,’ Pagan said.

‘Whereas pirates and someone who you thought was working for Rolleston are trustworthy?’ Mudge asked, taking another swig from his bottle of vodka before offering it to Morag.

‘Different situation,’ Pagan said.

‘I think operational security’s a bit fucked,’ I said, watching with some amusement as Morag took a big swig of vodka.

‘Besides,’ Mudge said, taking the bottle back from a resistant Morag. ‘I know what you’re planning. Sounds fucking stupid to me, but don’t worry, you won’t have seen my byline on much recently.’

‘So now we’ve established that we’re all friends, how’s God coming along? Are we all saved yet? Can I go home and get drunk?’ Which reminded me. ‘Have you got my whisky?’ I asked Morag.

‘I drank it,’ Morag said apologetically.

‘All of it!’ I was coming to the conclusion that I preferred being unconscious. Judging by the way Rannu was glaring at me I might soon get the chance again. I wondered what his problem was now.

‘Balor helped,’ Morag said. ‘It was my birthday.’

‘Fucking Balor!’ I spat incredulously.

She shrugged and looked quite uncomfortable. ‘He’s kind of cute when you get to know him.’

‘Can we discuss boys later?’ Pagan asked. ‘In between Morag’s whisky binges we’ve made some good progress.’

‘You’ve been helping?’ I asked her. She nodded. Pagan looked uncomfortable. ‘How long?’ I asked Pagan.

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I would hope sooner rather than later.’

‘Assume there won’t be a later,’ I suggested. ‘So what do we do?’

‘Balor says you can stay as long as you want,’ Mudge said.

‘Rolleston knows we’re here?’ I asked Rannu. The ex-Ghurkha nodded. ‘So why not just hit us with another orbital?’

‘The political fallout from Dundee was too heavy,’ Rannu answered. ‘He will not get access to another orbital strike.’

‘Besides,’ Mudge continued, ‘if he didn’t kill everyone he’d spend the next twenty years fighting terrorist insurgency from vengeful special forces types, and I think that Balor’s got an ASAT nuke somewhere. Basically it’s more trouble than it’s worth.’

An anti satellite nuke, a ground to orbital weapon, I gave this some thought. ‘Even Balor wouldn’t do that,’ I said.

‘He wants to burn brightly and be famous, of course he would,’ Mudge said. I saw Pagan nodding in agreement.

‘Conventional forces?’ I asked, already knowing the answer. Mudge let out a humourless laugh.

‘Nightmare scenario, heavily defended city with enough supplies and booby traps to fight an indefinite guerrilla war. Balor and his Fomorians could fight it from underwater, as could a lot of the other vets here. Again more trouble than it’s worth.’

‘Rolleston could buy us,’ I suggested.

‘Balor’s given his word,’ Pagan said.

‘Well that’s reassuring,’ I said sarcastically.

Mudge sighed. ‘Look, Balor’s unquestionably fucked in the head but he keeps his word. It’s one of the reasons he commands so much loyalty. You’re under his protection. He’ll die for you if he had to and do it smiling.’

‘Suddenly we have so many friends. So all we have to do is stay here and try not to get assassinated?’ Mudge and Pagan nodded. This was beginning to sound good to me. I could get drunk and wait for the Grey Lady to come in relative comfort. Maybe they even had some sense booths here. We couldn’t stop the Grey Lady; in fact I wondered why she hadn’t already killed us all. Then I remembered why we’d come to New York in the first place.

‘Why are you here?’ I asked Mudge as he lit up another cigarette. Morag stole it from him and I stole it from her before she could take a drag. Mudge lit another one and looked around at the assembled people. I sighed. ‘Have we not already decided that we are all friends?’ I asked.

Mudge shrugged. ‘Sure you want to hear this?’ he asked, the tip of his cigarette glowing as he took another drag.

‘No, but we’ve come a long way and nearly died twice doing so, so we might as well.’

‘I think Gregor’s still alive,’ he said. He took another drag on his cigarette and watched my expression. I suppose I’d known I was going to hear about Gregor but I guess deep down I’d assumed he was dead. Maybe it would’ve been easier that way because I wasn’t obligated to a dead man.

‘Where?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know.’

‘What makes you think he’s alive?’ I asked. The others were quiet.

‘Because Rolleston really wanted someone infected by a Ninja. After your trial I asked around, spoke to a couple of German guys who’d been in the KSK and a Delta operator. They’d both been working with squads taken out by a Ninja. In both cases the Ninja had left one of the members of the squad alive after somehow infecting them.’

‘Just like Gregor,’ I breathed. Mudge nodded.

‘In both cases Rolleston and the Grey Lady show up soon after, looking for the infected guys, but in both cases the infected guy was totally fragged when he was found. Neither Delta or KSK were taking any chances.’ Rolleston had wanted someone infected and that was why he’d dropped us in the mincer.

‘Why were they infecting people and then leaving them to be found? Germ warfare?’ I asked.

‘Most probably,’ Mudge said. ‘But who knows how they think?’ I couldn’t help but glance over at Morag when he said that. She didn’t notice but I felt Pagan looking at me.

‘So Rolleston’s got Gregor somewhere, infected by an alien germ?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know, maybe,’ Mudge said, taking another long pull from the bottle of vodka.

‘But you don’t know where he is?’ I asked.

‘Nope.’ I felt some relief. Even if MacDonald was alive it sounded unlikely that there would be any point in rescuing him; in fact it would make things worse. I was relieved that I was free of the obligation. In my head I could hear myself apologising to my absent friend. ‘But I think I know who does know,’ Mudge finished. I heard Pagan groan. I think he saw what was coming.

‘Who?’ I asked.

‘Everywhere Rolleston and Bran went looking for those infected by the Ninja they were flown—’

‘By two degenerate fuckwits,’ I finished for him, Gibby and Buck, the two cyberbilly Night Stalkers from the 160th SOAR. ‘You think they know where Gregor is?’

‘I think they would have transported him for Rolleston. It was what they were doing when we last saw them.’

‘Let’s just stay here, finish the job at hand and worry about this later,’ Pagan said in what I guessed he hoped was a reasonable-sounding voice. Truth be told it was a reasonable request, very reasonable, and I wholeheartedly agreed with him, but some things just aren’t reasonable.

‘Good idea,’ Mudge said.

‘You know where they are?’ I asked Mudge. He took another mouthful of the vodka. I wondered how drunk he was, how many bottles he’d had today.

‘Knew where they were,’ he said. ‘I was on their trail. Fully ready to beat what I wanted to know out of that pair of cunts when the Grey Lady caught up with me and made it perfectly clear that I should drop the matter.’

‘See, it’s old info. They’ll have moved on by now,’ Pagan pleaded.

‘Where are they?’ I asked. Thinking I’d like to have a violent little chat with them myself.

‘They deserted the 160th—’

‘They probably got killed by Rolleston,’ Pagan interrupted.